It was like driving through a hail of BBs. Eventually the flies gave up and flew off in search of prey with thinner hide. As Merry had discovered, however, once inside a vehicle they had a disconcerting habit of hiding until the passengers relaxed. Then they would come straight at exposed flesh like darts fired from a tiny gun. Nor did they waste time the way horseflies did by searching around for the best place to bite. First contact was always made with the lancetlike proboscis. About all that could be said in their favor was that the pain faded rapidly and left no swelling behind.
Killing one was another matter. Their bodies had the consistency and resiliency of tire rubber. A flyswatter was useless against them. So was anything smaller than a Webster's dictionary or hammer. The best method of extermination consisted of trapping one against the glass and pressing a shoe heel, tire iron, or other unyielding object against them. The result was a messy window but peace of mind.
Several times in the gathering twilight the road ahead seemed to disappear into the trees, but Olkeloki always chose the right path. As the sun was starting to set, the forest abruptly gave way to a steep slope at the bottom of which flowed a lugubrious stream. Here the Great Ruaha River was no more than a hundred yards across. There was no sign of a bridge.
There were, however, a couple of curious game wardens living in round steel huts that were metallic duplicates of traditional African bomas. One had them sign their names in a register while eyeing them suspiciously. He accepted Oak's story that Olkeloki was their guide and Kakombe his son with great reluctance. Why get into a fight with two muzungu over the purpose of their visit, however? So they didn't look like typical tourists—neither did they look like poachers.
Payment of a small fee brought a barge ferry from the other side of the river. Two men sat on one side and pulled it across by means of a thick steel cable and pulley system. Oak carefully drove the Land Rover onto the ferry, which was barely long enough to hold it, and then watched while the two men started pulling them back the way they'd come.
Eyes blinked at them from the surface of the river. After a casual inspection, the crocodiles sank out of sight in search of the huge tiger fish that occasionally broke the surface and sent droplets flying over the ferry. An impatient Kakombe sat down behind the two ferrymen and wrapped huge hands around the cable. Their progress across the river was noticeably faster as soon as the senior warrior lent his bulk to the effort.
Once safely on the north shore, Oak took a moment to admire the sunset, a sky of pink and cerulean blue silhouetted by low mountains. Then he spoke to Olkeloki.
"Which way now?"
"Upriver. I think you will be surprised, Joshua Oak. And pleased."
Ruaha River Camp was an oasis in the middle of East Africa. The entire complex had been built from scratch using local materials by a determined English family named Wolf. A few other vehicles were parked around the camp, which they soon learned belonged to members of various foreign aid projects. They drove hundreds of miles to the camp from their project sites because it was the only place in that part of Africa where one could enjoy a decent meal out.
Individual huts, or bomas, built of native river rock clung to the flank of a massive granite outcropping that overlooked the river, looking like so many fat birds nests in a baobab tree. Merry expressed the belief that she'd never seen a more beautiful place in her life. The cataracts that roared below the camp generated a cool breeze which not only made the temperature more bearable but kept most of the tsetse flies away. Elephant and giraffe could be seen grazing in the shallow water upriver where the water flowed less rapidly around grassy islets.
Screened-in rooms had beds with foam mattresses and linen, chairs, and kerosene lamps. The calm before the storm, Oak reflected.
Olkeloki confirmed his suspicions. "We are very near to the Out Of, Joshua Oak. No tourist would find it, just as few have found this park. Tomorrow we will attempt to seal the weak place where the fabric of reality is tearing. Tonight—tonight we will eat well. The people who run this camp know how to cook for muzungu and Africans alike, though where they obtain some of their food in this country is as much a mystery as the nature of the shetani. Sometimes I think they must find it in the Out Of."
They were sitting in the open-air restaurant atop the smooth rock, enjoying the view upstream. "I thought all the hotels in this country were nationalized."
"Not this camp. It is too small and too isolated to bother with."
"Then there aren't any government people here at all?"
"No." Olkeloki looked at him sideways. "A strange thing to ask."
Oak shrugged. "Just curious."
"You know what I think, Joshua Oak? I think life has soured a part of you. I think you are uncomfortable with it at times and do not see all the beauty that surrounds you. A part of you sleeps. Perhaps someday it will awaken."
"Look, old man, don't try to tell me how I feel about life. Stick to your evil spirits and your world-saving and leave me alone, okay?"
"Ah, here is Merry. Kakombe will be along shortly, I should think."
While they ate an astonishingly tasty supper they watched bright turquoise agama lizards scurry across the rock walls in search of bugs drawn to the lights. After days of nothing but roast pork interrupted only by the occasional serving of roast goat they were served something that tasted remarkably like beef. It was so tender and flavorful Oak forbore from asking what kind of animal it had come off. There was also fresh fruit and, wonder of wonders, ice cream. In the middle of Africa.
Feeling very full and contented (fatted calves, Oak thought darkly) they hiked to the crest of the granite outcropping. A small bar with tables and chairs had been set into the rock. From below rose the liquid rumble of the Nyamakumu rapids. Somewhere an elephant trumpeted to its mate. Silent staff brought coffee and drinks.
"This is wonderful." Merry sipped at a cup of heavily sugared local coffee. There was no cream. Small furry shapes skittered furtively over the rocks. "There's something over there."
"Hyrax," Olkeloki informed them. "Very tasty, though I think they look too much like rodents to suit muzungu palates."
One came cautiously into the light. It looked at them out of dark, challenging eyes. Oak thought of an overweight, tailless squirrel. Then it whirled and darted back into a crevice, tiny claws scratching against bare stone.
He leaned back in his chair, listening to the river. The magic of the place was insidious. The breeze from the rapids kept the mosquitoes away at night just as it warded off the tsetse flies during the day. A warm lethargy spread through his whole system.
The spell was shattered by a query in thickly accented English.
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"And where are you from, pretty lady?" Oak recognized the speaker and his three companions from supper. Italian engineers assigned to an irrigation project near a town called Mbeya. They'd chatted with them only briefly before eating. He decided immediately that he liked them better before they'd visited the bar. Not that you could blame them for overindulging. They were far from home, living among people they weren't fond of, and their work was continually frustrated by the Tanzanian government's habit of taking two steps backward for every one forward.
They'd attempted to drown their frustration in a small ocean of beer. The one who'd spoken leaned, or rather swayed, close to Merry and put a proprietary hand on her shoulder. She shrugged lightly. He didn't remove his fingers and Oak straightened imperceptibly in his chair, acutely conscious of the fact that what passed for local authority lay more than a hundred miles to the south.
"We're visiting. Tourists," she told him.
"Tourists?" The burly engineer seemed to find this uproariously funny. "No tourists come here, this place. You get to go home. We all got to stay. Work, here, when you can't get anything done in this stinking country." Behind the bar, the bartender's expression tightened, but he made no move to intervene. One of the engineer's companions noticed, however.
"You, what you looking at, eh?"
"Nothing, bwana." The man kept his voice carefully neutral, but Oak could see the disgust in his face as he turned back to his slim stock of bottles. The first engineer was far too drunk to notice subtleties of expression. The hand on Merry's shoulder began to rotate slowly.
"We don't see many white women here. The black whores are nice, but you get tired of anything after a while." He whispered something in Italian to his companions and the four men enjoyed a private guffaw.
Oak smiled up at him. It was a smile he'd had occasion to make use of in other places. Except for possible additional difficulties that might be caused by language, he knew how to handle the present situation. There was just no backup to call upon. He was on his own.
"Why don't you fellows relax and let's all have a beer together. I'm told the local stuff's not half bad."
"Half bad?" The man who spoke looked like an athlete. He was a tall, rugged redhead in his forties and he clutched a bottle of the brew under discussion in his right hand. "No, it's not half bad. It's worse than that. It tastes like elephant piss. But it's all we have." He chugalugged the rest of the bottle's contents before hurling the empty over the stone wall. Oak heard it shatter far below. One of the man's friends gave him a friendly shove. Laughing, they opened two more beers.
"If it's that bad," Oak said quietly, "maybe you shouldn't drink any more of it."
Instant silence and sudden glares. The effect was the same as if he'd shot off a gun.
"Sure, we've had enough." The first speaker wiped foam from his lips. "We've had enough of this country, enough of these lazy, stupid people, and maybe I think enough of noisy Americans too." Grabbing his bottle by the neck, he smashed the body against the rock wall, kept a tight grip on the jagged handle that remained.
"Josh." Merry tried to rise but the athlete put both hands on her shoulders and shoved her back down in the chair.
"You stay, pretty lady. Ludovico know when to stop. He an engineer. I know when to stop too." He leaned over and jammed his mouth against hers, forcing her head and body back until her chair was balanced on the rear pair of legs. She kicked futilely at the air.
Meanwhile Oak found himself backed against the wall, a steep fall-off behind him and two of the Italians advancing from the front. The third was circling around to the right to block the stairway.
The chair Oak picked up was heavy, simply made, of local wood. If it made contact with a man's skull it was the bone that would shatter. A glance to his left showed that the barman had already beat a fast retreat. To save himself, or to get help? With his attention divided among three grinning adversaries, Oak couldn't afford time to speculate.
A shadow appeared behind the engineer who was assaulting Merry. It lifted the man off the ground as if he were a child. A moment later Kakombe gently set the unconscious man down and then moved silently forward to put an arm around the neck of the big engineer clutching the broken bottle. His other hand went around the man's right wrist and squeezed. The jagged bottleneck fell to the floor to shatter harmlessly against the stone.
By now the other workers had turned to warily study the newcomer. Kakombe waited until the engineer stopped kicking before lowering him to the ground. Then he turned to the remaining pair. Both men drew knives; short, heavy-bladed weapons. Chair raised in front of him, Oak advanced on the nearest. Now it was the turn of the two Italians to commence a slow retreat.
"You killed him," one of them muttered angrily. He held the knife loosely, as if he was thinking of throwing it. Oak took a second step toward him and he slashed with the blade. It glanced harmlessly off one leg of the chair.
"He only sleeps," said Kakombe. "It is better to sleep than fight over such things. I have had too much honey beer myself, sometimes."
The other engineer raised his knife and Oak could see him taking aim at the giant. He'd have to make a rush with the chair and hope the two didn't know how to fight together. If Kakombe could get his hands on the other one…
"That's enough!"
Eyes flicked toward the top of the stairs. The barman was standing there holding a kerosene lantern. Next to him stood Axel Wolf, holding the biggest rifle Oak had ever seen. His gaze shifted rapidly between the two armed Italians.
"This is a Chesterton Express, gentlemen. It will drop a bull elephant at two hundred yards. I hope I will not be compelled to demonstrate what it can do to a human being."
The engineers exchanged a look. Slowly, knives slid back into leather sheaths. Wolf nodded.
"Better. Now pick up your friends and get out. You're not welcome here anymore. Be good chaps and maybe I won't find it necessary to speak to your project supervisor about this the next time I'm in Mbeya, right?"
Glowering, the two men shouldered their companions and started down the stairs. One of them considered spitting at Kakombe, thought better of it, and contented himself with mumbling unintelligible obscenities.
Everyone in the bar waited quietly until the sound of a four-wheel drive starting up and leaving the parking area was heard. Only then did Wolf set the big gun aside. He spoke in Swahili to his waiting men, who took the weapon and vanished down the steps.
"My askaris will make sure our drunken friends don't sneak back to cause trouble later on. I don't think that's likely. As much beer as they drank they'll be lucky if they can still find their pants in an hour. I only hope they're sober enough to make it back across the river. If not, the crocs'll get 'em. I wouldn't like that. Bad publicity, y'know. You folks all right?"
Merry was fixing her hair. "Been a long time since I saw a bar fight. Most bars are closed when I'm off work." She rubbed at her mouth. "I'm okay. Kakombe?"
"Cowards. Muzungu are nothing without their guns. Some muzungu," he added hastily, smiling at Oak.
"My apologies. Next drinks are on the house." Wolf pulled up a chair. He was the same age as Oak, but the lines in his face hinted at a hard life. Most of his hair had turned gray prematurely. "Some people handle MMBA better than others. Not easy livin' out here among strange folks without, if you'll excuse me, madame, womenfolk of your own persuasion. Some people go a little crazy and have to be slapped down. Some go a lot crazy and have to be sent back home in white overcoats." He nodded toward the river.
"Most likely that lot'll wake up in the morning with bad headaches, bad memories, and stomachs they'd as soon pass on to somebody else. When they sober up they'll probably be more embarrassed than anything else. The foreign workers here are a mixed bag. The Scandinavians are the best, the Bulgarians the worst, and the Chinese are inscrutable. The Italians and Brazilians fall somewhere in the middle."
"Thanks for your help," Oak told him, "though I think Kakombe and I could've handled things ourselves."
"I don't doubt that, old chap, but I don't allow bloodletting in my place. Not that the government gives a damn if a bunch of drunken muzungus want to spill each other's guts, but they won't stand for anything that slows up one of their pet development projects. Putting a visiting engineer in the hospital's the local equivalent of blowing up a tractor. The tractor would get the better burial. Beer?"
"I think I'll stick to double cola, or whatever that local soft drink's called."
"Right." Wolf rose, smiled at Merry. "Apologies again. Check your sodas for bugs. We do our best here but I can't inspect every case personally. This isn't Hyde Park, you know. G'night."
Merry sipped at her glass, made a face, and pushed it aside. "Warm. Thanks, Josh." She looked up and to her left. "Thank you too, Kakombe."
He shrugged and settled his massive frame into the chair next to her. Watching her face closely, he picked up her glass. "I will finish this. My throat is dry and I am used to warm beer."
She smiled at him. "Help yourself."
Satisfied that all was well for at least the next half hour, Oak turned and gazed out over the dark river, thinking back to what Wolf had told them. "MMBA." They'd heard the term used in Nairobi. It stood for "miles and miles
of bloody Africa." Not so much a derogatory description as one of resignation. If he didn't know better, he could imagine the forest below was the piney woods of Georgia or the hardwood forest fringing his beloved Burke Lake back home in Virginia.
The sounds rising from below suggested otherwise. Exotic hoots and chirps, shrill whines and mechanical buzzings identified the surroundings as anything but familiar. Suddenly he peered harder into the dim light. A large shape was squatting on a curve of rock not far below. Wolf had warned them on arrival that it was rare but not unheard of for leopards to wander into camp. At the time Oak thought it was a ploy to ensure that guests did not make unnecessary use of the limited outdoor plumbing facilities. Now he wasn't sure.
Then he relaxed. Shifting its position slightly, the shape identified itself as human. He thought he recognized the outline.
"Mbatian Olkeloki?"
A head turned and moonlight flashed from upturned eyes. "What is it, friend Joshua?"
"How long have you been sitting there, old man?"
"A long time. I like the coolness of the smooth stone against my backside and the slant of this slope suits my spine. The hyrax come to nibble at my toes. They look at me questioningly, but I have neither food nor answers to give them."
Oak jerked his head toward the distant glow from the bar. "Didn't you hear what was going on up there?"
"You were there. Merry Sharrow was there. Kakombe was nearby. There was little need for me to intervene. I did not doubt the three of you could deal with four drunken ilmeet. If you had not been able to then I would have known I made a mistake in choosing you. Besides, I am an old man. My time for fighting is past. Knowledge and wisdom can prevail against spirits and shetani, but they are of little use against drunks." He turned away, staring out across the hissing rapids and blackened forest, then tilting back his head to regard the stars. Oak wondered what he saw there.
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