Rhinoceros Summer

by Jamie Thornton

  He moved to the perimeter of the little group, trampling stalks of yellow savannah grass with his boots, and let his safari think they defied him. Paul had nudged their driveline toward Barry’s car all day and then let Lydia’s eye and M’soko’s sense of duty take over. It was his only chance. He’d planned to take Juja out, but Juja was off on one of his village escapades, god knows where doing god knows what. If Paul had left M’soko behind too and gone without a tracker, that would have been a surefire way to signal Paul planned something illegal.

  He allowed the Pontiac to be discovered. He handed over a lesser crime to keep the bigger one hidden, not that anyone could tie the car to him. He had stripped the license plate and identifying papers. Barry had bled and howled in Paul’s back-seat, but that hadn’t stopped Paul from making a side trip to hide the Pontiac in the trees. Before they left for Billy’s safari, Paul found out Barry had gotten into a car accident and fallen into a coma. Another piece of luck going Paul’s way. In the grip of fever, before succumbing to the coma, Barry had shouted something out about the existence of a mythic rhino. An injured man’s crazy words, the nurse said. Whether Barry ever came out of the coma and want to collect the thirty grand Paul had promised him for his silence was a problem Paul would leave for another day.

  “I must report this,” M’soko said, his damn hands still clasped behind his back as if he were a solemn elder sending down a verdict.

  “I forgot to pack the satellite phone,” Paul said. But you didn’t forget that kind of thing. Paul knew this. M’soko knew this.

  “I will go to a village and find a radio.”

  “You are our scout, we can’t continue the safari without you,” Paul said. “If you go, I’m not going to pay you for this safari.”

  M’soko did not respond. He went and spoke a few words to Lydia, grabbed some supplies from the car, then began his long walk to the closest village.

  M’soko disappeared over the horizon. By then it was too dark for pictures. Paul drove them to a small clearing to make camp for the night.

  The next day, M’soko now long gone, Paul set up breakfast and then brought out a box of supplies. The cumulous clouds sat thick and pillowed against the bright blue sky. It was now or never.

  As Lydia and Billy ate, he sorted through the equipment for green hunting the rhino. He came across the tranquilizer dart and chemicals he’d snatched from Caleb’s room. It had been an automatic decision to take them, just as it had been to join the military, to let that first Cape buffalo charge him, to entice Lydia out here, to—Well, he’d almost always let his gut instinct decide his next move.

  Even as he laid out the vials and the GPS logbook containing the rhino’s general coordinates, his thoughts strayed to Caleb. Didn’t matter how many years passed, how many miles were traveled, how many times a name changed. His son’s absence was like an open wound. He pictured the way both of them rested a rifle on the right shoulder and hooked their left thumb in a jean pocket. How they seemed to attach to women who didn’t want them in return.

  He felt a stab of sorrow. No, that was a woman’s word. Disappointment fit better.

  “What is all this?” Lydia asked finally.

  “I’m getting ready for the next hunt,” Paul said.

  “What are we hunting with a .32?” Billy raised an eyebrow as Paul pulled out an oversized hypodermic needle with feather-like fins.

  “You’re green hunting,” Paul said.

  “Green hunt?” Billy asked. “You mean tranquilize the animal and then let it go? Sounds like a pussy’s way out. Is that even considered a legitimate kill?”

  “Of course,” Paul said. “It’s harder to tranq a rhino than it is to kill it. This setup,” he held up the .32 caliber shotgun, the tranq dart, and the .22 caliber blank cartridge that would act as a gas charge, “requires you to stalk within forty yards of the target.”

  Billy still looked unconvinced.

  “Billy, darting a rhino is more difficult and dangerous than killing it. You got to get closer, and sometimes the first dart doesn’t take, leaving you with a very angry animal. Trust me. You won’t be disappointed.”

  “If it were anyone else telling me this, I’d call it bullcrap,” Billy said. “But coming from you, Paul, I gotta trust your sense of things. You’ve never let me down.” He took another bite of his sandwich. “All right. When do we go looking for it?”

  “After lunch,” Paul said.

  “Isn’t Caleb looking for a rhino?” Lydia asked. She sat relaxed, one leg stretched out on the blanket, the other tucked in. She had her camera in her hands and took a picture of Paul holding the equipment.

  He almost told her to delete the picture, incriminating evidence and all, but figured he was long past that point. “Maybe,” Paul said. “Probably, but he’s probably gone back to the government by now.” He didn’t comment further on Caleb’s disappearance from camp. He didn’t need to have actually heard the fight between Lydia and Caleb to know there had been one. He also knew Caleb wouldn’t have left for long and had used his absence as a window to get the green hunt done.

  Even if he did convince Lydia to keep her mouth shut and take the pictures, he figured it’d only be a matter of time before her conscience would get the best of her—lover’s spat or no—and then she’d tell Caleb about the rhino. He didn’t know how he’d work it out, but something would come to him. It always did. He just had to talk her into keeping quiet for a little while.

  Lydia opened her mouth. Paul held up his hand.

  “I’m going to tell him,” Paul said, “but I need to be sure the rhino’s still there and I figure Billy might as well take a shot at her while we’re out. I’m going to tell him everything, but I need you to give me some time to tell him.” A part of Paul meant it. If giving up the rhino to Caleb could reconcile them, he’d seriously consider it.

  “Why should I believe you ever plan to tell him?”

  “I’m not asking you to believe. Tell him yourself if I don’t. What I’m asking for is a little time. Let me finish Billy’s safari. That’s all I’m asking. If I haven’t told Caleb within a few weeks of us getting back from Billy’s safari, then you can feel free to tell him yourself.” He tried to gauge Lydia’s reaction but found he couldn’t read her. “Think about it,” Paul said finally. “Nobody has gotten the pictures you could take. We’ll be so close, and the rhino will just walk away after.”

  She didn’t say a word but got up from the blanket and walked away herself.

  “She’ll go along with it,” Billy said.

  “How do you know that?”

  Billy finished his sandwich and stretched out on the blanket. He tipped his hat over his face. “Something about you, Paul. You know exactly how to give a person the thrill of his life. I don’t know how you manage to do it, but you got a way of getting people to do things they never thought they’d do. It’s quite a talent. She’s too curious. She’ll come along. She won’t be able to bear missing out.”

  Paul finished preparing the tranquilizer darts. He watched Lydia walk off into the knee-high grass and then lost sight of her behind some thorn bushes.

  Billy was right. He’d trust his talent to work its magic.

  CHAPTER 19

  Lydia

  Lydia sat on a large rock and rested her head on her knees. Watching Paul lay out the equipment and logbook as he discussed the green hunt had touched her curiosity. She wanted the pictures so badly. She didn’t try to understand the need anymore. It just was. It existed and rested all its weight on her.

  When M’soko left—she wasn’t afraid for herself physically. Paul had backed off weeks ago and she liked Mr. Compton. She was afraid for her mind, her camera, her soul.

  She could stop anytime she wanted. She could ride the train and still jump off before it wrecked itself. That’s what she forced herself to believe.

  What Paul planned was probably illegal. Definitely wrong to keep it from Caleb. But where was Caleb anyway? He’d given her no time to apologiz
e for lashing out with false accusations after he’d kissed her. Of course he wasn’t like Paul. Of course he wasn’t using her. That’s why she’d kissed him back. But then he disappeared into the night and it was her fault.

  She didn’t know if he had any plans to return. What she did know is she desperately wanted to add to her pictures. The saw cutting into an elephant’s skull, Caleb’s match lighting the ivory bonfire. The gun barrel on one side of the picture, aimed at the buffalo charging from the other side, the sky so blue in the background, the men standing around those dead buffalo with the blood and the flies and the war-battled look on their faces. Disturbing pictures that told a story of violence and hardship and humanity and cruelty and wildness and beauty in a single frame. Every time she looked at the previews on her camera, a type of frenzy filled her.

  She pressed her hands onto the dirt, ignoring the stabs of thorns into her palms.

  She could not stop now, she could not back away. Not now. Her pictures had hooked her like an addiction and she didn’t want to fight it.

  She marched back to the breakfast blanket. “All right. I’ll go,” she said to the two men.

  CHAPTER 20

  Paul

  The three of them drove for several hours before Paul called for a halt.

  “We’ll stalk from here,” he said. “We likely passed her about a mile back but we had to get in the right wind position.”

  Paul helped Billy set up the dart outfit.

  “This is M99,” Paul told Billy. “The tranquilizer.” He patted his jacket pocket where he’d tucked another syringe. “And the antidote to revive her once we’re done. Let’s go, but here’s what I’ll say about how rhino-stalking works. Their eyesight is worth almost nothing when it comes to things standing still. They are sharp at picking up movement but not anything standing still. Their sense of smell more than makes up for their eyesight. We’ll stay downwind, but if it sees us and charges, your best chance for surviving? Stand still. The rhino will probably just pass you by.”

  The direction of the wind was too slight to tell without help. He pulled out a pouch of talcum powder and threw a pinch into the air.

  Lydia sneezed behind him.

  “Quiet,” Paul said.

  “You threw the powder in my face.”

  Paul glanced behind him. A thin white layer of powder did cover her hair and face now.

  “That means we’re in the correct position, I guess,” Billy said and laughed.

  Lydia rubbed her eyes and moved over a few feet.

  They continued their stalk.

  As soon as the rhino came into sight, Billy pulled out his binoculars. “Oh my god, Paul. That is absolutely the largest horn I have ever seen. Which kind is this?”

  “A northern white,” Paul said, not caring if Lydia heard. It didn’t matter anymore. He was so close to getting what he needed, she couldn’t get in the way now.

  Billy turned to Paul with a shocked look on his face. “Now Paul, I know you’ve never lied to me, but maybe this will be the first. A northern white? You ain’t foolin’ me?”

  “It’s the truth.”

  Billy let out a soft whistle and refocused his binoculars on the rhino.

  Paul could see the excitement that always rose up in a person when he realized he might just be about to experience something dangerous and unique. Something that would forever set him apart from every other man on earth and throughout history. A person’s worth had everything to do with how true he was to his animal self. The part of himself that set out to conquer instead of sacrifice, to accomplish instead of love. To make no compromise.

  “You got the camera ready?” Billy said to Lydia. He practically quivered with impatience.

  “Yeah,” Lydia said.

  “We’ll stalk about thirty or forty yards from the rhino, Billy. Take time setting up your shot. Try to hit a wide flat area like her rear, her shoulder, or side of the hindquarter, otherwise the dart might bounce off the curve of the tough hide. Once she’s down we’ll take a plaster cast of the horn—that’ll be your trophy. Then I’ll give her the antidote.”

  They crept within forty yards. Paul continued to throw up small pinches of powder to check the wind’s direction. Lydia stayed behind him and Billy. He figured by the time he was done the powder would cover her completely.

  The rhino’s rear was to them. Paul nodded at Billy when they came within range.

  There was a low sucking sound. A weak charge. The dud cartridge forced the dart to fall short of the rhino.

  The rhino whirled around even at that bit of noise, sounded out a big, “snuff,” then thundered off.

  “Crap,” Billy said.

  “It’s all right. She didn’t go far,” Paul said. “Come on.”

  This time they stalked within twenty-five yards, up to the edge of an open meadow. The rhino kept its head up, still in the opposite direction from them. It settled into feeding, though Paul could tell the rhino kept its muscles taut, ready to run.

  Paul nodded at Billy again. Lydia crept between the two of them as Billy set up his shot. The discharge sounded, this time a strong report.

  The dart landed deep into the hindquarter of the rhino. Shock shuddered through the rhino’s body at the dart’s sting. It turned. Maybe it had meant to run away but it charged right at them instead.

  “Hold steady.” Even as Paul whispered it, he realized that, with the three of them standing side by side, the rhino was bound to run over one of them, even if only by accident.

  “Hiyaa!” Paul yelled to catch the rhino’s attention. Even as he ran, the rhino whirled its two tons toward him.

  He darted to the left and tried for the closest tree. The rhino hooked her horn around his leg and threw him into the air. The world turned upside down, blue ground, brown sky. The air rushed around him, like a bullet whizzing past the ear, except his body was the bullet. He landed hard in a bush, thorns pricking dozens of wounds.

  He thought maybe the rhino wasn’t worth dying for after all.

  He felt sorry for himself that this thought came so uselessly late.

  Then he blacked out.

  “Shameful. Shameful what that Besly did to his woman. Shame on him.”

  Those neighbors’ words, they echoed through the blackness even after more than twenty years, haunting him.

  His mother had been sick. Paul never knew from what and he couldn’t remember life before. That golden age when the three of them went out as a family, or when he and his father felled tree for firewood on their five-acre plot while his mother tended the vegetable garden. Maybe that happened but maybe not. At seventeen, all he remembered about their acres was it was big enough that the neighbors couldn’t hear his mother yell during her tantrums.

  A golf course had backed up to their property. A few golfers got a scare once or twice when she went onto the green in her nightgown and collected the golf balls. His father had held her like a fragile piece of glass as he walked her back to the house, even as she screamed and beat at him. His father gave her a pill, and when she quieted down, he made Paul put up a long wood fence against the back edge of the property.

  On her good days, his parents laughed together as they cooked dinner. But good days were rare. Mostly it was her yelling and drinking, and then her using drugs that last year to stop the pain. Paul had come home once to a strange car in the driveway, a strange man’s voice in his parents’ bedroom, and turned around and left before going two steps into the house.

  “If you could only know the woman she was,” his father told him in their kitchen, the linoleum yellowed and peeling, the cupboards greasy from finger oils, barely any food in the refrigerator but dirty dishes still piled high in the sink.

  “You don’t know what she’s like when you’re not around,” Paul said. “She’s a whore.”

  His father’s hand had snaked out and slapped him across the right cheek, then slapped him again. “She is your mother.”

  Paul raised a fist and pressed it against the sting
. He welcomed the rage that came to squash the tears. He stared at the linoleum and allowed the anger to expand until he was sure his voice would not crack. “She has them here when you’re at work.”

  “You think I don’t know, boy?” His father raised his hand as if to strike again but left it in the air like some kind of salute. “You think I don’t know?” his father asked again, now in wonder. “You think I don’t know?”

  Paul looked up and saw his father stared at his raised fist with a puzzled expression before he lowered it, and then his father began crying. The man who dug house foundations for a living, the man who came home with blistered hands swelled double their normal size from the work, the man who always smelled of dirt and metal and concrete, his hand ready for the only thing Paul could count on finding in the fridge—beer.

  “She put a knife to my throat last night,” Paul said. It had happened twice before, but with a penknife and a letter opener. It had taken two times for him to finally get smart and lock his bedroom door at night. It was embarrassing afterwards, how his nerve had failed him, how he’d…How an almost eighteen-year-old man had urinated on himself like a baby. He’d not told his father for fear of being called a coward, but this last time she’d used a butcher knife.

  His father locked his wandering, teary eyes back on Paul. “What you say, boy?” He knew his father couldn’t be drunk yet, not with only two empty bottles on the countertop.

  “I told you.”

  He grabbed Paul by the front of his shirt. “Tell me again and don’t leave anything out.”

  For all the courage anger gave him, fear managed to work its way in. His father loved his mother. There was no doubt. No doubt, no matter how sick she got. His father loved him too, but not like he loved her.

  “She woke me up in the middle of the night.” In her pink, flowery nightgown thingy, looking like a ghost out of some horror movie, but he would never admit that to his father. “She held that kitchen knife right up to my throat. That’s what woke me up, was that knife pressing into my skin.”