Safari

by Parnell Hall

  SAFARI

  PARNELL HALL

  PEGASUS CRIME

  NEW YORK LONDON

  For Jim and Franny

  SAFARI

  1

  PACKING

  “I DON’T WANT TO GO.”

  Uh oh.

  That didn’t compute.

  Alice had been over the moon ever since a small inheritance from a great-uncle so obscure I wasn’t sure who she was talking about—plus scrimping on a few non-essentials such as food and rent—had allowed us to fulfill her lifelong dream and book a cut-rate safari in Africa.

  Since then she had been haunting Campmor, REI, EMS, Orvis, and countless other retailers I had never heard of before, and safari outfits, hats, boots, binoculars, sunscreen, insect repellent, and polyester underwear that dried so fast you could barely get them wet long enough to wash had been spread out in an ever-increasing array on the living room floor. Countless itineraries, checklists and maps poured from the computer. Flights had been booked, passports updated, and visas obtained.

  Alice had talked about nothing else for months. So if Alice didn’t want to go, something was terribly wrong.

  There had to be an if.

  “I don’t want to go if you’re not going to take it seriously.”

  Aha! So that was the problem. My lack of gravity. I wondered in what aspect of the journey I had failed in that department. From experience, I knew inquiring would not be wise. That would mean I had not taken the trip seriously enough to realize what she was talking about.

  I had to be careful. I didn’t want to say the wrong thing. “What do you want me to do?”

  That was the wrong thing.

  “I don’t want you to do anything. You’re the one who should want to do something.”

  I restrained myself from saying, “What should I want to do?” That would have thrown down the gauntlet and challenged Alice to a no-holds-barred dogfight where a win for me would be surviving with my marriage intact. “I want to go. I’m looking forward to it.”

  “Did you read the itinerary I printed out?”

  “Of course I did.”

  “What do you think?”

  “I think it looks good.”

  “Specifically.”

  “Ah—”

  “What about bush camp?”

  “Bush camp sounds good.”

  “You know what we do there?”

  “We camp in the bush.”

  “If you’re not going to take this seriously-”

  “No, no. Wait a minute. That’s where we go on game hikes.”

  “Uh huh. And what do we look for on a game hike?”

  I almost said, “Game.” Some guardian angel changed it to, “Wild animals.”

  “And what wild animal would you like to see most?”

  “Tigers.”

  “Wrong continent. You might see a lion or a leopard.”

  “Great.”

  “How about the checklist I gave you?”

  “I have it.”

  “Have you started packing?”

  “Alice, we’re not leaving until next month.”

  “We’re leaving on the fourth. Have you gone over the checklist?”

  “Of course.”

  “What have you checked off?”

  “I haven’t checked anything off. I just went over it to see what I need.”

  “What do you need?”

  “Ah—”

  “Stanley.”

  “I have a safari outfit.”

  “Actually, you have two. So you can change when one needs to be washed.”

  “Of course.”

  “Did you try on the harness?”

  “Harness?”

  I was not doing well. But with questions flying this fast I would be lucky to guess my name.

  “For your binoculars. You need to practice putting it on.”

  I always thought binoculars hung from your neck, but that, Alice assured me, let them flop around and get in your way. She had found a harness that went on like a vest. The binoculars clipped into it. The harness kept them hanging securely above the waist, and still allowed them to be raised freely to your eyes.

  “I can put on the harness,” I said. I hoped I could. I was bluffing.

  “I’ll believe it when I see it. Do you know how to use the headlight?”

  I stopped myself from saying, “Headlight?” I knew this one. The headlight was a tiny flashlight on a band you wore on your forehead to get around bush camp in the dark. “Yes, I do.”

  I expected her to make me prove it, but since I could, she didn’t.

  “You need to check off everything on your list, lay out anything else you want to take, pack your duffle, and weigh it. Some of our interior flights are on very small planes. Your duffle can’t weigh more than fifteen kilos. Your carry-on can’t weigh more than seven.”

  “What are we using for carry-ons?”

  Alice looked pained. “Our backpacks, Stanley. We’ve been over this.”

  “Right, right. I’ll get on it.”

  “Don’t get on it, just do it. You need to pack now so you can see if there’s anything else you need.” Alice shook her head. “Seriously, Stanley. It’s hard to cope with your lack of enthusiasm. Are you sure you want to go?”

  “Are you kidding? I can’t wait.”

  Then we could stop packing.

  2

  BUSINESS CLASS

  SOME DAYS YOU GET LUCKY.

  Our flight was overbooked and they didn’t have a seat for us. You probably don’t think that’s good news, but you’re not married to Alice. My wife is not one to suffer long in silence. Her record can be measured in milliseconds. Alice had booked the seats. She had booked them correctly, and she had booked them well. If they were not available, heads were going to roll. Alice was either going to get satisfaction or wind up owning the airline.

  The airline caved fast. The opening bid was five hundred dollars to take a later flight. That was not five hundred dollars cash, that was a five-hundred-dollar credit off any future flight, as if there was any chance Alice would ever fly with them again if she were bumped off this one. Within minutes Alice had that offer up to a thousand, which apparently was as far as lower-level lackeys were empowered to bid, any further compensation requiring management and/or lawyers.

  It never got that far. Alice was pulled aside and told quietly, out of earshot of the other passengers, several of whom were also being bumped, that the problem had been solved. Alice and I were upgraded to business class.

  Welcome to paradise.

  I’d never flown business class before. I’d seen it sometimes, on those planes you entered and walked through business class to get to coach. And I had peeked through the curtains during the flight and seen the privileged few being served food and drink far superior to the slop being foisted on the unwashed masses. But that’s the least of it.

  There’s the lounge. Before you even get on the plane, you are treated to the business-class lounge. I’d never been in one before, but I’d fantasized about them, much in the way schoolboys fantasize about the girls’ bathrooms, imagining all kinds of wonders and delights denied the so-called stronger sex. (Or is that just me? If so, of course not, I never did that.) Only in this case it’s true. The business-class lounge was all I’d ever dreamed of, and more.

  I had envisioned a coffee pot, a soda dispenser, perhaps some beer and bar nuts. Not quite. The dining wing featured a full-service buffet currently serving brunch, ranging from crepes to omelets to all varieties of muffins, scones, croissants, three kinds of bacon, two kinds of sausage, Nova Scotia lox, bagels, blueberry pancakes, strawberry waffles, and thick-cut French toast.

  Alice left me to check out the food while she commandeered a nook of mini-couches where she could connect her iP
ad to the free Wi-Fi service. So I was standing there gawking at the opulent, far-too-rich-and-calorie-laden-to-meet-Alice’s-approval buffet when a goddess caught my eye.

  It was a young girl—and here I’m at a loss, for at my advancing age I can’t really distinguish sixteen years old from thirty—but a fresh-faced girl in some tank-toppy thing or other, and a pair of faded jeans. She was toting a plate of French toast and surveying the omelets as if she could eat a dozen or so and look none the worse for wear. She leaned over, perhaps to compare the cheese omelet to the egg-white one, and I tried not to stare. It’s hard at my age. Actually, it’s hard at any age, but it’s gotten worse lately. Not that I could see anything. We’re not talking nipples here. All I could see was cleavage, but that’s all you get nowadays. Fifteen years ago women didn’t wear bras. And when they did, they’d pretend they didn’t. They’d hide them away. They’d tuck the straps carefully under the shirt as if the sight of a bra was embarrassing. Now they wear them as a fashion statement. I don’t get it.

  I knew I shouldn’t look, but I’m a bad person, a dirty old man. The problem is I see myself as a teenager. I have to punch myself in the head and remember how old I am. I did, and moved away from temptation. By that, I mean the fattening food. The young lady was not temptation, just a flight of fancy.

  I escaped to the relative safety of the coffee machine. I say relative safety because in the valley of the new and different, the clueless man is not king. The coffee machine had no controls whatsoever, just a picture of a cup of coffee nestled among fluffy clouds which could have passed for cappuccino foam. I would have liked cappuccino foam, but below the picture was merely an opening with a wire bottom typical for the setting of a coffee cup with spigots up top to dispense coffee. But there were no buttons to activate the spigots. I wondered what did. Prayer?

  As I stood blinking at the machine in helpless confusion, I felt someone standing behind me. I turned around and there she was. Omelet girl. Little Miss Let-me-lean-over-and-let-you-get-a-better-look. I flushed with embarrassment, realized I looked embarrassed, and blushed some more.

  She smiled. “Can’t figure it out?”

  Figure what out? How old she was? How old I was? How to get her to bend over again? I grinned like a goofy dope.

  She pointed. “The coffee machine. You can’t figure out how to work it.”

  I smiled. “Got me. There’s no button to press.”

  “Touch the screen.”

  I touched the cup of coffee and the picture immediately became a menu.

  “See?” she said. “The whole thing’s a giant iPad.”

  “Of course,” I said. “That’s why I don’t think of it. I’m too old for an iPad. It’s not a mePad. It’s a youPad.”

  She giggled. “You’re funny.”

  I wanted to die. I didn’t want to be funny. Not to a girl like that. To a girl like that, funny was a pejorative to a guy like me. Funny was what you called your old uncle Wally, the one who never married.

  At that moment, the girl of my dreams was pushed aside by a she-dragon, an older malevolent version of the woman in question, obviously the mother. “What did I tell you?” she said meaningfully to her daughter, glaring at me with one eye.

  I knew what she told her, and it had something to do with talking to strange men. I turned back to the coffee machine, touched the screen for a cappuccino. Realized I hadn’t taken a cup. I grabbed one off the counter, slid it under the flow of coffee and steamed milk, barely missing any and hardly burning my hand. I took the filled cup and beat a hasty retreat back to the couches.

  Alice was reading the New York Times on her iPad. There was a free copy of the New York Times right on our table, but I’m not one to argue with Alice.

  “Pretty good cappuccino,” I said.

  Alice looked up. “It took you ten minutes to get coffee?”

  “It’s a confusing coffee machine.”

  I sat and sipped my coffee, resolved not to get into any more trouble before they called our flight.

  Business class was on another level. Literally. The lounge was upstairs from the gate, but you didn’t go back down to board the plane. You walked straight in from the lounge. Because the plane was a double-decker, and the business-class seats were on top. As I walked down the ramp, I could see the two entry ramps down below. There were two of them because there were so many more economy seats. Not that the economy deck was any bigger, but the business class seats took up more space. They were not just roomy, they were roomy as in having your own room.

  My seat was two seats wide. I was on the aisle, and the seat next to me was a window seat, only it wasn’t, it was a little built-in table, with a book rack and a Wi-Fi screen.

  I also had a TV screen mounted on the back wall of Alice’s table, about three feet in front of me. Underneath the screen was a hollowed-out space under the table where I could stretch my legs.

  Alice had the window seat, the mirror image of mine, though also facing front and a half seat ahead of me. The two seats were little cubicles. Alice and I were technically sitting together, but I couldn’t see her, and she couldn’t see me. I figured that was probably okay with her.

  It worked for me too. I slapped on my headphones and immersed myself in a movie. The screen offered a zillion choices including Movies Still in Theaters, Movies Just Opening, Movies Not Yet Released, and probably some Movies Still in Principal Photography. I chose a mindless action movie of the type Alice wouldn’t be caught dead at. Alice prefers movies with no gunshots, car chases, special effects, or plot.

  About an hour later I needed to go to the restroom, so I paused the TV and padded down the aisle.

  The restrooms were in the back on the plane. So, I discovered, was the business-class bar. Drinks were free, so if you wanted you could hang out in the bar and get spectacularly stewed. I don’t drink, but a Diet Coke seemed tempting. One of the restrooms was vacant, so I used it first.

  When I emerged, Lolita was at the bar. Her back was to me, but it had to be her. No, it wasn’t that I recognized her derriere, though it certainly looked good in those faded jeans. Not that I was looking.

  I hesitated for a moment. Prudence said go back to your seat and watch the movie. But I wanted that Diet Coke. And it wasn’t like I’d hit on her, despite what her mother might think.

  I bellied up to the bar just as she got her drink. It looked alcoholic. I wondered if she was old enough to drink, or if in business class they just didn’t care.

  The bartender was an attractive woman, young but not jailbait. She smiled, said, “What can I get you?”

  “A Diet Coke.”

  The girl looked at me. “You’re drinking soda?”

  “They have very good Diet Coke on these flights. I ride business class just to get it.”

  She giggled. “But it doesn’t have alcohol in it.”

  “What are you drinking?”

  “A margarita.”

  “I know. You drink it just for the salt.”

  She giggled again. “That’s right. I fly business class for the salt.”

  Uh oh. I was getting on far too well with the girl. That couldn’t be good.

  It wasn’t.

  “You been in the restroom yet?”

  “Just now.”

  “Aren’t they amazing?” She lowered her voice a little. “Wouldn’t they be great for the mile high club?”

  I smiled nervously.

  “You a member?” she said.

  “Can’t say as I am.”

  “Wanna join?”

  My heart skipped a beat. I was amazed it didn’t stop. I smiled. “Couldn’t afford the dues.”

  Behind me someone came up to the bar. I prayed it wouldn’t be Alice.

  My prayers were answered. It was the lesser of two evils.

  Mama barreled between us, turning her back toward me.

  I took the hint, picked up my Diet Coke, and went back to my seat.

  On my way out I heard Mama mutter, “There ought to be a
law.”

  It occurred to me there was.

  3

  TOILET SEATS

  WE CHANGED PLANES IN DUBAI, which was a bit of a letdown. The plane was older, smaller, and in poor repair. It also had empty seats, so we were unceremoniously bounced from business class. I didn’t mind, but Alice was offended. She’d fought hard for the upgrade and figured it should apply all the way through. No doubt a host of conciliatory SkyMiles were in the offing.

  At any rate, Alice and I suffered the ten-hour flight to Lusaka in coach. Actually, Alice suffered not at all, sleeping most of the way. I had the window seat, because Alice likes the aisle so she can get up and walk around and stretch her back and go to the bathroom without having to climb over me. She doesn’t, of course; she goes right to sleep, and I have to climb over her. When I do, no matter how careful I am not to disturb her, she always stirs slightly and says “mumph,” which freely translated means “this will be in the divorce complaint” and “guess who ain’t gettin’ nothin’ on this trip.”

  I can’t sleep on planes. I sit and watch movies, my attention span ranging anywhere from eighty percent to zero. Eighty percent is me wide awake and fully alert and missing things only by being what Alice likes to call dull and vague. Luckily, with Alice asleep there was not apt to be a quiz on the movie, so I watched with total assurance, if not total comprehension.

  (I didn’t see the girl, by the way. Not that I was looking, she wasn’t there. Clearly she and mommy had purchased business class and were still there. Driving home the point, as if it were necessary, that a girl like that was out of my class.)

  I also spent a lot of time winding my watch. I have the old fashioned windup kind—well, actually it’s self-winding—what I mean is there’s hands and numbers and you have to able to read it, a skill probably only a generation away from being extinct. Anyway, you don’t have to wind it to keep it going. You have to wind the hands to set the clock. Dubai is nine time zones ahead of New York, so I had to wind the watch ahead nine hours. The watch doesn’t wind well. The face looks at me as if to say, what the hell are you doing? The hands of time ground slowly though exceedingly fine, and I managed to set the watch nine hours ahead on the flight to Dubai.