Red Earth

by Tony Park

  Lerato’s spirits and energy levels seemed to lift a little as they walked on the smooth tar road.

  ‘You’ll like this place, the hide we’re going to,’ Themba said.

  ‘Are you sure about that?’

  Themba gave a little laugh at her sarcasm – at least she could still make a joke. ‘I’ve seen white rhino there, kudu, baboons, all sorts of animals.’

  ‘Are all rhinos dangerous, like the one that charged us?’ she sniffed.

  ‘Not the white ones, so much,’ he replied.

  ‘I didn’t know they were different colours,’ Lerato said.

  ‘They’re not.’ He stopped and they rested a moment. ‘They have different-shaped mouths, which is one way to tell them apart, but Mike told me another. The black rhino is like a black woman; her calf, her baby, walks behind her, similar to the way a Zulu woman carries her child on her back, and like you carry the baby. The white rhino’s baby moves in front of her, like a white woman pushing a pram.’

  Lerato gave a small laugh. ‘Speaking of babies on backs, this one is killing me. I don’t know how my mother coped with me. I was a little fatty.’

  ‘You’re not fat.’

  ‘No, but I was when I was a baby. You should see pictures of me.’

  He smiled. He had no photos of himself as a child; his family had been too poor to own a camera or have pictures made.

  ‘Hey, I need a toilet break.’ She undid the knotted wrap and Themba picked up the sleeping baby and held him in his arms, looking down at its now peaceful face.

  ‘Don’t go far,’ he said.

  ‘Oh, don’t worry, I won’t. I’m too scared. You watch the baby, in case he wakes – you know how much he likes to explore.’

  Themba gently rocked the baby in his arms and turned his back to give Lerato more privacy. He heard the rustle of dry leaves and branches as she made her way behind a thicket.

  ‘I think I’m hallucinating,’ she said from the bushes.

  He resisted the urge to look around. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I’m so hungry I think I’m going crazy; I’m smelling things.’

  ‘Like what?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s the funniest thing. I can smell hot buttered popcorn. Is that weird or what?’

  Themba shook his head. ‘You’re …’ He was about to tell Lerato that she was right, she was going crazy, when something Mike had told him, in a lecture, came back to him. ‘Lerato, are you decent?’

  ‘No, not yet, and don’t you come over here. I’m not sharing my popcorn with you for anything. I’m not imagining it, I can really smell it now.’

  Themba turned. He had to get her away from here. He looked at the AK-47, which he’d put on the ground when they’d stopped. To pick it up and use it he would have to put the baby down on the ground. Fear paralysed him. ‘Hurry.’

  ‘OK, keep your pants on,’ Lerato said. ‘I’ve got mine on now.’

  Themba eyed the rifle. He set the sleeping baby down on the dry grass and snatched up the AK. He turned and ran to where Lerato had disappeared into the bush. She had gone even further than he thought, to avoid embarrassment, he guessed.

  He saw the branches move in front of him and Lerato appeared, wide-eyed at the sight of him holding up the assault rifle.

  ‘What’s wrong? What did you do with the baby?’

  He ignored her questions. He sniffed the air and caught the unmistakable odour.

  ‘You smell the popcorn, right?’

  He put the index finger of his left hand to his lips and whispered: ‘Hurry, the baby’s back there. We have to get out of here, quickly.’

  ‘What is it? What’s that popcorn smell?’

  ‘It’s …’ The rasping sound, like a saw cutting wood, silenced both of them.

  Themba spun on his heel and felt Lerato press her body into his back. He saw the movement in the grass, the silhouette low, sleek and dappled.

  ‘Leopard.’

  ‘Oh my God,’ Lerato said.

  ‘Hush.’

  Mike Dunn had amused and surprised his group of student rhino guards when he’d given them a lecture on the most elusive of predators, the leopard. Glands on their rump, he said, excreted a scent that smelled like hot buttered popcorn. By rubbing against a tree or bush a male leopard used the scent to mark its territory.

  ‘The baby,’ Lerato hissed.

  Themba drew a deep breath. ‘Stay here.’

  He started to walk back to where he’d left the baby and it felt like his feet were encased in lumps of cement. His heart was beating like a shebeen’s bass speakers. Themba gripped the AK-47’s pistol grip and stock so hard it hurt his fingers. He heard movement behind him.

  ‘I told you to stay back there.’

  ‘I told you to look after the baby,’ she hissed back to him. ‘You know how he crawls away.’

  Themba heard another growl and froze. It was warning him to stay back, not to approach. Mike had explained that the big cats would give warnings and it was a stupid man who ignored them.

  ‘Stay here.’

  ‘No.’

  He exhaled. She was so stubborn. He took a step forward, then another, and brushed a thorny branch away with the barrel of the rifle. Themba remembered the compact torch he’d taken from the Fortuner. He took it out from his pocket with his left hand and flicked it on.

  Themba cast the beam ahead as he walked slowly closer. He saw movement, then two yellow eyes burned from the darkness. He stopped.

  Lerato screamed. ‘It’s got the baby.’

  Themba played the beam down. The leopard was standing over the infant, which had woken up and now started to cry. The leopard lowered its head and sniffed the wailing being. Trying to still his shaking hands, Themba held both the torch and the stock of the rifle in his left hand and raised the rifle. He took aim.

  ‘Shoot it,’ Lerato said.

  They were still twenty metres from the cat, at night, and its head was low as it continued to inspect the strange creature in front of it. Themba was worried he would hit the child. He raised the barrel, aiming just above the leopard, flicked the selector to automatic and pulled the trigger.

  A burst of five rounds erupted from the barrel, which, true to form, pulled high and to the right as Themba fired. The baby gave a violent start at the noise and began to shriek, and the leopard turned in a single bound and raced away into the dark.

  Lerato ran past Themba to the baby and scooped it up, holding it close to her chest. Tears rolled down her cheeks and she muffled the infant’s cries with her breasts. Themba jogged to them and wrapped his arms around both of them.

  ‘Take me home, Themba, please take us home,’ Lerato sobbed.

  He wanted, more than anything else in the world, to make this nightmare end. Themba knew, however, that the loud fusillade would have alerted anyone following them to their position.

  And so, he realised with an almost crippling despair, they had to keep running.

  Chapter 21

  Nia and Mike drove through Mkhuze Game Reserve, scanning the bush on either side of the road for movement.

  So far they had seen genet and civet cats, a fat python sluggishly sliding across the road, nyala and a quick glimpse of a white rhino, but no sign of the fugitive youngsters.

  When they arrived at Mkhuze Mike had been put through to the park warden via the gate guard’s radio. They had learned that there were already rangers out looking for Themba and Lerato and the missing baby. There was a police detective with them as well, apparently. The warden had given permission for Mike and Nia to join the search and to drive around in the dark, which was forbidden for regular visitors to the park. Mike told Nia that he knew Mkhuze well, as he regularly came to the park to count vulture nests and check for eggs and chicks.

  Nia felt bad, on reflection, about the way she had spoken
to Mike. ‘I’m sorry for what I said, the way I acted, earlier.’

  He shrugged off her apology, eyes still scanning the bush. ‘It’s none of my business and I didn’t mean to pry into your personal life.’

  ‘You just caught me at a bad time. I found out today my boyfriend, Angus, has been cheating on me.’

  He looked to her. ‘I’m sorry.’

  She smiled, but it didn’t last. ‘He is a jerk. But then, I’ve been thinking about it. I can be very demanding. I’m always correcting him, other people. He complains about me being too critical.’

  ‘Is that enough of a reason to sleep with someone else?’

  She sagged in the seat. ‘I know. I mean, I thought we – well, I thought we were getting on OK.’

  What she was really thinking about was their sex life. He was good in bed, and a beautiful specimen of a man, but lately she’d found herself wanting more from him, more conversation. When they had time off together he would sit in front of the television watching rugby, or golf, or cricket, and they would go for hours not talking to each other. As nice as the other night had been, she had once more been left to take care of her own pleasure after he’d fallen asleep. That wasn’t a first. She realised, if she was honest with herself, that there had been signs for some time that their relationship would not last forever.

  She didn’t always want to talk, but at other times she longed for someone she could converse with about politics or religion or even helicopters. She had always been a tomboy growing up, but she also loved the ballet. She’d taken Banger once and he’d made snide jokes about the male dancers. She’d been red-faced by the end of the performance, embarrassed by his behaviour and angry. Nia had never suggested they go together again.

  ‘You seem very bright,’ Mike said, then looked away, out the window, as if regretting the remark.

  ‘I read a lot. I went to university, studied law, because that’s what my parents wanted, but by the time I graduated I realised there was no way I wanted to be a lawyer. I’d started flying for fun and I loved that more than anything else in the world.’

  ‘You’d make more money as a lawyer.’

  ‘Says the man with the PhD who works for a wildlife charity. I’m guessing you could make more money as a lecturer.’

  He looked back at her and it was his turn to smile. ‘I don’t like classrooms.’

  ‘I’d feel the same way about a courtroom, or an office.’

  ‘Are you going to keep flying forever?’

  She shrugged. ‘Forever’s a long time. I’m enjoying life for now. Part of me thinks it would be nice to settle down with someone and have a couple of kids.’

  ‘But part of you dreads it.’

  She was surprised. ‘Hey, how did you know that?’

  ‘I like being out in the bush by myself, not wondering if someone at home is missing me, or being faithful.’

  ‘Like one of your birds?’

  ‘Oh, they’re far more settled and domesticated than I am.’

  She laughed. He was a nice guy, and quite handsome, in a rugged, rough sort of way. He needed a new haircut, and khaki didn’t suit his colouring, though she guessed neutral tones were needed for walking in the bush.

  She had been with a man much older than herself, once. Roger had been a client, a wealthy merchant banker from Johannesburg. He’d flown to Durban and arranged for a chartered helicopter to take him to a friend’s fiftieth birthday party on a golf estate on the north coast. He was only in the province for a day so his time was short, although his cash clearly wasn’t. On the twenty-minute flight he had flirted with Nia and told her, straight out, that he thought she was beautiful. She had laughed off his advances but throughout the party, as Nia had sat in the shade of a tree by her helicopter, waiting to fly him back again, he had used the contact number she’d given him to send her SMSs from his phone.

  Roger was funny and smart as well as flirty, and she had replied, teasing him about his age. He was also fifty, and she had been just twenty-eight at the time.

  On the flight home, very tipsy, he had told her that he hadn’t meant any offence. She had laughed and they had talked about their families – he’d said he was divorced – and their shared loves, flying and, surprisingly, the ballet.

  ‘Any man would be lucky to have you as a girlfriend,’ Mike said, breaking into her thoughts.

  Nia decided to confide something of what she’d been thinking. ‘Before Angus I was going out with a banker from Johannesburg. He used to fly down to Durban to see me. I liked him a lot. He was much older than me.’

  ‘And much more married.’

  ‘How did you guess?’ she asked.

  ‘You dumped him for a security guard.’

  She leaned over and punched him in the arm. ‘Don’t be a snob, penniless wildlife dude.’

  ‘Ow!’

  ‘Maybe I dumped him because he was an old man, though probably younger than you.’

  He looked to her. ‘Don’t be ageist.’

  ‘Nah, you’re right. I didn’t leave him because he was old – my dad’s actually twenty years older than my mom – I left him because he was married. He lied to me. I flew up to Johannesburg one time, to surprise him, made an appointment to see him using a fake name, and when I showed up at the investment bank at Melrose Arch he was kissing his wife goodbye on the street outside; they’d just come back from lunch.’

  ‘Ouch.’

  ‘Yip, double ouch.’

  Suddenly Mike pulled over and turned off the engine.

  ‘What is it?’ Nia asked. She hadn’t seen anything.

  He held up a hand. ‘Sounded like a burst of gunfire.’

  ‘I couldn’t hear anything over the noise of this Land Rover’s engine.’

  Mike put a finger to his lips, then opened his door and got out. He stood, mouth open, and looked around into the darkness. Nia got out and joined him.

  Mike got back into the Land Rover and turned on his satellite navigation device. Nia returned to the passenger seat. ‘Pass me the map, please.’

  ‘Sure.’

  When the sat nav picked up signal he used it to work out his exact location, then cross-referenced it with the map of Mkhuze Game Reserve. Nia watched as he ran his finger in a line from the camping ground, where the park warden said the fugitive children had been reported by the couple with the caravan, through their current location on the road.

  ‘He’s heading to kuMasinga.’

  ‘That sounds familiar. But I’ve only been to this park a couple of times.’ Nia had last been there with her parents a few years ago when they had returned to South Africa on a holiday to spend time with her.

  ‘It’s the most popular viewing hide in the park.’

  ‘Oh, right, the one on the stilts that hangs over the waterhole.’ She remembered glimpsing a black rhino there, the first she’d ever seen.

  ‘Yes, that’s the one. I’ll radio headquarters.’

  ‘They’re going there for shelter?’ Nia asked.

  ‘I’d say so; it’s a good place for them to spend the night, and safer than sleeping in the bush, but they’d need to be clear of the place by shortly after dawn, when the first tourists on morning game drives make a beeline for the hide.’

  ‘You said this Themba was a car thief before he went straight?’

  Mike nodded.

  ‘Might be a good place for him to find a new set of wheels, once the tourists are in the hide.’

  ‘Good thinking. People often leave their vehicles unlocked at places like that. Let’s go.’

  Nia felt the adrenaline pulsing through her veins as Mike took off, at speed. The excitement of the chase dispelled her tiredness, and the ache in her head and ribs had dulled to a throb.

  Mike took his phone out of his pocket and handed it to Nia. ‘Could you please call the park warden? His name�
��s Jonas. His number’s the last one I dialled. Tell him where we’re heading.’

  She did as he asked and relayed Jonas’s message, that he would send his patrol, accompanied by the police detective coordinating the search, to the hide. ‘Jonas says it sounds like we’re closer, so he told you to be careful, as we’ll probably get there first. He’s asking if you want to wait for back-up.’

  ‘Tell him no thanks,’ Mike said, focusing on the road ahead as he sped through the park. The risk of them hitting a nocturnal animal was high. ‘I know the kid and I want to approach him first if we find him.’

  ‘OK.’ Nia relayed the message and ended the call.

  They headed north, then made a tight turn back to the southeast when they were almost at the main Mantuma rest camp. The Land Rover roared through the night and Mike had to brake hard to miss a spotted hyena. ‘I hate driving this fast after dark in the bush.’

  She gripped the dashboard in front of her. She’d done some crazy low-level flying sometimes, pursuing car thieves, but she thought this was perhaps scarier. Nia loved the thrill of the chase. It was the same in the relationships she’d had in her life; she’d been most interested, most stimulated in the early courtship stages.

  She was intrigued by Mike Dunn. He was university educated, but he’d turned his back on academia and teaching and spent his life living on a pittance in the bush. She admired his passion, if not his business sense. Still, she mused, opportunities for a middle-aged white zoologist in South Africa would be pretty limited. He was doing what he loved for the love of it and not for money, and in that respect, despite their age difference, they were very much alike.

  ‘You should stay in the car when we get to the hide.’

  ‘No. I’m coming with you.’

  ‘Themba knows me, but he’s armed and he’ll be jumpy. He’s been on the run a while now and he’ll be tired, confused. Just stay behind me.’