by David Alric
‘I like it! The twins from hell – we’ll have that carved on our gravestones eh, Fred?’
Meanwhile Mgosa was speaking to the boy who then held out a note. Sid opened it and read it slowly, pointing at each word with his finger as he did so.
I’m looking for Sid and Fred. I have news of Chopper and Sam and a proposition to put to you. If you agree to meet me send this note back with a tick (the professor had guessed, correctly, that Sid’s reading skills probably exceeded his writing ability) and the boy will return with me tomorrow.
Professor Kuficha.
P.S. Lots of money involved
Sid handed the note to Fred, then decided it would probably be quicker to tell him what it said, especially as Fred was holding it upside down. When he had finished he looked at Fred.
‘Wotcha think?’
‘Could be a trap by the cops,’ said Fred.
‘Yeah, but how would they know about Chopper and Sam – ’specially as Sam got eaten by them ’gators?’ Fred thought about this and then nodded. Sid turned back to Mgosa.
‘What do you guys think?’
‘Well, the name is probably false, boss – it means ‘unseen one’ in Swahili. The boy swears it’s nothing to do with the police and the guy who sent him is splashing money around the village like there’s no tomorrow. I’d say it’s worth a chance. We’ll set an ambush and if it’s the cops we’ll wipe them out.’
‘OK,’ said Sid. ‘Give the kid some food.’ He ticked the note and the boy, looking greatly relieved, trotted off with Mgosa to have some supper before his hazardous journey back through the African night.
‘On second thoughts,’ Sid called after them, ‘send him in the morning – he’s probably more likely to make it.’
At the crack of dawn the boy disappeared, to return three hours later with the Professor who had by now acquired an automatic pistol.
He shook hands with Sid and Fred and they sat down with bottles of beer. The Professor started by telling them how he had formed a close working relationship with Chopper and Sam to make a great deal of money from diamonds.
‘But Sam’s dead. He was eaten by ‘gators in the jungle,’ said Sid.
‘No, apparently he escaped,’ said Luke, ‘and he managed to spring Chopper and me from jail. I was in jail for murdering a university colleague who was becoming something of a nuisance, and Chopper and I hit it off immediately’.
Sid and Fred leaned forward. They were getting more interested by the moment. The Professor had risen enormously in their estimation by being a murderer and a jailbird.
‘Where d’you find these diamon’s?’ asked Sid. The professor gave a little smile.
‘Oh, we don’t find them — we make them!’ The twins’ eyes bulged. ‘The science is immensely complex,’ he explained, ‘but, basically I have invented a technique for creating genuine diamonds of any size from low-grade diamond ore thought to be commercially useless. Unfortunately…’ He paused for dramatic effect, then continued, putting on a suitably grave expression, ‘…I have some very bad news for you both. Your poor brothers died in a shoot-out with the police. I nursed Chopper on his death bed and his dying wish was that I should contact you two and share with you the benefits of my invention; the benefits that Chopper would never himself be able to enjoy.’ He paused once more, and wiped a tear from his eye. Then he cleared his throat and continued.
‘I have good information that the kind of ore that yields the best diamonds using my process is found in Africa. Obviously the process is illegal as it will make us into millionaires while undercutting the official world market in diamonds. I will need your help in extracting the ore and in protecting me from, let’s say, unfriendly authorities and greedy neighbours. In return I will split the proceeds of the operation with you fifty–fifty.’ He caught the avaricious glance that the brothers exchanged and knew he was succeeding in his plan.
‘There’s just one snag,’ he said. He knew already that it wasn’t a snag, for the large banknote which he had pressed on the henchman who had first greeted him that morning had yielded valuable information about the brothers’ conversation of the previous night.
‘This snag is that you, gentlemen, will need to move your camp to a different location. One that’s some way distant. Actually, about a thousand miles away, for that’s where the diamond-bearing shale exists.’ He paused and took a long draught of beer. ‘Well, there it is boys. Are you on board for a few million or not?’
The brothers almost fell over in their eagerness to be the first to shake Luke by the hand.
‘OK, now I’m going to return to Nairobi and hire a couple of big trucks. I’ll be back to pick you up and any of your…,’ he looked across at the motley group of ruffians eating breakfast, ‘… hmm, ‘gentleman associates that you wish to accompany us. Then I’ll kill the driver of the second truck – we don’t want to leave any loose ends.’
Sid looked at him with renewed respect. This man had the same ruthless streak that he had so admired in his elder brother Chopper.
‘We’ll take the ones we trust,’ he said quietly, ‘ – there’ll be about eight of us in all. The other four can share a spot in the bushes with your spare driver.’
They shook hands and the Professor left with the boy.
Two days later two ex-army trucks roared southwest towards Serengeti and the southern shores of Lake Victoria on the first stages of their long drive to the Congo. The lorries were ten-ton vehicles with military camouflage markings covering their metal front cabs and canvas-covered bodies. Moments after the vehicles had left the camp, vultures began to circle down to investigate something they obviously found very interesting in a hollow in the surrounding bush.
Back in Nairobi Inspector Kukamata of the Wild Life Service Office, examined the latest poaching reports. They were nothing short of appalling. Three more rhino corpses and five elephants had been found within a week, all with horns and tusks hacked out and their carcasses left for the hyenas, vultures and jackals. And every report seemed to implicate the infamous Ndugu Shetani – the twins from hell. It was time to act. The World Wildlife Fund, various UN agencies and, most important of all, the Minister for Tourism, would all be breathing down his neck within days if he didn’t do something. He picked up the phone.
‘Get me aerial surveillance on the other line,’ he snapped at an assistant as he started to dial the head ranger at the Masai Mara National Park.
After a dusty and bumpy ride the trucks eventually left Kenya and crossed into Tanzania.
‘We’re goin’ through the Serengeti,’ said Sid to the professor who was sitting next to him in the front cab of the leading truck. ‘It’s by far the quickest way. There’s a chance of meetin’ a park ranger, but if we do we’ll just waste ‘im.’ He pointed to a well-worn map on his knees. ‘Then we go south of Lake Victoria and into Burundi – or Rwanda – I ain’t sure yet which route will give us the least aggro at the border. Then it’s west into the middle of the Congo. It’ll take days on these roads – weeks if it rains – so you got plenny of time to decide where our little diamond mine’s goin’ to be.’ As they crossed the border into Tanzania along a disused forest track a small plane could be heard. It was clearly looking for something, for it circled as it gradually moved southwest and eventually disappeared. Sid had stopped the trucks in the forest where they were invisible from the air.
‘Rangers call in a plane sometimes,’ he said, ‘when they think the poachin’s gettin’ out of hand. Good job we’re movin’ out.’
Soon the trucks were rolling across the great plains of the Serengeti. The immense herds of game and breathtaking views were of no interest whatsoever to the men in the trucks whose thoughts were only on the fortunes they intended to make. As they neared the western edge of the reserve Sid suddenly pointed ahead.
‘Look!’ Luke peered in the direction he indicated and there, beside a large scree of boulders, were two children, a boy and a girl of about ten. They were standing stock still and
at first Luke thought they were playing some kind of game. Then he saw what held the children transfixed. Directly in front of them, about thirty yards away, a pride of lions lay dozing under some bushes. Even as Luke watched, the children began to walk slowly backwards towards the bank of rocks, never taking their gaze off the predators. Then, a lion cub which had been playing with its litter-mates suddenly saw the children and bounded towards them with a yelp. The lioness nearest to them lazily opened one eye then immediately opened both wide and sprang into the crouching position so familiar to anyone who has watched a domestic cat stalking a bird. The children clutched each other in terror. Sid immediately put the truck in gear and drove it between the lioness and the children. The cub ran back to its mother as the truck approached and Luke opened his door and pulled the children in.
‘Thank you, thank you!’ said the children, sobbing with fear and relief.
‘There, you’ll be safe now,’ said the Professor who, when it suited him, could be all kindness and charm. ‘Now, where are your parents?’ he continued. The boy simply gesticulated back across the rocky hill; he seemed speechless from shock.
‘The other side of that little hill,’ said the girl, her face white as a sheet and her voice trembling. ‘But it’s not our parents. We’re on a tour.The guide is giving them lunch.’
As she spoke the professor saw, far away on the horizon behind her, the sun glinting on the fuselage of a plane as it banked and tilted in its endless search. He thought for a long moment then, after a meaningful glance at Sid, turned back to the children.
‘There’s a bit of a problem. As you see this road leads away from the rocks and we can’t drive across the ridge – it’s too steep. We can’t walk across because of the lions, so you’d best stay with us until we can get in touch with your group. What are your names?’
‘I’m Ben Sharp and she’s my cousin, Sarah Bonaventure,’ said Ben.
‘OK,’ said the professor. ‘We’ll get on the radio and call up the park rangers.’ He turned and winked at Sid – who looked at him blankly.
‘We’ll call the rangers won’t we?’ repeated the Professor giving a little cough and an even more exaggerated wink.
‘Oh yeah, the rangers – of course!’ said Sid as comprehension dawned. He picked up a radio transmitter and reported that the children were safe and that they would take them to the nearest settlement – but neither of the children saw that the equipment was switched off.
‘Now there’s just one more thing,’ said the Professor. ‘A trick I’ve learned after years of grappling with wild animals in the bush’.
The children stared wide-eyed at him – they’d never met a real hunter before.
‘If you each give me a bit of clothing – something quite large like a top is best. Oh, and your hats; I’ll leave them here. The lions already have your scent so if we leave something behind they’ll think you’re still nearby and it’ll stop them following us to the next camp.’ The children had no idea that this was the Professor’s first ever trip to the African bush and that he had never seen a wild lion before in his life, and they were impressed with his fake bush-lore; the last thing they wanted was lions chasing them. They hurriedly slipped off their tops and gave them to the Professor.
‘Great,’ he said. Then, anxious to reassure Sarah who had turned her back to him, he added: ‘Don’t worry about your clothes. We’ve got plenty of stuff on board; we’ll patch you up with a couple of our smallest bush-shirts and some makeshift hats until we reach civilization.’ He turned and asked the men in the back to pass some clothes through, then jumped down and went to the back of the truck, out of sight of the children. He tore Sarah’s top into pieces and scattered the fragments among the rocks. He made holes in Ben’s shirt and rubbed it with dirt and sand. He then threw it as far as he could in the direction of the pride of lions and returned to the truck.
Nobody from the tour group had yet appeared over the rocks and, as Sid started up and drove away from the rocky ridge as fast as the road would allow, the professor set about winning the confidence of the children. He told them tales of his heroic adventures prospecting for diamonds in South America and about being kidnapped by villains who had eventually been eaten by wild animals. Ben was fascinated by the scars on his balding head.
‘Were you attacked by wild animals too?’ he asked. ‘Is that what happened to your head?’
‘Sort of,’ Luke replied. ‘As I was walking towards a plane I was attacked by a hawk who stole my pistol and then a tiger started to stalk me. As I backed away from it I walked into a rotating propeller and that’s how I got my scars.’
‘Wow!’ said Ben. Sarah looked sceptical.
‘I thought they didn’t have tigers in South America,’ she said.
‘Well,’ said the professor smoothly, ‘I didn’t realise you knew so much about animals; I was just using the term to indicate a big cat. The accident affected my memory,’ he added hurriedly, ‘and it may have been a leopard or jaguar or something.’
‘What an interesting man,’ said Ben later when they stopped briefly for a comfort break.
‘Ye ..es,’ said Sarah slowly. ‘It’s a bit funny though, for someone who’s spent his life hunting animals and prospecting in the wilderness to make a mistake about a tiger.’
‘But he lost his memory,’ said Ben. ‘He said he was unconscious for days.’
‘Yeah, I suppose so,’ Sarah replied but she still looked doubtful.
Sid’s poaching experiences meant that he knew every track and road in the locality and they managed to leave the Serengeti by a remote route which avoided any encounters with rangers or official check points. Once out in the remote bushland to the south of Lake Victoria they stopped and set up camp. The Professor suggested that Fred set off to find fresh meat for their meal and that the children might want to accompany him. Ben was very excited at the prospect of going on a hunt, even though his request for a gun was politely refused. Sarah wasn’t so sure about it but didn’t want to be separated from Ben, so off they went with a somewhat bewildered Fred who wasn’t heavily into child care.
When they had gone Sid turned to the Professor.
‘What the hell’s goin’ on?’ he snarled truculently. ‘We can’t get saddled wiv a couple of snotty kids!’
‘Wait a moment and think,’ said the Professor calmly. He pointed to the distant glint of another search plane on the horizon. ‘They’re looking for something and it’s probably us. I don’t know how much game you’ve killed recently but I do know from the records I saw in Nairobi that the authorities are on to you’.
‘What records?’ exclaimed Sid.
‘You don’t seriously think I would risk my life coming out here to join you without checking up on you first, do you?’ Luke replied. ‘I know a great deal about you – including the fact that you know how to survive out here and don’t let anyone mess with you; you’re just the guys I need.’ Sid, placated by the compliment, returned to the discussion about the children.
‘Yeah, whatever. But even if they are lookin’ for us, so what? The kids can’t help us in a shoot-out’.
‘They certainly can,’ said Luke. ‘If we get caught in a police trap we can use them as hostages. Nobody will dare to attack us while we’ve got two kids with us. It would kill the tourist trade stone dead. They’ll negotiate to get the kids back and our deal will be a free passage to Burundi. They’ll be glad to get rid of us’.
‘Yeah… but …,’ Sid’s contorted face reflected the mental effort he was going through, ‘… but won’t they chase us even more if they think we’ve kidnapped the kids?’
‘Of course they would if they knew,’ said Luke, ‘but remember nobody has seen us yet. When the kids’ tour group look for them they’ll find some torn clothes, a couple of hats and a pride of lions and it’ll just be another tragic case of children devoured by wild animals.’
Sid fell silent for a moment. The Professor’s logic was undeniable.
‘But what’ll we
tell the kids – and what’ll we do with ’em when we’re safe in the Congo?’
‘Leave the first of those problems to me,’ said Luke. ‘In fact,’ he added grimly after a moment’s reflection, ‘leave the second to me as well.’
Sarah and Ben were now enjoying themselves. The rangers would soon appear and return them to the others and, though they expected to get told off for having wandered away, no harm would be done. In the meantime they were having real excitement, not just sitting in a tour truck with a bunch of old fogeys with cameras, but crawling along the ground downwind of a herd of Thomson’s gazelles. Fred had spotted the antelopes soon after they left the camp and had motioned the children to the ground with his finger to his lips.
‘Don’t worry,’ he whispered hoarsely in Ben’s ear. ‘If they’re grazing calmly there can’t be any big cats around.’ Ben wondered how, in that case, the predators ever caught anything but didn’t like to say so to Fred. Soon Fred slowly raised his rifle and motioned to the children to cover their ears. Even though they did so, the crash of the rifle at close quarters was terrifying and both children were ashen-faced as they hurried after Fred to retrieve the carcass of a young buck. They watched in fascinated horror as he pulled an enormous knife from his belt and eviscerated the animal.
‘Now back to camp. We gotta move quickly,’ he said, nodding at the pile of steaming guts on the ground. ‘The hyenas’ll smell this stuff in no time.’ He tied the feet of the animal together and slung it on his rifle, holding the barrel himself and giving Ben the butt to carry.
Sarah was very upset by the whole scene.
‘Isn’t it wrong to kill animals?’ she asked tentatively, worried about Fred’s possible response. He just laughed.
‘It may be wrong or it may be right but it’s how we eat out here. Anyway, there’s plenty of ‘em around and they don’t belong to nobody so what’s the harm. An’ …,’ he added, as if by way of justification, ‘… an’ anyway, I dun plenty of wrong things; that’s why I been in the slammer innit?’
