The Intern Affair (58 page)

Abdul was a big burly man with a fat belly hanging over the belt of his shorts.
He looked disgusting.
Talya had vision of him fitted with a pig’s mask at the fair.
It would suit him to a T
.

Samir opened the door of the truck for Talya to climb out. “My Lady, please come out of the car.
These men want us to stay here and wait for their return.” Just before Talya did, however, and while all eyes were on her, she felt a slight jerk at her back.
Christian
had disembarked the pick-up.

“Come, we will go and sit in the shade while these men go about their duty,” Samir offered, taking her hand to lead Talya away from the truck, and under the shade of a small tree.
Abdul followed them closely, leaving the truck to depart for what was waiting for its passengers at the bottom of the hill.

Christian
was nowhere to be seen, yet Talya could sense his presence.
Samir had been right;
Christian
’s father must have been of the feline family.

90

Jerry
,
who was still sitting at the wheel of the second Landrover, saw a cloud of dust turn into
view from behind the hill.
He estimated it to be about two miles away from where they were parked.
“
Thomas
, look, the truck is coming back. I’m sure Samir is not at the wheel this time.
Let’s get out of the car slowly.
Charles
, you go and sit in the front car and look ill. Can you do that?”

Charles
was already out of the vehicle. “Sure, no problem, I am feeling a bit under the weather anyway.” He went to sit in the first Landrover ahead of him. He left the back seat door opened, and from where
Jerry
and
Thomas
were sitting,
Charles
looked as if he was ready to fall out of the vehicle.

“
Thomas
, you stay close by.
I may need you,”
Jerry
ordered as he got out from behind the wheel and went to stand in front of his car, his body leaning against the bull-bar with his arms crossed over his chest.
Thomas
slipped out of the passenger seat and rolled out of sight into a nearby bush, crouched down and waited.

91

They sat beneath
the tree and waited in silence for a couple of minutes.
Abdul stood in front of them looking down at Talya. Behind the veil, she was looking at the machete the pig held in his right hand. She could feel Samir’s tension mount.
Abdul was ogling her.
His salacious gaze didn’t leave her for one second.
Yet, that was one second too many. Out of nowhere, ‘their cat’ jumped on the fellow, pulled a rope from under his T-shirt and lashed it around the pig’s neck. The machete went flying, landing somewhere behind
Christian.
He then pulled the rope downward while giving Abdul a kick behind the knees. In no time, the fat man was subdued and kneeling in front of their eyes. The cord encircling his throat prevented him
from
scream
ing
.
Christian
finished the job by tying the rope around the man’s wrists and ankles behind him so that if he tried to move a fraction of an inch in any direction he would strangle himself.
Samir smiled and helped Talya to her feet. The whole thing had reminded her of the calf roping competition at the rodeo.
It didn’t take
Christian
five seconds to accomplish this feat of agility and strength.

“
Christian,
I am the one saying to you now, well done! Brilliant planning and execution. You’re a master at your craft.” Samir meant every word of this.

“All in a day’s job, Samir, but thanks anyway. Coming from you, I appreciate the compliment.”

Talya lifted her veil and peered into
Christian
’s eyes.
“Thanks. And I’m sorry about my comment earlier, about being deceitful.”

“Don’t worry about it, Talya.”
Christian
smiled. “But I know what you mean, and believe me, deceit is not often part of the planning.”

“Let’s get the fat one out of the way and see if we can find the two women our truck driver was talking about,” Samir suggested, pushing the wrapped sausage on his side with his foot in a disdainful manner. “They’ll come searching for their fellows soon enough—just after sunset.”

While
Christian
and Samir were dragging Abdul behind the tree, Talya looked at the road and the row of houses on either side of it, stretching in front of her eyes.
She saw what she was looking for. A very thin plume of smoke was rising from behind a hut farther down
Main Street
.
She started walking in that direction. She knew what she had to do
.

92

The pick-up truck
came to a screeching halt beside the first Landrover.
Two men came out of the cab in an agitated manner.
Jerry
was watching their every move.
One man was short and stocky. The other was also short but slim and muscular.

The stocky man spoke first. “Where’s Sambah? Your friend said he’s been sick and we should find him here.”

“Well, fellows, I think the one you’re looking for is here in the ditch.
I’ve just arrived myself only to find a sick old man in the car up front and this guy in the ditch, so what do you want?”

“We’ll just take Sambah back with us, if
that’s okay
.
And we’ll be on our way,” the man answered while he and his companion turned and took a few steps toward the roadside, ignoring
Jerry
.

“Not so fast!”
Jerry
pulled out his semi-automatic from the back of his belt and pointed it at the two men without a moment’s hesitation. “
Thomas
, would you watch these two, please, and see that they don’t move, while
Charles
and I get this show on the road?”

The stocky man opened his mouth to argue, but closed it again when he felt the barrel of
Charles
’s gun pressed against his spine.
Thomas
was already out from his hiding place before
Jerry
had time to finish his sentence.

While
Thomas
and
Charles
kept their gun aimed at the two captives,
Jerry
went to get three lengths of rope from under the seat of his car, and tied each of the men in the same fashion as
Christian
had done with the pig at the camp.

Thomas
and
Charles
stood side-by-side smiling and watched
Jerry
perform his calf-roping act.

“Believe me,
Thomas
, when I say that this little episode
will not
go on record.
No one would believe me anyway, although I would have liked to see
Carl
’s face if he were here to see this.”

Thomas
laughed. “He would probably have the police charge you with a dozen offences, and me with you.”

“You’ve got that right. And
Terrance
would ask for an expense claim for the use of the government ropes.” They were both laughing nervously now.
They had needed a release of this sort since Talya had left their sides.

Jerry
locked up the first car, and took the ignition wires out of it, just in case some thief wanted to drive off with it during the night.
In a moment, the three men were on their way to Sabodala’s mine site.
The sun was slipping fast behind the horizon now.
Prayer time was almost over.

93

“Where is she going?”
Christian
demanded, as they watched Talya walk down the road ahead of them.

“Look, my friend…, the smoke rising from behind that hut.” Samir
pointed to
a house along
Main Street
. “She’s going to bring the women into the open. Let’s follow her but do nothing until I tell you
what
to do.”

Talya arrived at the hut, and went behind it to find two women squatting in front of the charcoal cradle.
They were cooking tonight’s dinner. They didn’t see or hear her approach.
Talya retreated until she reached the front corner of the hut and then she let escape a groan that no woman would be able to ignore, and fell to the ground. They rushed to Talya’s aid only to be grabbed from behind by
Christian
and Samir who had followed Talya stealthily.
While they were tying and gagging the women down, Talya went back to the cooking cradle. She quickly emptied the boiling water onto the embers and took the large cloth that had been spread on the ground, onto which the women would have laid the dishes after the washing up, and covered the extinguishing fire with it, thus preventing the smoke from rising.

When she joined her companions, she said, “I suggest you put these two under the kitchen counter.
There are sacs of rice under there; they
can rest against them for the night.”

A few minutes later, the three of them were entering the last hut in the row.
Talya sat on the edge of one of the beds and looked up at Samir.

“Would you mind leaving me alone for awhile?
I need
—
”

“Don’t say anything
.
If
Jasmin
were here, I would send for her. We’ll be outside.
Just come and join us whenever you want our company.”

She watched them walk out and closed the door.
As soon as Talya
felt
alone, she knelt on the floor and started crying quietly. She hated herself for what she had just done. She had led her two companions into the ambush of two women who had done nothing but serve the men they probably loved.
She felt dirty and ashamed. Crying was the only way she knew how to express her feelings.

“What do you suppose she’s doing in there?
I hope she’s not killing herself in that hut.”

“Have no such fears,
Christian.
At this minute, she’s crying in humility because she knows that the two women we’ve just
captured
have done nothing wrong and yet she’s inflicting pain onto them.
But she’ll be all right in a little while.”

“You care about her don’t you?”

“Isn’t there a song or a poem that starts like this:
“Let me count the ways in which I love thee?”
If I were to count the ways in which I love her, we would be here until the first gold ingot is poured out of the smelter and I wouldn’t even have begun counting them all.”

Christian
made no comments.
He wanted to respect Samir’s privacy above all else. He liked the man.

They stood silent for a few minutes watching the last of the sunrays disappear behind the hill above them. A moment later, they heard the Landrover and the truck come up to the gateway.

Charles
was the first out of the vehicle. “Where is she?
What happened?”

“Everything is okay,
Charles
. If you see me standing before you smiling, then you can tell yourself that Talya is all right.” Samir patted his friend on the back.

“Where is she, though?
I want to talk to her before we go on with this.”

“She’s in the hut.
She wanted to be alone for a while.
Just let her be for now.
And as for talking to her, there will be time for that yet.”

94

When Talya heard
Charles
’s voice outside the hut, she wiped her eyes, got up and went out.
She looked at
Charles
and no words would come out of her mouth.

“I see you’ve cleaned the place. That’s great,”
Charles
said hesitantly.

“No, that’s not
great
at all but it was necessary, and we haven’t cleaned anything yet.
In three or four hours, maybe longer, that’s when the cleaning will start.”
Talya’s voice was devoid of feelings, but she looked at
Charles
kindly enough, so that he smiled and shook his head.

“
Christian,
get the trucks out of sight, will you? And let’s get into the hut, so we don’t attract any more attention
,
”
Talya said.