by Peter Riva
“Okay, I agree and I’d already decided we’ll break camp tomorrow morning and go, forget Ol Jogi, and go straight to Pangani to the croc farm, okay?” The end of their filming trip was planned for the seaside town of Pangani in Tanzania. Pero clearly wanted to move on, out of Kenya and the grasp of the local law, just in case.
Heep clearly understood the reason for a quick country departure as well, “You already in contact with the people there? How about the SeaSled I asked for?”
“Yes, I called Flamingo Travel and Schenkers from the Chief’s on his ham radio phone. Everything is moved up, rescheduled.” Pangani was opposite Pemba Island on the coast. It was remote, tropical, lush and boasted a great hotel. The croc farm there had huge crocs they could film, and it was definitely safer to be out of Kenya if things got hot.
“Is the change in schedule also okay with her?”
Pero knew whom he meant. Their on-camera expert could have been angry to have her schedule rearranged. “Well, she’s made a few conditions . . . but she’ll be okay, it’s only a week, she’ll still get back to Nairobi in time. The camp is thrilled to have us early, the tourists cut their numbers down, and there are four tents empty.” To end the conversation and take responsibility away from his friend, Pero added an order, “And, Heep, it’s done, over with, my responsibility. I’ve arranged for Simon’s body to be sent down to Nairobi by the Chief—I paid the fare already. And the Cessna arrives tomorrow late morning. That’s it, got it?”
Heep stood, pushing his hands on knees, looking tired: “Yes, okay, you’re the boss, that’s fine, well done Pero, as always. We’ll leave first thing. Have you considered Mbuno?” Heep knew they could not leave at night and that gave Pero time to talk things over with Mbuno. Not taking Mbuno into their confidence was a bad idea, a really bad idea when Mbuno was the only one there with expertise dealing with bush danger. The way Heep saw it, and felt Pero should as well, their security was dependent on a would-be attacker seeing their two armed guards here in the National Park, even if they were barely armed. At night outside of the Park (with its Ranger patrols), they would be ambushed before they got onto the main road. Mbuno might be the only warning they would have, nobody could fool him in the wild, Heep was sure of that.
Daytime in the huge Park, as large as it was, they would have no problem with visibility over ten miles in every direction, but night was definitely not for travel. Their two armed escorts, left behind always at camp, could protect them here at night, standing by a roaring campfire, in plain view—providing Mbuno scouted the area for ambushes out of campfire light.
After Nairobi, they wouldn’t need guards anymore anyway.
Thinking of his unfinished special task for State, hating that their trip and Simon’s death were all for nothing, Pero decided he needed to push their luck, just a little, but only in daylight and as safe as possible for the crew and then get the hell out. It was time to put a seed of a thought in Heep’s head, see if Heep agreed. “Pity we didn’t get the soaring shot from down below. It would have done Simon proud to have his last flight on network TV. As it is, you’re right, the execs are sure to can the whole segment—without that shot.”
Leaving Heep thinking, Pero went in search of Mbuno. Not finding him in the other tent or either Land Rover, he called out softly. The two guards, backs to the fire, pretending to be alert, were shocked into shouldering their rifles as Mbuno materialized just out of firelight. “Mimi ni tu ni,” (it is only me) he called out and they relaxed their arms.
Pero motioned Mbuno away from the men and sat on a boulder, “Okay if we talk, Mbuno?”
“Ndiyo bwana” (yes boss), Mbuno squatted next to the rock, eyes on the bush, not watching Pero. He took a sharp breath, “I know.”
It was a statement of fact, not less than Pero expected, but Pero had to be sure just what Mbuno knew. “Know what?”
“Mr. Simon did not fall, he was killed.”
Pero nodded and handed the bullet to Mbuno. “I had to cover it up.”
“Ndiyo, big trouble if you had not. This Park is not safe. We should leave before troubles come back.” Pero was not surprised Mbuno had put the pieces together. The clues were sparse and the odds were that shufti were the only explanation.
“We’re going to Pangani tomorrow. The Cessna’s coming late morning, in broad daylight, with the Chief’s blessing.”
Mbuno was silent, then turned to face Pero, “Then we only need to guard against the night, the very bad men who may still come. I have seen this before. The Troubles.” And with that, he stood and walked into the darkness, picking up his pace to a trot, disappearing deep into the gloom. Pero sat for a while longer and wondered why Mbuno had called them “very bad men” and not shufti. Also, his mention of the Troubles, the time of the Mau Mau Revolt and carnage, really had Pero worried. Just what had they gotten into up here? A second thought popped into his head, exactly what was Mbuno’s experience with the Troubles? One thing he was certain of, they were not going to miss that flight tomorrow.
Suddenly he regretted his hint to Heep. If Mbuno was this much on guard, matters might be worse than Pero had calculated. With a shiver, perhaps the desert night cold, he realized that, no matter what, he had to get the crew to safety.
CHAPTER 4
Ramu
The next morning they were up and packed, ready to go, especially early. Heep seemed anxious about something. He told Pero he needed one more shot and a big favor.
That’s how Pero knew he would get to the top of the Ajuran Plateau one more time, as he himself had hinted and then regretted. Pero had dreamt that night that Simon’s killers saw Simon soaring, so they must have thought Simon would have seen them. And now here Pero was, caught in his own subterfuge, having to agree with Heep, one more shot was called for not to waste Simon’s life.
They drove in the first rays of daylight. At the base of the Ajuran Plateau, going in the opposite direction of “down to Nairobi” (as the minder had repeatedly insisted), Heep stopped the Land Rover and prepared the Betacam to record a descent of the glider. In the other Land Rover, Mbuno driving, Pero sat with the spare orange crew anorak on wondering how he had gotten himself into this mess. He knew he only had himself to blame. Still, it was daylight, surely the Chief had gotten out the word to any Gurreh bandits or shufti to leave the crew alone, everything should be all right. Pero carefully avoided thinking about the choice of weapon, a sniper’s bullet, hardly the weapon for a poacher or ex-soldier.
Pero had done a few jumps off the side of a Swiss mountain, near Chateau d’Oex, in a similar hang glider. The height didn’t worry Pero. The updrafts and distance to a safe landing did. Also, he knew that there was no way he could, or would, be able to fly as smoothly as Simon had. Surely, the footage couldn’t match, would it? Was it pointless to risk his life for a video shot, for some messed-up concept of videographic integrity for a TV show?
But then again, there was the question of possibly identifying who had killed Simon. Pero thought if he could just spot something, anything unusual, round the backside of the Ajuran Plateau again, to see if there was a camp back there he had missed spotting or someone that had triggered that prompted the shooting of poor Simon . . . but why shoot? What purpose did it serve except to draw attention to the shooters? They couldn’t know Pero had covered up their crime and why. Still, he also worried they might be prepared to kill again, so Pero asked himself the same question: Why do this, Pero? He knew why, it was his sense of fair play, of justice. Simon’s death should not be a total waste. And besides, if he did spot something, and told State, maybe they could investigate or inform the proper Kenyan authorities and catch Simon’s killer.
As they started the Land Rover up the rutted track up the side of the Ajuran Plateau, Pero left the driving to Mbuno and busied himself with the binoculars out the top hatch, looking north, scanning for any signs of a camp. The noise of their Land Rover would not carry far in this terrain. Sand and low scrub are natural sound-deadeners, so unless th
e shufti were close, which Pero doubted, they shouldn’t hear them. Their dust trail was another matter. Anyway, yesterday their vehicle had showed up over an hour after they started the climb. So, Pero kept scanning assuming Mbuno and he’d have time before whoever was out there were aware of their presence. Get up, get off, all done, Pero thought to himself. That is, if there was really anybody out there.
And why would they have come looking, shooting at Simon? And why, if they were camped there to the north, just in Ethiopia, would they track and then shoot at Simon on the other side of the mountain inside Kenya? Pero had no answers, just worries.
A distant newspaper memory nagged its way into his thoughts. The problem was satellites at the equator. In orbit, they traveled in waves across the face of the Earth. They passed the equatorial regions between four and sixteen times a day, but passing over the equator, they could not be maneuvered nor have an angled look-down and therefore showed little oblique detail. Passing over nomadic camps, dug in the uni-color sand, you had to be extraordinarily lucky to ever spot an encampment at all. Last time the State Department thought they did, they told President Clinton and he bombed the desert in the Sudan, convinced the three nomads they had seen must be the al-Qaida camp they were looking for. Result? Four camels died. Cost? One Tomahawk missile and lots of red faces at State. On-site inspection was now demanded by the White House.
Oh, lord, thought Pero, that’s why they wanted me to look. They think something is there.
Pero kept looking. Mbuno shot Pero a glance.
“Bwana, nothing there to see this morning, big game all gone west and the sun is in your eyes. I think too many hunters looking for nyama over there.” He pointed east. “Nyama are not stupid.” Nyama was the Swahili word for game—and meat. It is one and the same to the tribes’ people . . . it’s what makes the term “poaching” a Western concept.
“Mbuno, I’m looking for that car from yesterday. I wondered if they might be here again. If I could just spot them . . .”
“If they are here bwana, we must go. Shufti here very bad.”
“Agreed. After you drop me on the top, you should leave immediately to make sure they don’t have time to zero in on you.”
“Zero, bwana?”
“Spot you.”
“Oh, they have. They will be deciding if they want to come. This Land Rover is a thing to steal.”
“They’ve seen us?”
“Oh yes, if they are there, they have seen us. I would see us.” It was that simple.
Pero sat down, pensive. “Mbuno, if we get to the top and we see them or their car, you must decide if you want to risk driving down. We can radio for help.”
In his calm way, Mbuno responded with authority, “Yes, bwana. We will have a look just now.” And with that, they crested the top of the ridge. The flat plateau was, thankfully, empty. Pero had been half-ready to scoot back down ahead of the shufti if they rolled up on them up here. The two men got out of the Land Rover. Mbuno climbed on top of the Land Rover and used the binoculars.
Pero took down the glider, opened the triangles, and fastened the stays. Off the rear seat, Pero picked up the harness, Simon’s spare one, clipped himself in, and looked up, “Mbuno, have you spotted anything?” Mbuno was still standing above the open hatch, looking around and around, like some sort of lighthouse keeper.
“Not clearly, Mr. Pero. Yes, there is something there . . .” he pointed. “Just there beyond the yellow earth.” There was a patch of sulfur earth, in contrast to the red soil of the region. Volcanic residue, no doubt.
Pero took the proffered binoculars and peered. He could see nothing. Pero gave them back to Mbuno. “What do you see?”
He peered intently for a few moments. “They are maybe twenty moving, they have many cars, they have made mounds, there are no bushes on top. There is no car moving. It is confusing.”
Although still early, an hour past first sunup, and the air was clear, Pero was still amazed at his vision. “Okay, Mbuno, take the Land Rover and get back down the track. When you get there, tell Mr. Heep to be ready to leave and roll fast. Tell our two guards to put their single bullet” (a .303, one bullet issued per guard, on police orders) “in the chamber and to be ready to protect the crew. I’ll jump from here and get down as fast as possible.”
“Ndiyo bwana, tafadali,” (yes boss, thank you), “but not down too fast.” He made a down swing with his hand, smiled and got in the driver’s seat, started the motor and left. Pero watched him go, sadly. Why sad? I don’t know. Yes, I do, there is only one way out of here—off that damn edge.
As soon as the Land Rover was off the mesa, Pero stepped into the triangle and clipped up. Pero had prepped Simon and watched him do this. “It’s C of G neutral,” Simon had told Pero. C of G is center of gravity to pilots. Too far forward and you cannot pull up. Too far back (aft) and you cannot control the aircraft. The only plane Pero had ever flown solo was a Cessna in California over the Sierra’s near Edwards Air Force Base, through loads of thermals. Pero hoped that training would help here. Simon had leapt off the edge, gone down, but soon was rising again, way over their heads. He had had to fly the currents to get back into camera shot.
Today, it was a little earlier in the daytime. Pero needed to wait for the sun to match the light. It was cloudless here again, so that was okay. Pero had time to think, standing there on the cliff’s edge holding the glider’s rudder bar.
He keyed the walkie-talkie, “Heep, tell me when you think the light is right.”
Heep’s voice came back strained, “You sure about this buddy?”
Pero summoned what was left of his courage and firmly replied, “Land Rover on the way down, I’m set, ready. Out.”
Twenty of them, eh? Twenty armed to the teeth shufti hell-bent on violence and pillage? Or twenty al-Qaida-affiliated terrorists out of Ethiopia, armed to the teeth and hell-bent on violence to keep their position secret? Either way, this wasn’t his idea of an adventure anymore. Pero had gotten up here on the excuse of saving Simon’s last moment of fame, with a side intention of spotting someone he could turn in for Simon’s death—but now came the hard part: a leap into vulture history with a good landing (any landing you can walk away from is a good landing)—or a suicide plunge with no one the wiser, ever. Ah well, to hell with it.
Heep called ready on the walkie-talkie and then called “Action!”
It had seemed the thing to do in the circumstances after yesterday’s disaster. He ran forward and was dumbfounded to be going up, not down. Now, prone as Pero was, there was only the ground beneath and he pulled the bar and dropped the nose of the hang glider down. His peripheral vision of soaring giants on each side, to guide the long descent, tracing the face of the cliff was breathtaking. The vultures above and to either side first told him he was in trouble—as well as the uncomfortable sensation of fear between his legs. Heights had that effect on Pero, especially as he was primordially unsure the flimsy blue wings of the hang glider would, or could, really fly. Added to which, as there were no vultures below, he felt sure they clearly expected him to plummet straight down any moment now. All this clicked through his brain in an instant, snap, snap, snap, reeling off reasons why this flight might still be really a bad idea.
Watching Simon yesterday morning from the safety of the cliff top, it all looked so calm, so serene. Now white-hot fear made every muscle in his body tight as wood and just as inflexible. Pero had had trouble lifting his legs into the pouch at the back, to fully swing into the prone position, just as another thermal caught the kite and lifted Pero like an express elevator. Pero could see way over the mesa now, and from the extra hundred feet altitude, the shufti encampment was plainly visible. Simon must have seen it, or they saw him high up, soaring and thought he had spied them. Pero knew right then that’s what had triggered them. He was sure it would trigger them now as well. With the sun reflecting off the aluminum tubes and the blue of the wings, Pero was like a huge billboard proclaiming, “I see you!”
&
nbsp; He keyed the mike, “Heep, get ready to leave, pack up and get set to go.”
Heep sounded worried, “What’s the matter?”
“I’m okay, but you’ll only have one shot of this, I cannot stay up here, coming down now, get ready, one shot that’s all you have, then straight to the airport. Copy?”
“Copy. Careful.”
The lead vultures, sensing his amateur status, and maybe his nerves, really took a dislike to Pero and four or five banged on the wings and fabric hard enough to make him stupidly feint the bar away, which started a spiral down. When Pero got it leveled out, he was halfway down and, from where Heep was, Pero would be framed up against the cliff. Pero knew Heep needed the shot of the kite emerging from the cliff with the vultures in tandem, against the blue sky. The vultures camouflage simply made them disappear against the mottled rock face. So, Pero pushed the bar to the left and circled out, moving now towards the western cliff edge, where Simon had been flying. Pero took a straight line and the cliff disappeared off his right shoulder.
Soon, Heep called in his ear, the relief in his voice obvious: “Got it, come on down safely. Over.” Pero also caught the excitement in his voice. It was always there, when the shot was just right. Pero smiled, feeling safer because he wasn’t exposed over the top of the mesa now, so he angled the hang glider back towards Heep’s position, east, and then Pero spotted them. There was one dust trail from a car being driven at speed, followed, a mile or two back, by a larger dust cloud, maybe two to four vehicles. One dust cloud looked very large, larger than a Land Rover, maybe a truck. A truck meant troops. In the sun’s early heat shimmer, Pero could not be sure. Pero needed to warn Heep.
Holding the bar with one hand, Pero reached for the mike key on the walkie-talkie and blipped it twice. “Heep here, what’s up? Over.”