Red Earth

by Tony Park

  The bullets shattered his forearm and wrist, but Boyd had just enough strength left in his dying body to rotate the wheel. The spark leapt from the flint and Boyd tossed the ignited lighter towards the open door of his gas oven.

  Boyd’s house exploded.

  Chapter 27

  Themba heard a loud thump and walked around to the front of Pete’s farmhouse. He saw a black and orange fireball roll up into the blue sky from Boyd’s house.

  Lerato came to his side, the baby on her hip. ‘What was that?’

  ‘The doctor, Boyd, he is dead.’

  Lerato sniffed. ‘This has to end.’

  ‘Come, back to the car.’

  Pete the farmer was not at home; his house was closed and locked. They had found an old Mercedes parked in a carport at the rear, and Themba had been searching for a spare key in the places he knew people most often hid them, to no avail, when they had heard the explosion.

  They went back around to the carport. It seemed Pete had been doing some work at some stage on the Mercedes, as there was a tool box sitting on the concrete slab. Themba took out a screwdriver and a pair of pliers, then looked around him, on the ground.

  He found half a house brick, picked it up and smashed in the window of the front passenger’s side door. Lerato winced at the sound and the baby began to cry.

  He opened the door and climbed in then, painfully, stretched across and unlocked the driver’s side. ‘Get in, and put the baby in the back.’

  Lerato bundled him in the wrap and lay him on the seat. She did her best to restrain him with a seatbelt but he was already wriggling, trying to get out of his confinement. ‘What are we going to do; we don’t have a key.’

  ‘I can’t do this with one hand.’ He handed her the screwdriver and the pliers.

  ‘What am I supposed to do with these?’

  Themba felt his head spin, and knew it was the loss of blood. He forced himself to concentrate. ‘Put the screwdriver into the gap in the panel under the dashboard and push it down.’

  Lerato tentatively probed the join in the fascia. Themba reached over, gasping in pain, and rammed the screwdriver home. ‘Push down, as hard as you can.’ The lower panel snapped away from its securing screws. ‘Now pull out all those wires.’

  He saw the three bundles in her hand, one for the lights and indicators on one side of the steering column, another for the window wipers and washer, and the third, most important, that led to the battery, the ignition switch and the starter motor.

  Themba reached across, biting down against the pain of yet more movement, and touched the relevant wires. ‘These two are for the battery. Pull them out and strip a couple of centimetres of insulation from each end.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Use the pliers, cut a little bit and pull off the plastic stuff.’

  ‘OK.’

  Themba looked out the car window. Smoke was still billowing over Boyd’s place. Dogs were barking somewhere and further away Boyd’s zebra was braying. Lerato looked up at the sound of a gunshot. ‘Hurry,’ Themba urged.

  She went back to her work, and after a couple of attempts the metal wires at the end of each cable shone bright.

  ‘Now twist them together.’ As the wires connected the dashboard instruments flashed on, off, then on again. They had power. ‘Good.’

  ‘What next?’

  ‘You have to strip the starter wire,’ he tapped it, ‘but be careful, it’s live now that we’ve connected the battery.’

  Lerato cut into the insulation, but the metal of the tool hit the wires within and it sparked. She shrieked and dropped the pliers. ‘Ouch!’

  ‘It won’t kill you,’ he said, in frustration.

  ‘No, but it hurt, Themba.’

  ‘A bullet will hurt much more, trust me, I know.’

  She looked at him, wiped her eyes and picked up the wire again. Being more careful, she gently nicked the insulation and pulled it free.

  ‘Great work,’ he said.

  ‘And now?’

  ‘Another scary bit. You have to touch the bare end of that wire to the battery wires. It will spark, but hopefully the car will start.’

  Lerato drew a deep breath, then tentatively touched the two ends of bare copper together.

  ‘Aah!’ The wires sparked and the starter buzzed. The engine almost caught, but Lerato dropped the cables. ‘I can’t.’

  ‘You can.’ He reached over to her and grabbed one of her hands with his good one. ‘You can do anything, Lerato. I think I love you.’

  She looked at him and blinked. ‘You do?’

  He nodded.

  She picked up the wires again, took a deep breath, closed her eyes and touched the bare ends together. Sparks flew and the engine turned over and caught.

  ‘Push the accelerator, rev it!’

  Lerato looked down and pressed her foot hard to the floor. The old diesel engine coughed a couple of puffs of black smoke then roared. Lerato looked down between them. ‘This car is automatic, but where’s the gear stick on this thing?’

  ‘On the column.’ Themba touched it and Lerato peered through the steering wheel, selected reverse and accelerated. They leapt backwards out of the carport and she turned and braked. ‘Hurry.’

  ‘I am hurrying. I’m trying to find “D”, for Drive.’

  ‘Hassan!’ a high-pitched voice called. They looked around.

  The baby pulled himself to his feet on the back seat and was staring out the back window.

  Themba saw the woman with the blonde hair. Her police uniform looked blackened in places and her face was smudged. She held a pistol loose by her side. She called the name again and the baby screamed.

  ‘It’s his mother,’ Themba said.

  Lerato looked to him. She had found the right gear. ‘What do we do?’

  As crazy as all of this had been, the child belonged to this woman. ‘Maybe we should just leave him.’

  The woman was walking towards them, and as her strides quickened to a jog she brought up her pistol to the ready position.

  ‘She won’t shoot at us with her baby standing there looking out. She can’t take the risk.’

  They both kept watch, heads craned, looking over their shoulders, not knowing what to do. About fifty metres short of them the woman stopped. The baby waved his little fists at his mother and squealed excitedly.

  ‘Get out of the car and put your hands up, both of you,’ the woman called.

  Themba and Lerato looked at each other again. ‘She’s going to shoot us as soon as we get out,’ Lerato said.

  He knew she was right. Themba leaned between the two front seats and reached for the handle of the rear door on Lerato’s side.

  ‘Are you going to push him out?’ she asked.

  He hated the thought of the child ending up with this madwoman, even if she was his mother. ‘I won’t stand by and let you get hurt, Lerato. You mean too much to me.’

  Lerato glanced in the rear view mirror. ‘She’s walking, coming closer!’

  Themba hooked a finger around the door handle and just as he was about to pull it open the rear window shattered into a thousand glittering fragments and cascaded down over the child, Hassan.

  *

  Nia drove them both in her Golf, so fast that Mike had a hand braced on the dashboard in front of him. The rev counter was red-lining as she changed gear, and she hit one-eighty.

  Mike pointed through the windscreen. ‘Smoke, over Boyd’s farmhouse.’

  ‘I see it. Where’s the turnoff to his neighbour’s place?’

  ‘Up ahead. Left, one hundred metres.’

  Nia drifted into the turn, geared down and was just about to accelerate up the driveway when an old model white Mercedes sedan came around the bend in front of her. She jinked left, braked hard and skidded to a halt in the grass. />
  ‘It’s them,’ Mike said.

  The Mercedes bumped and juddered up to them. ‘Rear tyre’s shredded.’

  They got out and Nia drew Banger’s pistol. Mike ran to the other car.

  ‘The woman, she’s here,’ Lerato shrieked. ‘She tried to kill us – and her own baby.’

  ‘Get in the Golf,’ Nia said. She raised the gun and cupped her left hand under her right, as Banger had taught her. ‘Get them inside, Mike.’

  Mike scooped up the baby from the back seat. The child was screaming and crying, and Mike passed him to Lerato, who was sliding into the cramped rear of the little Volkswagen. Mike then went to Themba, who looked unsteady on his feet, and, wrapping an arm around him, led him to Nia’s car.

  Nia glimpsed movement on the other side of a hedge that lined the road halfway up to Boyd’s neighbour’s house. She squeezed the trigger and the pistol jumped twice in her hands.

  ‘Let’s go,’ Mike said.

  Nia fired again, and as she got into the driver’s seat she heard gunshots. Something clanged into her car. She planted her foot and dropped the clutch. The Golf fish-tailed on the grass and she aimed for the front gate. In her mirror she saw the woman firing at her, but they were more than a hundred metres from her, at extreme range. All the same she heard another bullet strike.

  ‘Everyone all right?’ Mike asked into the back.

  Over the noise of the baby’s crying Themba said, ‘Yes.’

  Nia didn’t take her eyes off the road at the speed she was attaining. ‘Lerato?’

  ‘She’s fine,’ Mike said.

  Nia risked another glance in the mirror and saw that the girl had her face buried in the baby’s chest, as she alternately kissed the infant and sobbed.

  Nia ran a hand through her short hair. ‘Where to? Back to the hotel?’

  Mike rubbed his chin, thinking. ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’ she asked.

  ‘I could hear Boyd’s conversation over the phone before he died. They knew John Buttenshaw flew us, and it sounded like they got to him.’

  ‘Oh no,’ Nia drew a sharp breath. Her heart almost stopped with fear for John and the thought they had brought harm to him. ‘How did they know?’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe someone’s tracing our phone conversations, yours and mine. Could be a cop feeding information to Suzanne. If so, they’ll know I was at the Oyster Box. We need to change direction, head north.’

  ‘Fly or drive?’

  ‘Drive. Everyone, the Americans, the cops, the bad guys, if there are any still alive other than Suzanne Fessey, knows where you work.’

  Nia nodded. ‘OK, so where in the north are we headed?’

  ‘Zimbabwe.’

  Nia raised her eyebrows. ‘Seriously?’

  Mike looked to the kids in the back again. ‘I take it neither of you have passports?’

  ‘No,’ Themba said.

  Lerato sniffed. ‘Me either. My dad was about to get me one.’ Mentioning her father’s name seemed to bring on another wave of crying.

  ‘That’s fine, we’ll work around it.’ Mike turned to Nia. ‘You want me to drive?’

  ‘No, you sleep. I’ll go around Swaziland so we don’t have to cross any borders; I’ll wake you in few hours when we get to the N4, and you can drive from there.’

  Mike took out his phone and started tapping the keyboard on the screen.

  ‘Who are you messaging?’

  ‘Banks, the CIA guy.’

  ‘You’re not telling him where we’re going?’

  Mike shook his head. ‘I’m letting him know where Suzanne is right now – I told him I would. However, I doubt she’ll still be there by the time the Americans arrive. Banks will tell the cops as well.’ He pressed send.

  When the message was gone Mike searched his contacts on his phone, selected one and held the phone to his ear.

  ‘Who are you calling now?’ Nia asked.

  ‘A friend of mine in Zimbabwe. Last call, in case we’re being traced.’

  ‘Who is it?’ she asked.

  ‘A guy called Shane Castle. He’s a one-man army, and he’s got some heavily armed friends.’

  *

  Just after dawn they reached Phalaborwa, a mining town and the site of an entrance to the Kruger National Park, about halfway up the reserve’s western boundary. Nia opened her eyes, blinked a couple of times, yawned and checked her watch as they pulled up outside the town’s Spur restaurant.

  ‘Get out and take a break,’ Mike suggested. ‘I’ll go in and get takeaway, that way people won’t remember us. We’re a pretty memorable crew.’

  They gave him orders for toasted sandwiches, chips, Cokes and coffees. Mike went in and ordered the food, then he waited outside the restaurant, keeping an eye on the car while the others were stretching their legs. He went back inside, collected the order and brought it out to them.

  ‘We should shop, get some food for the road,’ Mike said. ‘There’s a Spar just before the Kruger gate. We’ll load up there and drive through the park.’

  ‘Aren’t we better off staying on the main road?’ Nia asked.

  She seemed to like to challenge everything. He tried not to resent it, reasoning that it was just the way she was: strong, independent, questioning. ‘The Americans will convince the South African police to set up roadblocks on the N1 and other roads heading north, once they work out we haven’t gone to Durban.’

  ‘And they won’t expect us to be tootling slowly through the Kruger Park.’

  He nodded as he pulled up at the gate office.

  ‘Clever.’

  Her saying that pleased him. He’d been thinking about her. When he had received Boyd’s call for help, Mike had felt guilty that he and Nia had been having sex while the children were facing danger. Even worse was the sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach when he had heard the explosion on Boyd’s phone and seen the pall of smoke still rising from the veterinarian’s home.

  Now he felt numb. He wondered if Nia was also feeling as mixed up as he was. Their flight from danger had been all consuming, the rush to get away sucking out all other feelings from his mind and body. He’d felt a moment of victory, turning the tables on Paulsen in Mkhuze, but then Mike had almost died. Nia had saved him.

  They ate their toasted sandwiches and takeaway chips standing around the car, then climbed back into the Golf. On impulse Mike reached over to Nia and squeezed her hand. She returned the gesture and, just for an instant, he felt warmth in his heart. She let go of him. ‘We should go.’

  He drove towards the national park and turned right into the car park of the Kruger Park Spar supermarket. ‘We need fuel,’ he said.

  ‘You go across the road to the service station,’ Nia said, pointing to the garage, ‘and Lerato and I will shop.’

  ‘Yes, ma’am,’ Mike said.

  He drove to the garage, and while the attendant filled the tank he and Themba got out and leaned against the car.

  ‘I’m sorry you had to get involved with this, Mr Mike,’ Themba said.

  ‘You can call me just Mike, after what we’ve all been through.’ Mike looked through the window into the car. The baby was asleep on the back seat. Mike fixed Themba with a stare. ‘Tell me you did nothing wrong.’

  Themba blinked twice. ‘It was all going fine, too fine. I was doing well at school, I was getting to know Lerato, I was getting good marks. It couldn’t last.’

  ‘What couldn’t?’

  ‘I’m cursed, Mr … Mike. I am a criminal. I get what I deserve.’

  Mike took hold of his arm. ‘You’re not. I saw something in you, Themba. You’re a victim of circumstances.’

  Themba looked at the ground. ‘You once told me I couldn’t use that as an excuse.’

  ‘You told me in the car what happened, how Joseph forced you to hel
p him at gunpoint. I couldn’t foresee something like that, but it’s an excuse. Themba, listen to me, I need you to be a man, for the girls, for all of us. You’ve proved that you can do that, but I need you to stay strong.’

  Themba looked up and Mike held out his hand. They shook and Mike drew Themba to him, holding him close. The service station attendant hovered nearby, so Mike let Themba go, ignored the man’s puzzled look, and paid for the fuel.

  It was less than a kilometre to the entry gate to the Kruger National Park. When they reached it, Mike got out and went towards the reception office. A security guard, yawning from the early hour, intercepted him and handed him a form and Mike took it back to the car.

  ‘We need everyone’s names and ID numbers.’

  ‘Is that wise?’ Nia asked.

  Mike was tired, like the guard. She was right. He had an idea. ‘Let’s all pretend we’re foreigners. Pick a name and a country, not African, and make up a passport number. We’ll pay the overseas rate; the parks people won’t bother asking for passports if we’re paying the maximum entry fee to Kruger. If they ask I’ll tell them we left our passports at our hotel.’

  They filled out the form and Mike took it to the office, where the man behind the desk tapped the names into his computer. Mike looked out the window. There was a police officer checking a car leaving the park; the man glanced at him and went back to his task. Police checks were not uncommon at the Kruger Park gates due to rhino poaching in the park.

  Mike paid the entry fee in cash, not wanting to leave a paper trail that the Americans or South African police might pick up on. He knew the Kruger Park was the busiest of all of South Africa’s national parks, even outside of school holidays. ‘Do you have any accommodation in the park between here and Punda Maria?’

  The man tapped his computer keyboard and ran his finger down the screen. ‘Eish, we are always very full. I only have a three-bedroom bungalow at Shimuwini. It’s a bushveld camp, and has no shop or Eskom electricity.’

  Mike would have liked to travel further, but Themba needed more bed rest and the others were tired. ‘I’ll take it.’

  He paid, went back to the car, got in and started up. They drove to the boom gate, where a national parks security officer checked their permit and asked if they had any firearms. Mike laughed off the question. ‘Of course not.’