Leopard Hunts in Darkness - Smith Wilbur - Страница 39

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"I only came to New York to pick up a cheque." Henry Pickering laughed that delightful purring laugh of his. "You hint with a sledgehammer I shudder at the ect of a direct demand from you." He paid the bill prosp and stood up. "Our house lawyer is waiting. First you sign away your body and soul and then I give you drawing rights up to the total of five million dollars." The interior of the limousine was silent and cool, and the suspension ironed out most of the trauma of the New York street surfaces.

"Now enlarge on Sally-Anne Jay's conclusions regarding the head of the poaching ring," Henry invited.

"At this stage, I don't see any alternative candidate for the master poacher, perhaps even the leader of the dissidents." Henry was silent for a moment. Then he said, "What do you make of General Fungabera's reluctance to act?"

"He is a prudent man, and an African. He will not rush in. He will think it out deeply, lay his net with care, but when he does act, I think we will all be surprised at how devastatingly swift and decisive it will be."

"I would like you to give General Fungabera. all the assistance you can. Full co-operation, please, Craig."

"You know Tungata was my friend."

"Divided loyalty?"

"I

don't think so, not if he is guilty."

"Good! My board is very happy with your achievements so far. I am authorized to increase your remuneration to sixty thousand dollars per annum."

"Lovely," Craig grinned at him. "That will be a big help on the interest payment on five million dollars." t was still light when the cab dropped Craig at the gates of the marina'. The smog of Manhattan was transformed by the low angle of the sun to a lovely purple mist which softened the grim silhouettes of the great towers of concrete.

As Craig stepped on the gangplank, the yacht dipped slightly under his weig4', and alerted the figure in the cockpit.

"Ashe! Craig was taken by surprise. "Ashe Levy, the fairy princess of struggling authors."

"Baby." Ashe came down the deck to him with a landlubber's uncertain steps. "I couldn't wait, I had to come to you right away."

"I am touched." Craig's tone was aci ye "A when I don't need help you come at a gallop." Ashe Levy ignored it, and put a hand on each of Craig's shoulders. "I read it. I read it again and then I locked it in my safe." His voice sank. "It's beautiful." Craig checked his next jibe, and searched Ashe Levy's face for signs of insincerity. Instead he realized that behind the gold-rimmed spectacles, Ashe Levy's eyes were steely with tears of emotion.

"It's the best stuff that you have ever done, Craig."

"It's only three chapters."

"It hit me right in my guts."

"It needs a lot of polishing."

"I doubted you, Craig. I'll admit that. I was beginning to believe that you didn't have another book in you, but this it was just too much to take in. I've been sitting here for the last few hours going over it in my mind, and I find I can recite parts of it by heart." Craig studied him carefully. The tears might be a reflection of the sunset off the water. Ashe removed his spectacles, and blew his nose loudly. The tears were genuine, yet Craig could still scarcely believe them, there was only one positive test.

"Can you advance on it, Ashe?" Now he didn't need money, but he needed the ultimate reassurance.

"How much do you need, Craig? Two hundred grand?"

"You really like it, then?" Craig let go a small sigh, as the writer's eternal doubts were dispelled for a brief blessed period. "Let's have a drink, Ashe."

"Let's do better than that," said Ashe. "Let's get drunk." Craig sat in the stem with his feet up on the rudder post, watching the dew form little diamonds on the glass in his hand, and no longer really listening to Ashe Levy enthusing about the book. Instead he let his mind out to roam, and thought that it would be best not to have all one's good fortunes at the same time but to spread them out and savour each more fully.

He was inundated with delights. He thought about King's Lynn and in his nostrils lingered the odour of the loams of the Matabele grassland. He thought about Zambezi Waters and heard again the rush of a great body in the Thorn brush. He thought about the twenty chapters which would follow the first three, and his trigger finger itched with anticipation. Was it possible, he wondered, that he might be the happiest man in the world at that moment?

Then abruptly he realized that the full appreciation of happiness can only be achieved by sharing it with another and he found a small empty space down deep inside him, and a shadow of melancholy as he remembered strangely flecked eyes and a firm young mouth. He wanted to tell her about it, he wanted her to read those three chapters, and suddenly he longed with all his soul to be back in Africa where Sally' Anne Jay was.

raig found a. second-hand Land-Rover in Jock Daniels" used car lot that backed onto his auctioneering floor. He closed his ears to Jock's impassioned sales spiel and listened instead to the motor. The timing was out, but there was no knocking or slapping.

The front-wheel transmission engaged smoothly, the clutch held against tho,brakes. When he gave it a run in an area of erosion and steep don gas on the outskirts of town, the silence" r" box fell Off, but the rest held together.

At one time he had been able to take his other old Land, Rover down into its separate parts and reassemble it over a weekend. He knew he could save this one. He beat Jock down a thousand dollars and still grossly overpaid, but he was in a hurry.

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