Rage (26 page)
Authors: Wilbur Smith
I
t was much easier to contact Kitty Godolphin than she had expected it to be. She borrowed Marion's pick-up and drove five miles to the nearest village, and she telephoned from the public booth in the little singleroomed post office. The operator in the Sunnyside Hotel put her through to the room, and a firm young voice with a Louisiana lilt said, âKitty Godolphin. Who is this, please?' r
t was much easier to contact Kitty Godolphin than she had expected it to be. She borrowed Marion's pick-up and drove five miles to the nearest village, and she telephoned from the public booth in the little singleroomed post office. The operator in the Sunnyside Hotel put her through to the room, and a firm young voice with a Louisiana lilt said, âKitty Godolphin. Who is this, please?' r
âI'd rather not give my name, Miss Godolphin. But I
would like to meet you as soon as possible. I have a story for you, an important and dramatic story.'
would like to meet you as soon as possible. I have a story for you, an important and dramatic story.'
âWhen and where do you want to meet?'
âIt will take me two hours to reach your hotel.'
âI'll be waiting for you,' said Kitty Godolphin, and it was as easy as that.
Tara checked with Reception and the girl at the desk phoned through to Miss Godolphin's suite and then told her to go up.
A young girl, slim and pretty, in a tartan shirt and blue jeans opened the door to Tara's ring.
âHello, is Miss Godolphin in? She's expecting me.'
The girl looked her over carefully, taking in her khaki bush skirt and mosquito boots, her tanned arms and face and the scarf tied around her thick auburn hair.
âI'm Kitty Godolphin,' said the girl, and Tara could not hide her surprise.
âOK, don't tell me. You expected an old bag. Come on in and tell me who you are.'
In the lounge Tara removed her sunglasses and faced her.
âMy name is Tara Courtney. I understand you know my husband. Shasa Courtney, Chairman of Courtney Mining and Finance.'
She saw the shift in the other woman's expression, and the sudden hard gleam in those eyes that she had thought were frank and innocent.
âI meet a lot of people in my business, Mrs Courtney.'
Tara had not expected the hostility, and hurriedly she tried to forestall it.
âI'm sure you doâ'
âDid you want to talk to me about your husband, lady? I don't have a lot of time to waste.' Kitty looked pointedly at her wristwatch. It was a man's Rolex and she wore it on the inside of her wrist like a soldier.
âNo, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to give you that impression.
I have come here on behalf of someone else, someone who is unable to come to you himself.'
I have come here on behalf of someone else, someone who is unable to come to you himself.'
âWhy not?' Kitty asked sharply, and Tara readjusted her early estimate of her. Despite her childlike appearance, she was as tough and sharp as any man Tara had ever met.
âBecause he is being watched by the police Special Branch, and because what he is planning is dangerous and illegal.' Tara saw instantly that she had said the right things and had aroused the newswoman's instinct.
âSit down, Mrs Courtney. Do you want some coffee?' She picked up the house phone and ordered from room service, then turned back to Tara.
âNow tell me. Who is this mysterious person?'
âYou probably have never heard of him, but soon the whole world will know his name,' Tara said. âIt's Moses Gama.'
âMoses Gama, hell!' Kitty Godolphin exclaimed. âFor six weeks now I've been trying to catch up with him. I was beginning to think he was just a rumour, and that he didn't really exist. A Scarlet Pimpernel.'
âHe exists,' Tara assured her.
âCan you get me an interview with him?' Kitty demanded, so anxious that she leaned across and grasped Tara's wrist impulsively. âHe's an Emmy score, that one. He is the one person in South Africa I really want to talk to.'
âI can do a whole lot better than that,' Tara promised her.
S
hasa Courtney was determined that his sons would not grow up believing that the affluent white suburbs of Cape Town and Johannesburg were all of Africa. This safari was to show them the old Africa, primeval and eternal, and to establish for them a firm link with their history and their ancestors, to engender in them a sense of
pride in what they were and in those who had gone before them.
hasa Courtney was determined that his sons would not grow up believing that the affluent white suburbs of Cape Town and Johannesburg were all of Africa. This safari was to show them the old Africa, primeval and eternal, and to establish for them a firm link with their history and their ancestors, to engender in them a sense of
pride in what they were and in those who had gone before them.
He had set aside six whole weeks, the full period of the boys' school holidays, for this venture, and that had taken a great deal of planning and considerable heart-searching. The affairs of the company were so many-faceted and complex that he did not like leaving them, even in such capable hands as those of David Abrahams. The shaftsinking at Silver River was going ahead apace, and they were down almost a thousand feet already while work on the plant was also far advanced. Apart from that, the first six pilchard trawlers for the factory at Walvis Bay were due for delivery in three weeks' time, and the canning plant was on the water from the suppliers in the United Kingdom. There was so much happening, so many problems that could demand his immediate decision.
Centaine was, of course, always on hand for David to consult with, but of late she had withdrawn more and more from the running of the company, and there were many eventualities that might arise that could only be dealt with by Shasa personally. Shasa weighed up the chances of this happening against what was necessary, in his view, for his sons' education and understanding of their place in Africa and their inherited duties and responsibilities, and decided he had to risk it. As a last resort he arranged a strict itinerary for the safari, of which both Centaine and David had a copy, so that they would know exactly where he was during every day of his absence, and a radio contact would be maintained with the H'ani Mine so that an aircraft could reach any of his camps in the deep bush within four or five hours.
âIf you do call me out, then the reason had better be iron-clad,' Shasa warned David grimly. âThis is probably the only time in our lives that the boys and I will be able to do this.'
They left from the Hâani Mine the last week in May.
Shasa had taken the boys out of school a few days early, which in itself was enough to put everybody in the right mood and ensure a splendid beginning. He had commandeered four of the mine's trucks and made up a full team of safari boys, including drivers, camp servants, skinners, trackers, gun-bearers and the chef from the H'ani Mine Club. Of course, Shasa's own personal hunting vehicle was always kept in the mine workshops, tuned to perfection and ready to go at any time. It was an ex-Army jeep which had been customized and modified by the mine engineers without regard to expense. It had everything from longrange fuel tanks and gun racks to a short-wave radio set, and the seats were upholstered in genuine zebra skin while the paintwork was an artistic creation in bush camouflage. Proudly the boys clipped their Winchester .22 repeaters into the gun rack beside Shasa's big .375 Holland and Holland magnum, and dressed in their new khaki bush jackets scrambled into their seats in the jeep. As was the right of the eldest, Sean sat up front beside his father, with Michael and Garry in the open back.
Shasa had taken the boys out of school a few days early, which in itself was enough to put everybody in the right mood and ensure a splendid beginning. He had commandeered four of the mine's trucks and made up a full team of safari boys, including drivers, camp servants, skinners, trackers, gun-bearers and the chef from the H'ani Mine Club. Of course, Shasa's own personal hunting vehicle was always kept in the mine workshops, tuned to perfection and ready to go at any time. It was an ex-Army jeep which had been customized and modified by the mine engineers without regard to expense. It had everything from longrange fuel tanks and gun racks to a short-wave radio set, and the seats were upholstered in genuine zebra skin while the paintwork was an artistic creation in bush camouflage. Proudly the boys clipped their Winchester .22 repeaters into the gun rack beside Shasa's big .375 Holland and Holland magnum, and dressed in their new khaki bush jackets scrambled into their seats in the jeep. As was the right of the eldest, Sean sat up front beside his father, with Michael and Garry in the open back.
âAnybody want to change his mind and stay at home?' Shasa asked as he started the jeep, and they took the question seriously, shaking their heads in unison, eyes shining and faces pale with excitement, too overcome to speak.
âHere we go, then,' Shasa said and they drove down the hill from the mine offices with the convoy of four trucks following them.
The uniformed mine guards opened the main gates and gave them a flashy salute, grinning widely as the jeep passed, and behind them the camp boys on the backs of the open trucks started to sing one of the traditional safari songs.
Weep, O you women, tonight you sleep alone
The long road calls us and we must goâ
The long road calls us and we must goâ
Their voices rose and fell to the eternal rhythm of Africa, full of its promise and mystery, echoing its grandeur and its savagery, setting the mood for the magical adventure into which Shasa took his sons.
They drove hard those first two days to get beyond the areas which had been spoiled by men's too frequent intrusions with rifle and four-wheel-drive vehicle, where the veld was almost bare of large game and those animals that they did see were in small herds that were running as soon as they heard the first hum of the jeep engine and were merely tiny specks in their own dust by the time they spotted them.
Sadly Shasa realized how much had changed since his earliest memory of this country. He had been Sean's age then and the herds of springbok and gemsbok had been on every side, great herds, trusting and confiding. There had been giraffe and lion, and small bands of Bushmen, those fascinating little yellow pygmies of the desert. Now, however, wild men and beast had all retreated before the inexorable advance of civilization deeper and deeper into the wilderness. Even now, Shasa could look ahead to the day when there would be no more wilderness, no more retreat for the wild things, when the roads and the railway lines would criss-cross the land and the endless villages and kraals would stand in the desolation they had created. The time when the trees were all cut down for firewood, and the grass was eaten to the roots by the goats and the topsoil turned to dust and blew on the wind. The vision filled him with sadness and a sense of despair, and he had to make a conscious effort to throw it off so as not to spoil the experience for his sons.
âI owe them this glimpse of the past. They must know a little of the Africa that once was, before it has all gone, so that they will understand something of its glory.' And he smiled and told them the stories, reaching back in his memory to bring out for them all his own experiences, and
then going back further, to what he had learned from his own mother, and from his grandfather, trying to make clear to them the extent and depth of their family's involvement with this land, and they sat late around the camp fire that first night, listening avidly until, despite themselves, their eyelids drooped and their heads began to nod.
then going back further, to what he had learned from his own mother, and from his grandfather, trying to make clear to them the extent and depth of their family's involvement with this land, and they sat late around the camp fire that first night, listening avidly until, despite themselves, their eyelids drooped and their heads began to nod.
On they went, driving hard all day over rutted tracks, through desert scrub and grassland and then through mopani forest, not yet stopping to hunt, eating the food they had brought with them from the mine, though that night the servants muttered about fresh meat.
On the third day they left the rudimentary road they had been following since dawn. It was nothing more than a double track of tyres that had last been used months before, but now Shasa let it swing away towards the east and they went on northwards, breaking fresh ground, weaving through the open forest until abruptly they came out on the banks of a river, not one of the great African rivers like the Kavango, but one of its tributaries. Still, it was fifty feet wide, but green and deep, a formidable barrier that would have turned back any hunting safari before them that had come this far north.
Two weeks previously Shasa had reconnoitred this entire area from the air, flying the Mosquito low over the tree tops so that he could count the animals in each herd of game, and judge the size of the ivory tusks that each elephant carried. He had marked this branch of the river on his large-scale map, and had navigated the convoy back to this exact spot. He recognized it by the oxbow bend of the banks and the giant makuyu trees on the opposite side, with a fish-eagle nest in the upper branches.
They camped another two days on the southern river bank while every member of the safari, including the three boys and the fat Herero chef, helped to build the bridge. They cut the mopani poles in the forest, thick as a fat woman's thigh and forty feet long, and dragged them up
with the jeep. Shasa kept guard against crocodiles, standing high on the bank with the .375 magnum under his arm while his naked gangs floated the poles out into the centre of the river and set them into the mud of the bottom. Then they lashed the cross-ties to them with ropes of mopani bark that still wept glutinous sap, red as blood.
with the jeep. Shasa kept guard against crocodiles, standing high on the bank with the .375 magnum under his arm while his naked gangs floated the poles out into the centre of the river and set them into the mud of the bottom. Then they lashed the cross-ties to them with ropes of mopani bark that still wept glutinous sap, red as blood.
When at last the bridge was complete, they unloaded the vehicles to lighten them, and one at a time Shasa drove them out on to the rickety structure. It swayed and creaked and rocked under them, but at last he had the jeep and all four trucks on the far bank.
âNow the safari truly begins,' he told the boys. They had entered a pocket of country, protected by its remoteness and its natural barriers of forest and river from men's over exploitation, and from the air Shasa had seen the herds of buffalo thick as domestic cattle and the clouds of white egrets hovering over them.
That night he told the boys stories about the old elephant hunters â âKaramojo' Bell, and Frederick Selous and Sean Courtney their own ancestor, Shasa's great-uncle and the namesake of his eldest son.
âThey were tough men, all of them, incredible shots and natural athletes. They had to be to survive the hardships and the tropical disease. When he was a young man, Sean Courtney hunted on foot in the tsetse-fly belt of the Zambezi valley where the temperature reaches 115° at noon, and he could run forty miles in a day after the big tuskers. His eye was so sharp he could actually see the flight of his bullet.' The boys listened with total fascination, pleading with him to continue whenever he paused, until at last he told them, âThat's enough. You have to be up early tomorrow. Five o'clock in the morning. We are going to hunt for the first time.'
In the dark they drove slowly along the northern bank of the river in the open jeep, all of them bundled up against the cold for the frost lay thick in the open vleis and
crunched under the jeep's tyres. In the first feeble light of dawn they found where a herd of buffalo had drunk during the night and then gone back into the heavy bush.
crunched under the jeep's tyres. In the first feeble light of dawn they found where a herd of buffalo had drunk during the night and then gone back into the heavy bush.
They left the jeep on the river bank, and stripped off their padded anoraks. Then Shasa put his two Ovambo trackers to the spoor and they followed the herd on foot. As they moved silently and swiftly through the dense second-growth mopani thickets, Shasa explained it all to the boys, speaking in a whisper and relying on hand signals to point out the different hoof prints of old bull and cow and calf, or to draw their attention to other smaller but equally fascinating animals and birds and insects in the forest around them.
A little before noon they finally came up with the herd. Over a hundred of the huge cow-like beasts, with their trumpet-shaped ears and the drooping horns that gave them such a lugubrious air. Most of them were lying in the mopani shade, ruminating quietly, although one or two of the herd bulls were dozing on their feet. The only movement was the lazy flick of their tails as the stinging flies swarmed over their flanks.
Shasa showed the boys how to work in close. Using the breeze and every stick of cover, freezing whenever one of the great homed heads swung in their direction, he took them within thirty feet of the biggest of the bulls. They could smell him, the hot rank bovine reek of him, and they could hear his breathing puffing through his wet drooling muzzle, hear his teeth grinding on his cud, so close they could see the bald patches of age on his shoulders and rump and the balls of dried mud from the wallow that clung in the stiff black hairs of his back and belly.
While they held their breaths in delicious terror and watched in total fascination, Shasa slowly raised the heavy rifle and aimed into the bull's thick neck, just forward of his massive shoulder.
âBang!' he shouted, and the great bull plunged forward
wildly, crashing into the screen of thick mopani, and Shasa gathered his sons and drew them into the shelter of one of the grey tree trunks, keeping his arms around them while on all sides the panicking herd galloped, huge black shapes thundering by, the calves bawling and the old bulls grunting.
wildly, crashing into the screen of thick mopani, and Shasa gathered his sons and drew them into the shelter of one of the grey tree trunks, keeping his arms around them while on all sides the panicking herd galloped, huge black shapes thundering by, the calves bawling and the old bulls grunting.
The sounds of their flight dwindled away into the forest though the dust of their passage hung misty in the air around them, and Shasa was laughing with the joy of it as he let his arms fall from their shoulders.
âWhy did you do that?' Sean demanded furiously, turning his face up to his father. âYou could have shot him easily â why didn't you kill him?'
âWe didn't come out here to kill,' Shasa explained. âWe came here to hunt.'
âButâ' Sean's outrage turned to bewilderment ââ but what's the difference?'
âAh! That's what you have to learn. That bull was a big one, but not big enough, and we have all the meat we need, so I let him go. That's lesson number one. Now, for lesson number two â none of you is going to kill anything until you know all about that animal, understand its habits and life cycle, and learn to respect it and hold it in high esteem. Then and only then.'
In camp that evening he gave them each two books, which he had had bound in leather with their own names on the cover: Roberts'
Mammals of South Africa
and his
Birds of South Africa.
Mammals of South Africa
and his
Birds of South Africa.
âI brought these especially for you, and I want you to study them,' he ordered. Sean looked appalled, he hated books and studying, but both Garry and Mickey hurried to their tent to begin the task.
Over the days that followed he questioned them on every animal and bird they saw. At first the questions were elementary, but he made them progressively more difficult and soon they could quote the biological names and give
him full details of sizes and body weights of males and females, their calls and behaviour patterns, distribution and breeding, down to the smallest detail. Set an example by his younger brothers, even Sean mastered the difficult Latin names.
him full details of sizes and body weights of males and females, their calls and behaviour patterns, distribution and breeding, down to the smallest detail. Set an example by his younger brothers, even Sean mastered the difficult Latin names.
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