The Temple Covenant

by D C Macey

  The intervention knocked Abe out of the groove he had set himself in. He looked slightly flustered.

  Angel waved the barman back with more beers. ‘Abe is a mechanic for one of the safari tour companies. He’s based in Arusha but gets out in the bush, helping with breakdowns and such. He’s the man who speaks to everyone in the business. Now, Helen said you were looking for clues about an unusual bush convoy bypassing the Kenyan border crossing.’

  Abe looked at Sam. ‘If you want to know who’s doing what they shouldn’t in the bush, I’m the man.’ He leant back again, gave another excessive laugh, finished his bottle of beer and took another from the barman who had just arrived with replenishments.

  Sam was not impressed with Abe, felt he was a chancer. He looked at Angel, arching a questioning eyebrow.

  Angel understood and turned to speak again to Abe. ‘You should be ashamed of yourself. These are my guests— you should not be trying to exploit them.’ He turned to Sam and Helen. ‘This man, Abe, he drinks and smokes and stays out half the night. But he is also married to a good woman, an Ethiopian woman who belongs to my church. She loves him, for all his drinking and paganism.’ He threw Abe a brief scowl and Abe laughed again. ‘For all that, I know he works hard, cares for his wife and feeds his family, and allows them all to attend my church. He may not look it, but he is honest. I would trust him.’

  Sam looked at Abe. ‘So, Angel trusts you. That says a lot for me, but how can I know what your information is worth if I don’t know what you know?’

  Abe had stopped laughing now. He looked very thoughtful. After a period of silence, he looked at Sam. ‘My wife will not be happy if I upset her priest. But I have an answer to your question, I think it’s worth a lot. A lot.’

  Sam locked gaze with Abe. ‘Here’s my proposal. I’m going to give you fifty dollars for your information, whatever it is. If it sounds useful, I’ll double it right now to a hundred. If what you tell me is right, once I’ve checked it out, I’ll give you double that again, and I’ll leave that money with Angel, so you know you’ll get it. That’s the best offer, the only offer, you’re going to get tonight.’ Sam fell silent and held Abe’s gaze.

  After only a short moment’s hesitation, Abe laughed again. ‘Sam, you are a hard man. I think you would let my children go hungry.’ He shook a finger at Sam in admonishment. ‘But, if Angel trusts you, then so do I.’ He thrust his hand across the table. As he and Sam shook hands their grip slipped naturally to end in a thumb clasp.

  ‘I think we should go outside to transfer the money somewhere quieter,’ said Sam. He stood, and the others followed, making for the exit, Angel pausing on the way to pay the bill.

  They stepped out into the shadows of the street; the warm night air was still and there was nobody in sight. Distant sounds from elsewhere in the city crossed the darkness to join with the gentle thrum of the Land Rover’s engine turning over. Helen climbed into the front seat, wound the window down and followed the conversation on the walkway beside her.

  Sam was counting out money. He handed Angel a hundred dollars and Abe fifty more; he kept a further fifty in his hand and them buttoned his wallet away.

  ‘Well?’ said Sam.

  Abe was happy with the deal and was keen to tell all he knew. ‘There’s a safari driver, goes mostly to Ngorongoro and further up to the north too. Nasty piece of work. I wouldn’t trust him for a minute. Last week he cancelled three days’ driving, caused his company no end of headaches. Their other guides were busy, and they had to borrow a driver and vehicle guide from my boss to meet their commitments.’

  ‘And?’ said Sam.

  ‘It was odd; the man put himself off-duty but took the vehicle. He had his company mechanic give it the full works first. Full tank, lots of extra fuel cans. If he was off sick, why did he need the vehicle? And where did he go?’

  ‘So where did he go?’

  ‘We don’t know, but he was gone three full days and when he got back the vehicle was in a mess, all the spare fuel used. It had been worked hard.’ Abe paused for a moment. ‘Then when the mechanic cleared out the vehicle he found some empty lager bottles, Summit brand.’ He paused and looked expectantly at Sam.

  Sam waited.

  ‘Summit is a local Kenyan lager; you don’t normally get it in Tanzania. Certainly not usually out at the lodges around Ngorongoro.’

  ‘Do you have a name for this man, where can I find him?’

  For the first time Abe looked anxious. He hesitated. ‘It won’t come back to me will it? He’s an evil man, I’ve heard stories …’

  ‘Don’t worry, your part ends here,’ Sam rustled the fifty-dollar note in his hand, and a moment later, Abe gave Sam the information he needed.

  ‘He’s a guide driver for African Sunrise Safaris. They have an office in Arusha, but he mostly drives the crater tours. We think he has something on the boss. Always seems to get what he wants, coming and going as he pleases. Henk. Henk Smuts.’

  ‘South African?’

  ‘I think so. I’ve never really talked much to him. He doesn’t mix with the mechanics or other guide drivers.’

  Sam handed over the extra fifty dollars.

  18.

  Tuesday, 29th October - AM

  The orange Land Rover was making a steady speed along the highway. Jeanie had insisted that Sam and Helen take it and that Mauwled drove. They had set off at first light to be sure of getting through Arusha before the worst of the morning traffic developed. Now clear of the city and on a good road, it felt that they were making progress at last.

  First, there were well-ordered farms, commercial enterprises that controlled the best land. They frequently drove past row upon row of carefully maintained coffee bushes that stretched out to dominate the environment. Further away from Arusha, family farms became more frequent with smaller fields whose shapes were formed by the natural lie of the land. With each passing mile, man’s influence became less prominent as the bush imposed its might. Now the farmsteads were less frequent, mostly scattered subsistence agriculture struggling to maintain a toehold in the bush.

  Everywhere was dry, with lots of browns and blacks and straw-coloured golds; those few plants that still managed to sport some green stood out as targets for browsing animals.

  The bush growth had organised itself into four rough groups. There were occasional trees that had bucked the system and made it to full height. Their canopies, above browsing height, spread and flourished to create little havens of shade. Spreading out around the trees, sometimes alone, sometimes in little clusters, grew stunted trees and bushes, perhaps twice the height of a man. Between them, grew isolated thickets of shoulder-height bushes that, here and there, managed to link up and create dense patches of undergrowth. Around and between it all was open ground, carpeted with grasses; there were occasional tufts up to knee height but most had now been grazed down to the roots by passing hungry animals.

  At first glance, the bush seemed to offer deceptively easy access. Regular grazers ensured clear walking paths could be found between and around most of the denser plant growth. But it was hot and dry going and visibility was significantly restricted by the plant growth ahead, to the sides and behind. In bush that could stretch a hundred miles without a break, it was easy to become lost, and just as easy to become prey for the many inhabitants who viewed humans simply as just another link in the food chain.

  Mauwled explained he had once been a safari driver and guide but had got himself into some trouble. He avoided saying exactly what. Just that he’d lost his job and become a bush driver for a group that arranged to move things around the country without asking too many questions. It was clear he meant smuggling but was not going to admit it. Eventually he’d got into serious trouble and it was his Aunty, Mama Grace, who had persuaded Jeanie Albright to intervene on his behalf. She did, he was spared jail, and now worked for her.

  They were making good time along the road, which seemed to stretch on endlessly. They frequently passed heavy-la
den trucks and pickups whose engines struggled under the burden of hopelessly overloaded cargos. Eventually, they reached Makuyuni. Here, they branched off to the north onto a smaller though still serviceable road where the traffic noticeably reduced; anything that was heading for the western towns and Burundi, Rwanda or Uganda had stayed on the main highway that continued away to the south and west.

  Where the road had been improved to enhance travel times, great gashes had been left in the landscape. The raw earth, exposed to the sun received no human landscaping. The next rains would start the process of moulding and shaping the naked earth and, with the wet, would come plant growth ensuring that it would quickly blend into the surrounding bush.

  The quiet in the Land Rover was broken by the ringing of the phone. Helen pulled it from her bag and checked the caller.

  ‘It’s Elaine.’ Sam watched intently as Helen’s conversation progressed, seeking any sign as to progress. It sounded positive.

  After a couple of minutes, Helen ended the call. ‘Well, it seems your suggestion is working out. Elaine has been in touch with African Sunrise Safaris. They have you in for a tour of the Ngorongoro crater tomorrow, and they have booked you with Henk Smuts. Elaine’s let them think you’re a high-ranking exec who has flown in for two or three days looking for a safari tour and Smuts had been recommended by a friend as the guide to have. If anyone thinks to check, there’s a nice executive aircraft sitting waiting for you back at Kilimanjaro Airport.’

  ‘That’s great. Though it would have been better to have met him this afternoon. Time’s not on our side.’

  ‘Apparently, he’s away until later today.’

  ‘I wonder where.’

  ‘You don’t need him, I can take you down into the crater, I did it years’ ago.’

  ‘Mauwled, I explained earlier, we’re not here for the tour, we need to speak with this man Smuts. See if we can coax any information out of him. When we want a proper tour, I promise, you’ll be the man.’

  Their Land Rover was following the road that would eventually reach down onto the Serengeti plains. But first they had to drive up and over its ancient volcanic fringe. The road started to describe more turns as it followed the land’s upward contours. Moving steadily upwards, greens returned to the plants, and on the areas of darker fertile soil, coffee plantations appeared more frequently, as they had done around Arusha.

  Mauwled kept the Land Rover moving at a good pace, even as the gradient became steeper. The landscape ahead gave every appearance that they were driving into a mountain range. Helen glanced down to the left and caught distant glimpses of a wide flatland far below them, and still Mauwled kept moving up and on.

  At last the road levelled off and it appeared to run straighter ahead. For just a moment, Helen thought the road was on a high plateau, as to her left, she gazed down onto the distant Serengeti, watching it stretch away towards the horizon like a pale biscuit-brown sea, formed by the endless dried dusty grasses.

  ‘Wow, look at that,’ said Sam, pointing to Helen’s right.

  She turned quickly and caught her breath. This was no plateau; they were on the broad lip of an ancient volcanic cone. The Land Rover drew to a halt at a viewing point and they all got out. The view offered a steep drop down into a crater whose flat bottom stretched for miles across. Down there, great stands of trees looked like little patches of moss while shimmering splashes of silver marked the presence of broad lakes. Her eye traced the rim of the volcano as it swept away into the distance before arcing back to complete the circle and enclose everything within.

  This gave the lie to the impression they were climbing up into a mountain range; this was actually one monstrous volcano, its perfectly preserved cone rim enclosing a crater that she guessed was twenty miles across.

  Helen pulled out her phone and took pictures, though she instinctively knew they would never do justice to what her eyes saw. Far below, amongst the stands of trees and the lakes were areas of dark green, that she guessed were marshlands, long ranges of yellowed grasses and dry dusty expanses. It was Eastern Africa in miniature.

  ‘It’s a great place for safari,’ said Mauwled. All the animals you would want to see live in here. Look, even elephants.’ He pointed towards tiny dark spots far below, no bigger than matchstick heads.

  ‘This looks really good.’ A note of concern sounded in Helen’s voice. ‘Are they all trapped? How did they get in there?’

  Mauwled laughed. ‘They got in themselves. Maybe over thousands of years, I think. There is a track down inside the crater and they can use it to get out too if they want, and even others could join them from outside.’

  ‘Do they?’ said Sam.

  ‘Not the lions any more. On the volcano’s slopes there are too many villages and farms to pass through now. But the elephants do. It’s mostly bulls here. They enjoy a safe quiet life and when they want to meet ladies they go out, maybe once a year. Then they come back. The villages and farms on the outer slopes don’t bother them, nobody argues with the elephants. Very dangerous.’

  Helen and Sam crossed to the other side of the road and they were at last able to properly take in the sheer scale of the African savannah far below, where the lower reaches of the volcano merged into the Serengeti and then stretched off towards a far horizon. They fell silent, struck by its sheer scale.

  ‘Brilliant,’ said Sam.

  ‘It is.’ Helen did a full turn, trying to take in both the crater and the plains together. ‘And Sam, isn’t that odd? That 4 x 4 has stopped a little further back up the road, but there’s plenty of space in the layby behind our Land Rover.’

  ‘Yes, odd, but even more of a coincidence - it’s been behind us pretty well since we left Arusha.’

  ‘You never said.’

  ‘No, but this is a safari destination, it may just be a coincidence.’

  ‘I see.’ Helen’s voice carried no conviction.

  Having absorbed the scale of their environment they returned to the Land Rover where Mauwled was waiting. Driving on, they moved away from the pinch point and the crater rim spread into a broadened and flattened expanse of land. It was permanently greened due to its high altitude microclimate. Here it really was like a high plateau and they quickly lost sight of both the crater’s edges and their precipitous drops.

  ‘The lodge accepts visitors from midday; we’ll arrive about then. If you won’t need me for a while, I can go and speak with some of the other drivers, see if they know anything about Smuts,’ said Mauwled as they drove on towards their destination.

  19.

  Tuesday, 29th October - PM

  Mauwled pulled open the back door to the Land Rover but didn’t get the chance to remove Helen and Sam’s bags before two smiling bellhops hurried out from the lodge reception and took them. Set in beautiful flowering gardens, the single-storey building was of new construction but used a mix of dressed dark hardwoods and white plaster to give a hint of tradition. Helen and Sam both guessed there was no wattle beneath the plaster, just modern concrete blocks. That didn’t matter, this was a lovely setting, and the modern construction offered a degree of comfort that was welcome after the morning’s long drive.

  As they followed the bellhops into the lodge reception, their senses were refreshed by the sweet rich scents emanating from the riot of flowers and shrubs in the gardens and the climbing plants that had been trained around the entrance. Immediately they had passed through the flowering arch, they were inside reception. There they felt the welcome blast of air conditioning and were greeted by a young woman in a westernised version of Maasai dress - a white blouse with neatly tailored lightweight skirt and waistcoat in a red plaid pattern. Worn off the shoulder was a similarly patterned cloak fastened by an intricate lion’s head broach.

  Beyond the reception, glass doors set in an internal glass wall allowed access to the guests’ area. First a broad lounge, its high white walls broken only by high set windows, small to exclude the sun’s heat. The walls were decorated with clust
ers of artefacts - mostly spears and shields but some pots and gourds interspersed with paintings of wildlife and people in tribal dress. A bar was positioned close to the reception. At one end of the lounge was a raised performance area; at the other end was a dining room, accessed via an open archway formed into the wall. Glancing through the arch, Helen could see seating for perhaps two hundred people.

  ‘You know, calling this place a lodge is a little misleading. It’s a big hotel, but where do all the guests sleep?’

  The receptionist completed their registration and with the warmest of smiles handed Helen an electronic key card. ‘This is your room key. It also releases the lock on that door between reception and the lounge,’ she said, waving towards the set of glass doors. The wave morphed into a clap, and from somewhere behind reception, two more smiling women appeared. Each was dressed in similar style to the receptionist but worn in place of the cloak were purple-hued tabards, added to protect their uniforms from the dust and dirt of the day.

  ‘These maids can take you to your room now.’

  ‘Where are the rooms?’ said Sam.

  ‘I know. Everybody asks,’ said the receptionist as she released the key card into Helen’s hand. ‘The building is upside down. The bedrooms are all below this floor.’

  ‘Ahh, so your building doesn’t break the skyline.’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘It’s on the crater edge?’

  ‘Yes, right on the edge. Your room will have a lovely view.’

  ‘Sounds great, let’s go see,’ said Helen. She resisted a maid’s attempt to take her little shoulder bag. ‘I can manage this,’ she said, then followed behind Sam, who had not been allowed to carry their bags by the women who now led them through the glass doors and beyond the bar to a discreet stairwell that Helen had not registered in her first scan of the area.

  One flight down, the maids led them into a corridor and past several numbered doors. Some paces along, they stopped.