Eagle in the Sky - Smith Wilbur - Страница 62

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Conrad fell into a long rapidfire discussion with Sam that lost David

after the first few sentences.  However, Conrad translated at the end.

Sam says he knows already, all your servants and their wives buy at his

store and he pays them for that sort of information.  It turns out that

there is bad blood between Sam and Akkers.  Sam suspects him of

arranging to have him beaten, on a lonely road on a dark night.

Sam was in hospital three months, he also accused Akkers of having his

hut fired to drive him off Jabulani.  'It adds up, doesn't it?  David

agreed.

Old Sam is dead keen to help us grab Akkers, and he has a plan of action

all worked out.  Let's hear it.  Well, as long as you are in residence

at Jabulani Akkers is going to restrict his activities to night poaching

with a killing lamp.  He knows every trick there is and we will never

get him.  So?  You must tell your servants that you are leaving for two

weeks, going to Cape Town on business.  Akkers will know as soon as you

leave and he will believe he has the whole of jabulam to himself, For an

hour more they discussed the details of the plan, then they shook hands

and parted.

As they drove back to the homestead they emerged from the open forest

into one of the glades of tall grass, and David saw the brilliant white

egrets floating like snow flakes over the swaying tops of golden grass.

Something in there, he said and cut the engine.  They waited quietly

until David saw the movement in the grass, the opening and closing at

the passage of heavy bodies.  Then three egrets, sitting in row, moved

slowly towards him, home on the back of a concealed beast as it grazed

steadily forward.

Ah, the buffalo!  David exclaimed as the first of them appeared, a great

black bovine shape.  It stopped as it saw the Land-Rover on the edge of

the trees and it regarded them intently from beneath the wide spread of

its horns, with its muzzle lifted high.  It showed no alarm for these

were Park animals, almost as tame as domestic cattle.

Gradually the rest of the herd emerged from the tall grass.  Each in

turn scrutinized the vehicle and then resumed feeding once more.  There

were forty-three of them, as Sam had predicted, and amongst them were

some fine old bulls standing five and a half feet tall at the shoulder

and weighing little less than 2000 lb.  Their horns were massively

bossed, meeting in the centre of the head and curving downwards and up

to blunt points, with a rugged surface that became polished black at the

tips.

Crawling over their heavy trunks and thick short legs were numbers of

ox-peckers, dull-plumaged birds with scarlet beaks and bright beady

eyes.  Sometimes head down they scavenged for the ticks and other

blood-sucking body vermin in the folds of skin between the limbs.

Occasionally one of the huge beasts would snort and leap, shaking and

swishing its tail, as a sharp beak pried into a delicate portion of its

anatomy, under the tail or around the heavy dangling black scrotum.  The

birds fluttered up with hissing cries, waited for the buffalo to calm

down and then settled again to their scurrying and searching.

David photographed the herd until the light failed, and they drove home

in the dark.

Before dinner David opened a bottle of wine and they drank it together

on the stoop, sitting close and listening to the night sounds of the

bush, the cries of the night birds, the tap of flying insects against

the wire screen and the other secret scurrying and rustling of small

animals.

Do you remember once I told you that you were spoiled, and not very good

marriage material?  Debra asked softly, nestling her dark head against

his shoulder.

I'll never forget it.  I'd like to withdraw that remark ron-nally, she

went on, and he moved her gently away so that he could study her face.

Sensing his eyes upon her she smiled, that shy little smile of hers.  I

fell in love with a little boy, a spoiled little boy, who thought only

of fast cars and the nearest skirt, she said, but now I have a man, a

grown man, she smiled again, and I like it better this way He drew her

back to him and kissed her, their lips melded in a lingering embrace

before she sighed happily and laid her head back upon his shoulder. They

were silent for a while before Debra spoke again.

These wild animals, that mean so much to you Yes?"  he encouraged her.

I am beginning to understand.  Although I have never seen them, they are

becoming important to me also I'm glad.  David, this place of ours, it's

so peaceful, so perfect.

It's a little Eden before the fall.  We will make it so, he promised,

but in the night the gunfire woke him.  He rose quickly, leaving her

lying warm and quietly sleeping, and he went out on the stoop.

It came again, faintly on the still night, distance muting it to a small

unwarlike popping.  He felt his anger stirring again, as he imagined the

long white shaft of the killing lamp, questing relentlessly through the

forest until it settled suddenly upon the puzzled animal, holding it

mesmerized in the beam, the blinded eyes glowing like jewels, making a

perfect aiming point in the field of the telescopic rifle sight.

Then suddenly the rifle blast, shocking in the silence, and the long

licking flame of the muzzle flash.  The beautiful head snapping back at

the punch of the bullet and the soft thump of the falling body on the

hard earth, the last spasmodic kicking of hooves and again the silence.

He knew it was useless to attempt pursuit now, the gunman would have an

accomplice in the hills above them ready to flash a warning if any of

the homestead lights came on, or if an auto engine whirred into life.

Then the killing lamp would be doused and the poacher would creep away.

David would search the midnight T expanse of Jabulani in vain.  His

quarry was cunning and experienced in his craft of killing, and would

only be taken by greater cunning.

David could not sleep again.  He lay awake beside Debra, and listened to

her soft breathing, and at intervals to the distant rifle fire.  The

game was tame and easily approached, innocent after the safety of the

Park.

It would run only a short distance after each shot, and then it would

stand again staring without comprehension at the mysterious and dazzling

light that floated towards it out of the darkness.

David's anger burned on through the night, and in the dawn the vultures

were up.  Black specks against the pink dawn sky, they appeared in

ever-increasing numbers, sailing high on wide pinions, tracing wide

swinging circles before beginning to drop towards the earth.

David telephoned Conrad Berg at Skukuza Camp, then he and Debra and the

dog climbed into the Land Rover, warmly dressed against the dawn chill.

They followed the descent of the birds to where the poacher had come on

the buffalo herd.

As they approached the first carcass, the animal scavengers scattered,

slope-backed hyena cantering away into the trees, hideous and cowardly,

looking back over their misshapen shoulders, grinning apologetically

little red jackal with silvery backs and alert ears, trotting to a

respectful distance before standing and staring back anxiously.

The vultures were less timid, seething like fat brown maggots over the

carcass as they squawled and squabbled, fouling everything with their

stinking droppings and loose feathers, leaving the kill only when the

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