Cloudburst

by Wilbur Smith

  ‘In his own words: he’ll live. Langdon’s got him digging in some mine with an actual shovel for the rest of the summer. Can you believe it?’

  ‘Yes. I can.’

  ‘Well, he said to tell you that despite that, he’s OK. After what happened with Innocent, he reckons he deserves it.’

  ‘What did you tell him?’

  ‘The truth – that you were worried for him, and grateful for his help.’

  Xander was right, obviously. Yet I was more than worried and grateful. For some reason I wanted Caleb’s forgiveness. And not just because we were about to expose his father.

  Langdon drew the door back and stood framed in the opening. His face looked worse than it had the day before, but he’d been at a distance then, and it had been dark. His nose was swollen, his left cheek too, the eye above it a mean slit. An ugly brown-purple bruise down the left side of his face underscored everything. The sight of him made me wonder how truthful Caleb had been with Xander. I’d have been willing to bet Langdon had done worse than make his son dig holes. How else would he have punished him?

  ‘Welcome,’ Langdon said. With no apparent feeling at all he continued, ‘What a relief to see you.’

  ‘What on earth happened to you?’ Dad said.

  Langdon narrowed his good eye in my direction. ‘Ask your son.’

  ‘Can we come in?’ Mum said gently.

  ‘Why not?’

  Mum looked at him quizzically as he backed away from the door, then followed him into a large white kitchen. We all traipsed behind. The room smelled of disinfectant. Before we’d come to a stop, Amelia, who’d heard what Xander told me as we crossed the yard, said, ‘Where’s Caleb?’

  Langdon snorted. ‘Where you last saw him. Making amends.’

  He clearly wasn’t going to pretend to be surprised by Mum and Dad’s newfound freedom. A tumbler of whiskey sat on the countertop between us. He reached for it and took a sip, waiting for the accusation to come, I suppose.

  ‘What’s going on, Langdon?’ asked Mum, renewed steel in her voice.

  ‘You tell me.’

  ‘We’ve been locked away –’ she began.

  ‘I’ll tell you,’ I cut in, anger knotting in my chest. ‘We know you’re responsible for Mum and Dad’s disappearance. You had them kidnapped. Admit it.’

  Langdon let out a slow breath, looked from me to Dad and said, ‘I think not.’

  ‘This is ridiculous,’ said Dad, without conviction.

  ‘Is it now?’ said Langdon. After a pause, he unleashed: ‘What’s ridiculous is the havoc this little twit of yours, together with his interfering friend, have caused in your absence. I hate to say I told you so.’

  ‘Told you what? Dad?’ I asked.

  To me Dad replied, ‘I don’t know what he’s talking about.’

  ‘Yes, you do,’ Langdon laughed, taking another slug from his glass. ‘I said at the beginning, the safest thing to do would have been to lock them up too. It would only have been for a few days. What harm could it do?!’

  Mum was rocking on her heels beside me, looking from Langdon to Dad with her mouth open. The shape of the problem, a locomotive bearing down on me through the mist, was coming into focus.

  Amelia got there first. ‘I don’t believe it,’ she said to Dad. ‘Except I do. You were in on the whole thing.’

  ‘Come again?’ said Xander.

  ‘Jack’s dad here, together with his brother, had himself and Janine kidnapped on purpose.’

  ‘But why?’ I still couldn’t fathom it.

  ‘Money, probably.’ Amelia was right in Dad’s face, sneering up at him. ‘I bet you’ve an interest in Langdon’s mines, haven’t you?’

  ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about,’ said Dad coldly.

  His reserve was supposed to be dismissive, but I could see the lie behind it. So could Mum. With one quick step she arrived in front of Dad and struck him across the face. The slap sounded like the crack of a whipped towel. It stunned Dad. He did nothing in response. Just swayed there for a moment before turning his gaze upon me. He’d never looked at me that way before. No words could have spelled out his hatred as plainly. The air in my lungs turned to ice.

  ‘Yup,’ said Langdon. ‘We should have kept the lot of them in the jungle. Caleb too. But he had to mess that up with his stupid gorilla baiting. Still, we could simply have rounded them up on their return, as I suggested, even chucked them in the same tank as you.’ He was slurring, drunk, happy to repeat himself. ‘But no, no, no. Your boy was too witless to piece anything together, you insisted. Well, someone pieced it together for him, and he turned Caleb against me while he was at it, and now the whole goddamn operation is blown.’

  ‘From the very beginning,’ said Mum. ‘The fake storm, the robbery at the airport, the missed meetings. Kidnapping. All of it orchestrated, bought, for one purpose: to undermine me.’

  ‘You’ll get over it,’ Dad hissed.

  ‘My own husband,’ whispered Mum.

  ‘My own father,’ I said.

  Mum looked at me funnily when I echoed her like that. Pity filled her face. She moved closer to me, placed both cool hands on the back of my neck, a huge decision weighing in her face. ‘What did you say?’ she said.

  ‘My own father. I can’t believe he’d do this to you. To us.’

  She turned from me to Dad, an utter stillness descending. ‘Nicholas,’ she said, and paused to draw breath.

  Amelia, at my side, took hold of my hand. I could feel Xander’s presence in the room too. They were a help. We’d done some good together. I tried to think about that and block out everything else, and I failed. In the near silence, all I could hear was the whine of a mosquito.

  ‘Nicholas,’ Mum repeated eventually, ‘for as long as I live –’

  ‘We,’ I interrupted. I knew exactly what she was going to say, but it had to come from me too. I squared up to Dad, stared straight into his eyes, an unexpected sense of relief flooding through me as I spoke for both of us: ‘For as long as we live,’ I told him, ‘neither of us wants to see you again.’

  Epilogue

  We flew back to London separately. Xander sorted the logistics, changing our flights and organising taxis to the airport while the rest of us packed up in a bit of a daze. He was returning to Nigeria; I’d see him back at school. Amelia, Mum and I made the trip home without Dad. Mum was furious. She spent the journey staring into the middle distance with a determined look on her face. Over the days and weeks that followed I tried to help her cope by looking like I was coping myself. Dad decided to take us literally and refused to set foot in the house. He would send someone for his things, he said. This meant Mum and I had to pack up all his belongings ready for the courier. I took charge. It was surreal to stand before his mahogany desk – I’d not even been allowed near it when I was small – and sweep the contents off its leather-inlaid top into a packing crate.

  One of the objects on that desk was a little wooden elephant Mark had carved, copying as best he could one made out of actual ivory which, for as long as either of us could remember, had stood in pride of place under the brass desk lamp. Carving anything out of ivory is wrong; to make an elephant is as wrong as it gets. Mark’s wooden version was crudely done when I held the two side by side, but for a ten-year-old, the age at which he had carved it, that elephant was impressive.

  I stood there turning the carving over in my fingers, transfixed. Was it a good thing that Mark died without knowing what our father was actually like, deep down? Was I better off knowing it now? For the first time since the ordeal in the Congo, the feel of that wooden elephant in my hand brought me close to tears. I put it in my pocket. The rest of the desk’s contents, the magnifying glass and letter opener, the blotter and glass paperweights – and Dad’s prized ivory elephant – I clattered into the crate. Who cared if anything got broken? Desk cleared, I dragged the box into his dressing room and rammed in his handmade suits. A couple of drawers of underclothes went in on top. Se
eing the neatly pressed silk boxer shorts and paired woollen socks fall in among the jumble was curiously satisfying. Box full, I went off to find Mum.

  She was at the island in the kitchen, focusing on her laptop.

  ‘What’s going to happen next?’ I asked.

  ‘Hmm?’ She sat back on her barstool. ‘Well, Langdon’s mining operation is under investigation,’ she said. There was a glimmer of satisfaction in her eye as she nodded at her screen. ‘According to Mr Mukwege, the authorities are likely to confiscate the whole business.’

  Though that was of course good news, I hadn’t quite meant the question as she’d taken it. ‘I was thinking more of us,’ I said.

  ‘Of course. So you’ll be back at school in no time. That will be the same as it’s always been, more or less.’

  She was probably right, but that wasn’t a good thing. The idea of sitting in a classroom was pretty boring, and being cooped up like a prison inmate for weeks on end filled me with dread. It must have shown in my face. Mum went on, ‘Listen. You’ll be fine. And before you know it you’ll be home again for the holidays. I’ve been thinking about that too. The Congo trip didn’t work out that well –’

  ‘You could say that.’

  ‘So we should plan another one, somewhere else, the two of us.’

  ‘It wasn’t exactly a bundle of laughs for Amelia or Xander either,’ I said.

  ‘You’re right. We should invite them too. To do something completely different. Have a think about it.’

  She was trying so hard to be positive, I found myself doing the same. What sort of place would best blot things out? From nowhere a picture of Amelia swimming underwater came to me. Turquoise sea, coral reefs, a firework display of tropical fish. Might as well add in some treasure spilling out of a pirate’s chest. We should head beneath the waves somewhere. That was about as far from the jungle as it’s possible to get.

  Mum was watching me closely. ‘Any ideas?’ she asked.

  ‘As it happens –’ I returned her smile – ‘yes.’

  Wilbur Smith is an international bestselling author, having sold over 130 million copies of his incredible adventure novels. His Courtney Family saga is the longest running series in publishing history, and with the Jack Courtney Adventures he brings that adventure to a new generation.

  Chris Wakling is a lifelong Wilbur Smith fan, travel writer and novelist. He is available for events at schools and festivals and for interview.

  For all the latest information about Wilbur, visit: www.wilbursmithbooks.com facebook.com/WilburSmith www.wilbur-niso-smithfoundation.org

  Wilbur Smith donates twenty per cent of profits received from the sale of this copy to The Wilbur & Niso Smith Foundation. The Foundation’s focus is to encourage adventure writing and literacy and find new talent.

  For more information, please visit www.wilbur-niso-smithfoundation.org

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  First published in Great Britain in 2020 by

  PICCADILLY PRESS

  80–81 Wimpole St, London W1G 9RE

  www.piccadillypress.co.uk

  Copyright © Orion Mintaka (UK) Ltd, 2020

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  The right of Wilbur Smith to be identified as Author and Illustrator of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988

  This is a work of fiction. Names, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN: 978-1-84812-854-5

  Also available in audio

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