Assegai

by Wilbur Smith

  ‘Abundantly, sir.’

  ‘If you let me down, I will teach you the meaning of the words “pain” and “suffering”. What Freddie Snell did to you will seem like a pat on the head in comparison. You have been warned.’

  ‘Indeed I have, sir. Now, if you will kindly move away from the wash of the propellers, I’ll be on my way to obey your orders.’

  Ludwig drove the big von Meerbach truck to the far end of the polo ground and parked it so that its headlights lit the landing strip. As Leon roared down the field on the take-off run, he saw Penrod, silhouetted by the headlights, hunched on his mount. He could almost feel the heat of his uncle’s anger.

  As soon as he had cleared the tops of the bluegum trees at the end of the field he turned on to a heading for Percy’s Camp. As he gained altitude the moon seemed to rush eagerly over the black horizon to light him on his way. From fifteen miles out, the hill above the camp was gilded by moonlight, guiding him in on the last leg of the journey. To attract Max Rosenthal’s attention he circled the camp three times, revving the engines, then throttling back. On the last circuit he saw headlights switched on below him, then watched the truck grind its way over the rough track to the airstrip. Max understood what was required of him and lined up the vehicle to orientate Leon for the landing.

  As soon as Leon had parked the Bumble Bee he threw his pack over the side, then grabbed the Holland rifle and bandolier from the locker where Manyoro had left them. He scrambled down and hurried towards the truck.

  ‘Max, I want four of our best horses and one of the grooms to go with me. We’ll each ride a horse, and take the spares on lead reins.’

  ‘Jawohl, boss. Where are you going? When do you want to leave?’

  ‘Don’t worry about where I’m going, and I want to leave at once.’

  ‘Himmel! It’s eleven o’clock at night. Can’t it wait until morning?’

  ‘I’m in a hurry, Max.’

  ‘Ja, so it seems.’

  Leon hurried to his tent and threw a few essential items into his light pack, then went down to the picket lines. There, the horses were already waiting, but instead of four animals, as he had ordered, there were five. Leon’s frown cleared, replaced by a grin as he recognized the figure mounted on the black mule. ‘May the Prophet shower blessings on you!’ he greeted him.

  Ishmael’s teeth flashed white in the moonlight. ‘Effendi, I knew that you would starve without me.’

  They rode hard for the rest of that night, changing horses twice. In the dawn the shadowy blue bulk of Lonsonyo Mountain lay low on the distant horizon ahead. By noon it filled half of the eastern sky, but this aspect was unfamiliar to Leon. He had never before approached the mountain from this direction. Now it was presenting its more rugged northerly slope, the one he and Eva had flown over with Graf Otto at the controls of the Butterfly.

  By this time they had been riding for almost thirteen hours since leaving Percy’s Camp and he had pushed the horses hard. Despite his impatience to be reunited with Eva he knew he could not demand more of the animals or the men. He had to rest the men and let the horses graze and drink. They unsaddled beside a small waterhole and hobbled the animals, then turned them loose to graze.

  While they were busy Ishmael brewed coffee, then cut slices of cold venison and pickled onions on to a hunk of unleavened bread. When he had eaten Leon slept until nightfall. Then they saddled up and rode on into the darkness. In the cool night the horses went with a will and at dawn the mountain towered above them. Leon stared up at its cliffs in awe: the high walls were decked with brilliantly coloured lichens. He picked out the silvery gleam of falling water in one of the gorges that rent the massive ramparts. Although from this low angle the circular dark pool was hidden, he realized that this must be the waterfall he and Eva had looked down upon from the air.

  Leon knew from Loikot that there was a pathway beside the waterfall that scaled the cliffs to the summit, and this was the route by which they had intended to take Eva to Lusima. But he was still too far off to pick out the track even with the help of binoculars. Instead he concentrated on estimating the distances and direction from which the others would come, hoping he might intercept them before they began their ascent. It was more likely, though, that they were already on the path ahead of him.

  Either way he knew Eva was close at hand, and his spirits soared. Ishmael and the groom were unable to keep pace with him as he urged his mount forward. Within another hour he reined in sharply, swung down from the saddle and squatted beside one of the numerous game trails that crisscrossed the savannah. Three sets of human footprints were freshly impressed in the fine dust. Manyoro had been in the lead - Leon would have recognized that limp anywhere: the slight drag of the toe was unmistakable. Loikot had followed, with his long, lithe paces, Eva behind them.

  ‘Oh, my darling!’ Leon murmured, as he touched one of her neat, narrow prints. ‘Even your little feet are beautiful.’

  The tracks were headed directly towards the mountain, and he remounted and followed them at a canter. The path climbed the first pitch of the slope, becoming steeper with each pace. The cliff reared up until it seemed to fill the sky and the clouds sailing above gave Leon the uncomfortable delusion that the mountain was collapsing on top of him.

  Soon the path was so steep that he was forced to dismount and lead his horse. At intervals he picked up the tracks Eva’s boots had left, which encouraged him to keep on upwards at his best speed. The severity of the slope made it impossible to see more than a short way ahead, but he strode on, the rest of his party struggling after him but losing ground rapidly. He reached a step in the mountainside, and as he topped it he stared in wonder.

  Before him lay the circular pool. It was much larger than it had seemed from the aeroplane, but its size was dwarfed by the magnitude of the cliff above it and the thunderous white deluge of the waterfall. So copious was the flood that it sent eddies of cool air swirling around the rock cauldron.

  Then he heard a voice, faint and almost drowned by the din of cascading waters. It was hers, and his heart surged with excitement. Eagerly he scanned the cliffs on both sides of the pool, for the echoes were deceptive and he was uncertain of the direction from which she was calling. ‘Eva!’ he shouted at the cliffs, and the diminishing echoes mocked him.

  ‘Leon! Darling!’ This time the direction was more obvious. He turned to the left side of the pool and threw back his head. He saw a flash of movement high above and realized she was standing on a ledge that angled up the cliff face. But as he watched she started back down towards him, running with the speed and agility of a rock hyrax over the treacherous footing.

  ‘Eva!’ he yelled. ‘I’m coming, my darling!’ He dropped his horse’s reins and scrambled up the mountainside to meet her. Now he could see the two Masai on the path above her. Even at this distance he could read the astonishment on their faces as they watched this extraordinary display. He and Eva reached the beginning of the ledge at almost the same time, but he was below the lip and she was on top of it, six feet above his head.

  ‘Catch me, Badger!’ she called and, trusting in his strength, flung herself over the edge. As she dropped he caught her, but her weight and momentum brought him to his knees. He knelt over her, hugging her protectively to his chest as they laughed.

  ‘I love you, you crazy girl!’

  ‘Never let me go again!’ she said, as their lips came together.

  ‘Never!’ he promised, speaking into her sweet mouth.

  Much later when they drew apart to breathe, they saw that Manyoro and Loikot had followed Eva back down the path, and were squatting on the ledge just above them, watching their performance with grins of delight.

  ‘Go and make nuisances of yourselves somewhere else!’ Leon ordered them. ‘You’re not welcome here. Take my horse and go down the mountain until you meet Ishmael. Tell him to make camp at the foot. Wait for us. We’ll sleep there tonight.’

  ‘Ndio, Bwana,’ Manyoro answered.


  ‘And stop giggling like that.’

  ‘Ndio, Bwana!’

  Manyoro’s voice was muffled with mirth as he scrambled down, but Loikot remained on the ledge above him. Suddenly he squeaked at Manyoro, in a falsetto imitation of Eva’s voice, ‘Cashy mia, Bazzer!’ and threw himself from the ledge as Eva had done. He crashed into Manyoro with such force that he bowled him over. The two rolled down the slope locked in each other’s embrace, howling and hooting with laughter. ‘Cashy mia!’ they screamed. ‘Cashy mia, Bazzer.’

  Neither Leon nor Eva could contain themselves and burst out laughing again. Eventually Leon found his voice: ‘Go, you idiots!’ he ordered them. ‘Get out of my sight. I don’t want to see either of you again for a long, long time!’

  They staggered down the mountain, still racked with paroxysms of laughter, hugging themselves and each other with glee.

  ‘Cashy mia, Bazzer!’ Manyoro howled.

  ‘Luff you, clazy gel!’ Loikot slapped his cheeks and shook his head. ‘Luff you!’ he repeated, and jumped three feet into the air.

  ‘That was, without doubt, the funniest incident ever to be recorded in the history of Masailand. You and I will go down in tribal mythology,’ Leon told Eva, as the two men disappeared down the path. He picked her up in his arms and she locked hers around his neck. He carried her to a flat ledge beside the pool and sat with her in his lap. ‘You don’t know how I’ve longed to hold you like this,’ he whispered.

  ‘All my life,’ she replied. ‘That’s how long I’ve waited for this to happen.’

  He stroked her face, tracing the arches of her eyebrows with his fingertips, then burrowed his fingers into the tresses of her hair, filling his hands with the thick, glossy locks, gloating on every facet of her beauty, like a miser fondling his hoard of gold coins. She seemed so fragile and delicate that he was afraid he might hurt her, startle or alarm her. Her loveliness awed him. She was nothing like the other women he had known. She made him feel inadequate, unworthy.

  She understood his dilemma. His timidity reawakened in her feelings of tenderness such as she had not experienced for a very long time. But she wanted him desperately and could not wait. She knew she must take the lead.

  He felt her unbuttoning his shirt and one of her hands slipped through the opening and began to caress the muscles of his chest. He shivered with delight. ‘You’re so hard, so strong,’ she murmured.

  ‘And you’re so soft and tender,’ he countered.

  She leaned back a little way so that she could look into his eyes. ‘I’m not breakable, my Badger. I’m flesh and blood as you are. I want what you want.’ She took the lobe of his ear between her teeth and nibbled it softly. He felt goosebumps rise on the nape of his neck. When she thrust her tongue deep into his ear he shuddered deliciously.

  ‘I have sensitive places, just like you do.’ She took his hand and placed it on her breast. ‘If you touch me here and here, like this and that, you will see for yourself.’

  He felt the hooks and eyes of her blouse under his fingers and slipped open the top one. He did it diffidently, expecting a rebuke, but she drew back her shoulders so that her breasts swelled out to meet his exploring fingers.

  ‘There’s a clever boy! You found one of my places without any help from me.’

  Her words, and the tone in which she uttered them, roused in him a feverish impatience. He threw aside all restraint and caution, plucked open her blouse and reached inside. Her breasts were hot and silky, and he felt the tips harden and pucker. Her breathing was coming faster as she whispered, ‘They are yours, my darling. All I have is yours.’

  She drew back just enough and moved so that her breasts brushed lightly against his face. She shrugged off her blouse and silken slip, and was naked to the waist. Again she let her breasts swing against his face, and he took one of her nipples into his mouth. She gasped and lay back in the circle of his arms, then took a double handful of the hair at the back of his head and used it to direct his mouth to the other.

  ‘Forgive me, my darling, but I cannot wait any longer,’ she cried, her tone almost desperate as she wriggled off his lap and knelt in front of him, her naked breasts heavy and full, just brushing his face as she tugged at his belt. When she had opened the buckle and unbuttoned his fly, he lifted himself just enough to enable her to push his breeches down to his knees. She hoisted her long skirt to her lower ribs - she wore nothing under it - and her waist was fluted, like the neck of a Grecian vase, curving into the swell of her hips. The skin of her belly was nacreous and unblemished. Her thighs were strong but shapely and between them nestled her womanly bush, dark and curling luxuriantly in its marvellous profusion. She raised one of her knees over him, mounting him as she would a horse, and as her thighs parted he glimpsed, through the dark curtain of hair, the gape of her sex. It was pouting and damp with the lubricious juices of her arousal. Then, with a single adroit thrust of her hips, she engulfed him to the hilt, and they cried out together as though in pain.

  For both, it happened so swiftly and intensely that they were left unable to speak, barely able to move, clinging together like the survivors of some devastating earthquake or typhoon. It took them some time to drift back from the far frontiers of their minds and bodies to which they had been transported.

  Eva spoke first: ‘I never imagined it could be like that.’ She laid her head on his chest to listen to his heart. He stroked her hair and she closed her eyes. They slept, and came awake to the barking of a troop of baboons high on the cliff face, their challenge reverberating through the gorge. She sat up slowly and pushed the hair back from her face. It was still wet with sweat and her cheeks were flushed. ‘How long were we asleep?’ She blinked.

  ‘Is it important?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s very important. I don’t want to waste a single moment of the time we have together in sleeping.’

  ‘We have the rest of our lives.’

  ‘I pray God that is so. But this world is so cruel.’ She looked forlorn and bereft. ‘Please don’t ever leave me.’

  ‘Never,’ he said fiercely, and when she smiled the violet lights glowed in her eyes.

  ‘You’re right, Badger. We’re going to be happy for ever. I refuse to be sad on this wonderful day. The world can never catch us.’ She sprang to her feet and pirouetted on the ledge. ‘This day will last for ever,’ she sang, and as she danced she shed her clothing, scattering it over the rock.

  ‘What are you doing, you shameless hussy?’ He laughed with delight as she danced for him, naked in the sunlight. Her body was very lovely, young and perfectly proportioned, her movements lithe and graceful.

  ‘I’m going to take you for a swim in our magical pool,’ she cried. ‘Throw off those dusty old clothes, sir, and come with me.’ She stopped dancing and watched with her full attention as he hopped on one foot to pull off his boots.

  ‘All of your things bounce and joggle when you do that,’ she observed.

  ‘So do yours.’

  ‘Mine aren’t as pretty and useful as yours.’

  ‘Oh, yes, they jolly well are.’ He flung aside his breeches and started after her. ‘Let me show you just how useful yours really are.’ She squealed with mock-alarm, ran to the end of the ledge and paused there for just long enough to make certain he was still pursuing her. Then she clasped her hands above her head and dived into the pool. She struck the water like an arrow, her limbs perfectly aligned with her body so that there was almost no splash as she slipped beneath the surface. She went deep, her image wavering beneath the ripples, then shot up again so swiftly that her white body burst out to the level of her belly button before she fell back with her hair slicked over her shoulders, like the pelt of an otter.

  ‘It’s cold! My bet is that you’re too much of a sissy to chance it,’ she shouted.

  ‘You lose your bet, and here I come for my payment.’

  ‘You must catch me first.’ She laughed and set off for the far side of the pool, kicking up a froth behind her.
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br />   He dived in and ploughed after her with long, powerful, overhead strokes. He caught her before she was halfway across, and seized her from behind. ‘Pay up!’ he demanded, and turned her to face him.

  She placed both arms around his neck and her lips on his. Kissing, they sank deep below the surface only to come up again, spluttering, choking and laughing. She had her long legs locked around his waist and her arms around his neck. She lifted herself out of the water and used her weight to force his head under, then twisted out of his grip and darted away. She only looked back when she reached the far side of the pool. The waterfall thundered down in two separate streams, leaving an area of quiet water between them. In the centre of this haven a single rock thrust its top above the surface, black and smooth, polished by the waters. She pulled herself up on to it and sat with her legs dangling below the surface. With both hands she thrust her wet hair back from her eyes as she looked around for Leon. At first she was laughing, but then, as she saw no sign of him, she became anxious. ‘Badger! Leon! Where are you?’ she cried.

  He had followed her across the pool, but as she approached the black rock he had taken a deep breath and duck-dived, swinging his legs high in the air so that their weight forced his body under. Once he was below the surface he swam on downwards. He had imagined that the pool was probably bottomless, for he had seen no overflow at the surface. The huge volume of water pouring over the falls must have another means of escape. But as he swam down he found he had been mistaken. The bottom appeared below him and, even at this depth, the water was so clear that he could see it was covered with a jumble of rocks that must have fallen from the cliffs.

  By now his eardrums were aching with the pressure and he stopped to clear them, holding his nose and blowing air through the Eustachian tubes. His ears squealed and popped, the pain subsided and he swam on down. He reached the bottom and found that among the rocks was scattered a bizarre collection of Masai artefacts: ancient assegais and axes, mounds of pottery shards, necklaces and bracelets made from trade beads, small carvings of hardwood and ivory, primitive jewellery and other artefacts so old and rotten that they were unidentifiable, all offerings made by the Masai over the ages to their tribal gods.