I throttled back, slowing as I juggled with the yoke to keep the nose level while touching down. The landing was pretty bumpy, but not too bad. I steered the nosewheel with the rudder pedals and pushed in the throttle to get myself into the hangar.
Normally, I pulled the plane around with whoever was flying with me, but alone I couldn’t do it myself. I made a wide sweep so I could turn and park nose-out. Craig had stored a military camouflage netting behind the backseat, and I threw it over the front of the plane to make it seem like the plane had been there for some time.
Still wearing the goggles, I grabbed my camera bag off the passenger seat and slung it over my shoulder. I then headed to a small bush track that led to the other end of the airstrip.
After a short while, a low dark vehicle approached. Above me, I heard the sound of a large prop engine plane. I crouched down as the car stopped a short distance away. I moved forward to get closer to the vehicle as a Cessna 207 made an expert landing on the strip in the darkness. This couldn’t have been his first landing here, as the place was littered with warthog holes, and he missed them all. But this was not the airplane that had flown over Susuwe, nor was it the one I saw at the poaching site in Angola. If this was indeed Geldenhuis, he must have swapped planes in Lusaka.
The pilot drove the plane toward the car and stopped just at the edge of the strip. Both the car and the plane were about ten meters away. It was going to be tricky to get a meaningful shot even with my night-vision camera. I could get the airplane and hopefully the cargo, but I wasn’t sure I’d be able to get an identifying shot of the pilot. I removed the night-vision goggles from the headband, unscrewed the camera lens, mounted the intensifier between the camera body and the lens, and took photos of the numbers on the side of the plane. And there was no mistaking a Red Cross symbol near the tail.
When the pilot got out, he was a familiar-looking heavyset man, though his face was hidden under the shadow of his wide hat brim. The green grain of the night vision wasn’t helping, and the zoom on the camera was not that powerful. It was going to be tough to get what I needed.
Two men got out of the car. The passenger was clearly the same man I had seen talking to Geldenhuis at Hippo Lodge, the witch doctor, dressed this time in a black suit. The driver opened the trunk for the pilot. The pilot looked down and lifted a slender elephant tusk. As he nodded, I got the shot. And another and another as the men loaded the tusks into the back of the airplane.
When the men were far enough away, I tilted my camera down and turned on the data screen and zoomed in on one of the shots. I could barely make out the pilot’s face under the hat. Too many profiles. I had to get closer.
I crept through the bush next to the airstrip until I reached a patch of bush right next to the hood of the car opposite the plane. It was uncomfortably close, as every breath I took seemed to make too much noise. But it was the only option if I wanted to get better photos. And from this distance, I could hear what they were saying.
I turned the autofocus off on the lens so the camera wouldn’t make a noise. I adjusted the focal distance to five meters, turned the data screen off so it wouldn’t light up, aimed through a break in the bush, and started taking pictures again. Finally, through the lens, I could make out the pilot’s face as he lifted a tusk. It was Dr. Geldenhuis.
I don’t know why my heart started to race, as this was exactly the face that I had expected to see. But suddenly seeing him right in front of me, in this context, terrified me. I felt his hand pressing down on my shoulder back in his office as he threatened me. This wasn’t the sort of work I thought I’d be doing here. And it certainly wasn’t what my father thought I’d be doing. Not that I felt I needed my dad’s approval at twenty-nine, and, recently, every time I found myself in an extreme situation, he often came to mind, whether I wanted him there or not.
As blood retreated to my core, I shivered and fought back more memories—and thoughts of Sean. I had to stay in the moment. Goose bumps shot up my legs and arms, and my legs started shivering uncontrollably. I had to get as many more shots as I could. Maybe we’d be able to identify the driver as well. I tried to keep track of the tusks and counted twenty. They were all small and slender, probably from a family group. From the dark smears on the tusks, I assumed they were covered in fresh blood.
Geldenhuis pulled out a wad of money, handed it to the driver, then walked back toward the plane. The driver counted as the witch doctor lit a cigarette.
As Geldenhuis opened the door to the airplane, the driver approached him with a small paper bag.
Geldenhuis snarled and hit the bag away.
The man picked it up and brought it back.
Geldenhuis snatched the bag out of the man’s hands, opened it, cursed, and threw it at the witch doctor and missed. The bag bounced off the hood of the car and landed right next to me.
“Fok my!” Geldenhuis yelled. “I don’t bloody deal in bloody human bloody body parts!”
I tried to back into the bushes, but I was wedged within some acacia thorns, and a branch snapped. I dropped my camera in surprise.
My hands were shaking with fear as the witch doctor spun around and looked right in the direction of where I was crouched. “Did you bring company?” he called over to Geldenhuis.
“What are you talking about?” Geldenhuis marched over to the car.
I gasped for breath and held it, remaining completely frozen, hoping he wouldn’t come any closer.
Geldenhuis looked around, picked up the paper bag, and put it on the hood of the car. “There’s nothing here but a bag of stolen youth.”
I exhaled in relief, not knowing how it was possible that he didn’t see me.
The witch doctor whispered threateningly, “Why didn’t you warn me about the Singalamwe bust?”
I realized he was referring to what happened to his henchman, Ernest, who had been taken by Eli and Gidean in the ministry whaler and had disappeared.
Geldenhuis pointed a finger at the witch doctor. “What did you think would happen after the stunt you pulled at Susuwe? I don’t know what’s going on with the Nigerians, but you’re becoming a liability.”
“And poisoning a carcass and killing six hundred vultures didn’t draw your own bit of attention?”
“I’m trying to get things done here, and I need to deliver four hundred tusks next week.”
The witch doctor shook his head. “Not my problem.”
“It bloody well is your problem,” Geldenhuis retorted.
“Your connection to Mr. Lin and that triad has nothing to do with me. That is your problem. Not mine. I don’t like how they operate.”
As the conversation got more heated, my breathing accelerated. I didn’t want to pick up my camera for fear of breaking another branch. I had gotten good pictures of all of them anyway.
“But you’re connected to me.”
“The triads are smart enough to respect black magic,” the witch doctor said slyly. “They won’t touch me.”
“Lin’s got me by the bollocks,” said Geldenhuis. “What am I supposed to do?”
“Try the Angolan rebels. They’re eating more elephants than they can get rid of tusks.”
“They’re too sloppy.”
“Perhaps they need better instruction.”
“Maybe what I need is a new partner.” Geldenhuis snatched out his nine millilmeter.
The witch doctor held his hands up. “Whoa. Easy, doc. This isn’t your style. Let’s talk this through.”
Geldenhuis shot twice in rapid succession and the witch doctor dropped to the ground. He nodded to the other man, who stood there in shock holding his hands in the air. “You’re my new partner,” he said coolly as he replaced his revolver in its holster.
Chapter 19
Long after Geldenhuis flew off in his airplane and the other man dragged the witch doctor’s body over to the car and, with great effort, pulled it into the backseat and drove away, I made my move. I sat shivering for some time, trying to make
sense of the past few days. I had really started to believe what Jon Baggs said about Geldenhuis—that he was a playboy, not a murderer. That he must have been set up for the murder of his former colleague Mr. Lee. Where did this come from?
Again, I couldn’t help wondering if Jon was hiding something. He was either involved somehow, or purposefully playing down the doctor’s role because he didn’t want me involved in the case. I’d have to find a way for him to allow me to take a genetic sample of the ivory evidence in his office. I’d have to get Craig to convince him to give it to us.
After picking up my camera, I steeled myself as I approached the pool of blood on the airstrip left behind by the witch doctor’s dead body. Even though I knew it would be useless, I took pictures of the black liquid, as that’s how it looked through night vision. I had DNA evidence on the brain because I wanted more than anything to take a sample of the blood as evidence. But I talked myself out of it. Even though Craig had told me that I had permission to fly over the border of Zambia, if I was questioned upon my return to Mpacha, carrying blood from a murder victim could make me look like an accessory to murder.
But even just looking at the pool of blood sent a chill down my spine. I hadn’t quite adapted to seeing a murdered person yet, must less watching someone get killed. I had discovered less than a week before that the dead body of a stranger made me feel vulnerable, as if I were suddenly in danger of being attacked. And now, even a pool of blood from a murdered body made me feel the same way.
I took the night-vision tube off the camera, mounted it back in my goggles, and put them on. I walked over to the hangar and sat down, staring out at the airstrip. A long time passed before it felt safe to leave—long enough that the half-moon was low on the horizon. The noise of an airplane taking off traveled a good distance in all directions. And after the gunshots, if anyone had been listening, they’d be listening even closer. But I couldn’t wait too long, or I’d risk someone actually wanting to investigate.
As I waited, I couldn’t help thinking about my dad again. Feeling guilty about how he’d feel if he knew what I had gotten myself into with this job, I suddenly wanted to hear his voice. When I had last visited before leaving for Kruger, I could tell he was proud but also nervous. He held my hands out and squeezed them while he took me in. “Your mom would’ve been so proud. You know that, don’t you?”
I smiled and nodded.
“You’re gonna pack heat, right?” he whispered out of earshot of Kelly, knowing that the talk of firearms with his daughter would upset her.
“Dad, I’ll be fine. I’ll work something out when I get there.”
“You wanna borrow my forty-five?”
“It’s too big.”
“Not over there, it won’t be.”
Dad prided himself in taking me with him on his pheasant hunting trips when I was too young, according to Mom. I think she thought he was somehow living out his failed fantasy of becoming a professional hunter after Vietnam. Taking shrapnel in the face while trying to save a friend and losing most of his vision in his left eye did away with that dream. But after Mom died, he bought me a Remington .30-06 bolt-action rifle for my sixteenth birthday and took me on a weeklong elk hunting trip on horseback in Montana, just north of Yellowstone.
When I complained about the weight of the rifle, he said I needed a bit more than a .270 in grizzly country. After the trip was over, I started lifting weights to build my upper-body strength so I could handle bigger calibers but never got back to them. Then I started working at Yellowstone in the summers, and my life seemed to unfold in the wilderness from there, like one might have expected, having grown up in Wyoming.
But if Dad had known what I was doing here, he’d have caught the next flight over and tried to take me home. He understood why I hadn’t wanted to leave Africa after Sean died. He figured I’d get my footing back with a policy stint in Namibia and then I’d get tired of it and come home. He was already circling ads for park service positions in California, hoping to find me something in Yosemite. Having spent some time there during grad school at Berkeley, I could see it—eventually—maybe. I owed him a call, or at least a postcard.
With my nerves further jangled by the persistent scratching noise of a clawed critter walking on the metal roof above me, I finally mustered the adrenaline to move the airplane. I struggled to wheel the nose of the Cessna out of the hangar. I had to rock it a few times to get it to roll enough so that I could get the momentum to pull it out.
I got in and started up the plane. I drove onto the bumpy strip and pushed in the throttle to accelerate. Pulling up on the yoke, I flew into the night, eager to put as much distance between myself and the witch doctor’s blood as possible.
Chapter 20
After a fitful night, I got up in my barracks in Susuwe and headed straight for Katima. When I walked into the ministry building the next morning, I could hear Gidean’s voice coming from Jon’s office with the door partially ajar. “She’s okay, you know. I think she has a place here, despite Eli’s doubts.”
Since Draadie wasn’t in, I stood in the reception area and decided not to announce myself. Even though I knew someone would see me soon enough, at least I was out in the open and it didn’t look like I was eavesdropping. I was simply waiting for my turn to meet with Jon, and, if they indeed were talking about me, which I strongly suspected they were, it gave me a chance to hear it firsthand—fully expecting Jon to tear me apart.
I needed time to collect my thoughts anyway. This meeting had to go well. I had to turn things around with Jon and I didn’t want the photos that I took of Geldenhuis to upset him, knowing how sensitive he was about me stepping out of the role he had defined for me. Craig had told me to tell Jon that the photos had come from the WIA office in Johannesburg. He was nervous, though. And upset with me.
Apparently, even though I had had clearance to fly in and out of Zambia, there was no talk of a night flight. I was supposed to call—not text—for approval for any night missions. Craig didn’t tell me this because he didn’t anticipate that I would fly at night without telling him. Now he was nervous of what else I might do that was beyond my detail. I was hoping that nothing mattered outside of the pictures that I took, connecting two very prominent figures in the region to ivory smuggling.
Jon growled. “A place?” I could hear him jumping out of his seat. “What kind of place? Bloody hell, Gidean! Can’t you spot an American bloody do-gooder? The women are the worst!”
“She can handle a firearm,” he offered.
“A firearm! Jislaaik, any bloody teen around here can handle a firearm. What did she tell you?”
“She asked me to take her to the shooting range.”
“The shooting range!” Jon’s voice was dripping with sarcasm. “The bloody shooting range! Does she think she’s Annie Oakley coming to join the local outlaws?”
As much as I didn’t want to hear what Jon was going to say next, I couldn’t move.
“Exactly what does she think she’s doing with a handgun when she’s supposed to be flying our census? She probably doesn’t even have a permit!”
I made a mental note to give Jon a copy of the permit that Craig had emailed me.
Gidean’s voice wavered. “She says she wants to pull her weight with the rangers.”
“What kind of weight?” Jon barked. “I was hoping to shatter her Karen Blixen fantasy and send her packing.”
“Look, Jon, I think she is okay.”
“Yes, no doubt. I imagine she knows just how to work the local stock.” I could hear his heavy footfalls as he paced back and forth. “You see, Gidean, they all come to Africa to save Africa, like some kind of personal redemption. Save Africa! As if she could protect the rangers! I think we need to save Africa from Americans!”
I sat down and could hear him goose-stepping back and forth, just as I had seen him do in front of the office the last time I came. “A bloody gun-toting Elizabeth Taylor wannabe. Yes, yes, it is coming to me.” He marched aro
und the office, and through the crack in the door, I could see he was hanging his head with arms stiff at his sides as he goose-stepped. “The Ministry of Silly Walks, eh, Gidean? That’s what I should tell the next American brimming with goodwill that comes into this office. I’ll say, Good day, and welcome to the Ministry of Silly Walks. It will be far more productive to give your donations to us, I assure you. And a great opportunity to employ your own countrymen abroad, as it promises to be a very long study.”
Just when I couldn’t take the humiliating monologue any longer and had decided to leave, Nigel entered the reception area. I stood up, blood immediately rushing to my face. “Hello, Nigel.”
Nigel nodded. “Catherine.” He smiled warmly and shook my hand, disarming me.
He pointed to the door with a questioning look on his face.
“He’s in a meeting.” I quickly opened the well-worn conservation magazine that I had pored over previously, as if I were completely engrossed in an article about sustainably harvested water lilies. “I’m just waiting to speak to him.”
Nigel knocked on the door lightly, just as Jon was in his next phase of inspiration.
“This is how it will work….Ah, come in, Nigel, you’re one of those nongovernmental types. You can help me set up the program.”
“Program for what?” Nigel asked.
Jon hesitated. “You look like hell. That Peace Corps pigeon keeping you up at night?”
“I told you she wasn’t my type.”
“No?” Jon’s voice cracked in disappointment. “She looked like the redheaded double-breasted mattress thrasher type to me.”
“Hell, even if she was, she’d gnaw my bloody ear off.”
“Pity.” Jon continued his marching. “I am starting a new ministry. The Ministry of Silly Walks. Yes, Nigel, we will administer the silly walks, a great diversity of them, and then study their propagation patterns, their cultural idiosyncrasies, you know, how each tribe will add this twitch or that hop or click. Then we’ll send out a team to fully monitor and evaluate how the walks are holding up, how they are culturally enriched and entrenched. Eh, Nigel, what do you think?”
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