Dust Devils

by Roger Smith

  "What's that then?" Tossing the page onto his father's lap.

  "That's a man getting above himself. A man ripe to be cut down."

  Dell changed gear as they headed into a bend, looked across at his father. "This girl, she doesn't get hurt. Are we straight on that?"

  Saw his father jerk upright. "Jesus Christ!"

  Dell hit the brakes but the tires found no traction on the gravel and the truck slammed into the bull that had ambled into their path. The animal was flung into the air, landing on the hood of the truck with a heavy wet smack, blood spraying across the windshield. The Toyota stood on its nose for a moment, then the rear spun, throwing the bull to the ground.

  The truck sat stalled, pointing back the way they had come, red dust shrouding them. Dell looked out the rear window as the dust cleared. The bull lay on its side on the road, tributaries of blood flowing out onto the sand.

  Dell turned the key in the ignition. The engine caught, then spluttered and died. "Fuck." He pumped the gas pedal.

  Goodbread said, "Don't you flood her now." Dell turned the key again. Nothing. "Give her a moment," the old man said.

  That's when Dell saw them, maybe ten Zulu men and boys, swarming down the hillside from a cluster of nearby huts. He caught the gleam of blades in their hands. He turned the key. Engine coughed and cut out. Dell felt for the gun in his waistband as the men reached the truck.

  Goodbread slid out of the Toyota, relaxed, but with a hand near the pistol under his shirt. The men surrounded him. Torn clothes, bare feet, dark skins shining with sweat. Blades in black fists. Dell heard the rattle of Zulu, tongue-clicks like small explosions in the mouths of the men. Heard his father reply in the same language.

  Then Goodbread laughed and shook his head. A couple of the Zulus laughed too and the old man leaned down into the window to talk to Dell. "They want to know if we're of a mind to claim the meat. Told them no."

  The men fell upon the bull, started butchering it with cane machetes and pocket knives. Dell stepped out and walked to the front of the truck. The hood was dented and the bumper and bars were bent and red with blood. But the bull had come off worse. Dell watched as two small boys each grabbed one of the animal's horns, while a shirtless man – all ribs and sinew – started hacking off the bull's head with a rusted wood saw.

  Dell got into back into the Toyota, tried the key, and this time the engine fired. Goodbread lowered himself into the truck and slammed the door. Dell turned the vehicle and drove slowly around the Zulus. One of them waved a bloodstained arm. Goodbread flapped a hand in reply. Dell worked the stalk of the windshield washer and twin jets of water hit the glass. The wiper blades smeared blood across their view, the color of the landscape that surrounded them.

  "Welcome to the heart of goddam darkness, son." The old man's laugh sounded like a death rattle.

  Zondi sat on a wooden bench under a thorn tree. He would rather have waited in his Beemer, with the A/C cranked up to the max, but it was the only car in the parking lot at the Zulu Kingdom and he felt conspicuous anyway. So what's your plan? he asked himself. The answer was simple: he didn't have one. He'd improvise.

  A small yellow bus with a tour company logo painted on the side lurched up the road and stopped with a squeak of hot brake drums. Zondi waved away the dust, the fine red grains settling in the folds of his crushed linen shirt. How had he lived here, all those bloody years ago? Simple. He hadn't known any better.

  Zondi watched as a group of skinny Orientals filed out of the bus and stood in the shade of the vehicle, casting anxious glances up at the blowtorch sun. A woman in a baseball cap barked at them in Japanese. Or maybe Korean. They formed an obedient line and followed her into the kraal, camera lenses flaring in the sun.

  Zondi heard an old pickup truck rattling to a stop. Saw the girl get out, swamped by a shapeless poorhouse dress. She looked sad. Somehow older than the day before. A big man, running to fat, fought his way out of the driver's seat. As he stood his T-shirt lifted and Zondi caught the hard shine of a pistol at his waist. The man followed the girl toward the beehive huts. He was pigeon toed and he walked with his head and chest flung forward, as if he were crossing a finishing line.

  Okay, and now what's your fucking plan? Zondi asked out loud, watching the big man disappear behind a reed fence. Feeling out of his depth here.

  Zondi had never been at the sharp end of law enforcement. His skills lay in the meticulous collection of data, building mantraps of fact, conjecture and association under the corrupt and the venal. He'd left the wet work to others who were better equipped.

  He eyed his Beemer, thought of settling his ass on its leather seat and getting the hell out of there. Then he sighed and stood and followed the girl and the gunman into the kraal.

  It was one of those places Dell had always avoided. A tacky little tourist trap that looked like a bad movie set. A few beehive huts enclosed by a fence of sticks. An entranceway guarded by the skull and horns of an antelope.

  A Zulu man with a beer gut, dressed in tire sandals and bits of skin, stepped out of one of the huts, wearing what looked like a feather duster on his head. He held a stabbing spear in his hand, waved it at the heavens, bellowed a war cry and made as if he was going to turn one of the little Orientals into a kebab. Then he laughed and the tour group giggled nervously. Fired off a barrage of flashbulbs in reprisal.

  Dell followed at the back of the group, his father walking ahead, his bush hat pulled low over his eyes, doing an impersonation of a senior citizen on vacation. Dell saw another man on the fringes of the group. A man who looked as out of place as Dell felt. Tall black guy. Definitely city. Designer cargo pants and shades. Clean white Reeboks. A slim watch on his wrist. The guy caught his eye for a moment, then he walked on to where the girl from the wedding invite sat on a grass mat, weaving knotted strands of cloth on a wooden loom.

  She wore a beaded skirt, a red and blue choker around her slender neck. Her breasts covered by a bib of animal skin. More beads wrapped her calves and seedpods encircled her ankles. The kind that would sound like cicadas when she danced. Dell couldn't see her as a bride. She was a child.

  The girl ignored the tourists, kept her eyes on the cloth. She looked up just once, toward another Zulu guy, also in Western clothes. A big man in a T-shirt and jeans that bagged at his butt. He leaned against one of the huts and yawned, then he scratched his ass. Dell glanced across at Goodbread. Saw the old man's eyes on the big guy, then back on the girl.

  It was just a recon, his father had said. To check out the lay of the land. Suited Dell. The rush of adrenalin that had come after they hit the bull had drained and he felt tired. Hot. Grief bubbling up from some bottomless underground reservoir. He wanted to go and lie under a tree somewhere and not wake up.

  Sunday served the beer. Brought the gourd to the rich black man who had been there the day before. He shook his head and she moved on, wondering who he was. She had seen him sitting beside the shining car, watching her when she arrived. Sunday thought of that black fax machine swallowing the wedding invite in the phone kiosk. Stop dreaming, she told herself.

  Sunday moved on to serve the small yellow people who chirped like birds and made faces when they tasted the beer. They reminded her of her aunt, with their thin bodies and the skin stretched tight as drum hide across their high cheekbones.

  The last two people to get the beer were a tall pale man with dark hair, who drank and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, nodding, and an old man as white as the bones of a carcass left lying in the sun. His hand shook as he took the gourd and she heard his teeth smacking the clay rim. But he drank long and deep and when he was finished he looked at her with his light eyes and thanked her in Zulu.

  Richard did as he always did, throwing back a full gourd and burping loudly, standing with his swollen belly bulging out over his skins, smiling with teeth like rows of yellow corn, while the foreigners took their snaps. When they were done he led them out of the ceremonial hut to buy souvenirs. Sun
day sat a while, alone in the dark coolness.

  Then she left the beer enclosure and went across to the small hut where the ugly clothes the fat woman had given her were waiting. Sunday was standing naked except for her panties, when the hut went dark and the big man ducked in through the low door.

  She covered her middle with the dress. "Uncle, I am not ready," she said.

  He stood, picking his teeth, staring at her. She could smell the sourness rising from his skin like the fumes from a pit latrine. He laughed. "Don't worry, girl, when I feel the hunger, I feed on a thing with meat on its bones. Hurry, now. Finish."

  Sunday turned her back. Pulled on the dress over her head, the fabric coarse on her skin. Stepped into her tennis shoes, anxious to be out of the hut and away from this man looming behind her, his breath coming in wet grunts.

  Zondi walked to his BMW, hearing it chirp as he used the remote to open it. Stood leaning his arms on the roof, watching the big man and the girl heading toward the truck, the girl hanging back, looking down at her old shoes as they scuffed through the sand.

  Zondi saw the two white men walking toward a Toyota double cab with a dented hood. The younger man got behind the wheel. The old man stood and lit a cigarette, his eyes flicked across Zondi and then over to where a hawk circled the red hills. Something about the old man was familiar and Zondi started running his database. Stopped when he saw the big gunman shambling away toward the bathrooms, leaving the girl sitting alone in the truck. If he was going to do it, it would have to be now.

  Zondi pushed away from the car, took a step toward the girl, not sure whether he was walking back into his past or forward into some fucked up future. Stopped as the yellow tour bus bumped past, wiping her from view.

  Goodbread drew smoke into his lungs, held it for as long as he could, felt the soothing warmth as the nicotine rush hit. He hadn't been able to smoke during the beer ceremony, all that thatch and wood ready to blaze like kindling. He exhaled, heard the dry squeak of his breath, like the blades of a rusty windmill coming to rest. His eyes on the circling buzzard, black against the burning sky, but watching the big, loose-fleshed man with a pistol under his dirty T-shirt. Saw him hand the girl into the battered pickup.

  Watched the other dark man, too, by the BMW. Well dressed. City written all over his tailored shirt and expensive shoes. Something setting off alarm bells. A cop maybe? Didn't look as if he was armed, though. Goodbread could always tell. A man held himself differently when he was packing a weapon.

  He saw the bodyguard walking away from the truck, toward the bathrooms. Saw the black man watching the girl across the gleaming roof of the Beemer. Goodbread knew there couldn't be no dress rehearsal.

  The small tour bus smoked to life, sweating tourists sucking A/C like they were in an oxygen tent. As the bus rattled by, Goodbread felt the dust kick into his lungs. Fought a cough. Then he was moving. Telling his boy to start the truck.

  Showtime.

  Dell yawned as he turned the key of the Toyota and heard the engine fire, released the brake, waiting for his father to get in beside him. But the old man headed over to the other truck, the brown one, dented and pimpled with rust. Moving fast. The pistol was in his hand, held flat against his khaki work pants.

  Jesus Christ.

  Dell was awake now. Saw Goodbread open the door of the old truck, the girl looking up at him, shaking her head, his father's hand white on her dark skin as he pulled her from the vehicle. The girl cried out. Goodbread had the gun at the girl's head and Dell saw her eyes widen and her mouth open and close again.

  Then Goodbread was walking her to their truck, left arm around her, holding her close, pistol to her ribs. They were nearly at the Toyota when the Zulu guide, still in his skins, spear in hand, came running across the parking lot.

  "Leave her, you white bastard!"

  Goodbread turned, gripping the girl with his left arm. Lifted the pistol. The Zulu kept on coming, bearing down on Goodbread, stomach wobbling over his leopard-skin loincloth, the spear raised above his head, ready to throw. Goodbread shot him in the head and the spear left the Zulu's hand and jammed into the dirt just short of Goodbread's feet. The tour guide fell flat on his face, leopard skins flapping up to show his red underpants.

  Dell reached across and pushed open the passenger door of the truck. Goodbread shoved the girl onto the seat, coming in after her. Coughing, fighting for breath. Dell reversed, forced the gearstick into first, hit the gas. Goodbread's door slapped shut.

  The bodyguard ran out of the bathroom, still buckling his jeans, reaching for the pistol at his hip. Letting go a shot that starred the windshield. Getting closer, pistol staring straight at Dell. A bullet slammed into the metal of the doorframe beside Dell's head with a sound like hammer on an anvil.

  Before he had time to think Dell lifted the gun from his waistband, stuck his arm out the window. Fired. At first he thought he'd missed – saw the big man still aiming – then red bloomed on the gunman's white T-shirt. He opened his mouth in surprise and blood flowed down his chin as he toppled slowly as an imploded building, legs going first.

  Dell heard Goodbread shouting, "Go, boy! Go goddamit!"

  He floored the gas, bumped over the dead man, nearly mowed down the tall black guy in the expensive clothes who sprinted toward them. Swerved around the tour bus that sat becalmed in the sea of dust and slalomed out toward the main road.

  Sunday had never been so close to white people before. She'd always kept her distance from the foreigners, now she was squashed in the front of the truck with these two white men, the younger one hitting her knee with his hand as he smashed through the gears. He was panting, sweating. Stinking of fear. The old one fought for breath like he was drowning, one hand holding onto the dashboard, the other gripping the gun that slipped away from her ribs as he coughed.

  The driver threw the car into a curve, flinging Sunday up against the old man. She smelt something like sickness on him. Saw the sun shining through his hairy ears, veins like red worms near the surface of the skin.

  "Where are you taking me?" she asked in Zulu. The younger one ignored her and the old one was too busy coughing blood, big drops that shot from his mouth onto his pants, to answer.

  Then her mother answered. Drew her eyes to the piece of paper that lay on the floor of the truck, under Sunday's frayed tennis shoes. The wedding invite. But different somehow. Printed on thin paper and the colors were blurred and smeared. So this is how it must have come out of the machine. In Pretoria. And now Sunday knew: her mother hadn't deserted her, she'd sent these white men to save her.

  Dell looked in the rearview. Caught glimpses of the road through the red cloud that pursued them. The truck ramped a hump, airborne for a moment, and he could see back over the dust, saw the BMW gaining on them. As the Toyota hit the gravel the girl was hurled up against Dell. A whiff of woodsmoke and Sunlight soap. He elbowed her aside, nearly lost the truck on a bend, battled to control it. Beemer closing in. He wasn't going to beat it for speed.

  The girl looked over her shoulder, speaking rapid Zulu. Clicks like gum being popped. Dell didn't understand a fucking word. Goodbread fought the coughing spasm back down into himself, grabbed at Dell's arm with fingers as bony as a skeleton, pointing out toward the plain.

  "She says, turn here. Onto the track." Words strangled on phlegm and blood.

  Dell saw two rough scratches in the hard, rocky surface, leading off into a Martian landscape of ruts and furrows. "Jesus, and then?"

  "Just do it."

  So he did, wrestling the wheel to the right, almost losing the truck, back yawing. Floored the gas and felt the tires grip and they were flying onto the track, loose rocks striking the underside of the Toyota like small-bore fire. Looked in his rearview. The Beemer was honest-to-god coming after them.

  Who the fuck is that black guy?

  The truck flew over a mound, landed hard, and Dell was staring up at a rocky gradient. The slope of a torn and eroded hill. He stopped, forced the Toyota into
four-wheel drive, muttered something that may have been a prayer. Hit the gas.

  The tires spun, churning dust, until the rubber found traction, gripped, and the truck hauled itself up the rise, hood framed against the bleached sky. Then they were over, skidding and slewing down toward a dry river bed. Dell checked the rearview which served him up a blurred and vibrating landscape in reflection. No BMW.

  Zondi stood on the brakes as he saw the incline, felt the car go into a drift, ended up at ninety degrees to the slope in a spray of gravel. Left stranded like a sand shark washed up on a beach. Ate dust. Watched the fat ass of the truck disappear over the ridge.

  Fuck.

  He turned the BMW, avoiding rocks and aloes and drove slowly back the way he had come. Picked up speed once he was back on the sand road. Started running his database again. Thought he had a hit on the old man. He needed the Internet. But first he needed a gun.

  Inja upended the square of cardboard crudely marked with blocks in diminishing size, sending tokens and money flying. Then he tipped the table, beer bottles and whiskey glasses crashing to the concrete floor of the tavern.

  The men who had been losing to him backed away, looking for shelter in the shadows of the dim room. Inja tugged his pistol from his pants. Pointing it at the unfortunate who had brought him the news.

  The man cowered on his knees, hands held up above his head in prayer. Eyes closed. "Induna, please. I beg of you, Induna."

  Inja stared down at the man, then took the weapon away from his head, looked at the gun as if he'd never seen it before. Holstered it. His breath coming in rasps. Saw the men backed up against the walls, none of them daring to look at him. His vision blurred, the room wavering before his eyes, as if he stared at it through flame.

  When Inja spoke, his normally rich baritone was hoarse and thin. Barely a whisper. "Get every man," he said to his flunkey. "Each and every one. Arm them and send out search parties. Let them round up people from all corners of the valley. Find out where these white bastards took her. If people won't speak, shoot their children. And keep shooting them until they do speak."