Rage (81 page)

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Authors: Wilbur Smith

BOOK: Rage
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‘The middle one,' Sean said softly. ‘Rake him through the chest.'
He stiffened in anticipation of her shot, and then glanced sideways. The barrel of the Weatherby was describing small erratic circles as Lana tried to hold her aim, and
it flashed upon Sean that she had forgotten to change the power of her variable telescopic sight. She was looking at a bull buffalo from thirty paces through a lens of ten multiplications. It was like looking at a battleship through a microscope: all she was seeing was a black shapeless mass.
‘Don't shoot!' he whispered urgently but the Weatherby erupted in a long blazing muzzle-flash across the clearing, and the big bull lurched and tossed his head, grunting to the strike of shot. Sean saw the dried mud puff from his scabby black skin, low down in the joint of his right shoulder, and as the bull spun away into the jess, Sean swung the Gibbs on him to take the back-up shot. But one of the other buffalo turned across the wounded animal, screening him for the instant that it took for him to crash away into the jess, and Sean lifted the Gibbs without firing.
They lay side by side and listened to the thunderous rush of bodies dwindle into the jess.
‘I couldn't see clearly,' Lana said in her childish piping treble.
‘You had the scope on full power, you silly bitch.'
‘But I hit him!'
‘Yes, Treacle Breeches, you hit him – more's the pity. You broke his right front leg.' Sean stood up and whistled for Matatu. In a few quick words of Swahili he explained the predicament, and the little Ndorobo looked at Lana reproachfully.
‘Stay here with your gunbearer,' Sean ordered Lana. ‘We'll go and finish the business.'
‘I'm going with you.' Lana shook her head.
‘This is what I'm paid for,' Sean told her. ‘Cleaning up the mess. Stay here and let me do my job.'
‘No,' she said. ‘It's my buff. I'll finish it.'
‘I haven't got time to argue,' Sean said bitterly. ‘Come on then, but do as you are told.' And he waved Matatu forward to pick up the blood spoor.
There were bone splinters and hair where the bull had stood.
‘You smashed the big bone,' Sean told her. ‘It's a racing certainty that the bullet broke up. At that range it was probably still going 3,500 feet per second when it hit – even a Nosler bullet can't stand that.'
The bull was bleeding profusely. Bright blood had sprayed the jess as he blundered through, and blood had formed a dark gelatinous puddle where he stood for the first time to listen for his pursuers. The other two bulls had deserted him and Sean grunted with satisfaction. That would prevent confusion, shooting at the wrong animal in the mix-up.
Lana kept close beside him. She had removed the scope from the Weatherby and left it with the gunbearer, and now she carried the rifle at high port across her chest.
Abruptly they stepped into another narrow clearing, and Matatu squeaked and bolted back between Sean and the girl as the bull broke from the far side of the clearing and came down on them in a bizarre crabbing sideways gait. His nose was up, and the long mournful droop of his horns gave him a funereal menace. His broken leg flapped loosely, hampering his gait, so he rocked and plunged, and bright blood was forced in a spurting stream from the wound by the movement.
‘Shoot!' said Sean. ‘Aim at his nose!' But without looking at her he sensed her terror, and her first movement as she turned to run.
‘Come on, you yellow bitch. Stand and shoot it out,' he snarled at her. ‘This is what you wanted – now do it.'
The Weatherby whiplashed, and flame and thunder tore across the clearing. The buffalo flinched at the shot, and black flinty chips flew from the boss of his horns.
‘High!' Sean called. ‘Shoot him on the nose.' And she shot again, and hit the horn a second time and the bull kept coming.
‘Shoot!' Sean called, watching the great armoured head over the express sights of the Gibbs. ‘Come on, bitch, kill him!'
‘I can't,' she screamed. ‘He's too close!' The bull filled all their existence, a mountain of black hide and muscle and lethal horn, so close that at last he dropped his head to toss and gore them, to rip and trample and crush them under the anvil of his crenellated boss.
As the massive horns went down, Sean shot him through the brain and the bull rolled forward over his own head. Sean pulled Lana out from under the flying hoofs as the bull somersaulted. She had dropped the rifle and now she clung to him helplessly, shaking, her red mouth slack and smeared with terror.
‘Matatu!' Sean called quietly, holding her to his chest, and the little Ndorobo reappeared at his side like a genie. ‘Take the gunbearer with you,' Sean ordered. ‘Go back to the Land-Rover and bring it back here, but do not hurry.'
Matatu grinned lewdly and ducked his head. He had an enormous respect for his
Bwana
's virility and he knew what Sean was going to do. He only wondered that it had taken so long for the
Bwana
to straighten this pale albino creature's back for her. He disappeared into the jess like a black shadow and Sean turned the girl's face up to his own and thrust his tongue deeply into the wet red wound of her mouth.
She moaned and clung to him, and with his free hand he unbuckled her belt and jerked down the culottes. They fell in a tangle around her ankles and she kicked them away. He hooked his thumbs into the waistband of her panties and tore them off her, then he pushed her down on top of the hot and bleeding carcass of the buffalo. She fell with her legs sprawled open and the muscles of the dead animal were still twitching and contracting from the brain shot, and the sweet coppery smell of blood mingled with the rank wild stink of game and dust.
Sean stood over her and tore open the front of his breeches and she looked up at him with the terror still clouding her eyes.
‘Oh you bastard,' she sobbed. ‘You filthy rotten bastard.'
Sean dropped on his knees between her long loose limbs and cupped his hands under her hard little buttocks. As he lifted her lower body he saw that her fluffy blonde mount was already as sodden as the fur of a drowned kitten.
They drove back to camp with the body of the dead bull crammed into the back of the Land-Rover, the great homed head dangling over the side, and Matatu and the gunbearer perched upon it, singing the hunter's song.
Lana never said a word all the way back. Ed Liner was waiting for them under the dining tent, but his welcoming grin faded as Lana threw her tom panties on the table in front of him and piped in her little-girl voice, ‘You know what naughty old Sean did, Daddy Eddie? He raped your little girl, that's what he did – he held her down and stuck his big dirty thing into her.'
Sean saw the fury and hatred in the old man's faded eyes, and he groaned inwardly. ‘The bitch,' he thought. ‘The sneaky little bitch. You loved it. You screamed for more.'
Half an hour later Lana and Ed were in the red and silver Beechcraft Baron when it took off from the narrow bush strip. As it banked away on course for Nairobi, Sean glanced down at his own trouser front.
‘Well, OK, King Kong,' he murmured. ‘I hope you are satisfied, that just cost us fifty thousand dollars an inch.' He turned back to the Land-Rover still shaking his head sadly as he picked up the bundle of mail that the pilot of the Beechcraft had brought down from the office in Nairobi. There was a yellow cable envelope on top of the pile and he opened it first.
‘I am marrying Holly Carmichael on 5th August. Please be my best man. Love. Garry.'
Sean read it through twice, and Lana and Ed Liner were forgotten.
‘I'd love to see what kind of bag would marry Garry,' he chuckled. ‘Pity I can't go home—' He broke off and thought about it. ‘But why not! Why the hell not! Living dangerously is half the fun.'
S
hasa Courtney sat at his desk in the study at Weltevreden, studying the Turner on the opposite wall as he composed the next paragraph in his mind.
He was drafting his Chairman's Report for the cabinet select committee of Armscor. The armaments company had been set up by special act of parliament, and the strict secrecy of its operations was ensured by that act.
When President Eisenhower had initiated the arms embargo against South Africa as a punitive reaction to the Sharpeville massacre and the racial policies of the Verwoerd government, the country's annual expenditure on weapons manufacture had been a mere £300,000. Four years later they had an annual budget of half a billion.
‘Dear old Ike did us a big favour.' Shasa smiled now. ‘The law of unforeseen consequences in action again, sanctions always backfire. Now our biggest worry is to find a testing ground for our own atomic bomb.'
He addressed himself once more to that section of his report, and wrote:
Taking into consideration the foregoing, I am of the opinion that we should adopt the third option, i.e. underground testing. With this in view, the corporation has already conducted investigations to determine the most suitable geological areas. (See attached geological survey reports.)
The shot holes will be drilled by a commercial
diamond drilling company to a depth of four thousand feet to obviate contamination of the underground water supplies.
There was a knock on the door and Shasa looked up in angry disbelief. The entire household knew that he was not to be disturbed, and there was no reason nor excuse for this intrusion.
‘Who is it?' he barked, and the door was opened without his permission.
For a moment he did not recognize the person who stepped into the study. The long hair and deep tan, the flamboyant costume – the gilet of kudu skin, and the bright silk scarf knotted at the throat, the mosquito boots and cartridge belt were all unfamiliar. Shasa stood up uncertainly.
‘Sean?' he asked. ‘No, I don't believe this is happening.' He wanted to be angry and outraged. ‘Damn it, Sean, I warned you never …' but he could not go on, his joy was too intense and his voice petered out.
‘Hello, Dad.' Sean came striding towards him, and he was taller and more handsome and self-assured than Shasa remembered. Shasa abhorred all manner of theatrics and affectation of dress, but Sean wore his costume with such panache that it appeared natural and correct.
‘What the hell are you doing here?' Shasa found his voice at last, but there was no rancour in his question.
‘I came as soon as I got Garry's cable.'
‘Garry cabled you?'
‘Best man – he wanted me to be his best man, and I didn't even have a chance to change.' He stopped in front of Shasa, and for a moment they studied each other.
‘You are looking good, Pater,' Sean smiled, and his teeth were white as bone against the tan.
‘Sean, my boy.' Shasa lifted his hands, and Sean seized him in a bear hug.
‘I thought about you every single day—' Sean's voice was tight and his cheek was pressed to Shasa's cheek. ‘God, how I missed you, Dad.'
Shasa knew instinctively that it was a lie, but he was delighted that Sean had bothered to tell the lie.
‘I've missed you, too, my boy,' he whispered. ‘Not every day, but often enough to hurt like hell. Welcome back to Weltevreden.' And Sean kissed him. They had not kissed since Sean was a child, that sort of sentimental display was not Shasa's usual style, but now the pleasure of it was almost unbearable.
Sean sat at Centaine's right hand at dinner that evening. His dinner jacket was a little tight around the chest and smelled of moth balls, but the servants, overjoyed to have him home, had pressed razor edges into the crease of his trousers and steamed out the silk lapels. He had shampooed his hair, and oddly the thick glossy locks seemed to enhance rather than detract from his over-powering masculinity.
Isabella, taken by surprise like everybody else, had come drifting downstairs, dressed for dinner with her shoulders and back bare, but her cool and distant poise had evaporated as she saw Sean. She squealed and rushed at him.
‘It's been so boring since you went away!'
She wouldn't let go of his arm until they went in to dinner, and even now she leaned forward to watch his lips as he talked, her forgotten soup cooling, avid to take in every word. When Shasa at the end of the table made a remark about Kenyan barbers and Sean's hair style, she rushed to her eldest brother's defence.
‘I love his hair like that. You are so antediluvian sometimes, Papa. He's beautiful. I swear if Sean ever cuts a single hair on his beautiful head, I will take vows of silence and chastity on the spot.'
‘A consummation devoutly to be wished,' murmured her father.
Centaine, although less effusive, was as delighted as any
of them to have Sean home again. Of course, she knew every detail of the circumstances in which he had left. She and Shasa were the only ones in the family who did, but that had been almost six years ago, and things could change in that time. It was difficult to believe that anybody who looked like that, even more beautiful than her own beloved Shasa, and who was possessed of such charm and natural grace, could be entirely bad. She consoled herself that although he had made a few mistakes when he was a child, he was now a man. Centaine had seldom seen more of a man, and she listened as attentively as the rest of them to his stories and laughed as merrily at his sallies.
Garry kept repeating, ‘I didn't really believe you'd come. I sent that cable on an impulse. I wasn't even sure of your address.' And then to Holly, who was sitting beside Sean at the long table, ‘Isn't he wonderful, Holly – isn't he everything I told you?'
Holly smiled and murmured polite agreement, and twisted slightly in her chair to prevent Sean pointing up the story he was telling by placing his hand on her thigh again. She glanced around the table, and caught Michael's eye. He was the only one who was not following Sean's tale with total concentration. Holly had only met Michael for the first time the previous day, when he arrived from Johannesburg for the wedding, but the two of them had found an immediate rapport, which had swiftly deepened as Holly had discovered Michael's protective concern and affection for Garry.
Now Michael raised an eyebrow at Holly, and smiled an apology at her. He had seen his elder brother looking at her, he had seen through Sean's devices to attract her attention, and had even seen her start and pale as Sean touched her beneath the table. He would talk to Sean after dinner, and quietly warn him off, for Garry himself would never see what was happening. He was too besotted by his elder brother's return. It was up to Michael – it had always
been his duty to protect Garry from Sean. In the meantime he smiled reassurance at Holly, and Sean intercepted the look and interpreted it accurately. He showed no reaction. His expression was frank and open and his voice sparkling and full of humour as he finished the story and the others all laughed, all except Michael and Holly.
‘You are so funny,' Isabella sang. ‘I just hate you for being my brother. If only I could find another boy who looked like you.'
‘There's not one of them good enough for you, Bella,' Sean said, but he was watching Michael, and as the laughter subsided, he asked lightly, ‘And so, Mickey, how is life on that Commie newspaper of yours? Is it true that you are going to change its name to the
ANC Times,
or is it the
Mandela Mail
or the
Moses Gama Gazette?'
Michael laid down his knife and fork and met Sean's gaze squarely.
‘The policy of the
Golden City Mail
is to defend the helpless, to attempt to secure a decent dignified existence for all, and to tell the truth as we see it – at any cost.'
‘I don't know about that, Mickey,' Sean grinned at him. ‘But a couple of times out there in the bush I've wished that I had a copy of the
Golden City Mail
with me – yes, sir, every time I run out of toilet paper, I wish I had your column right there.'
‘Sean!' Shasa said sharply, and his indulgent expression faded for the first time since Sean's arrival. ‘There are ladies present.'
‘Nana.' Sean turned to Centaine. ‘You have read Mickey's column, haven't you? Don't tell me you agree with those bright pink sentiments of his?'
‘That's enough,' Shasa said sternly. ‘This is a reunion and a celebration.'
‘I'm sorry, Pater.' Sean was mock contrite. ‘You are right. Let's talk about fun things. Let me tell Mickey about the Mau Mau in Kenya, and what they did to the white kids.
Then he can tell me about his Commie ANC friends here, and what he wants them to do to our kids.'
‘Sean, that's not fair,' Michael said softly. ‘I am not a Communist, and I have never advocated Communism or the use of force—'
‘That's not what you wrote in yesterday's edition. I had the great and glorious privilege of reading your column on the plane down from Jo'burg.'
‘What I actually wrote, Sean, was that Vorster and De La Rey between them are making the mistake of labelling as Communist everything that our black population sees as desirable – civil rights, universal franchise, trade unions and black political organizations such as the ANC. By naming these as Communist-inspired they are making the idea of Communism highly attractive to our blacks.'
‘We've just got a black government in Kenya, with a convicted terrorist and murderer as the new head of state. That's why I'm getting out and moving to Rhodesia. And here is my own beloved brother paving the way for another black Marxist government of rabble-rousers and bomb-throwers right here in the good old Republic. Tell me, which of the terrorists do you fancy for president, Mickey, Mandela or Moses Gama?'
‘I won't warn either of you again,' Shasa told them ominously. ‘I will not abide politics at the dinner table.'
‘Daddy is right,' Isabella joined in. ‘You are both being so utterly dreary – and just when I was beginning to really enjoy myself.'
‘And that's enough from the peanut gallery also,' Centaine picked out Isabella. ‘Eat your food, please, Mademoiselle, you are all skin and bones as it is.' But she was studying Sean.
‘He has been home six hours and already we are all at each other's throats,' she thought. ‘He still has a talent for controversy. We must be wary of him – I wonder why he really came home.'
She found out very soon after dinner, when Sean asked to see her and Shasa in the gun room.
After Shasa had poured a tiny glass of Chartreuse for her, and balloon snifters of Hennessy for Sean and himself, they all settled down in the leather chairs. The men went through the ritual of preparing their cigars, cutting the tips and warming and finally lighting them with the cedarwood tapers.
‘All right, Sean,' Shasa said. ‘What did you want to talk to us about?'
‘You know how we discussed the safari business, Pater, just before I left?' Shasa noticed how he showed no contrition as he mentioned his enforced departure. ‘Well, I've had six years of experience now, and I won't offend you with false modesty. I'm one of the top hunters in the business. I've a list of over fifty clients who want to hunt with me again. I have their telephone numbers, you can ring them and ask them.'
‘All right, I will,' Shasa said. ‘But go on.'
‘Ian Smith's government in Rhodesia is developing the safari business there. One of the concessions they are putting up for auction in two months' time is a plum.' Shasa and Centaine listened in attentive silence, and when Sean finished almost an hour later, they exchanged a significant glance. They understood each other perfectly after thirty years of working so closely, and they did not have to speak to agree that Sean had made a virtuoso performance. He was a good salesman, and his figures added up to the promise of rich profits, but Shasa saw the little shadow at the back of his mother's dark eyes.
‘Just one .thing perturbs me a little, Sean. After all these years you come breezing in again – and the first thing you do is ask for half a million dollars.'
Sean stood up and strolled across the gun room. The carved tusk hung above the stone fireplace, the central
position in the room, pride of place amongst all Shasa's own hunting trophies.
Sean studied it for a moment, and then turned back slowly to face them.
‘You never wrote to me once in all those years, Pater. That's all right, I understand why. But don't accuse me of not caring. I thought about you and Nana every day I was away.' It was cleverly done. He did not mention the tusk on the wall, and Centaine could have sworn there were genuine tears just at the back of his marvellously green clear eyes. She felt her doubts soften and begin to dissolve.
‘My God, how can any woman resist him,' she thought. ‘Even his own grandmother!' She looked across at Shasa and was amazed to see that Sean had shamed him. Neatly and adroitly he had shifted guilt and Shasa had to cough and clear his throat before he could speak.

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