by Wilbur Smith
Leon spoke softly: ‘It wasn’t fish-hooks. It was diphtheria that killed them. Hennie can’t understand that on our side it wasn’t deliberate, but the Boer women had always lived out on the open veld. When they were crowded together they had no idea of hygiene. They didn’t know how to keep the camps clean. They became filthy plague holes.’ He sighed. ‘Since the war the British Government has tried to make compensation. They have poured millions of pounds into the country to rebuild the farms. Last year they allowed free elections. Now a government under the two Boer generals, Louis Botha and Jannie Smuts, runs the country. Never has a victor treated the vanquished with such generosity and magnanimity as Britain has shown.’
‘But I understand how Hennie feels,’ Kermit said. ‘There are many people in the south of our country who, even after forty years, have not been able to forget and forgive.’
The following morning Hennie behaved as though the conversation had not taken place. After they had breakfasted on coffee and the remains of the cold tongue, they climbed into the heavily laden trucks. The trackers and skinners sat on the bloody buffalo joints. Kermit cajoled Leon into letting him drive one truck and Hennie followed in the second.
Once again Kermit’s mood was gay and carefree. Leon found him a pleasant companion. They had so much in common. They were both passionate about horses, motor-cars and hunting and had much to talk about. Although Kermit did not elaborate, he hinted that he had a father who was rich and powerful and dominated his life.
‘My father was just the same,’ Leon told him.
‘So what did you do?’
‘I said, “I respect you, Dad, but I cannot live under your rules.” Then I left home and joined the army. That was four years ago. I haven’t been back since.’
‘Son of a gun! That must have taken some guts. I often wish I could do that, but I know I never will.’
Leon found that the better he came to know Kermit the more he liked him. What the hell? he thought. He shoots like a crazy maniac, but no one’s perfect. During the conversation he discovered that Kermit was a keen naturalist and ornithologist. He would be if he’s at the Smithsonian, Leon reasoned, and told Kermit to stop the truck whenever he spotted some interesting insect, bird or small animal to show him. Hennie kept going and disappeared into the distance ahead.
They were not far from the spot where Kermit had left his horse the previous day, only a few miles from the presidential camp, when suddenly and unexpectedly two white men stepped out of the bush into the track in front of them. They were dressed in safari clothing but neither carried a rifle. However, one was armed with a large camera and tripod.
‘Damn it to hell! The gentlemen of the fourth estate,’ Kermit muttered. ‘Just can’t get away from them.’ He braked to a halt. ‘I guess we just have to be nice and polite to them or they’ll cook our goose for us.’
The tallest of the two strangers hurried to the driver’s side. ‘Excuse me, gentlemen,’ he smiled ingratiatingly. ‘May I trespass on your good nature and ask you a few questions? Are you connected to President Roosevelt’s safari, by any chance?’
‘Mr Andrew Fagan of the Associated Press, I presume, to paraphrase the deathless words of Dr David Livingstone.’ Kermit pushed his hat back and returned his smile.
The journalist recoiled in astonishment, then peered more closely at him. ‘Mr Roosevelt Junior!’ he exclaimed. ‘Please forgive me. I didn’t recognize you in that get-up.’ He was staring at Kermit’s filthy, blood-stained clothing.
‘Mr Who Junior?’ Leon demanded.
Kermit looked embarrassed, but Fagan hastened to reply. ‘Don’t you know who you’re riding with? This is Mr Kermit Roosevelt, the son of the President of the United States.’
Leon turned accusingly to his new friend. ‘You didn’t tell me!’
‘You didn’t ask.’
‘You might have mentioned it,’ Leon insisted.
‘It would have changed things between us. It always does.’
‘Who is this young friend of yours, Mr Roosevelt?’ Andrew Fagan asked, and whipped his notepad out of his back pocket.
‘This is my hunter, Mr Leon Courtney.’
‘He looks very young,’ Fagan observed dubiously.
‘You don’t have to grow a long grey beard to be one of the greatest hunters in Africa,’ Kermit told him.
‘... greatest hunters in Africa!’ Fagan scribbled shorthand on his pad. ‘How do you spell your name, Mr Courtney? With one e or two?’
‘Just one.’ Leon felt uncomfortable and glared at Kermit. ‘Now see what you’ve got me into.’
‘I guess you’ve been out hunting.’ Fagan pointed at the head of the bull buffalo in the back of the truck. ‘Who shot that creature?’
‘Mr Roosevelt did.’
‘What is it?’
‘It’s a Cape buffalo, Syncerus caffer.’
‘My God, it’s huge! Can we have some photographs, please, Mr Roosevelt?’
‘Only if you give us a couple of copies. One for Leon and one for me.’
‘Of course. Bring your guns. Let’s have one of you on each side of the horns.’ The photographer set up his tripod and arranged the pose. Kermit looked composed and debonair, Leon as though he was facing a firing squad. The flash powder exploded in a cloud of smoke, much to the consternation of the skinners and camp staff.
‘Okay! Great! Now can we have that tribesman in the red robe in the picture? Tell him to hold his spear higher. Like this. What is he? Some kind of chief?’
‘He’s the king of the Masai.’
‘No kidding! Tell him to look fierce.’
‘This mad fool thinks you’re dressed like a woman,’ Leon told Manyoro in Maa, and he scowled murderously at the photographer.
‘Great! God, that’s so great!’
It was another half an hour before they were able to drive on.
‘Does that happen all the time?’ Leon asked.
‘You get used to it. You have to be nice to them or they write all sorts of garbage about you.’
‘I still think you should have told me that your father was the ruddy President.’
‘Can we hunt together again? They’ve given me an old fellow called Mellow as my hunter. He lectures me as though I’m a schoolboy, and tries to stop me shooting.’
Leon thought about it. ‘In two days’ time the main camp is moving on up to the Ewaso Ng’iro river. I have to ferry the tents and heavy equipment up there ahead of it. But I’d like to hunt again with you if my boss gives me a chance. You’re not a bad fellow, despite your lowly antecedents.’
‘Who’s your boss?’
‘An old gentleman called Percy Phillips, though you’d better not call him old to his face.’
‘I know him. He often dines with my father and Mr Selous. I’ll do what I can. I don’t think I can take much more of Mr Mellow.’
Fate played into Kermit’s hands. Two nights after the grand safari moved into the camp on the south bank of the Ewaso Ng’iro river, the chef Lord Delamere had loaned to the President prepared a banquet to celebrate American Thanksgiving Day. There was no turkey so the President himself shot a giant Kori bustard. The chef roasted the bird and concocted a stuffing that contained spiced buffalo liver.
The next morning half the men in camp were struck down by virulent diarrhoea - the buffalo liver had apparently deteriorated in the heat. Even Roosevelt, he of the iron constitution, was affected. Frank Mellow, who had been appointed as Kermit’s hunter, was one of the worst stricken, and the camp doctor ordered him to the hospital in Nairobi.
Kermit, who had not eaten the stuffing, seized his advantage: he negotiated the appointment of his replacement hunter with his father through the door of the long-drop outhouse to which the President was confined by his indisposition. Roosevelt put up only token resistance to his son’s proposal, and Kermit could go to Percy Phillips as the bearer of the presidential decree. That evening Leon found himself hailed into Percy’s tent.
‘I don’t kn
ow what you’ve been up to, but all hell’s broken out. Kermit Roosevelt wants you to have the job as his hunter to replace Frank Mellow and has talked his father into allowing it. They didn’t consult me so I have no choice but to agree.’ He glared at Leon. ‘You aren’t yet dry behind the ears. You haven’t dealt with lion, leopard or rhino yet, and I told the President so. But he’s sick and didn’t want to listen. Kermit Roosevelt is a wild and reckless young rascal, just like you. If you get him hurt, you and I are finished. I’ll never have another client, and I’ll strangle you slowly with my bare hands. Do you understand?’
‘Yes, sir, I understand very well.’
‘All right, go ahead. I can’t stop you.’
‘Thank you, sir.’ Leon began to leave, but Percy stopped him.
‘Leon!’
He turned back in surprise. Percy had never before called him by his first name. Then, with even greater surprise, he saw that Percy was smiling. ‘This is your big chance. You’ll never have another like it. If you’re lucky and clever, you’ll be on your way to the top. Good luck.’
The next day Leon and Kermit rode out at large, not seeking any particular quarry animal but ready to take on whatever the day brought forward. ‘If we found a lion, a big black-maned old male, that would be my dream come true. Not even my father has taken one of those.’
‘You may have to wait until we leave Masailand,’ Leon told him. ‘This country’s extremely unhealthy for big black-maned lions.’
‘How’s that?’ Kermit looked intrigued.
‘Every young morani longs for a chance to kill his lion and prove his manhood. All the morani of the same circumcision year go out in a war-party. They hunt down a lion and surround it. When the lion realizes he cannot escape he picks one of the men and charges him. The morani must stand and meet the charge with his shield and assegai. When he kills he is allowed to make a war-bonnet from the mane and wear it with honour. He can also choose any girl in the tribe. The custom thins out the lion population somewhat.’
‘I reckon I’d take the girl before the fur bonnet.’ Kermit laughed. ‘But you have to admire that kind of courage. They’re a magnificent people. Look at your man, Manyoro. He moves with all the grace of a panther.’
Manyoro was trotting ahead of the horses but at that moment he pulled up and leaned on his spear, waiting for the horsemen to come up. He pointed across the open plain ahead at the huge dark shape that stood on the edge of a clump of bush. It was almost a mile away, its outline insubstantial through the shimmer of heat haze.
‘Rhino. From here it looks like a big bull.’ Leon fished out of his saddle bags the pair of Carl Zeiss binoculars that Percy had given him in recognition of his promotion from apprentice to fully fledged hunter. He focused the lenses and studied the distant shape. ‘It’s a rhino, all right, and the biggest one I’ve ever seen. That horn is unbelievable!’
‘Bigger than the one my father shot five days ago?’
‘I’d say much, much bigger.’
‘I want it,’ said Kermit, vehemently.
‘So do I,’ Leon agreed. ‘We’ll circle out under the wind and stalk him from those bushes. We should be able to get a clean shot for you from thirty or forty yards.’
‘You sound just like Frank Mellow. You want me crawling around on my hands and knees, or wriggling along on my belly like a rattlesnake. I’ve had enough of that.’ Kermit was already trembling with excitement at the prospect of the hunt. ‘I’m going to show you how the old frontiersmen used to hunt bison back out west. Follow me, pardner.’ With that, he clapped his heels into the flanks of his mare and bounded away across the plain, galloping straight at the distant animal.
‘Kermit, wait!’ Leon shouted after him. ‘Don’t be a fool.’ But Kermit did not glance back. He drew Big Medicine from the rifle boot under his knee and brandished it on high.
‘Percy’s right. You’re a wild and reckless rascal,’ Leon lamented, as he urged his own horse in pursuit.
The rhino heard them coming but his eyesight was so weak that he could not place them immediately. He switched his whole massive body from side to side, kicking up dust and snorting ferociously, peering about with myopic piggy eyes.
‘Yee-ha!’ Kermit let out a cowboy yell.
Guided by the sound, the rhino focused on the shape of horse and rider and instantly burst into a charge, coming directly at them. Kermit stood high in the stirrups, raised his rifle and fired from the back of the galloping horse. His first bullet flew high over the rhino’s back and kicked up dust from the plain two hundred yards behind it. He reloaded with a quick pump of the lever and fired again. Leon heard the meaty thump of the bullet slapping into the beast’s body but could not see where it had hit. The rhino did not even flinch from the shot but tore in to meet the horse.
Kermit’s next wild shot missed again, and Leon saw the dust fly between the rhino’s front feet. Kermit fired once more, and Leon heard this shot tell on the baggy grey hide. The bull bucked in agony and tossed his horn high, then lowered it to gore the horse as they came together.
But Kermit was too quick for him. With the skill of an expert polo player, he used his knees to turn his horse across the line of the charge. Horse and rhino passed each other in opposite directions, and although the latter hooked at Kermit with his long horn, the point flashed a hand’s breadth past his knee. At the same time Kermit leaned out from the saddle and fired with the muzzle almost touching the grey hide between the bull’s plunging shoulders. As the rhino received the bullet he hunched his shoulders and bucked. He swung around to chase after the horse, but now his gait was short and hampered. Bloody froth dribbled from his open mouth. Kermit reined in his horse while he reloaded his rifle, then fired twice more. When the rhino took these last bullets his body convulsed and he slowed to a walk. The great head hung low, and he staggered unevenly from side to side.
Coming up at a gallop, Leon was appalled by the brutal display. It ran contrary to every concept he had of the fair chase and the humane kill. Up to this moment he had been unable to intervene in the butchery for fear of hitting Kermit or his mount, but now his field of fire was clear. The wounded rhino was less than thirty paces away, and Kermit was well out on the flank reloading his rifle. Leon dragged his horse back on its haunches and it skidded to a halt. He kicked his feet out of the stirrups and sprang to the ground, bringing up the Holland as he landed. He aimed for the point where the rhino’s spine joined the skull, and his bullet cleaved the vertebrae like the blade of an executioner’s axe.
Kermit rode up to the carcass and dismounted. His face was flushed and his eyes sparkled. ‘Thanks for your help, pardner.’ He laughed. ‘By God! That was really exciting! How did you like the Wild West style of hunting? Grand, isn’t it?’ He showed not the least guilt or remorse for what had just happened.
Leon had to take a breath to keep his temper. ‘It was wild, I’ll give you that. I am not so sure about the grand bit,’ he said, his voice level. ‘I dropped my hat.’ He swung up into his saddle and rode back for it.
What do I do now? he wondered. Do I have a showdown with him? Do I tell him to find himself another hunter? He saw the hat on the ground ahead, rode up to it and dismounted. He picked it up and dusted it against his leg. Then he jammed it on his head. Be sensible, Courtney! If you walk away, you’re finished. You might as well go back to Egypt and take the job with your father.
He mounted up and rode slowly back to where Kermit stood beside the dead rhino, stroking the long black horn. He looked up at Leon as he dismounted, his expression thoughtful. ‘Something bothering you?’ he asked quietly.
‘I was worrying about how the President’s going to feel when he sees that horn. It must be damn nigh five feet long. I hope he won’t turn bright green.’ Leon succeeded in keeping his smile natural. He knew those words were a perfect peace-offering.
Kermit relaxed visibly. ‘That colour might suit him well enough. I can’t wait to show it to him.’
Leon glanced up at th
e sun. ‘It’s late. We won’t be able to get back to the main camp this evening. We’ll stay here tonight.’
Ishmael had been following them on one mule and leading another, which carried the cooking pots and other necessities. As soon as he came up he set about putting together a rudimentary fly camp.
Before it was fully dark he brought their dinner to them. They leaned back against their saddles with the enamel plates balanced on their laps and tucked into the yellow rice and Tommy buck stew.
‘Ishmael’s a magician,’ Kermit said, his mouth full. ‘I’ve had worse grub at restaurants in New York City. Tell him that, will you?’
Ishmael acknowledged the compliment gravely.
Leon scraped his plate clean and put the last spoonful into his mouth. Still chewing, he reached into his saddle bag and brought out a bottle. He showed the label to Kermit. ‘Bunnahabhain single malt whisky.’ Kermit smiled happily. ‘Where on earth did you find that?’
‘Compliments of Percy. Although he’s unaware of his own generosity.’
‘My God, Courtney, it’s you who’s the real magician.’
Leon poured a dram into their enamel mugs, and they sipped, sighing with pleasure.
‘Let’s suppose for the moment that I am your fairy godmother,’ Leon suggested, ‘and that I can grant you any wish. What would it be?’
‘Apart from a beautiful and willing girl?’
‘Apart from that.’
They both chuckled, and Kermit pondered for only a few seconds. ‘How big was that elephant my father got a few days ago?’
‘Ninety-four and ninety-eight. Didn’t quite make the magic number of one hundred.’
‘I want to do better.’
‘You worry a lot about doing better than him. Is this meant to be a competition?’
‘My father has always succeeded in everything he turns his hand to. Hell, he was a war hero, a state governor, a hunter and sportsman all before he turned forty, and as if that wasn’t enough, he became the youngest and most successful President of America ever. He respects winners and despises losers.’ He took a sip. ‘From what you’ve told me, you and I have lived through the same situation. You should understand.’