Murder on Safari

by Peter Riva

  “Who was it?”

  “Simon, the raptor fellow from the Parks Service.”

  “Simon Thompson? Bloody Christ, how’d the bugger do that? And why do a bloody swan dive when he’s using my damn vehicles?” Debbie was known to swear a lot, it suited her hard crust.

  “Your sympathy is underwhelming. He died, that’s enough of a problem for any of us—and for poor Simon. Why that causes this inspector to jack-boot all around is beyond me.”

  “Why? Why, you bloody wanker? Because Simon was a government man, you idiot. It should have been called in to the police, not bloody Chief Methenge.”

  The stooge spoke up, “It is what I wanted, what I ordered, they would not let me . . .”

  Heep stepped forward, feeling Pero had a hard enough day, and stared Debbie and the stooge down, “Look, back off will you two? Chief Methenge called the police, as you can see. Pero made all necessary arrangements with the Chief for the return of the body to Nairobi. There is no police matter to investigate. End of story.”

  “Smooth, you and your Yank, bloody smooth. You think by going to the Chief you’re going to go around this guy here?” She pointed. “Up here, he’s god, if he wants to be, he can call in the military, the Chief can’t. You better be prepared to wait a long time. And don’t make the mistake of tipping him. Last couple who did that, after they were charged with getting out of their Land Rover with no permit to do so inside the Park, spent five days in his jail.” She pointed down the airstrip to a mud hut with a soldier sitting under the roof overhang in the shade. As the roof was black metal, it would be, easily, one hundred and twenty degrees in there.

  Pero patted Heep on the shoulder and took over addressing Debbie, “Thanks for the advice. Let’s see if the Chief can sort this out.”

  “Oh, and how do you expect to contact him? There is no way he,” she motioned to the inspector, “will allow that.”

  “I owe the Chief some money. He’s coming here to collect it. Right about now . . .” Pero turned a little to his left to look past the dust airstrip. Debbie turned right to see what Pero was focused on. A distant cloud was coming closer from downwind, from back the way they had come.

  “Oh Christ, this’ll be bloody interesting.” And with that, Debbie sat on her haunches, dog by her side and prepared to wait. In parts of Africa, squatting like this means you are out of the action, if there was to be any. It’s a statement of neutrality, since it is hard to take an offensive posture squatting down. The inspector, ten yards away, noted her position and followed her line of sight. He crooked his finger and called Pero over. Not the government stooge, just Pero alone.

  He started yelling when Pero got close enough for spit to drop on his boots.

  The gist of his argument, and Pero must admit it was sound, was that he should have been appraised before the Chief was. Pero readily agreed. Pero plead previous experience with the Chief and none with him, which was a pity Pero assured him. Mollified, a bit, he asked all the standard questions: why were they here, what was their business, where were their papers (which he was holding already), where were they going, and so on. It was routine. He knew it and so did Pero, but Pero played along, pretending to be frightened. It wasn’t that hard.

  Then, knowing the local pecking order was about to be sorted out for real with the pending arrival of the Chief, he asked two more questions. Taking Pero’s sleeve and turning him away from his crew, he asked: “Why did you go back up the Plateau after the man died?” Pero explained the need for the cut-away, continuity, shot from below. He nodded. “Why did you race away when you were through and where is the, what do you call it,” he rifled through the sheaf of papers, their in-coming manifest, “hang glider—glider—a small plane, no?”

  Pero decided to stick to the story they all knew. Pero had even told the Park guards to tell the Chief on the radio as they drove the last two miles, to make sure the word would leak out. All of East Africa is like a sieve for gossip when it comes to foreigners. “We saw cars approaching, very fast. They could have been shufti like before. I had crashed the hang glider on landing, it’s wrecked, but insured, so we left it there, and, well look, I was frightened, so we drove straight here as fast as we could.”

  “Did you stop at all?” It was a loaded question, but Pero had experience here from years of traveling the world. These rural officials had little imagination, they were trained to ask simple questions to which they already had answers. Pero had seen it dozens of times over the years. Think you’re smarter than they are and they’ll trip you up, hold you for the slightest thing on the principle that if you would lie about something small, there’s a bigger lie they can discover. It’s not bad logic, really, Pero thought.

  “We only stopped once. After the two guards reported the cars had stopped following, I had to relieve myself on a nearby bush.” He looked down at his shoes, “I guess I was still frightened.” The two guards, listening in, were nodding.

  And that seemed to satisfy the policeman. He glanced first towards the dusty, ancient, luxury Humber, now visible at the end of the landing strip, then at the film crew and lastly at the fish-netted Land Rovers. The small mountain of equipment cases held his attention for a moment and finally he glanced at Debbie and her fierce, friendly, dog and came to a conclusion. “Mr. Baltazar, you and your men are free to go, with your cases. I will inspect the vehicles more fully tomorrow morning and Miss Debbie can have them then. They are safe for now. You must pay Miss Debbie. Agreed?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “Good,” Taking command, “Where is your aircraft?”

  “It is coming, I was assured, I may need to radio Wilson Airport.” The inspector waved Pero towards the tower and Pero walked off, feeling thankful. The Humber swept past Pero and made a bee-line for the inspector’s back. Pero turned to watch. Mbuno called out, “Hatari!” Almost too late the brakes locked up, the wheels caused a dramatic in-line skid, dust flew everywhere. The Humber came to a stop inches from the inspector’s heels.

  To his credit, the policeman never flinched; both men were indulging in pecking order displays, two proud cocks in the eternal fight, up here in this arid, barren wasteland of the Northern Territory. Pero left them to their pageantry of power and verbal argument.

  Meanwhile, a sudden engine buzz told Pero the plane was already inbound. It made a very low fly-by to secure the landing strip free of someone’s goats (two at the end ran off bleating), banked, dropped down and made a perfect landing. Heep was the first on board, buckling in before they had half the gear stowed, quickly followed by the government stooge. The large Cessna twin-engined 414 was capable of holding ten, they were now only six and no glider. On the steps, Pero shook hands with Debbie, all smiles after Pero assured her they’d cover the fine the inspector was sure to levy tomorrow morning, and Pero gave her driver Joshua a handsome cash tip as well. The damage to the front fender and paint scratches from the gentle roll over were, Pero promised, their expense, at least for a new wing and a little paint. Pero knew there never would be a new fender, just another battered, hammered, skin on an ancient Land Rover with a lick of fresh paint. But the billing charges would be there and she’d pocket the difference. It was the way things were sometimes this far from civilization.

  The Chief, having effectively dismissed the policeman, ambled over, all smiles, and Pero handed him an envelope, which he had the good grace not to open or count. “Your Excellency, I’ve added a little something extra for your help with shipping the body. Chief Methenge, salaama sana, and thank you.”

  “Salaama sana mzee Pero, do not-a forget to call to the-a paper people in Nairobi.”

  Pero promised it was his first priority, waved goodbye, and the cabin door was raised and locked. All of them exhaled when the wheels left the dirt strip. Pero looked back down the cabin and saw Heep shake his head and, folding his arms, lower his cap to cover his eyes. Only now that his work was done up here in this wasteland, Pero knew his friend would relive his emotions. Simon was dead and,
at least in part, he had some responsibility. He would be also worried about the girlfriend. From past experience Pero knew Simon’s death would hit Heep hard when he let go and dropped his guard.

  Pero recalled that last year, Heep’s daughter in Holland told Pero that Heep has just started crying, almost for no reason. It happened as he was talking to Kim, his grandson. After Kim wanted to know why his grootvader was crying, Heep had lied, “It was only a teddy bear I lost . . .” According to Heep’s daughter, it was some time before Heep admitted that he had lost a cameraman to a rip tide off Argentina. It wasn’t Heep’s fault anymore than Simon’s death was now. But that truth wouldn’t lessen his sorrow.

  Pero turned and shouted to make myself heard from the cockpit, “Hey Heep . . .” He raised his head, “Hey, not now Heep, we’re still on the job in Kenya, you can call Kim later when we’re clear, out of here, okay?” Pero saw in his eyes he was wondering what Pero meant. Then he got it and scowled. He raised a middle finger in response. Pero nodded, Heep shrugged and lowered his read to rest. Pero noticed his shoulders were still set squarely. He’d be all right.

  Pero turned and looked out the cockpit window.

  The flight to Wilson took over two hours, but was uneventful, if you can call the usual turbulence over the Northern Territory normal and uneventful. Being bounced around in this sky was becoming second nature for Pero and the crew.

  The approach to Nairobi was over Thika, the place of the famous Flame Trees, then skirting the northern part of the urban sprawl, their route cut over Ongata Rongai and turned back east to land at Wilson Airport, elevation 5,528 feet. As they passed over Nairobi, the green was palpable compared to the Northern Province. Here there were trees, bougainvillea in better neighborhoods, grass on medians, and bush vegetation on every non-built-up plot. Just a few decades ago, there were giraffes walking down the main street, a century before that virtually nothing but the fresh water well Nairobi was named for.

  Nairobi was once only a stop for the camel caravans and, later, for the steam trains needing water coming from Mombasa on their way to the green Mt. Kenya slopes (where the Kikuyu grew ninety percent of the crops for British Colonial Africa) or to the 1920s coffee and tea plantations of the Maasai Plain in Langata where the Blixens famously made their home.

  Now, there were houses everywhere instead of open farmland. A country of under one million in 1925 expanded to twenty-five million in 1988. Once the population growth rate exceeded five percent per year, officials stopped guessing on the future. Where there had been giraffes in Nairobi now there was gridlock, belching car fumes and crowds—all packed in; beggars, peddlers, petty thieves, open air markets, open wall shops, exotic restaurants, light industry, car parks, chrome luxury stores and, ever a driving force, tourist hotels and shops. The architecture was small two-story remnants of the colonial “glory days” followed by towering skyscrapers—planned and financed by Scandinavians—looking totally out of place but for a smooth hue and coating to make them look “African”; namely brown pebbledash, hardly natural looking at all. And, never to be outdone for bad taste, German charities and conglomerates had poured concrete business office bunkers, many stories high, all angles, jutting gray blocks and, of course, glass, lots of glass to necessitate air-conditioning. The hotels were cookie-cutter modern structures except for three: the Stanley, which was Hemingway’s and Holden’s old haunt, now decidedly seedy but authentic; the InterContinental, which resembled something from the 1950s in Miami Beach; and the Norfolk with its low two-story almost-on-safari feel, set in gardens.

  All this urban sprawl was waiting for them, every crew member knew, as their plane skimmed over rooftops, made a fast touchdown, and pulled up to the Mara Airways terminal, next to three other similar Cessnas, two Cessna Caravans, and three Beech Barons—all taking on or disgorging sun-burnt tourists and Samsonite luggage for their trip to or from the bush. The airport was busy. It usually was. Taxis, matatus (converted pickups or small buses loaded with passengers, up to three times the normal capacity by weight), dusty Land Rovers, shiny rich tourists’ Range Rovers, or Toyota Land Cruisers, private station wagons (all white Peugeots, Toyotas, or Nissans), and the ubiquitous zebra-painted minivans that tourists thought gave them “an authentic African experience” as they peered, carsick, through the dusty glass at animals in tame National Parks. On a good day, a pair of lions in Amboseli National Park or the Maasai Mara Reserve would have as many as twenty of these tourist buses all lined up, everyone gawking, thrilled at the “wild” lions. The lions, meanwhile, were thoroughly used to mankind and would scavenge the Park dustbins at night for human food leftovers.

  During the flight down from Ramu, Pero radioed the tower at Wilson and asked for a phone patch to the InterContinental Hotel. Mr. Janardan, the under-manager, who Pero had known for fifteen years, was more than willing to accommodate their needs of four rooms, all adjoining. Again, on the radio, the Mara Airways people learned that Pero wanted to retain the plane overnight, loaded as it was, ready for departure tomorrow in the early morning for Pangani on the coast in Tanzania. They had agreed, after a little wrangling over the “wait fee.”

  When they landed, Pero paid off the stooge. He was pleased to have been flown back instead of waiting for the weekly flight. Pero gave him his finder’s bonuses as well as a handsome tip and, because they might need him sometime in the future, called him by name. Pero assured him they’d be writing a letter of praise to his superiors. Mbuno, shaking his head, listening to Pero being so nice to the stooge, went off to arrange transportation.

  Pero told the crew to unpack and then pack only an essential overnight bag and turned the plane, under security, over to the charter people to pre-submit their forms and gear to customs. Paperwork and customs kept Pero, Ruis, and Priit busy, so Pero had asked Heep to use the Mara Airways office phone to talk to their travel agents about their visas and, if he wouldn’t mind, to give a call to the office in LA.

  When Heep was done with Flamingo Tours, he came back onto the tarmac where Pero was closing and sealing the last camera case with the inspector and took over the reloading of the aircraft while Pero went inside. Sheryl, the Mara Airways booking agent, and Pero arranged flight fees, transfer fees, stamp duty, billing, and loading/unloading. Sheryl was all bubbly, twiddling her gold cross, and cheeks flushed with excitement. By way of warming her up—because Pero had a flight change to arrange with the airline—he asked her what was so exciting, although Pero had already guessed.

  “The reverend Jimmy Threte is coming very soon. He’ll be addressing us in Elizabeth Park, just like the Pope, on Sunday at a Meeting on the Hill. He’s my pastor from heaven,” she said, using that catch phrase from Threte’s TV show, aired in over sixty countries. Pero had heard him, often, on the radio of Nairobi taxis as they blared past, slowly, in traffic. “One Pastor for the World, One Pastor from Heaven,” the slogans repeated, and repeated. It was mind-numbing. Sheryl, on the other hand, was really excited. Having one of the most powerful preachers on earth as your “personal pastor” was heady stuff. For Pero, it was perfect. It was how Pero was going to get Sheryl to agree to his special request. Pero had to bait the hook.

  Pero congratulated Sheryl on her exciting week ahead and then explained there would be another thirty-five kilos of equipment going down with them—plus one passenger. The paperwork would come from Schenker this afternoon, Pero assured her. She knew the import agent Schenker. Everyone in East Africa did.

  A Swiss German-origin company, they were, simply, the best. They were honest and very (how shall Pero put this?) reliably anal. Paperwork in Africa needs to be correct, in triplicate. The film companies always used them—or another at their peril. Tom Baylor said the State Department also used them, told Pero he could count on that. From Sheryl’s desk phone, Pero called their Mr. Prinzle and complimented him on his new agent, the one who had met them at Nairobi Airport.

  “Thank you, and your gift was most generous.” Mr. Prinzle asked, “Was the private s
hipment in order?” Pero assured him it was. “Ah, that’s interesting because the same shipper has sent a replacement shipment arriving tonight. Will you be needing it, or is it a mistake?”

  “I did lose the last contents, filming was a bit rough up north, so I am glad they sent another. Can you have it here tomorrow at the airport? Mara Airways, early in the A.M.?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  Pero then asked him if Schenkers had indeed received the equipment shipment from London they had discussed the day before. Mr. Prinzle confirmed, in his Swiss accent, that the special camera had already arrived and that the special batteries would arrive on the red-eye British Airways flight tomorrow morning. He assured Pero everything could be on one bill of lading, not two, and would be at Wilson in time for tomorrow’s departure. He would clear customs personally and transfer the goods, under bond (he was licensed and bonded), to the plane, thereby avoiding the Kenya duty as they were bound for Tanzania. Pero didn’t ask him how he knew that. Mara or perhaps Flamingo must have told him.

  Pero signed off, handed the receiver to Sheryl, and leaned his elbows on the glass-topped counter and smiled. Doing business with the attractive Sheryl was easy. He went through the next day’s loading schedule in detail until she looked a little bored. Although she was happy enough with those instructions, she was not happy with his final request. Pero wanted to change the flight plan with a stop in Arusha and then on to Pangani. Sheryl was not amused at all, “An extra stop would look suspicious to the Tanzanian customs’ people.” Too damn right, it will, he thought, but I don’t want to tip off anybody about where we are going, just in case.

  “Sheryl, please, I don’t want you to file a flight plan for Arusha. The passenger we’ll be taking all the way to Pangani has to make a quick stop to give testimony at the trials in Arusha in the late morning.” Everyone local knew that the Crimes Against Humanity Trials were in their third go-round for Central Africa (Rwandan genocide), with a few of the Sudan Darfur remnants thrown in. The trials were dragging out, seemingly forever. “Sheryl, please look, I need this woman for our shoot in Pangani. It was the only way I could get her to come, when I moved up our schedule, if I agree to take her to Arusha first, to get her testimony over and done with. But if Arusha starts customs’ problems . . . and you know how security is tight there . . . then we’ll fall behind or she may be forced to stay there and she said that if she does, she‘ll cancel our shoot because she has to be back in Nairobi for Sunday, no matter what . . . Come on Sheryl, can you help, please?” Sheryl was shaking her head, “What can you do, can’t you help? Oh, by the way, her name is Mary Lever.” Sheryl’s face snapped up, “Yes, Sheryl, that Mary Lever.”