Safari

by Parnell Hall

  I stayed behind when Alice left on game hike, and I spent the afternoon making use of the straight-drop toilet. I liked the straight-drop toilet. For one thing, it had a seat. For another, it didn’t flush. I am suspicious of primitive toilets that flush. I always have a feeling they won’t, leaving me with the prospect of taking off the back and trying to jiggle the toggle, if it’s that type of toilet, or carrying buckets of water from the sink and pouring it in, never possible, or sneaking away and hoping someone else gets blamed for it.

  The straight-drop toilet wasn’t designed to flush. It was a hole in the ground, dug down about four feet, which, added to the height of the toilet itself, made for fairly decent straight drop down to the bottom.

  Next to the toilet was a barrel of sand and a shovel. What you had to do was lift the toilet seat, take a shovelful of sand, and drop it down the hole and cover the bottom with a fresh layer of sand. The straight-drop toilet was a giant kitty litter box for people.

  The walking safari wasn’t home by dark. I knew they’d have to be soon, because it was dangerous. Granted, they had a jeep within hailing distance in case anyone got too tired and had to be picked up. But the group was supposed to walk back to camp.

  I stayed in bed, continued taking my temperature, told myself for the hundredth time I didn’t have malaria, just a side effect from the pills. There was a battery-powered lantern in the tent, but I saw no reason to turn it on until I had to get up. I lay in the dark, waiting for the hikers to return or my next attack of Malarone’s revenge to kick in.

  A light in another tent clicked on.

  That was a surprise. I didn’t know anyone else was in camp.

  It was Lolita. She must have been sleeping. She had just reached up and switched on her lantern. The side flaps of her tent were up, and with the light on I could see her plain as day through the filmy mosquito netting. She was sitting up and stretching like a cat. She reached down, rummaged through her duffle, and pulled out a sweater.

  It must have gotten cold when the sun went down. I hadn’t really noticed. Did that mean I had fever? I was wearing a long-sleeved safari shirt. She was wearing a short-sleeved one. So she’d notice it more. Even so, maybe I should take my temperature again.

  She unbuttoned her shirt and took it off. Which caught me flatfooted. I thought she was just going to pull on her sweater. She unsnapped her bra and took it off too.

  My god! A bare-breasted Lolita! My most fervent hope and deepest dread! And in the feverish flash of a malaria high, I was instantly transformed into the stereotypical dirty old man, famed in song and story.

  You know the last thing in the world I wanted at that moment? Neither did I, until it happened.

  Alice poked her head into the tent and said, “Guess what I saw!”

  10

  LEOPARD

  NO, ALICE HADN’T SEEN ME goggling gooney-eyed at the bare breasts of my teenage dream.

  Alice had seen a leopard.

  It was a young leopard, and it was up a tree with its kill. They’d startled it, and it had dropped the impala, jumped down, and scurried off into the bushes with it. Alice was concerned, because that would leave it vulnerable to lions. I’d have been more concerned if there were any.

  The leopard, according to John, was too young to have killed the impala himself. Mommy had done it and left it with him in the tree. She was nowhere in sight, and now there was a young leopard at large with no one to protect him.

  Alice was so caught up in her leopard story, it was a while before she asked me how I felt. That was just as well. It gave me time to recover from nearly being exposed as a peeping tom.

  “I feel better,” I said. “But I think I’m forming a bond with the straight-drop toilet.”

  “Did you take Pepto-Bismol?”

  “I was going to take Imodium, but I couldn’t find it.”

  “Moron. Then you can’t go to the bathroom.”

  “Isn’t that the point?”

  “No. You just want to be normal, not constipated.”

  “How can I be normal if I’ve got malaria?”

  “You haven’t got malaria.”

  “I’ve got diarrhea. Isn’t that a symptom of malaria?”

  “That’s a side effect of Malarone. Symptoms of malaria don’t show up until a week after you’re bitten.”

  “Maybe I got bitten in New York.”

  “Don’t be dumb.”

  Alice flopped the backpack down on the bed, pulled out the camera. “Wanna see my pictures?”

  “Can I wait until I feel better?”

  “Suit yourself.” Alice looked around for the lantern. “Why don’t you have the light on?”

  “I was asleep.”

  “You were sitting on the bed.”

  “I woke up.”

  Alice turned on the lantern. “And sat there in the dark?”

  “I was making a value judgment. Whether to go back to the straight-drop toilet.”

  “What did you decide?”

  “I’m still on the fence.”

  “Not a good place for a person with diarrhea.”

  Alice got out her cable and plugged the camera into the iPad. Pictures began loading. I couldn’t see, from where I was, but she seemed satisfied.

  “I was talking to one of the women.”

  “Oh?”

  “The sisters who are traveling together.”

  “They’re sisters?”

  “Yes. Couldn’t you tell?”

  No, I couldn’t. For my money, they looked like refugees from a biker bar.

  “Anyway, I was talking to the older one.”

  “Did she tell you she’s older?”

  “No.”

  “But you could tell?”

  “Can’t you?”

  “Alice.”

  “She’s having a hard time.”

  “With what?”

  “With her sister.”

  “Why?”

  Alice shook her head. “She made me promise not to tell.”

  “I’m your husband.”

  “I know you’re my husband.”

  “Did she really expect you not to tell me?”

  “She doesn’t know us.”

  “So?”

  “Lots of wives don’t tell their husbands things.”

  “I’m glad to hear it.”

  “Stanley.”

  I took a breath. “Alice, I have a fever. I’ve been lying in my tent all day while you’ve been chasing leopards. Frankly, my head is coming off. You brought it up. Why’d you even mention it if you weren’t going to tell me?”

  “She’s a nymphomaniac.”

  “What?”

  “She has to watch her all the time to keep her away from men.”

  “That woman is a nymphomaniac?”

  “You don’t even know which one I’m talking about.”

  “What difference does it make? I can’t believe either one of them’s a nymphomaniac.”

  “You’re very naïve. Anyway, if she starts flirting with you, it’s not your irresistible charm.”

  I smiled. “Ah. Of course. So that’s why you brought it up.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “So you could get in that devastating zinger. Tell me, did you think that up on the walk?”

  “No, that’s the type of thing you do. Rehearse real life, write your lines.”

  “I’m glad we had this little talk.”

  “And you don’t have a fever.”

  “What?”

  “You said your head was coming off because you had a fever. You don’t. You’re cool as a cucumber.”

  “You haven’t even checked.”

  Alice reached for her duffle.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Getting the digital thermometer.”

  “I’ve got it right here.”

  “So you took your temperature.”

  “Yes.”

  “And?”

  “It was ninety-nine.”

  “Almos
t half a degree! Oh, my god! Hang in there, I’ll call nine-one-one!”

  “It may have gone up.”

  “I hope not. We don’t have a defibrillator.”

  “You’re in rare form today.”

  Alice picked up her iPad.

  “And you’re lookin’ awful good.”

  “Hey. You’re sick.”

  I grabbed Alice by the arm, tugged her toward the bed. “I’m not that sick.”

  “Stanley!”

  “I can’t help it. It was all that sexy talk about nymphomaniac biker babes.”

  “Biker babes?”

  “You know. Girls who hang out in biker bars and fight each other with broken beer bottles.”

  “You think she’s a Hells Angel?”

  “I think you’re a Hells Angel. A very attractive Hells Angel.”

  “Stanley. Stop it.”

  “How do you expect me to get better if I don’t feel better?”

  “Stanley. The light’s on.”

  “So?”

  “These are not solid walls. When the light’s on, you can see right through them.”

  “Hadn’t noticed.”

  11

  TRACKS

  “THAT’S A LION,” ALICE SAID.

  It didn’t look like a lion. It looked like dried mud. “Are you sure?”

  “Of course, I’m sure.”

  On her two-hour hike with John, Alice had become an expert on animal tracks. There was nothing I could say that was going to convince her those squiggles in the dirt weren’t the paw of a lion.

  “But’s that right next to our tent.”

  “So?”

  “You’re saying a lion was outside our tent last night?”

  “I’m not saying it. The tracks are saying it.”

  “If a lion had come by, don’t you think we would have known?”

  “You wouldn’t. You were snoring like a grumpus.”

  “Even so.”

  “If you don’t believe me, ask John.”

  Our guide was squatting over a campfire, grilling toast. The other guide was also making toast over a campfire. I wondered if that meant they were each feeding only the people in their group. That seemed silly, but didn’t make it unlikely.

  “He’s busy,” I said.

  “Not too busy to answer a question.”

  Alice stomped off toward the campfire.

  I caught up. “You’re walking away from your paw print.”

  “You think I couldn’t find it again?”

  “I couldn’t.”

  “You can barely find the tent. John?”

  John looked up from the toast he was turning. “Yes?”

  “I found a lion’s paw print.”

  “Where?”

  “Right outside our tent,” I said.

  John nodded. “Yes.”

  “Can you take a look and tell us if it’s a lion?”

  “It is a lion,” John said.

  “Outside our tent?”

  “Yes.”

  “There was a lion outside our tent last night?”

  “Lions came by.”

  “Lions!”

  “Two or three.”

  “Did you see them?”

  “I heard them. I did not get up.” He indicated the fire. “Toast?”

  Alice claimed the toast as her just reward for being right and moved on to the table where oatmeal was being ladled out. I followed in a daze, accepted my oatmeal like a good boy, and sat in one of the folding director’s chairs arranged in a semicircle around the campfire.

  Possible nymphomaniac Hells Angel number one sat down next to me.

  She was the smaller but tougher-looking of the two. Her jet black hair was swept up into a perfectly acceptable ’do for a greaser. “See the lion?” she said.

  “No. Did you?”

  “I heard something. But the flaps were down. I wasn’t about to go outside.”

  The mosquito net walls of our tent were just for daytime. At night you zipped the canvas flaps down for warmth and privacy. Alice and I had done it when it started to get cold. We had had, alas, no need for privacy.

  “What time was that?”

  “Between two and three.”

  “Really.”

  That was around the time I’d been communing with the straight-drop toilet. I nibbled a piece of toast, wondered how close I’d come to encountering a lion.

  I was hoping Alice would come and sit down, because I’d know from her demeanor whether I was dealing with the nymphomaniac Hells Angel, but she was over by the coffee urn having a spirited discussion with Clemson. I figured she was educating the noted naturalist and founder of Clemson Safaris on the finer points of tracking.

  I ate my toast, warmed myself by the fire.

  Someone plopped down in the seat next to me. I looked around expecting to see Alice, and found myself face to face with Lolita.

  I was dumbfounded. I didn’t know what to say. The only thing that sprang to mind was, You have nice tits. Thank goodness I didn’t blurt it out. A simple hi would have been appropriate, but I couldn’t even manage that.

  Lolita giggled. “You look like you saw a ghost.”

  “I’m sorry. I thought you were my wife.”

  “Oh, naughty boy! I hope she didn’t hear you.”

  I smiled, hoping the same thing.

  “See the lion?” she said.

  “No. Did you?”

  “Our tent flaps were down. You can’t see anything with the tent flaps down.”

  That was a line I wouldn’t touch for love nor money. Luckily the young man sat on the other side of Lolita and distracted her attention.

  I turned back to the potentially amorous Hells Angel, hoping either Alice or her sister would sit down next to her, but it was the other husband who pulled up a chair. He looked haggard and his eyes were bloodshot.

  “Rough night?” I said.

  “I couldn’t sleep.”

  “You heard the lion?” Hells Angel #1 said

  “I heard noises. I don’t know what they were.”

  “You didn’t hear roaring?” I said.

  “If I heard roaring, I’d know it was a lion. I just heard something moving around. It could have been someone using the john.”

  The straight-drop toilet was not my private domain, though I’d come to think of it that way when everyone else was hiking and I was in need.

  “Okay,” Clemson said, and I realized everyone had sat down. “We are going on safari. And right off the bat we’ve got something to track. There were lions in camp last night. We don’t know how fast they’re going, or how far they’ve gone. But we’re going to find out. We’ll set out from here right after breakfast. We’ll stop for midmorning tea. We’ll be back here between eleven and twelve for lunch. Yesterday we hiked in late afternoon and the sun wasn’t that hot. Today it will be. You’ll need a hat and sunscreen. Make sure you take your own water bottle. They have your names written on them in magic marker. They’ll be refilled and on that table.”

  The bottles, which hung around your shoulder on a canvas strap, hadn’t been important in the jeep, where bottles of water were readily available. After breakfast, I picked up ours from the table. Mine was simply marked Stanley. Alice’s was marked Alice H., so as not to confuse it with Alice 2.

  We set off right after breakfast. Even without the jeeps, we were two separate groups. The tour guides were responsible for no more than six hikers at a time.

  The guides were not alone. In addition to the spotter, each guide had a ranger with a rifle in the party. Despite never having been a huge NRA supporter, I was glad.

  Clemson had shuffled the groups. I gathered that was the plan, to switch around so everyone went with everyone else. Alice and I were still with John, but today the rest of our party were the married couple and the two men. Clemson and the five women went with Mowangi.

  “Okay,” Clemson said. “This is where we split up. We’ll go this way, you go that way.”

  “Hey,”
Alice said, as Clemson’s party started out. “That’s the way the lions went.”

  “Is that right?” I said.

  “That’s the way the tracks went,” John said. “But it does not mean the lions are there. They go where they want.”

  “But they can track them,” Alice said.

  “They follow paw prints in the dirt. Then the grass gets thick.”

  “And they can’t find the prints?” I said.

  “Yes.” John held up one finger, smiled. “We will see a lion first.”

  “Before them?”

  He nodded. “We will see one first.”

  The young man, who had seemed moody, probably at being separated from Lolita, perked right up. “Then let’s go,” he said.

  He pushed by me and I saw the name on his water bottle. Keith. Lolita’s young suitor was Keith. I didn’t like Keith.

  We set out from camp on a dirt road in the opposite direction from which Clemson had gone.

  Alice walked ahead of me, studying the ground. “Here’s some tracks,” she said.

  John stopped, turned back. “Yes, that is a lion.”

  “Can we follow them?” I said.

  “Don’t be dumb,” Alice said. “See the front toes? The lion is going that way, back to camp.”

  I swallowed my ignominy, tagged along quietly. Hoped if we did find a lion, the ranger wouldn’t have to shoot it. Or it wouldn’t eat me.

  I was wearing my hat and my sunglasses. My backpack was lighter today because Alice had opted for the lighter camera. Actually it was the same camera with a shorter lens. The long lens, Alice had discovered, was just too heavy for hiking. I could thank Malarone for that decision. If I had been on the hike the night before, I might have lugged the long lens, and Alice wouldn’t have felt the strain.

  It turned out I didn’t have to carry the lighter camera either. Alice wanted it at the ready. Having it in my backpack wouldn’t do.

  I had the movie camera in my backpack just in case. I wasn’t counting on anything, but if a lion did chow down on one of us, I didn’t want to miss it. Alice would be miffed if I did.

  We didn’t see any animals, but we sure found a lot of tracks. I learned the various characteristics of each. Not that I could have passed an exam on it, but I understood. That would not likely be enough for Alice, who had mastered lion, leopard, impala, warthog, and aardvark on the afternoon hike.