Assegai

‘It is close.’ Manyoro pointed ahead. ‘Some of the villagers are coming already.’ A small group of women and children were ru

‘And how far to where we left the lions, O great hunter?’ Leon demanded of Loikot. With his spear he pointed out a small segment of the sky, indicating two hours’ passage of the sun. ‘Good. So, here you are close to the manyatta and the lions. I will leave both of you. Watch for my return. When I come back I will have Kichwa Muzuru with me.’

Leon left the two Masai on the salt and took off again. He circled the pan once before heading back to Nairobi. The Masai waved at him and then he saw them separate: Loikot trotted away to pick up the tracks of the lions, and Manyoro went to meet the women from Massana’s village.

As Leon made the initial approach to the Nairobi polo ground he looked out anxiously for the Butterfly. He was worried that Graf Otto might have taken off on another of his mysterious, unpredictable jaunts into the blue and would not reappear for many days, by which time Loikot might have lost contact with the quarry.

‘Thank the Lord for that!’ he exclaimed, as he made out the gaudy scarlet and black shape of the Butterfly parked in front of the hangar at the far end of the field. Gustav and his assistants were working on her engines. However, there was no sign of the hunting car, so instead of landing he circled out over Tandala Camp and found it parked outside Graf Otto’s private quarters. Leon made another pass over the camp and the Graf emerged from his tent, shrugging on a shirt over his naked torso.

Leon felt a sharp pang of jealousy and resentment. Of course he has Eva in there with him, he thought. She has to earn her keep. The idea made him feel sick. Graf Otto gave him a perfunctory wave, then went to the hunting car. Leon turned the Bumble Bee back towards the polo ground, but the taste of anger and jealousy were strong and rank on the back of his tongue.

Pull yourself together, Courtney! You know that Eva von Well-berg isn’t a vestal virgin. She’s been under the same mosquito net as him every night since they arrived, he told himself, as he lined up for the landing. As he side-slipped the Bumble Bee in over the boundary fence, his heart bounded as he saw her sitting at her easel in the shade of the Butterfly’s chequered wing. Until that moment she had been hidden from him by the fuselage. It seemed ridiculous, but he was relieved to know that Graf Otto had been alone in the private quarters.

As he set the aircraft down and taxied towards the hangar, Eva jumped up from her easel and started impulsively towards him. Even at this distance he could see the eagerness in her smile. Then she seemed to realize that Gustav was watching, checked herself and came on at a more demure pace. She hung back as he placed the boarding ladder against the fuselage, and Leon swarmed down it. He glanced at her over the heads of the other men, and saw that she was flustered and nervous. He was accustomed to her always being poised and cool, but now she was like a gazelle with the scent of a hunting leopard in its nostrils. Her agitation affected him, but he was able to hide his feelings sufficiently to nod casually at her. ‘Good day, Fräulein,’ he said politely, then turned to Gustav. ‘The starboard number-two engine’s ru

‘I’ll check it at once,’ Gustav said, and shouted to his assistants.

When his head disappeared into the engine cowling, Leon and Eva were alone. ‘Something has happened to you – something’s changed,’ he told her softly. ‘You’re different, Eva.’

‘And you’re perceptive. Everything’s changed.’

‘What is it? Has there been trouble with Graf Otto?’

‘Not with him. This is between you and me.’

‘Trouble?’ he stared at her.

‘Not trouble. The very opposite. I have made a decision.’ Her voice was low and husky, but then she smiled.

Her smile was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. ‘I don’t understand,’ he said.

‘Nor do I, Badger.’

Her use of that name was too much for him. He took a step towards her, and reached out a hand. She recoiled sharply. ‘No, don’t touch me. I can’t trust myself not to do something stupid.’ She indicated the dust thrown up by the hunting car as it drove towards them. ‘Otto is coming. We must be careful.’

‘I ca

‘Neither can I,’ she replied. ‘But for now we must keep away from each other. Otto is no fool. He will see that something has happened between us.’ She turned away and went to where Gustav was balanced on a wing, peering into the engine housing.

As he drove the hunting car in through the gate of the boundary fence, Graf Otto called, ‘So you are back, Courtney. You have been gone long enough. Where were you? Cape Town? Cairo?’

The brief exchange with Eva had left Leon in an ebullient and reckless mood. ‘No, sir. I was looking for your bloody lion.’

Graf Otto saw Leon’s elation and his own face lit up, his duelling scar turning pink with anticipation. He jumped out and slammed the door behind him. ‘Did you find it?’

‘I wouldn’t have come back if I hadn’t.’

‘Is he a big one?’

‘He’s the biggest lion I’ve ever seen, and the other is even bigger.’

‘I don’t understand. How many lions are there?’

‘Two,’ said Leon. ‘Two enormous brutes.’

‘When can we leave to go after them?’

‘As soon as Gustav has checked the engine of the Bumble Bee.’

‘I can’t wait that long. The Butterfly’s tanks are full, all our gear is loaded and she is ready to go. We will leave now! At once!’

Graf Otto was at the controls of the Butterfly as they took off from the Percy’s Camp airstrip, where they had stopped to refuel after the flight in from Nairobi. He headed southwest towards the manyatta of Massana. Eva sat beside him, Ishmael squatted on the deck with his precious kitchen bundle, while Leon, Gustav and He

They had been flying for little more than twenty-five minutes when Leon spotted a feather of smoke on their port quarter, rising straight into the still, breathless heat of midday. ‘Loikot!’ Leon knew it was him, even before he made out the slim figure standing beside the smudge fire. Loikot flapped his shuka to ensure that they had seen him, then pointed with his spear towards the jagged outline of a small kopje not far ahead. He was indicating the whereabouts of the quarry.

Swiftly Leon assessed the changed situation. The gods of the chase had been kind to them. During his absence the lions must have headed in the direction of Massana’s manyatta. They were now many miles closer to it than they had been when they had first spotted them. He looked at the distant escarpment of the Rift to orientate himself, then picked out the ghostly shape of the salt pan where he had left the two Masai only three days ago. It lay almost equidistant between the manyatta and the kopje where the lions were now lying up. Couldn’t be better, he exulted, and moved back quickly to where he could talk to Graf Otto above the engines. ‘Loikot signalled that the lions are lying up among the rocks on that hillock.’

‘Where is the nearest place I can land?’

‘Can you see that salt pan?’ Leon pointed it out. ‘If you put us down there, we’ll be close to the quarry and to the village where the morani are assembling for the hunt.’

Massana’s manyatta was larger than most others in the valley. A hundred or more large huts were laid out in a wide circle around the cattle pen. Graf Otto circled the settlement at low level. A dark mass of humanity had gathered in the central cattle pen. Although Leon could not pick out Manyoro in the press of shuka-clad figures, he had done his job, and prevailed on Massana to assemble his morani for the great hunt. Satisfied that all was in readiness for them, Leon asked Graf Otto to turn the Butterfly towards the salt pan. He landed and taxied to the treeline along its western edge before he shut down the engines.