by Tony Park
‘But there were no other remains found in the lion you killed, apart from …’
All three let the statement hang, unchallenged, until Chris changed the subject. ‘If she’s dead it could also have been a crocodile. Maybe she was fishing or swimming.’
‘Yes, that is very possible too,’ Moses agreed. ‘She would not be the first person in the valley to be taken by a croc. There is another thing I learned about the missing maid.’
‘What’s that?’ Jed asked.
‘Although it was not part of her duties, she used to work for your daughter.’
‘Work?’
‘She did her washing for her, her clothes, and sometimes cooked for Miranda if she was out late in the bush, calling the lions.’
‘Calling?’ Jed was trying to piece all this new information together in his mind.
Chris interrupted. ‘She’d go out at nights, with an armed ranger as an escort and sometimes the park’s ecologist, and play tapes to try to lure lions to her, so she could study them. The tapes are of other lions, and of dying prey. But, Moses, there are signs in all the lodges saying that washing and cooking are not part of the maids’ duties.’
‘Exactly. This girl caused some resentment amongst the other staff. Jed, your daughter was very good to her, and paid her well, in US dollars, but the other staff say the girl was letting her normal duties slip. They were jealous of her, and of her clothes.’
‘Her clothes?’
‘Yes. It seems Miranda had given this girl some of her own clothes. The other staff think that maybe she was stealing things from Miranda’s washing.’
Chris shrugged, not sure what to make of the new information, then had a thought. ‘Maybe that’s why we haven’t been able to find any of Miranda’s day-today clothes. It’s possible this missing maid stole them and ran off.’
‘Hard to say. I’d sure like to talk to her, though, if she isn’t already dead,’ Jed said. ‘For now, I want to see Miranda’s campsite. Do you want to come with us, Chris?’
‘No, I think I’ll keep going through these computer files. See what I can salvage. Miranda did some great work here and I want to make sure it’s catalogued and maybe even published in a paper, with full credit, some day.’
Jed nodded. ‘That’d be nice. Have you found anything else personal on the computer? Emails, a diary, that kind of thing?’
‘I can’t get into her email account because it’s password-protected. I’ve tried everything I can think of, but I can’t crack it. She’s got a file marked personal, but that’s blocked as well. I’m afraid I’m no computer hacker, but I’ll find someone in Jo’burg who can get into this stuff and then I’ll email it to you.’
‘Thank you,’ Jed said. He thought Chris looked fresh and lovely this morning, dressed in a sleeveless blue shirt with the top three buttons undone. He couldn’t help but notice the swell of her full breasts as she leaned forwards to take a closer look at the computer screen. Her short cut-off jeans and brown ankle-boots showed off her golden legs to perfection. Her hair was piled high and he noticed she had put on a little makeup.
Last night, when he’d seen she had been crying, he’d had the urge to take her in his arms, to comfort her and to seek solace for himself, despite the arguing that had gone on between them beforehand. He’d seen soldiers hug each other after a dangerous mission or cry on each other’s shoulders over the loss of a comrade. Wounded men needed friends to hold their hands. Humans often needed to touch as part of the healing process. He and Christine had both loved Miranda, and they were both grieving for her now.
Jed put a hand on her shoulder. ‘Sure you don’t want to take a break and get some fresh air with us?’
She placed her hand on his and looked up into his eyes, forcing a little smile. ‘I’m OK, Jed. You go with Moses, see some of the bush. I’ll fix us a salad for lunch and maybe we’ll go for a drive and a sundowner together later.’
He felt his heart beat a little faster at the touch of her hand. He was experiencing stirrings in his body which had been dormant for six months during his time in Afghanistan. There was an old myth, common to all armies of the world, that the cooks put something in the food to suppress the men’s sexual urges. In fact, it was just plain old hard work and lack of sleep that made life easier, in one respect at least, for soldiers away from home. Jed had done nothing physically strenuous since his fight with the burglar in Johannesburg, and there was nothing stopping him from feeling acutely aroused by the close presence of a beautiful woman.
He reluctantly removed his hand from her shoulder and asked Moses to help him with Miranda’s folded safari tent.
‘Are we going to camp now?’ The tracker looked surprised.
‘No. I just want to take the tent out and have a look at it. I thought that if I do that on the spot where Miranda was camped it might at least give me a feel for what her life here was like.’
‘I see,’ Moses lied. Death was a part of every African family these days, especially with the virus.
In the old days families had grieved for days and days, the women wailing and the men drinking. Now it was not unusual for people in the towns to take an hour off for a funeral and then go back to work afterwards. Moses had lost many friends to HIV-AIDS and the cemeteries of Zimbabwe were overflowing with the bare earthen mounds of fresh graves. In most towns, new land had been acquired to meet the demand for more and more burial spaces. Kariba, where Moses lived, had been hit particularly hard by the disease. The town had a high population of prostitutes whose clientele included long-distance truck drivers crossing the border with Zambia, as well as the fishermen from the kapenta rigs – the floating fishing platforms that harvested tiny fish from the lake.
While Moses didn’t understand a lot of what Jed was doing, he certainly knew what would make the man whole again. The best thing Mr Jed Banks could do right now was to get drunk, farewell his daughter for good, and sleep with the pretty, if skinny, lady professor. That was what a man needed to get his life back in order – beer and women – even if the combination occasionally caused as many problems as it solved. But Moses said none of this, keeping his wise counsel to himself as he loaded the truck with the dead girl’s tent.
*
Chris waved Jed and Moses off as the Land Rover pulled out from under the fig tree behind the lodge.
‘Shoo! Go on, beat it!’ she yelled at four grey vervet monkeys sitting in the tree. She clapped her hands and shook her head in annoyance. Monkeys and baboons continually patrolled the area around the lodges and the park’s camping ground during the day, seeking new ways to get to the hordes of food they knew waited inside human dwellings. Chris was aware from her studies that the primates were capable of devising elaborate plans of attack. Often, one or two of their number would act as highly visible decoys, trying an obvious method of entry to a building or tent, while the rest of the troop sought out less conspicuous routes to get to their booty. She had observed that the animals could tell the difference between men and women and generally seemed bolder when they thought there were only females present, especially a lone woman.
Chris picked up a rock and hurled it at a monkey that had climbed down out of the tree and was boldly approaching her. The stone only bounced off the juvenile male’s arm, but the blow was enough to show him that she meant business. He scampered back up into the tree and Chris went back inside, shutting the screen door behind her.
She returned to the laptop and continued to read through the emails she had been checking before Jed had quizzed her on the contents. It was a small lie, telling him that Miranda’s email folder was password-protected, but a justifiable one. There was nothing in the folder that would cast any light on what had happened to Miranda, and all the messages were business-related rather than personal.
There was nothing that would tell Jed anything more about his daughter than he already knew. They were of little interest to Chris, either, as most of them were directed to her and she had read them long ago. She didn�
��t really know why she was going over them.
Half-heartedly, she opened a recent message from Miranda to her mother.
Hi Mom. First off, I don’t mean to sound rude but, as advised before, can you PLEASE
PLEASE not send messages to this address any more-just use my Hotmail account instead. I know you had trouble accessing it the other day, but that was just a server problem, I think, so don’t worry about it. Things are fine here and Chris passed on the parcel you sent to me, via South Africa, when I last saw her. Thanks for the sun cream – it’s really expensive here and hard to find. Hopefully I’ll get a chance to work on my tan soon and to see a little more of this continent. Love, M.
Chris rocked back in her chair, clasping her hands behind her head, and stared at the ceiling of the lodge. A gecko had crept into a far corner and begun its daily sleep.
What was all that about working on her tan and seeing more of the continent? Miranda had said nothing to her about taking leave or travelling anywhere other than Zimbabwe. It was another piece of information to file away, and a possible line of questioning for the man Chris knew she would have to confront at some time. How she did that, where and under what guise, were all serious questions she had yet to formulate answers to.
To continue her own investigation into Miranda’s death – for Chris was sure she would never be found alive – she would need to speak to the man Miranda had farewelled from Marongora before her last trip to South Africa. The problem was, Chris knew Jed Banks would also want to track the man down, and she did not want him around for that particular interview. But then she didn’t want him to walk out of her life either.
‘Too bad,’ she said aloud to herself. Jed had to go.
She pondered Miranda’s references to some kind of holiday again. Her tenure in Zimbabwe was fixed but not inflexible. If she had wanted to get away for a break to a beach in, say, Mozambique, or anywhere else in Africa for that matter, all she had to do was ask. However, Miranda seemed to be intimating to her mother that she was about to depart on a trip. Was it possible, Chris wondered, that Miranda had simply departed on an unannounced, spur-of-the-moment jaunt? Miranda’s dedication to procedures and her unfailingly responsible attitude suggested otherwise, not to mention the remains in the belly of the dead lion. However, there was no harm in checking.
Chris went upstairs and opened one of her aluminium storage cases. From it she took a satellite phone and portable Trivec Avant tactical satellite antenna. The antenna had a number of pieces which fitted together to make an elongated, skeletal-looking structure. It was designed to go with the Lightweight Satellite Terminal tacsat radio transceiver in another case, but it also worked with her phone and gave her a more reliable signal. The Motorola LST-5C, like the antenna, was ex-military, and both Chris and Miranda had them as back-up, and in case they ever needed to contact aircraft or other assets. Chris positioned the assembled antenna on the verandah of the lodge, where it would have a clear line of sight at the sky and the satellites orbiting the earth. She connected it to the phone and, when she gained a signal, called a number in Pretoria.
‘United States embassy, can I help you?’ a male receptionist answered.
‘Could you put me through to Mort Solomon in the trade secretary’s office, please?’
‘Certainly, ma’am.’
Chris drummed her fingers on the wooden balcony as she waited, watching a pair of elephants showering themselves with water in the shallows of the Zambezi.
‘Solomon.’
‘Mort, it’s Christine. How’s things?’
‘Hi there, traveller. Long time no hear. When are you coming back to civilisation as we know it? I’ve found a great new bottle of Cape red we really should split sometime.’
God, she thought, Solomon was always on the make. ‘One of these days, Mort.’ In his dreams.
‘Look, I need you to check some cross-border movements for me.’
‘OK. I’ll go secure.’
Chris waited a few moments while the embassy man pushed a button on his phone to enable a scrambler, which would ensure no one could eavesdrop on the call. She didn’t think it was entirely necessary, but Mort, for all his flaws, was a stickler for rules. ‘Who do you want me to check out?’
‘Miranda.’
‘Jesus Christ, Chris. The girl’s dead. The case is closed. Just come back and file your report.’
Chris felt her cheeks colour. ‘I haven’t finished exploring all avenues, Mort, and this is some information I need to file my report!’
‘OK, cool down, babe.’
‘Don’t fucking call me that, Mort, you know I hate it.’
He laughed. ‘Sorry, Professor. Look, the kid had an unfortunate accident. If you girls want to work in the bush these are the risks you take. Anyway, shoot, what do you need?’
Asshole. Chris took a deep breath. ‘I need you to check if Miranda, or anyone using her passport, has crossed the border from Zimbabwe into South Africa, Mozambique, Botswana or Zambia since her disappearance.’
There was silence as Solomon took down the details. ‘OK. I take it you haven’t recovered her passport.’
‘That’s right. No passport. Some other stuff’s missing too.’
‘Probably stolen. She might have had her passport on her when she … when the lion got her.’
‘I don’t carry my passport in my top pocket when I go darting lions, Mort. But yes, you’re right, it’s a possibility Anyway, it’s a loose thread that needs to be tied. I’m not saying she’s still alive and, hell, I don’t think she is anyway, but we should find out if her passport’s in circulation.’
‘Agreed. I’ll get the bureaucrats onto it. Call me back this afternoon.’
‘Will do. Thanks, Mort. Hey, what are you hearing about the bomb in Tanzania?’
‘Jesus, what a fucking mess. You heard they evacuated the embassy?’
‘I heard.’
‘But hold on, there’s more.’
‘Not another one?’
‘Yep. Just got a signal. A nail bomb with some gasoline to get things going at a disco on Zanzibar.’
‘Bastards. Could be the same cell that planted the IED in Dar,’ Chris said, thinking out loud. IED was the military acronym for an improvised explosive device. ‘Are we helping out with the investigations on the ground?’
‘The ambassador’s sending some marines from the embassy in Tanzania to beef up security FBI are on their way from stateside to help out the Dar locals with the bus bomb. The embassy threat could have just been some asshole pulling a prank, but no one wants to risk it. There were no Americans killed in the Zanzibar blast. Brits, Aussies, Germans and a couple of other Europeans. All kids.’
‘What’s it all mean for your part of the world?’
‘They’re sending a pick-up team from home, to be based here on stand-by, just in case the Feds or our guys turn up anything interesting. Also, our VIP, the one you disapprove of on animal conservation grounds, is going back to his original plans, so you might bump into him.’
Chris frowned. ‘Because of the problems in Tanzania?’
‘Yeah. State put the mother of all travel warnings out yesterday on mainland Tanzania and Zanzibar – too late for the victims of last night’s bomb.’
‘I’ll be finished here soon. I don’t like it that I haven’t been able to find Miranda’s body, but the forensic tests should be back soon on the remains they pulled from the lion. You read about that?’
‘It’s in all the papers down here, although they neglect to mention that you were the great white hunter that bagged the killer lion. Bet the local guys were surprised at a pretty white lady outshooting them.’
‘Let’s just hope my name stays out of the papers. I don’t want to be known as a lion killer and I don’t intend being within a hundred miles of that asshole VIP of yours who kills animals for fun.’
‘Hey, you don’t mince your words, do you? Just because we’re on a secure line doesn’t mean I’m not being taped.’
<
br /> ‘What’s it to me? I’m just a humble scientist, remember? Bye, Mort, I’ll call again this afternoon, at four.’
‘Yeah, I remember. See ya, babe.’
‘Asshole.’
‘Just wanted to make sure you still cared,’ Solomon said, then hung up.
Chris shook her head, picturing his shit-eating grin. Grey hair, ponytail, tattoos. Old school. A knuckle-dragger who wore his political incorrectness on his sleeve and oozed macho bullshit every time he opened his mouth. Still, a lot of people, including her, forgave Mort Solomon an awful lot because he was a good operator and knew his business like no one else.
She repacked the tacsat antenna and phone and went back downstairs to shut down the computer.
There was nothing more the machine could tell her about Miranda’s last days.
‘Do you think I’m crazy, Moses?’ Jed asked as the Land Rover bucked and bounced along the road that paralleled the Zambezi River through the park.
‘What do you mean?’
Jed drove while Moses navigated, scanning the bush to the front and sides, always on the lookout for game.
‘Do you think I’m mad for wanting to believe my daughter is still alive?’
‘Death is no stranger to me, to my people, to my country. It is to yours.’
‘But I’ve been to war. I’m a soldier.’
‘Even in peace, people here are better at dealing with death, because we see a lot of it. We have the AIDS virus, but even before that the people in this valley always lived with death – in childbirth, from wild animals, from disease, from war. You have seen other soldiers die, but you have not seen your own children taken from you. It must be hard for you to believe that this can happen.’
‘There’s a saying that humans are not made to bury their children.’
‘Except in Africa. Jed, from what I know, your daughter is not the sort of woman who would run away without telling anyone. She does not sound like a foolish person.’
‘She wasn’t… isn’t.’
‘People get killed in this park. Even white people.’
‘What do you mean by that?’
