by Tony Park
‘All right, all right. I’m coming.’
Graham jogged to Charles, who fell in behind him. Typical, Graham thought, and then the starlit night turned to black as he pitched forward into the dust and passed out.
*
Fidel Costa saw the torchlight flash three times in the dark and drove up to the gate of Ukuphila Wildlife Orphanage in the BMW X5 he had rented. Charles unlocked the gate and Fidel drove in.
Fidel took a face mask, decorated with a grinning skull, out of his pocket and pulled it on. At the moment he killed Baird he would show the man his face, but first he would have to pass by Ukuphila’s security cameras and he did not want to be subsequently recognised. He got out of the BMW.
‘Baird?’ Fidel asked.
‘In the rhino enclosure, boss, as you ordered. He is still unconscious. I have tied him for now, in case he wakes.’
‘Good work.’ Charles, his man, had been infiltrated into Ukuphila thanks to a favour owed to Fidel by a distant relative by marriage who ran the security company that supplied the guards to the wildlife orphanage. It had been a costly exercise, organising the hit on the regular nightwatchman, Elphes, and while the regular guard had not been killed he was in hospital, which allowed Charles to take his place.
Fidel would have revenge for the death of his younger brother. Losing Inâcio had been akin, as far as Fidel was concerned, to a parent losing a child. He had seen comrades, friends, killed in war and fail to return from poaching missions, but this was different. Perhaps it was because he had hoped for a better, brighter future for his little brother. Whatever the cause, his quiet rage seemed unquenchable. Graham Baird would not only die, he would die in shame, his memory forever sullied. Even more, he wanted Baird to feel the pain of losing someone he cared for, right before the veterinarian himself died.
Charles led the way past the various animals and birds to the boma made of logs stout enough to contain the fully grown female white rhino and her latest calf. Charles had corralled the baby rhino into a separate part of the enclosure. It whined pitifully, pining for its mother. Fidel ignored the annoying sound.
‘Start cutting,’ Fidel said.
Charles nodded and climbed over the wooden post-and-railing fence. Inside he found the saw he had already taken from the tool room. The white rhino lay on her chest, a blindfold over her eyes. She was immobilised, but not unconscious. Next to her, beside Graham Baird, was a Dan-Inject dart gun, which had been used to tranquillise the rhino.
Fidel looked around and saw a bucket, probably used to bring food to the rhinos. He took it to a nearby standpipe and filled it with water. He hefted the bucket over the boma fence then climbed it himself. On the other side he carried the bucket to where the veterinarian was lying and set it down.
From the pocket of his bush jacket Fidel, who was wearing soft leather driving gloves, took out a Makarov, a Russian-made pistol that dated from the long, bloody civil war in Mozambique. Baird was lying on his side; his wrists and ankles were bound.
Fidel got down and put his right knee on Baird’s arms. The unconscious man started to stir. Fidel looked to Charles and saw he was halfway through sawing off the rhino’s horn. ‘Faster.’
‘Yes, boss.’ Charles redoubled his efforts, and wiped sweat from his eyes with his free hand.
Fidel, meanwhile, put the Makarov in Graham’s right hand, and threaded the man’s index finger through the trigger guard. Graham came to just as Fidel used Baird’s finger to fire a round into the air. Birds squawked and animals erupted into call at the clap of man-made lightning that too many of Ukuphila’s residents remembered.
Baird tried to turn the pistol on him, but Fidel knelt hard on Graham’s right arm and his fingers opened. Fidel snatched the gun back, stood and backed off a step. Then he looked to Charles, who was three-quarters of the way through sawing off the rhino cow’s horn. ‘Enough.’
Charles stood and wiped his brow with the back of his hand, then pulled out his shirt tail and used it to thoroughly wipe the handle of the saw he had been using. He brought it to Fidel.
‘Open your hand, Graham. Charles will put the saw in your hand and you will grab hold of it.’
Graham looked up at him. ‘Fuck you. Fidel Costa? Is that you? Have you finally grown the balls to do your own dirty work?’
‘You murdered a young man, Dr Baird,’ said Fidel through gritted teeth. ‘You shot him with one of your darts and you let him die, just like this rhino will die very soon. You look confused.’
‘You’re setting me up? No one will believe I darted this rhino and tried to cut off its horn.’
Fidel shrugged. ‘Why not? It’s happened before. The money this useless keratin, fingernail material, commands in Vietnam has corrupted far better men than you, even other veterinarians like yourself. And anyway, you won’t be around to tell your version of events. You will die in shame.’
‘That’s what this is about? You can’t just kill me, you want everyone in town to think I was crooked?’ He laughed.
‘Yes, Graham, that is what I want everyone to think. If I simply murdered you then people would figure out who was behind it. You would be a martyr, a cause célèbre, a posthumous poster boy for the save-the-rhino campaign. People would donate money, there would be investigations and enquiries and fingers would be pointed.’ Fidel dropped to a crouch to close the distance between them. ‘Believe it or not, Graham, the authorities in Mozambique are starting to get serious about rhino poaching. The president is under pressure, and not even I can rely on his patronage if the shit, how do the Americans say, hits the fan over your death. So, my best option is for you to pass into history like the useless, drunken little failure that you are.’
‘Hey, I’m six foot three. Who are you calling little?’
Fidel laughed. ‘I salute you, Graham. Joking to the end. Now grab the saw, please.’
‘Kiss my arse.’
Fidel shook his head, then stood. ‘Then we must do this the unpleasant way.’
He took out an iPhone, pressed in a number and then activated the phone’s speaker.
‘Yes?’ said a voice, impatient.
‘You are with her, Kerry Maxwell?’
‘Yes, but you said no names,’ the man said in a whisper.
‘I need to use the names for a minute, I have someone here who needs to know we’re serious.’
Jorge paused, which was understandable. ‘The woman got a flat tyre. I’m helping her right now.’
‘Good. My instruction to you was that it was to be quick, clean, that my main focus, my main target, is the man I am with now.’
‘Yes,’ Jorge said. ‘That is correct. I was just about to SMS you for the final go-ahead.’
‘I’ve changed my mind,’ Fidel said. He looked to Graham and smiled. ‘Take your time with the woman. Have some fun with her before it ends.’
Another pause. ‘Yes. OK.’
‘Unless I call you back within two minutes to countermand this order.’
‘Understood.’
Fidel ended the call. ‘You see, Graham, I’ve thought this through. You’re all going to die – the Maxwell woman, her father, you, Eli Johnston. I just want you to know that if you don’t do as I tell you, your friend Kerry will suffer unnecessarily. I want you to feel what it’s like to lose someone you care about.’
Baird was seething. Charles held the saw by the blade, the handle within reach of Graham’s fingers. He reached for it and took it in his right hand.
Fidel re-dialled. ‘Cancel that last order, just kill her.’
Graham stared up at him.
‘You see, Graham, I am a man of honour.’
*
Bruce felt the light hospital blanket move and then a small hand found its way into his pyjama shorts. He started; the touch was electric. It had been a long time since he’d been caressed by a woman.
‘You like?’
He was already stirring. ‘Oh, yes, I bloody well like all right.’
It was just her fing
ers, which was something of a relief. He didn’t know what she had in that little black bag of hers, but his imagination had almost got the better of him.
Her other hand was resting on his right one, which sat on top of the covers. He had a drip attached to a cannula in the top of his hand. Her fingers brushed his, lightly.
‘What are you doing?’
‘Nothing, Bruce. I just like to touch you. Is that OK?’
‘Hmm.’
‘No peeking, OK?’
‘Well, OK, if you insist.’ He closed his eyes under the mask.
‘I want to make you happy.’
Bruce felt a moment of guilt, remembering his wife, but then told himself there was no harm in this. He had no intention of letting it go too far, and in his condition it probably wasn’t a good idea. He’d just lie back and enjoy a little attention from this bizarre present.
It was still a surprise, coming from Johnston. Bruce thought about how Eli had asked his permission to go out with Kerry, as though he were some Amish farmer or something.
Eli setting him up with a hooker didn’t make sense.
‘Oh, Bruce, you are very big.’
This was all too weird, he thought. He reached for the eye mask.
Chapter 16
Gina’s ears pricked up as soon as she heard the loud boom. As a wild hyena, unlike the less worldly members of her clan, she knew that where there was gunfire there was usually food.
She loped to the gate and her posse followed her, as they always did. She nosed the bars near the lock and the gate started to slide open. She had almost escaped once before, when one of the keepers had forgotten to lock the internal gate. She had been able to lead the clan around Ukuphila but the gate on the exterior perimeter fence had been locked.
Now, Gina came to the second of the sliding gates on her enclosure. She sniffed it and smelled the man, the one with the shaggy beard who had an odour very different from that of other humans, more hyena-like. It was one of the reasons she tolerated him and one of the reasons she had accepted him into her odd little family of misfits.
Gina nudged the gate a few times. Something was loose. The padlock had been slipped into its hole, but it hadn’t been locked. Gina banged her head against the metal, then grabbed a bar between her teeth and worried at it. The lock vibrated out and landed in the dust with a thud. With a final shake Gina started the gate sliding and Jade and the others whooped with joy.
Freedom.
Gina scampered out, then stopped, raised her head and sniffed the air and listened. There were human voices, and a cry of pain. More good news. Where there was distress there was also food. But Gina had lived through enough encounters with humans in the outside world to know they were dangerous.
She turned to her clan, growled low to keep them in line, then moved stealthily but quickly through the shadows.
They passed the lion enclosure and the big, stupid round faces stared at them through the wire fences. Oh, how she would like to break in there and teach them a lesson; but there was no time for that now. A pair of wild dogs, roused by the noise, ran up and down within the confines of their enclosure, and whined and yelped at the hyenas. Gina tossed her head at them. Silly creatures.
Ahead, Gina saw a shiny four-wheeled machine, a man with a light – two men, in fact – and the open gate that led to the rest of the world. Her eyes, however, followed the track of the torch’s beam.
There, in the dirt, was the smelly man, the one who cared for them, one of her family.
*
Nurse Tamara Shepherd looked at her watch. It was nine in the evening. The seat opposite her in the Mediterranean Restaurant in the Riverside Mall shopping centre was as empty as it had been when she had arrived, five minutes early, at 6.55.
He hadn’t even left a message.
Such were the perils of internet dating, she assumed. She had met, in the flesh, three men from the Afrikaans-speaking website, and while none of them had proved to be a good match – one married, one drunk, one still getting over a divorce – at least they hadn’t stood her up. This was a first.
Henk, Mister No-show’s name, was a schoolteacher. He had remarked more than once, in the course of their online chats, that she struck him as a very self-assured woman. Was he intimidated by her? She wondered if she had said anything to scare him off.
Tamara drained her glass of wine, checked her watch and her messages again, then called the waiter over and asked for the bill. He gave her a sympathetic smile, but she didn’t want his pity. The salad she had ordered while she was waiting was barely touched. ‘Can you put it in a packet for me, please.’
With her doggie bag she left the restaurant, feeling the eyes of a couple of dozen strangers on her, some mocking, some understanding.
She went to her car, sniffed, wiped her eyes and checked her makeup in the rear-view mirror. Her eyeliner was smudged. Her husband had died in a car accident five years earlier and the last of her three children had gone off to university six months ago. The thought of going home to her empty house was depressing.
Tamara sat for a moment before starting the car. She wondered if Bruce Maxwell had been serious.
‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s is on tonight,’ he’d said to her before she’d finished work at four that afternoon. She’d been in a hurry to get home and get ready for her date, even though she’d had hours to do so. Each afternoon since he had arrived in the hospital he had asked her to drop by and see him after work. His invitations had ranged from watching rugby games to playing hands of poker and helping him with the crossword. She had laughed off all of them.
‘I’m busy,’ she’d told him that afternoon.
Bruce had raised his eyebrows. ‘Hot date?’
‘Well, as a matter of fact.’
‘Oh, well . . .’
She had noticed his change of demeanour immediately.
‘I wish you all the best, Tammy.’ He had picked up the diminutive of her name from the other nurses, and she didn’t mind him saying it in his broad Australian accent. ‘I hope you have a really lovely evening. He’s a lucky bloke.’
His sincerity had disarmed her. Normally she had to deliver a stern rebuke to him, but this evening she had simply said, ‘Thank you, Bruce, that’s very nice of you to say so.’
Visiting hours were long over, but as a senior nurse she could enter the hospital anytime, twenty-four hours a day, in case she was called in for an emergency. As she was now single and alone she had also put her hand up to do extra shifts, such as when one of the other nurses was ill.
Tamara turned on the interior light in her X-Trail and rummaged in her handbag. Underneath the .38 Smith & Wesson revolver her late husband had given her for personal protection was her eyeliner. She took it out and fixed her makeup. She had never had cause to use the gun – things were pretty safe out here in the lowveld – but living all on her own and working irregular shifts she carried it with her, just in case. She figured it was like insurance: you would only really need it the day you didn’t have it.
Tamara put her makeup away, started the engine and drove out of the shopping centre car park. At the intersection she would have turned right to head home, but instead she turned left, towards the hospital.
*
‘Oh, Bruce, you worry too much,’ Sally whispered, catching his hand as he reached for his eye mask. ‘Time almost is up. Lie still please. I have a surprise for you.’
Surprise, my arse, Bruce thought to himself. Her hand was on his wrist, stilling him, but it was his other hand he was now aware of – the one with the drip in it. He was getting the same feeling he got when the doctor or the nurse injected something into it. He felt the sensation of cool fluid flooding into his vein.
Bruce went to move his other hand, but Sally was pressing down on it. She was surprisingly strong for such a little thing, and for some reason he felt immediately weak. He struggled.
‘Goodbye, Bruce.’
She released her grip, but when he tried to lift his hand
it felt like it was encased in lead. He reached for his eye mask again and found he barely had the strength to raise it. When he saw the gloom of the room he blinked, as though a bright light had been flashed in his eyes. He made out Sally, standing, but swaying in his vision, or so it seemed.
‘Syringe . . .’ he managed to say, though the word sounded like it had come from someone else’s distorted voice.
‘Drugs, Bruce. Fun stuff. You won’t feel a thing.’ The needle was in the cannula.
‘Wait . . .’
‘No, it won’t hurt you, Bruce.’
Bruce thought of Tammy Shepherd. He reached for the call button and pressed it again, but nothing happened. A feeling of dread washed through him. Sally hadn’t come here to get him off, she had come here to kill him.
Bruce gritted his teeth and swung his heavy free hand as hard as he could. It was not in his nature to hit a woman – he never had – but he thumped Sally in the chest and she yelped.
‘No drugs.’
Bruce saw the syringe, half-in and half-out of the tube in his hand. He reached for it, managed to get his rubbery fingers around it and pulled it out. Then he tossed it on the far side of the bed, away from Sally.
She gave an animalistic growl, snatched up a spare pillow from the guest chair beside the bed and jumped up on top of him. She straddled his chest and covered his face with the pillow.
Bruce flailed at her with his one good hand and tried to sit up, but she had him pinned, good and proper. He tried to think, but his brain was getting hazier by the second. He gave up trying to dislodge her and, instead, snaked his hand between them, under her belly, and reached for his hand that was encumbered with the drip. His fingers closed around the plastic tubing and he wrenched it free. He ignored the pain.
Reaching back, he found the bottle of brandy Tammy had left him, under his pillow. He grabbed it by the neck and smashed it, as hard as he could, against the metal railing that ran down one side of the intensive care bed. On the second attempt he heard it shatter and felt the liquor running down his hand.