Zambezi

by Tony Park

  His staff had made the changes, but now, just a few days short of the conference, had cancelled them. State and the CIA had briefed him on a plot to shoot down the Secretary’s jet in Mombasa. He’d been told that a recently captured Pakistani prisoner at Guantanamo Bay had revealed details of a terrorist plan to conduct coordinated attacks on aircraft in Afghanistan and Africa, with up to six shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles. The aim was to show that the terror organisation could conduct simultaneous operations in different parts of the world. The intelligence had led to the US

  Special Forces raid on the compound in Afghanistan, which had netted two of the missiles. A further two missiles, and two more terrorists, had been destroyed in an attack on a dhow off the coast of Mombasa, by a CIA-owned Predator Unmanned Aerial Vehicle armed with a hellfire missile. Despite the victory, which had still not been made public, several of the African heads of state who had promised to attend the conference had pulled out and the whole thing had been called off. Calvert thought the fact that two of the anti-aircraft missiles which had left Pakistan were still unaccounted for, and were possibly somewhere in Africa, probably added to the African politicians’ nervousness.

  At first Calvert had fumed at the cancellation, and the loss of the opportunity to be seen on the world stage as something other than the be-medalled front man for other soldiers’ deeds on the battlefield and the guy who had to explain the rising body count in Iraq. However, his disappointment had been softened by the knowledge that he would have more time to spend hunting, and that he could now pursue his preferred choice of a Zambian safari.

  He smiled as he flicked through the revised itinerary in the folder. He would fly to Lusaka, the capital of Zambia, and pay a private courtesy call on that country’s president on his first day. Once his official commitment was over, his safari would begin in earnest, with a flight in a light aircraft to Willy Wylde’s private hunting concession, located on the edge of the Lower Zambezi National Park in the south-east of the country.

  He perused a colour brochure which showed pictures of satisfied hunters, many of them American, sitting beside or, in some cases, astride their slain trophies. He was going for a bull buffalo and a leopard on this trip, two of the big five that had eluded him on his last couple of safaris. He gazed enviously at a photo of a doctor from New Jersey who knelt next to a solidly built leopard. He decided that if he got his hunting quota out of the way early he would try his hand at catching one of Africa’s other great and wily predators, the hard-fighting tigerfish.

  ‘This is going to be great. I’ll have a leopard skin and a stuffed tiger to show you when I get back!’

  ‘A tiger?’

  ‘It’s a fish.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ The secretary frowned at her boss’s enthusiasm. As much as she admired him, she violently disagreed with killing animals for sport.

  ‘Aw, Janey, I know you don’t like hunting, but it’s not as bad as the goddamned bunny-huggers make out.’

  She couldn’t resist rising to the bait. ‘Tell that to the leopard you’re going to shoot, sir.’

  He shook his head. ‘Hunting is the lifeblood of some struggling communities in Africa, Janey. By managing their wildlife in a sustainable way they can keep hard currency coming into the country and provide wealth and jobs for local people.’

  ‘Yes, but it’s not their wildlife to manage, sir. The world’s wildlife belongs to all of us.’

  He had had the debate with many people in the past and, if the truth be told, had always shied away from stating his case too forcefully. He knew that if he wanted to pursue a career in politics he would have to keep his passion to himself for fear of alienating too large a chunk of the voting public.

  Still, he persisted in stating his case to his feisty and not unattractive assistant. ‘Janey, without hunting we wouldn’t have the great game parks of the world. Big reserves like the Kruger National Park in South Africa were started by governments that realised they needed to protect and conserve wildlife for future generations.’

  ‘But, sir, it was the hunters who nearly wiped out all the wildlife in the first place.’

  ‘Irresponsible hunters, Janey Poachers. People who would kill anything that moved for money and hang the effect on the future of the species. Today, hunting is also important for wildlife management. Animals such as elephants have to be killed in some reserves because there are too many of them. Controlled culling helps manage animal populations and provide income for people who need it.’

  ‘They’re all good arguments, sir, but you know that there’s a large proportion of the community who will never agree with you. The press won’t like it either, General. You know they’ve criticised your previous safaris as sending the wrong message to the rest of Africa.’

  ‘I don’t give a damn what the press thinks, Janey.’ ‘Yes, sir,’ she said, realising she would gain nothing from prolonging the argument. ‘Did you see that State has assigned two secret service agents to you for personal protection during your safari? I heard the Secretary of State made the order himself.’

  ‘Yes, I saw it and I’m not happy about it.’ He did not want anyone else tagging along on his trip, but he was astute enough to realise that as a public figure he warranted protection. Perhaps, too, it was the Secretary’s way of telling him that he should get used to the trappings of high office, no matter how inconvenient and intrusive they may be.

  Chapter 15

  Chris didn’t know how she felt about Jed Banks, and that annoyed her.

  She raised a hand to her eyes to shade them from the bright morning sunshine that streamed in through the louvred windows. She could smell him on the pillow next to her, on the damp sheets, on her, in her. She had let him into her body, but he had also invaded her mind, and it made her angry. He was leaving, and it made her sad. She had never fallen for a man so quickly, so completely, and she felt lost, out of control, angry, happy and confused, all at the same time.

  He had not used a condom. She hadn’t wanted him to, not even once they got back to the lodge, where they made love again after dinner, and once more, half an hour ago, in the morning. That made her feel stupid. She didn’t expect he was carrying any sexually transmitted diseases – although you never knew with soldiers – but she wasn’t using any other form of birth control. What if she became pregnant? The idea didn’t repel her as much as it once did, and that was totally weird.

  ‘Christ, get a hold of yourself,’ she whispered. Outside, somewhere in the river, a hippo mocked her with a call that sounded like a fat man’s big belly laugh.

  She screwed her eyes tight against the merciless, revealing sunlight and tried to work out why she had told him she was considering the job in Virginia, and why she had all but invited him to shack up with her. She could hear Jed in the next room packing his rucksack. He was leaving her, which would make things easier for a time, although she knew she would miss him. She wanted to cry and hated that he had made her feel so screwed up.

  Chris stood and felt his wetness and hers, still hot inside her. She was a mess, mentally, emotionally and physically. She needed to shower and get back to work, not lie around thinking about a man. She pulled on a T-shirt and denim shorts and grabbed a towel.

  ‘Hello, beautiful,’ he said, turning at the sound of her footfall on the wooden balcony outside his door.

  He moved across the floor, took her in his arms and kissed her. She rested her head on his shoulder and hugged him, her body moulded against his. They fitted together so well. He kissed her hair. Her heart and her resolve melted.

  ‘Moses will be here in a minute,’ he said.

  ‘I can do quick,’ she said, laughing at her own lasciviousness.

  ‘I doubt I can do anything after last night and this morning,’ he said, although they both felt him stir through his jeans. She looked up at him and smiled. ‘Enough, enough already, I’ve got to get the fourby- four back to Harare today.’

  ‘I’ve got to get organised myself, and start h
eading back to South Africa.’

  ‘Wish I could stay with you longer.’ He brushed a wisp of hair from her face.

  ‘So do I, but maybe this is for the best.’

  ‘You’re dumping me so soon?’ he asked with mock seriousness.

  ‘More like a raincheck. I don’t know what I’m feeling right now, Jed.’

  ‘Me too, but it’s all good.’

  ‘Same here,’ she lied.

  They heard the clatter of the Land Rover’s engine downstairs as Moses pulled up, then the slamming of his door.

  ‘Tell Moses goodbye from me. Say I’m still asleep. I don’t want to see him like this – I feel like a tramp.’

  ‘Don’t be silly, you look beautiful, and you could never look like a tramp.’

  She leaned closer and whispered in his ear, ‘I’ll be whatever you want me to be, soldier.’

  He smiled. ‘OK then, be my email buddy until you get back to the States, OK?’

  ‘Deal,’ she said. ‘I’ll miss you.’

  ‘Me too.’

  They kissed, passionately, and finally it was Chris who broke contact.

  *

  Jed shouldered his pack and the narrow wooden stairs down from the verandah creaked with the extra weight. He looked back over his shoulder when he was halfway down, and saw she stood where he had left her, outside his room.

  Images of their lovemaking flashed through his mind, visions of her face contorted in pleasure, the sounds she made, the taste of her. He had been in this situation before, more than once. In every case, except with Patti in the early days, he had turned and walked away, and never seen the girl again. He enjoyed the company of women, but his lifestyle and career were not suited to long-term relationships – he’d learned that the hard way with Patti and Miranda. In his younger years he had enjoyed the thrill of the chase, of getting a woman into bed, but his days as a Lothario were long gone. He’d met more than a few women since Patti who were just after sex, with no strings attached, and that had been fine with him, but the encounters had left him feeling hollow, unwanted.

  Did he really want to see Chris Wallis again? Yes, he was sure he did. Certainly the sex had been fantastic. Their bodies and minds had seemed perfectly attuned, anticipating each other’s needs and preferences intuitively. Also, he hadn’t been lying when he said he wanted to stay in touch with her because she provided a lasting link to Miranda. That was no basis for a relationship, of course, but he wanted to let her know, up front, that he no longer held her responsible for Miranda’s death.

  He smiled at Chris and said, ‘I’ll be checking my emails as soon as I get home.’

  ‘Check when you get to Johannesburg. I’ll send one tonight.’

  He paused on the stairs. Mobile telephones didn’t work in the Zambezi Valley and there was no conventional telephone line into the lodge. ‘You didn’t tell me you had a satellite phone.’

  She tried to hold back the blush but couldn’t. ‘You didn’t ask. Don’t miss your ride. Get out of here before I rip your clothes off, Jed Banks.’

  He laughed and waved again, but he could tell she had made the joke to cover her embarrassment.

  ‘Hi, Moses, how was your night?’ he asked when he saw the guide in the living room, but he only half listened to the man’s answer. He might have fallen for Chris, in a sexual way and maybe something deeper, but he still had the feeling she was holding something back from him.

  ‘Fine. Are you all packed?’

  ‘Packed and ready to go home,’ Jed said, loud enough for Chris to hear upstairs.

  Chris gave herself a mental kick as she showered, and again as she changed into clean clothes. Jed had caught her out in a lie and she was a fool for allowing it to happen. Her feelings for him were affecting her work.

  She rummaged through her bag for her diary and looked up the number of British Airways in Johannesburg. She flew frequently enough to need the reservations number on hand. She set up the portable satellite antenna and phone again and dialled the number.

  When the woman answered, Chris said, ‘Good morning, I’m calling on behalf of my husband, Mr Jed Banks. He wanted me to confirm his booking from Harare to Johannesburg tomorrow, please.’

  Chris guessed that Jed would be flying on the Comair flight, a subsidiary of British Airways, rather than the less reliable Air Zimbabwe.

  ‘One moment, madam,’ the reservations officer said. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, there must be a mistake, Mr Banks is not booked on tomorrow’s flight.’

  ‘Oh, silly me, I mean the day after tomorrow,’ Chris said.

  ‘No, nothing on that flight either. Perhaps you could get Mr Banks to call us back and we’ll clear this up.’

  Chris hung up feeling a little better about concealing the fact she had a satellite phone from Jed; after all, he had lied to her about his departure date. She wondered what he was up to, and sincerely hoped he wasn’t going to do the same thing she was. She flipped through a sheaf of print-outs of emails that Miranda had sent her during her time in Zimbabwe and found the one on which a telephone number had been marked with a yellow highlighter pen. She dialled the number, prefixing it with the international code for Zambia.

  ‘Crescent Moon Safari Lodge, good day,’ a male voice answered.

  ‘Good morning, may I speak to Hassan bin Zayid, please?’ Chris asked.

  ‘I’m very sorry, but Mr bin Zayid is not here right now.’ The man sounded African, the voice deep.

  ‘Can you tell me when he’ll be back?’

  ‘Who is calling, please?’

  ‘I’m a friend of Miranda Banks-Lewis, the American woman who was researching -’

  The man cut in, ‘Ah, we were all very sorry to hear about the death of Miss Miranda, madam. She visited us often.’

  ‘Yes, so she told me. I’m a friend of hers and she told me of her acquaintance with Mr bin Zayid and his help with her research work. I wanted to thank him in person, if possible, for all he did for Miranda and to pass on my sympathy. I understand they were close friends.’

  ‘Indeed they were. Miss Miranda was very popular here. However, I am sorry but Mr bin Zayid is in Tanzania on business. He was most distressed by what happened.’

  ‘I see. When will he be back?’ Chris asked again.

  ‘We do not expect him for two, maybe three, more weeks, madam. If I could have your name, I will pass on a message to him. Perhaps he can call you back.’

  ‘No, it’s OK,’ she said. ‘I have the number for his office in Zanzibar. I’ll try him there.’

  ‘Very well, madam, but Mr bin Zayid will be travelling around Zanzibar and Tanzania inspecting his other properties, so he may be hard to get hold of. Are you sure you don’t want to leave a message?’

  ‘No, but thank you for your help anyway.’

  ‘A pleasure, madam. Goodbye.’

  It was still a loose end. She would have liked to interview bin Zayid in person, to find out how close he and Miranda were. She wondered when exactly the wealthy hotelier had left the valley. Mort Solomon would be able to check his movements from Zambia to Zanzibar. She hated calling in another favour from the creep, but she had no choice. She dialled his number.

  While she waited to be put through she thought about Jed. She wondered if a relationship between two people who could lie to each other so easily could really mature, especially after they had just made passionate love. She was willing to give it a try, she thought. Maybe.

  ‘What?’ Jed exclaimed.

  ‘Hassan bin Zayid, that is the man’s name.’

  ‘Jesus Christ, an Arab?’

  ‘What’s so bad about Arabs? I myself was a Muslim for a while.’

  Jed ignored the braying zebra filing down to drink at Long Pool as the Land Rover juddered along the corrugated dirt road. ‘What do you mean, you were a Muslim?’

  ‘Muhammad Ali, the fighter, was a hero of mine. I converted when I was a teenager, but gave up when I discovered alcohol,’ Moses laughed.

  Aw, hell, I don’t want
you to think I’m racist or prejudiced, I’m just surprised, is all. I spent six months in Afghanistan hunting for Arab terrorists and now I find out my daughter was dating one.’

  ‘Not all Arabs are terrorists, Jed.’

  ‘I know that. I didn’t mean that this guy was a terrorist. Well, what else did you find out about him?’

  Moses had spent much of the night drinking with the head warden and two of his rangers and, between them, the three parks officers seemed to know quite a bit about Hassan bin Zayid. One of the rangers was certain the Arab had been sleeping with the young American woman, but Moses decided to leave that piece of information out, in deference to Jed’s feelings. ‘They say he is a good man,’ he said instead.

  ‘What the hell does that mean?’

  ‘He owns a game reserve on the Zambian side of the river a couple of kilometres downstream from here. He’s into wildlife conservation. This man spends a lot of money on captive breeding of rare species. They say he has some black rhino and cheetah over there which he is going to release into Lower Zambezi National Park.’

  ‘Good for him. What was he doing over here?’

  ‘The warden said Hassan was funding research in Lower Zambezi into the number of predators there -lions, hyenas, leopards – and that he wanted to get similar figures for the Zimbabwe side, in Mana Pools National Park. He comes to meet with the researchers on this side every couple of months to compare population numbers and trends. They say that is how he met your daughter.’

  Jed pondered the information. It seemed innocent enough. ‘How often did they meet?’

  ‘I asked the men this and the warden did not want to say Afterwards, one of the rangers told me that this man did not only come on his official visits.’ Moses stopped the Land Rover to let a big bull elephant cross the road in front of them. The massive creature shook its mighty head as it passed and flapped its ragged ears. Moses left the engine running in case the elephant decided to charge.