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  Sam sighed with relief. ‘Glad to hear that. We had approximately sixty millimetres of rain here last night, but it has cleared completely this morning with a very slight southerly breeze. No messages.’

  Sam put the mike back on its bracket and walked over to where Aaron was drying the saddle of the XT500 scrambler, Sam’s favourite means of transport in the bush. ‘Mr van Reenen says Sipho is going to be all right.’ Aaron straightened up with a grin, which froze on his face s they heard a burst of automatic rifle fire in the distance.

  ‘The elephant poachers! That’s an AK47.’ There was a mean glint of anticipation in Aaron’s eye.

  Sam was shouting instructions to the other rangers as he ran to fetch his rifle from the truck. ‘Leave the tents and follow us in the truck!’ He grabbed his rifle from the bracket and slung a portable radio over his shoulder. Aaron had already started the big scrambler, and the moment Sam got on behind him he roared off, raising a rooster tail of wet soil. The rest of the rangers dropped what they were doing, grabbed their rifles and ran for the truck. By the time Josiah got the truck started the bike was long gone, but the single track in the wet ground was easy to follow.

  Rui and his men had been lucky. They had started out at first light, and within twenty minutes they’d come across bull’s fresh tracks in the mud. An hour later the elephant had died in a hail of bullets amongst the fever trees.

  There was an urgency in the way the three bloody men hacked at the bone around the bases of the big tusks. In another hour the heat from the Lowveld sun would start creating the thermal updrafts needed by the vultures to get aloft, and by eleven there would be hundreds of big carrion birds circling above the carcass. These stacked towers of circling birds could be seen from miles away, and someone was bound to come and investigate. By then Rui wanted to be well on his way to the wire.

  The thicket of fever trees and the high humidity dampened the sound of the approaching motorcycle. Sam was standing on the footrests with one hand on Aaron’s shoulder, tracking. The three sets of footprints over the dish-like indentations left by the lone bull stood out like a highway, and they were travelling at speed.

  Rui and his two accomplices never heard them coming above their own jubilant chatter and the continuous whacking of the axes into bone. As the big XT500 came roaring into the clearing Rui and the man closest to him reacted instantly. They grabbed their AK47s and ran. The third man, working on the bottom tusk, was too slow. By the time he realised what was going on, he was looking down the intimidating bore of the .458 Steyr Mannlicher. Aaron grabbed the poacher, and all three of them went down behind the carcass as one of the departing poachers started firing his weapon over his shoulder. Sam popped up from behind the elephant and let off a snap shot at the poacher, who went down with a scream. The heavy .458 Nosler bullet had struck him on the elbow, tearing off half his arm. The thunderous roar of the Mannlicher pumped an extra squirt of adrenaline into Rui’s system, and he was still picking up speed when he disappeared amongst the fever trees.

  While Aaron was handcuffing the first poacher around the base of a sturdy sapling, Sam applied a tourniquet to the other’s arm. He knew the third poacher was getting farther away by the minute, but they were at least fifteen kilometres from the border. There was just no way the man was going to get that far – not with the clear imprints his boots were leaving in the sodden soil.

  After the first kilometre of running flat out, Rui’s knees started buckling, and he knew he had to slow down. His breath was a raw rasp in his throat, and his heart was pounding against his ribs. He knew the man behind him was Sam Jenkins, and he’d heard enough to know that he was in deep trouble. If half of what he’d heard was true, trying for a shoot-out with Jenkins was out of the question. Gripping his AK47 by the barrel he swung it above his head and threw it as far away from his tracks as possible. When the distant putter of the motorcycle became audible, Rui put on a new burst of speed to get as far away from his rifle as possible. He knew there was no way he could get away from this man, but he could always claim that he didn’t do the shooting. With a good lawyer he could be out again in a couple of months. When the puttering behind him became a roar he stopped and put his hands on his head.

  Sam was scanning the ground in the area as the bike skidded to a halt next to Rui. ‘Where did you dump your rifle?’

  ‘I want a lawyer,’ Rui stated as Aaron frisked him and put the cuffs on him.

  Sam jacked a round into the chamber of the .458 and pointed it at Rui’s groin. ‘Lawyer’s can’t do anything for hyena shit. Where’s the AK?’

  ‘I did not carry a rifle.’

  Sam sighed. ‘You see that warthog hole over there?’

  Rui let out a snort of contempt. Sam clicked off the safety. ‘OK, Aaron, strip him. I’m not going to waste my time searching for his gun.’ Before Rui realised what was going on, Aaron had sliced through his belt, and proceeded to cut the clothes off him with a vicious-looking knife. ‘Hey, hey! What are you doing, man?’

  Sam shrugged. ‘We’re going to shove your clothes and boots down that hole and collapse it. By morning you will be all over the veld in the form of huge piles of hyena dung, bones and all. Nobody will ever know. That’s the only way you can escape.’

  One look into Sam’s eyes convinced Rui not to call his bluff. ‘I will show you.’

  Aaron winked at Sam. ‘Pity. The man could have saved us a lot of paperwork. You got a name?’

  ‘Carlos Perreira.’

  ‘OK, Carlos. Let’s go see if your friend is still hanging on.’

  The ranger post at Nwanetzi consisted of two separate areas enclosed with triple fencing. Sam’s house, office and workshop were separated from his rangers’ compound, where Aaron and the others lived with their families, by a hundred metres of dense bush.

  Job, the ancient gardener, opened the gates as Sam approached on the motorcycle, followed by his truck. The wounded man was groaning in agony on the back of the truck.

  ‘Aaron, put some Cicatrin on that man’s arm and get him out of the sun. I’ll see if I can get him a chopper,’ Sam said as he headed for his office.

  Sam’s office resembled a small museum in disarray. On shelves lining the walls was a remarkable collection of snakes and insects in bottles of formalin, interspersed with a variety of animal skulls, from a pangolin to a lion. Sam switched on his radio. ‘Sam 371 calling Skukuza 101.’

  Aunt Cecile Steinbeck at reception in the Parks Board offices was quick, efficient and nosey. ‘Skukuza 101, hello Sam. How are you?’

  ‘Hello Aunt Cecile. Fine thanks. Could you get Mr van Reenen for me please. It’s urgent.’

  A moment later John van Reenen was on the radio. ‘Morning, Sam. Problem?’

  ‘On the contrary, John. We got the elephant poachers. All three of them.’

  ‘Beautiful! You bringing them down?’

  ‘Two of them. We need a casevac for the third one – he got his arm shot off. He needs a hospital fast.’

  ‘OK, I’ll send the chopper to get him to Nelspruit. Come see me when you’ve dropped the other two off.’

  Driving down to Skukuza, Sam decided to take a short cut via the Sweni fire break. He had to engage four-wheel drive on the seldom used track, but he preferred the solitude of fire breaks to the crowded tourist roads. He caught himself thinking about Linda Crawford, and a sudden feeling of guilt twisted in his stomach like a live snake.

  Estelle, his fiancée, was a schoolteacher, and the daughter of Dr. Fisher, director of the Parks Board. Sam’s father and Dr. Fisher had been friends since their schooldays, and everybody was pleased as punch about the forthcoming wedding. Sam knew he loved Estelle deeply. He also knew that she would make him the best wife any man could ever hope for. She was intelligent, beautiful, virgo intacta, and loved him to a point that scared him. He had been a contented man, at peace with his life and future. His apple cart had been upset three weeks ago in the Regional Court in Nelspruit, the nearest big town to the Park. Sam had
been witness in the trial of three poachers who had put out a poisoned carcass to kill vultures, which fetched astronomic prices in the muti (witch-doctor) shops in the big cities. As a result of their unbelievably good eyesight, vultures had the uncanny ability to spot a dead animal from heights where they themselves were invisible to the human eye. Because of this, it was a widely held belief amongst blacks that vultures have foreknowledge of a kill. This, in turn, led to belief that potions concocted with certain remains of a vulture will enable the user to see into the future. Very handy when playing the horses – instant Nostradamus; hence the high prices.

  The cape Vulture being on the endangered species list, the Parks board had been determined to make an example of these three poachers.

  The public prosecutor had warned Sam about the new lawyer in town. Her looks turned your knees to jelly, her tongue was a scorcher, and she was as liberal as hell. Sam, having used and dodged females of all calibres in his life, was amused by this build-up of the woman. Up until he got engaged to Estelle a year ago, he had enjoyed the female of the species with gusto. The image of the khaki-clad bronzed bachelor-in-the-bush was irresistible to women, and Sam had used this advantage to the hilt, so to speak. The net result was that he had seen it all, done it all, and after getting engaged, thoughts of other women no longer crossed his mind. In fact, he found the obtrusive passes that were still being made by the opposite sex boring, and had lately developed an attitude of superior contempt towards females in general.

  But nothing could have prepared him for Linda Crawford. He had been standing outside Court B discussing the case with the public prosecutor when she swept past. The moment he made eye contact with her, something snapped in his head. At first he had tried to understand what was happening to him. He’d been under the impression that he was immune.

  In court he couldn’t concentrate and he couldn’t keep his eyes off the lawyer for the defense. She’d rattled him in the witness box and nearly tore him to pieces.

  When she approached him afterwards in the passage he actually felt himself blushing. He could not comprehend it but he no longer cared. With a wide, white smile she had introduced herself and inquired about accommodation in Satara rest camp for herself and a friend for the coming weekend. Just like that, no preliminary small talk. Although tourism was an entirely different department, he had assured her that he would organise something.

  He had made a point of being in the restaurant in Satara when they came in for breakfast the Saturday morning, and volunteered to show them the prime areas for viewing game.

  Not having inquired about the nature of the ‘friend’, he was consumed by jealousy when she arrived accompanied by a young doctor doing his housemanship at the Nelspruit Hospital. He had forthwith proceeded to charm her with everything he had in his arsenal, much to the chagrin of the doc. She had remained aloof but he noticed, with great pleasure, that she also treated her companion as if she had him on a leash.

  The following Monday Sam had driven the sixty odd kilometres to Orpen Gate and phoned her. He was going to be in town in two weeks time and could he see her? She told him to come to her house on the Saturday morning and to be sure to bring his swimming gear.

  He was brooding so deeply about what was happening to him that he nearly lost the Toyota as it went into a skid on the muddy track. Aaron’s loud comment from the back of the truck, supported by a chorus from the poachers pulled him out of his reverie. He felt an icy finger crawling along his spine as he thought about his trip to Nelspruit tomorrow. He felt elated at the thought of seeing Linda, yet at the same time apprehensive. . .

  The police station at Skukuza consisted only of a charge office and two small holding cells. Sam dropped Aaron off with the two prisoners and told him to meet him at the Nature Conservation offices in an hour or two.

  Aunt Cecile was on to Sam the moment he set foot in reception. ‘Sam, nice work! How have you been, all alone up there in the bush? Are you eating well?’

  ‘Aunt Cecile, I’ve been eating well for the past ten years.’

  She took a stack of mail from under the counter and handed it to Sam. ‘Been keeping your mail for you. I see there’s a letter from Estelle.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Sam headed for the passage, but she hadn’t finished with him.

  ‘So have you decided on a date yet? A girl won’t wait forever, you know.’

  ‘I know, Aunt Cecile. We just haven’t gotten around to it yet.’ Again the snake coiled in his stomach.

  As he passed the office door of the newly appointed public relations officer, Sam stopped and stuck his head in. ‘Hey, Joao, what’s it like, driving a desk?’

  Until a month ago Joao had been divisional ranger near Pafuri in the north. Having declined promotion on two previous occasions, he had had no option but to accept the new post.

  ‘Lousy. Come on in, talk to me about the bush.’

  You should have been out there last night – I had sixty millimetres. It was heaven. And to round it off, we nailed the elephant gang this morning.’ Sam was in the process of admiring a new pen set on the desk, and he missed Joao’s expression of utter shock. By the time he looked up Joao had composed himself. ‘Identification?’ he asked casually.

  They never carry any,’ Sam said. ‘But we’ll play them off against each other. Two of them are in the cells here, and the other one is in Nelspruit Hospital.’

  Joao looked at his watch. ‘You’ll have to excuse me – I’ve still got to make the bank before they close.’

  ‘Yeah, John’s waiting for me. Be seeing you.’

  Shortly after midnight Joao stopped in front of the small Skukuza police station in his official Parks Board 4x4. The constable on duty was surprised to see anybody at this time of night. ‘Evening . . . uh, morning, Mr dos Santos. Anything wrong?’

  ‘No, I’ve been working late, and I’ve got to go up north first thing in the morning. Thought I’d pop in and have a look at those two poachers – I think I might be able to help you with identification.’

  ‘Good. They’ve clammed up on us – pretend not to understand English. Maybe you can get something out of them.’ The constable took a bunch of keys from his desk and headed for the cells in the back, switching on the lights as he went. ‘The Nelspruit police are grilling the one in the hospital, and they’ll fetch these two in the morning. Would be nice if we could at least give them something to play off against the other one.’ He checked the pistol on his hip before pushing open the cell door. Joao grinned at the constable. ‘We’ll give them something, all right.’

  The constable was watching the two prisoners closely. So closely, in fact, that he didn’t notice Joao produce a silenced 9mm Heckler & Koch pistol from underneath his bush jacket. ‘In for a penny, in for a pound, eh, constable?’ Joao said and shot the man between the eyes.

  Chapter Two

  Sam left Nwanetzi at six the next morning. He had to drive sixty kilometres through the Park to get to Orpen, the gate closest to him.

  From there it was another 130 clicks to Nelspruit. He wanted to be in town early to do some shopping before he went to visit Linda. He wondered what would be the earliest acceptable time to put in his appearance.

  Having lost some time by not exceeding the 50 kilometre/hr speed limit in the Park, he out his foot down once outside. He was in town just after eight, his two-year-old Alfa Romeo purring with joy after the hard ride.

  Parking in the new Nedbank Centre he took the lift down to the ground floor and had a cup of coffee at Gobbles. He couldn’t get the woman out of his mind, and he couldn’t get the snake out of his stomach. He was going to visit her just this once to convince himself that he was infatuated with an image rather than a person, and then get her the hell out of his system.

  Living in the bush, he never had much use for swanky civilian clothing, so his first stop was Threads, across the road. Midas Blum, the owner, had excellent taste in men’s clothing, and was a salesman par excellence. After having spent three times as much as
he intended, Sam walked out with the assurance that the alterations would be completed in ninety minutes flat.

  His next stop was the pharmacy, where he purchased a bottle of White Linen perfume, which he could ill afford.

  He felt like the proverbial schoolboy on his first date, and dawdled around town, killing time. Estelle was nagging at the back of this mind, worrying at his conscience like a terrier with a rag.

  He squashed the thought, stepped on the snake, and went to pick up his new clothes. In the fitting room he decided to keep on the new white slacks, loafers and green shirt. Back at the car he put the rest of his new stuff in his suitcase and stashed his old clobber in a corner of the boot. The suitcase was for in case things went according to plan.

  Sam missed her house on the first pass, but when he eventually turned into the driveway at 10:30, he couldn’t believe his eyes. It was a magnificent house, set well back in a resplendent garden. Must have a very rich daddy, he mused. At her age she could not have earned enough to be able to afford this on her own. In the driveway was Dr. Eben Smith’s 230 E and a jaguar.

  Despondently surveying his surroundings he fleetingly considered sabotaging the Mercedes. Never mind. He got out and rang the doorbell.

  When she opened the door it was like the first time all over. He had the gut feeling that he was hooked. She was wearing a bright yellow summer dress, accentuating the curves of her lithe body; her limbs were tanned and her eyes took his breath away. His image theory faded into obscurity. ‘Hello, Sam, so good to see you.’ She presented a cheek, and he had some difficulty in just pecking it politely. Momentarily he had a blind urge to put his arms around her and kiss her properly, and to hell with the consequences.