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Play dead! he thought, even as he was going down. His lower body was paralysed, but he forced his torso to relax. He hit the floor with the loose unresisting weight of a flour sack and did not move again.
His head was twisted to one side, his chest pressed to the cold cement floor. He lay still. He heard the gunman cross the floor, the rubber soles of the combat boots squeaking softly.
Then his boots entered Joh
Joh
Don't move, Joh
It was his last despairing hope.
He knew that the slightest movement must trigger the shot. He had to convince the gunman he was dead.
At that moment there was a burst of shouting from outside the room, and then a volley of automatic fire, followed by more shouting. The pressure of the rifle muzzle was lifted from Joh
Joh
Immediately he smelled his own faeces and knew that the second bullet had ripped open his intestines. He reached down into his crotch and pressed his fingers into the wound in his groin. Blood spurted hotly over his hand.
He found the open artery and pinched off the end of the severe d femoral.
Mavis, and the babies! That was his next thought. What could he do for them? At that moment he heard more firing from up the hill, in the direction of the domestic compound and his own cottage.
It's a gang of them, he realised with despair. They are all over the camp. They are attacking the compound. And then, My babies. Oh, God!
My babies!
He thought about the weapons in the room next door, but he knew he could not get that far. Even if he did, how could he handle a rifle with half his guts shot away and his life-blood spreading in a pool under him?
He heard the trucks. He recognised the beat of the big diesels and knew that they were the refrigerator trucks. He felt a surge of hope.
Gama, he thought. David . . . But it was short-lived. Lying on his side, clinging to his severed artery, he looked across the room and realised that he could see through the open door.
One of the white refrigerator trucks pulled into his view. It reversed up against the door of the ivory godown. As soon as it parked, Gomo jumped out of the cab and began a heated, gesticulating discussion with the scar-faced leader of the gang In his confused and swiftly weakening condition, it took Joh
Gama, he thought. Gomo is one of them. He set it up.
It should not have come as such a shock. Joh
He was just the type, but Joh
Suddenly the area around the godown that Joh
Joh
I'm dying, he thought without emotion. He could feel the numbness spreading from his paralysed legs up through his chest.
He forced the darkness back from his eyes and thought that he must be fantasising, for now Ambassador Ning stood in the late sunlight below the verandah. He still had the binoculars slung over his shoulder and his ma
Then to his astonishment he saw the scar-faced leader of the gang come to where the ambassador stood and salute him, if not respectfully, at least with recognition of his authority.
Ning. Joh
I'm not dreaming it.
Then the voices of the two men carried to where he lay.
They were speaking in English. You must hurry your men, Ning Cheng Gong said. They must get the ivory loaded, I want to leave here immediately.
Money, answered Sali . One thousand dollars. . . His English was atrocious. You have been paid. Cheng was indignant. I have paid you your money. More money. More one thousand dollars. Sali gri
Sali's grin widened. Give money now. I haven't any more money with me, Cheng told him flatly. Then we go! Now! You load ivory yourself.
Wait. Cheng was obviously thinking quickly. I haven't got money.
You take the ivory, as much as you want. Take everything you can carry.
Cheng had realised that the poachers would be able to take only a negligible number of tusks from the hoard. They could not possibly manage more than a single tusk each. Twenty men, twenty tusks, it was a small price.
Soli stared at him while he considered the offer. Clearly he had milked every possible advantage from the situation, so at last he nodded.
Good! We take ivory. He began to turn away.
Ambassador Ning called after him. Wait, Sali ! What about the others?
Did you take care of them? They all dead. The warden and his woman and children? Them too? All dead, Sali repeated. Woman is dead, and her piccanins.
My men make jig-jig with all three women first. Very fu
He dead like a ngulubi, dead like a pig. He laughed. Very good job, hey?
He walked away with the rifle over his shoulder, still chuckling, and Cheng followed him out of Joh
Anger came to arm Joh
The poacher's words conjured up a dreadful vision of the fate that had overtaken Mavis and the children. He could see it as clearly as if he had been there; he knew about rape and pillage. He had lived through the bush war.