The Greystoke Legacy (19 page)

Robbie had suffered enough arguments at home and always sought to avoid them, but Jane's contentious behavior irked him. “I risked my life looking for you! I was searching when no one else would! I got bit, chased, almost shot . . . at least you could have the courtesy of listening to me!”

The jeep hit a ditch and shuddered as the transmission struck rocks. Robbie cursed and hoped the vehicle wasn't damaged. The momentary distraction was enough to hush them both, until Jane spoke up in no more than a whisper.

“You don't believe me.”

“Do you blame me? Some guy out there lives with the animals, talks to them, and looked after you despite attacking us? And then this eco-warrior just dumps you back in the camp, riding an elephant, and disappears into the forest.” He risked removing one hand from the wheel to demonstrate a magic puff of smoke. He decided to take a different tack to get his point across. “You know you have to be careful what you eat out there. A lot of it is poisonous and some of it is hallucinogenic, makes you see wild stuff. Can't you see that it was all just a feverish dream?”

Jane remained silent and refused to look at him. Now Robbie felt guilty. Jane had been through the wringer and didn't deserve his sharp remarks. He glanced at her, the way she pouted, the way her hair partially hid her profile—it all reminded him of Sophie.

“Sorry,” he muttered. He wasn't used to apologizing but Jane had a knack of wrapping him around her finger.

Jane broke her frosty gaze and nodded graciously. He caught her staring at him several times.

“What?” he asked.

“Why are you out here?”

Robbie felt uncomfortable. He had always tried to avoid telling Jane about his life.

“I had a sister, Sophie . . . who died. She was all the family I had left. When that happened I felt I had no reason to carry on. So I ran away.”

Saying “sorry” seemed rather pointless, so Jane remained silent for several minutes. It was the first time Robbie had mentioned his sister and she wanted to know more.

“I've been thinking about why people are here,” said Jane.

“Deep.”

“I mean here in the Congo. Everybody has a story. Clark has always been looking for risky gambles, we're stuck here because we're broke and have too many loan sharks looking for us. And you . . . because your sister died.”

Robbie nodded in agreement. He didn't understand what her question was. He caught her staring at him with a frown.

“What're you thinking?” he said.

Jane shook her head, but something was obviously on her mind. After a few minutes of contemplative thought she spoke up.

“Tell you what. I'll go see the doctor if it keeps you and Dad happy.”

“Thanks.” He shot her a warm smile. She had caved in quicker than he'd anticipated.

“And when you go shopping for supplies, I'm going to find that Internet connection and try and email a few friends.”

“Deal.” Robbie was glad she was finally going along with the plan, but couldn't shake the feeling Jane was not telling him everything.

•••

The town of Sango was a large collection of dwellings and shops clustered on the bank of a meandering tributary that fed the Congo River. Although most locals were farmers, armed rangers used the town as a base to counter poaching activities. The town also had a lucrative black market dealing with valuable animal parts that could be smuggled out via road, river, or air.

The fertile hills around Sango had been cultivated for potato crops, and the town boasted an airfield—or rather a strip of flat dirt and a corrugated-iron shelter that served as the terminal. Power cables and telephone lines followed a lone tarmac road that led to civilization.

As Robbie and Jane entered, they were immediately hit by the smell of progress—overstressed sewers, gasoline fumes from numerous vehicles that were no longer roadworthy, a market square with stalls selling meat and fish that hung in the afternoon sun and were swarmed by flies. Scrawny dogs strayed through the streets, scattering chickens foraging amongst the piles of plastic waste. Somewhere a radio played tinny Congo rumba guitar tunes. Raised voices and laughter filled a bar with young and old people clutching cold beers as they sat on ancient furniture.

They located the Doctors Without Borders post and Jane was seen to immediately. The doctor, an elderly Australian woman, was impressed with the care Jane's wounds had received. She could find nothing wrong, but agreed that there was every possibility Jane had had a fever, and fetched some antibiotics. That satisfied Robbie and he whispered to Jane:

“See, told you this Tarzan was just a bizarre hallucination. You'll be OK.”

Jane didn't reply. She accepted a bottle of antibiotics just in case there was a slight infection. Both she and Robbie were thankful the doctor didn't inquire why they were in the middle of the jungle—the doctor had been in many Third World countries and had learned it was best not to ask.

Robbie took Jane to a building with white paint flaking from its façade. The handwritten sign above claimed it supplied mobile phones and had an Internet connection. The phones were all old recycled ones, and Jane was surprised to see she could get a signal, although her phone refused to connect to the single provider that flashed up.

Robbie paid for her Internet use upfront and set about purchasing supplies. He hated this part of his job, as it involved haggling, and he was never very good at it. Mister David had laughed many a time when Robbie had paid over twenty times the going rate. Now he was spending Archie's money, he had to be careful. He took one final look at Jane and was satisfied to see her engrossed in the computer screen.

•••

Jane impatiently drummed her fingers as the modem dialed the number and went through a long series of squawks and beeps.

Once she was online she did a search for the name Tarzan, ignoring the search engine's unhelpful suggestion:
Do you mean Tanzania?
. . . and drew zero responses.

A search for
jungle ghost
returned almost four million unhelpful hits. Research was going to be tougher than she thought.
Plane Crash Congo
found over four hundred thousand articles, but most of the ones she browsed were all new occurrences. She stared at the screen thoughtfully.

Plane Crash Greystoke.

A much smaller list of options was returned. Jane felt her pulse quicken as she clicked on a link and the headline appeared:
Lord and Lady Greystoke presumed dead.

“Lord?” she said to herself—and the power to the connection took that opportunity to drop. She banged the mouse in frustration as the screen went blank and received a stern look from the young shopkeeper who was seated on the window ledge watching the boats in the port. “Sorry.”

“It'll be up again in no time,” assured the shopkeeper. No time turned into forty minutes. As soon as the computer bleeped back to life, Jane went through the aggravatingly long dial-up process and found the article again. This time she expanded it.

Controversial conservationist Lord John Clayton Greystoke and his wife, Lady Alice Greystoke, were officially declared dead today after an enquiry found they most likely perished in an airplane crash while on a scientific undertaking in the jungles of Zaire.

Jane scrolled through the article and found a photograph of the dashing Lord and Lady. The very same faces she had seen in the photograph recovered from the aircraft cargo hold. A shiver ran down her spine as she continued reading.

Most famous for their outspoken views on how world governments were ignoring environmental concerns and failing to support groups who were dedicated to preserving both the environment­ and endangered species, the Greystokes had spent a portion of their personal wealth to follow in the footsteps of great environmentalists such as Dian Fossey. Their travels around the globe, to protest the destruction of rainforests and demand government intervention, were often met with lackluster official support. The couple had planned an expedition into the Congo rainforest to gather scientific evidence of man's damage to the ecosystem, a venture the Foreign Office strongly warned against due to the intense fighting in the region. Their private jet vanished over east Zaire and no distress signal was detected. What brought the aircraft down remains a mystery. Earl Greystoke was said to be piloting at the time. Lady Greystoke is thought to be the only other victim lost. She was five months pregnant with their first child and had hoped to return to England for the birth . . .

Jane gasped and reread the sentence. Pregnant? Could it be that they survived the crash for four more months, at least until their baby was born? That was a huge assumption to make, but Tarzan's existence supported it. It also begged the question as to how they'd died.

Jane examined pictures of the Greystokes, which were clearer than the damp photo she had found, and now she was struck by their uncanny similarity to Tarzan. There was no doubt in Jane's mind. Even the dates of the crash tallied. Tarzan was their son.

She clicked through more articles, each one repeating the same information. A few touched on the fate of the Greystoke estate, but Jane was more interested in any references to their son. The only other news snippet was:
Greystokes confirm pregnancy rumors
. Then a name caught her eye
: D'Arnot
. She clicked on the link. It was from a more sensational newspaper:

The world was shocked last week when missing French UN Peacekeeper Paul D'Arnot staggered from the Congo jungle after being missing for almost eleven months following an insurgent attack on his unit.

D'Arnot claimed that a mysterious boy, who lived with a band of wild gorillas, had nursed him back to health. He further claimed to have proof that the boy was son of the missing Lord Greystoke, who had allegedly crashed in the forest eleven years earlier. The Greystoke estate dismissed the rumors as nonsense, saying D'Arnot's claims were nothing more than a confidence trick to get his hands on the Greystoke fortune. D'Arnot is set to undergo psychiatric evaluation.

So D'Arnot had reached civilization, only to be greeted with skepticism. Jane knew how he must have felt. So he had attempted to return to Tarzan, and that is what got him killed.

What should she do? Who could she contact to inform the world that she had found Lord Greystoke's heir? Why would she be believed any more than D'Arnot? People would assume she was just digging for the Greystoke fortune too. Then she reeled . . . that made Tarzan a lord! A very rich lord! A thousand questions rushed through her mind but she muted them all with one fact—she needed to tell Tarzan the news first. How would he react? Jane suspected that he wouldn't care.

“Jane?” Robbie stood at the door, a boxes cradled in his arms. “Ready to go in twenty minutes?”

Jane nodded, deliberately using her body to block his view of the monitor. “Great.”

When she was sure Robbie had gone she turned back to the screen and continued skimming through articles. No more information seemed to be forthcoming. She was about to close the machine down when another thought hit her. Checking that Robbie wasn't around, she typed in:
Robbie Canler
.

The few results yielded nothing relevant. After a moment's thought she tried:

Robert Canler New York Missing Person.

She was surprised to find an exact match. She caught a few words:
Robert Canler—missing—sister found dead—wanted for murder.

Then the town's power went down again and the words vanished.

W
ith the jeep refueled and weighed down with supplies—mechanical parts, full fuel canisters, a new inflatable raft to enable Clark to guide the logs downstream, and enough rice to last for weeks—Robbie made careful progress back to Karibu Mji. They had spent longer than necessary as Jane had insisted on waiting until the power was restored so she could send an email. Robbie had agreed, pleased to see her mood had improved. Now it was approaching sunset, but the sky was already dark with brooding clouds as the heavens unleashed their payload.

Only one headlight worked on the jeep and Robbie was unable to find a spare. The jungle track was slick with mud and he had to concentrate on keeping the vehicle on the road, particularly when the steep track became nothing more than a raging stream as it flooded.

For four hours they drove through the storm, the path ahead occasionally illuminated by violent forks of lightning. They barely exchanged any words, and Robbie's shoulders were beginning to ache from the physical act of steering. Several times the jeep slipped in the quagmire and the tires freely spun like muddy pinwheels before reconnecting with the earth.

Just when Robbie was beginning to think they wouldn't be able to make it any further through the storm, the rain abated to a fine trickle. He suspected it was only temporary, but seized the opportunity to step heavily on the accelerator.

“How did your sister die?' asked Jane, picking up the thread of the conversation from hours earlier.

Robbie was instantly cautious. Jane had never asked questions before. He was never sure if it was due to lack of interest or politeness.

“I . . . I don't know,” he admitted.

After months of wanting to speak to Jane about how he felt, he was suddenly struck mute. He coughed and gripped the wheel unnecessarily hard as they bounced along the track.

“She was abused, beaten by . . . by Graham, our stepfather.” At first the words reluctantly came, but now he was talking rapidly, relieved to finally speak about it. “I think it was a blow on the head. She had a bump for a week from when he shoved her head against the wall. I thought it was nothing worse than he'd done before. We were always getting knocked around. But this . . . it didn't go. She complained that she felt light-headed. I should have acted then. Done something . . . took her to a doctor, but I'd started to sleep away from home. I was gone for a week—” images of that fateful day filled his thoughts. “One day I got back and she was dead. Our wonderful mother was passed out and Graham was in front of the TV. Watching a comedy show.” He sneered at the memory, the rage he had felt resurfaced.