Safari

by Parnell Hall

  “I thought you wanted to see one,” Clemson said.

  “From the jeep,” Annabel said. “We wanted to see one from the jeep.”

  “Nonsense,” Clemson said. “It’s a walking safari. We could have found a lion any time. It was disappointing that we didn’t, but, hey, we got lucky. We found a lion now. Let’s see if he’s still here.”

  Without waiting for more objections, he turned and scrambled up the bank.

  We stared at him, dumbfounded.

  “Come on, come on,” he said. “This is your chance.”

  It was Keith’s chance to impress Victoria by being brave, and he scrambled up the hill behind. Others followed. I snapped the video camera on, took a shot of this happening. Not so much to delay my own ascent of the hill as to document the event. Alice started climbing. I caught a shot of her and followed.

  There we all were, in a line, just below the crest of the bank. Was the lion still there? The only way to tell was by sticking your head up. That seemed an awfully poor option. It would either be disappointing, or bring you face-to-face with a lion.

  That didn’t stop Clemson. He stuck his head up over the top of the bank and said, “He’s gone.”

  We looked then, some more hesitantly than others, as if Clemson were capable of playing a practical joke, which I wouldn’t have put past him. But it was true. The lion was gone.

  “Come on, let’s see where he went,” Clemson said. He climbed up onto the bank and looked back, surprised that no one was with him. We all looked up with somewhat bemused faces. This time no one asked him if he was crazy. We knew the answer.

  Clemson waved his hand. “Come on, come on, before he gets away.”

  Somehow a lion getting away from me is a concept I had never imagined. I mean, it’s not as if we were going to stop him. I certainly hoped we weren’t. The only way I could think of was to shoot him or let him eat Bono.

  Clemson prevailed through the strength of his personality. On the river, without guides and rangers to inhibit him, he had blossomed into Steve Irwin, Crocodile Hunter, only armed and dangerous with none of the reserve. The only reassuring thought, and there weren’t many, was if he hadn’t gotten himself killed by now, he probably wouldn’t get me killed.

  “Okay,” Clemson said. “This is just another walking safari. Single file, follow me, keep ahead of Bono bringing up the rear.”

  We set off with Clemson in the lead, Alice right behind. No surprise there. Alice always was the smartest person in the room. In case of a lion, she wanted to be right behind the man with the gun.

  The two librarians fell in next, then Victoria and Annabel. A great deal of negotiation preceded this, with Victoria suggesting it would be safer in the middle of the line than near the end. I doubt if that was what swayed Annabel. She just didn’t want to be left alone.

  Close on their heels were Keith and Jason, followed by Simon and Trish.

  I brought up the rear, just ahead of Bono.

  Clemson found the lion’s tracks, leading away from the river. We followed them until they disappeared in the thicker vegetation. Clemson pushed ahead, undeterred, through a narrow path in the brush.

  It dawned on me we might actually find the lion. I know, I know, that was the whole point. It was just that the danger of what we were doing had overshadowed the goal. But, I realized, the prospect of finding a lion was exciting as hell.

  I swung my backpack off my shoulders, dug out the video camera again. If we found it, I was going to film it.

  Optimally, I wanted to film the actual moment of us finding it. That would mean running the camera for a while, but if I could shoot forty-five minutes of my leg, I could certainly shoot a few minutes of us creeping through the underbrush. I flipped out the screen, switched the camera on.

  Since we were walking in a straight line, all I could get was Trish. When the path widened up into a little clearing, I took two steps to the right and got an angle on the group. I zoomed in on Alice and Clemson in the lead.

  Two things happened just then. Bono told me to get back in line, and Clemson began to run ahead, waving his hand, “Come on! Come on!”

  No one wanted to let the man with the rifle get away. We all ran with him.

  And there we were, clomping through the underbrush, bouncing up and down the way you do when you’re out of shape and not used to running over rugged terrain wearing a backpack.

  Having no idea what had impelled this burst of speed, I kept the camera rolling. I managed to zoom back to wide angle in case we came up on anything to see.

  After about a hundred yards I was panting and wishing it would end. It didn’t, of course. We went down a small arroyo and up the other side to the crest of a hill, which looked like a good vantage point if anyone wanted to spot a lion. Instead, Clemson led us down the other side into the bush. Whereupon he stopped, listened, looked around. Studied the ground for prints. He found some that petered out again. I know because Bono pointed them out to me as we passed. We’d been going the right way, it was just that a lion was faster than a bunch of middle-aged tourists, even when they jog.

  I wondered how far we were from the canoes. It was hard to tell, since we’d been running. We wouldn’t be running back. Even if I had to read Clemson the riot act. The only way we’d be running back was if a lion were chasing us.

  At the moment we were picking our way down the path, slowly, carefully, so as not to miss a thing. You can’t see everything because the brush is thick, and there are too many directions to watch. It’s the only way I can account for what happened.

  Because Clemson went first, of course, with everyone following him. And no one saw a thing.

  Except Trish.

  Trish stopped dead. Her face was electric. Her eyes were wide and her mouth gaped open in a terrified grin. She pointed to the side of the path in an exaggerated gesture, jabbing her finger in front of her face.

  I looked, and my mouth fell open.

  The lion was right there. In the bush. Sitting up. Looking at us. Next to the path. Not six feet away.

  I did my best Trish impression, looked to Bono.

  “Walk,” Bono said calmly.

  He didn’t have to tell me twice, though he did. Actually he told me three times. “Walk. Walk away.”

  It seemed like good advice. Bono wasn’t armed, and I’m sure he wanted to put as much distance between him and the lion as possible.

  Bono whistled and Clemson turned. Bono made there’s-a-lion signals. Clemson nodded, picked up the pace. He had been walking slowly, searching the brush. How he had missed the lion I had no idea. Now he walked right along, at the same time putting his hands out, palms down, enjoining us not run or do anything else to attract attention. He walked through the brush, turned right, headed up a hill. At the top he turned back to the right.

  I knew what he was doing. He was circling back on the lion.

  He stopped on the crest of the hill overlooking the bush where it had been, raised his binoculars, and looked.

  “Which bush?” he said.

  Trish pointed mutely. She probably didn’t trust herself to speak.

  Clemson focused in on the bush. “There he is. See him?”

  I grabbed my binoculars, couldn’t see him at all.

  “See him?” I asked Alice.

  “Yeah,” Alice said. “You can just see the mane. Oh! There he goes!”

  The lion ran off into the bush. At least that’s what they told me. I never saw a thing.

  We spent a few minutes studying the bush, to no avail. The lion was gone.

  Great.

  We finally saw a lion.

  It scared me to death.

  And I didn’t get it on film.

  34

  TRISH FACE

  IT WAS THE TALK OF lunch. Trish’s encounter with the lion. Someone would make what came to be known as the Trish face, and we would all crack up. Luckily, now that it was over, Trish found it pretty funny too.

  At first Simon, to his credit, was re
ady to leap to her defense, should the need arise. But as he realized she was taking it well, he relaxed and we all had fun.

  Lunch was on a bank overlooking the river. Not that bank. We got back in the canoes and paddled a good way downstream before docking again.

  “We want to have lunch, we don’t want to be lunch,” Clemson said, a twinkle in his eye. Clemson was in his element, having the time of his life.

  Lunch was sandwiches and soft drinks set out on a makeshift table about the size of a TV tray which Bono had brought along in our canoe. There was also sliced fruit. It was not a sumptuous repast, but it was ten times better than dinner the night before. Being on the river made all the difference in the world.

  And having just seen a lion.

  “I don’t know how I missed it,” Simon said. “I was right in front of her. I just walked by and, arrrrh!” He made a Trish face, having come to the realization that it was all right to do so.

  We all laughed, including Trish, but hers was somewhat strained. By then she must have been wondering how long people were going to tease her.

  I’d have bet on quite a while. The Trish face was amazingly addictive.

  It was time to float a trial balloon.

  “A shame Alice never got to see it,” I said.

  That killed the mood. There was an awkward silence.

  I looked over at Clemson. He seemed to approve, but he wasn’t jumping in.

  “You think she’d have made a Trish face?” Trish said. She made one, and we all laughed again, and the moment had passed.

  So. No one wanted to talk about it. I wondered if that was significant, or if the subject was just a natural downer. The latter seemed likely. My remark might have made the killer uneasy, but it was lost in the shuffle because everyone was.

  My task, finding a killer who likely wasn’t there, wasn’t going to be easy.

  At least Clemson would see that I had taken a stab at it.

  After lunch Bono walked into the brush, nothing ate him, and we were able to mark our territory.

  We got back in our canoes, headed out on the river.

  I started noticing pairs of eyes staring at me. At first I thought it was crocs. Then one yawned and I saw it was a hippo.

  Clemson gave them a wide berth, sometimes crossing the river just to keep away from them. After his bravado with the lion, his healthy respect for the hippos made an impression.

  We came to a spot where two legs of the river joined together, making it wider and faster.

  “Okay,” Clemson said. “We have to get to the other side. It’s a strong current, and we have to paddle through it. Point your canoe a little upstream because you’re going to get pushed back down. I’ll go first, show you where to aim. In case you get in trouble, Bono will be bringing up the rear. So do what I do. Paddle a little upstream until you get caught by the current, then paddle like crazy for the other shore. Try to land as close to me as possible. If you land a little downstream, that’s fine. If you go way downstream, it’s not.”

  “We wouldn’t go down there,” one of the librarians said. I’m pretty sure it was Pam.

  “You will if you get caught by the current. And you don’t want to wind up there. See all the hippos? That would be very bad news.”

  “Are they really so dangerous?” Keith said.

  “You’d be better off tangling with a crocodile.”

  “Wait a minute,” Annabel said. “You’re rowing us into a bunch of dangerous hippos?”

  “Paddling,” Victoria said. “He’s paddling us into a bunch of dangerous hippos.”

  “It’s not funny.” Annabel was getting hysterical. “First a lion almost eats us, then this. The boy’s dead, and Alice is dead, and who’s next?”

  “Annabel,” Clemson said sharply. “Look at me.”

  She did. It was amazing the way he could pull focus.

  “Was Daniel killed by an animal? No. Was Alice killed by an animal? No. No one was killed by an animal, and no one’s going to be killed by an animal while I’m in charge. Even if I have to shoot every hippo in the river. Victoria, you paddle right behind me. If you go off course, I’ve got you.”

  “I’ll be right behind you,” Keith said. “Nothing to worry about.”

  The librarians nodded at each other. Neither looked particularly worried.

  “What about me?” Trish said.

  I could understand her concern. Her canoe had been off course all day.

  “Bono will be right behind you,” Clemson said. “There’s nothing to worry about. When you hit the current, you paddle like crazy on the right side of the canoe. Okay, here we go.”

  Before anyone else could protest, he and Alice set off across the river.

  We all followed with varying degrees of trepidation.

  Halfway across, the current hit us. Victoria didn’t do badly, and Keith and the librarians had no problems, but Trish and Simon immediately began losing ground.

  Bono was right alongside, shouting encouragement. “Paddle! Paddle! Paddle! Don’t paddle! Paddle! Paddle! Paddle!”

  Paddle, paddle, paddle was for Trish and Simon, who, for the first time all day, were having trouble aiming their canoe at the bank. Don’t paddle was for me, the nonessential personnel.

  We reached the shore without incident. Simon and Trish were about thirty or forty yards downstream, still way shy of the hippos.

  Under Clemson’s guidance, we skirted the hippos and continued downstream. It was idyllic, if uneventful. Which shows how quickly one can get jaded. It was not as if we weren’t seeing animals. There were hippos galore, none close enough to be threatening. They glided beneath the surface like submarines, just the twin periscopes of their eyes betraying their presence. Some watched us as we went by. None made a move in our direction.

  And there were crocodiles, either sleeping or elaborately unimpressed by our presence. I wasn’t fooled. I had no doubt if I hopped out of the canoe and began thrashing my legs, they’d be on me in a second.

  There were elephants and an occasional zebra, even a water buffalo or two. Nothing to write home about. By now we were big game hunters, armed only with cameras but ready to take on even the wildest of beasts.

  As we drifted down the river, my mind went back over the events of the day, trying to see if there was anything that would shed some light, however dim, on my appointed task. Nothing jumped out at me. Like Trish’s lion. Which hadn’t jumped out at her, just sat there in the bush, minding its own business, watching all the tourists go by, and inspiring the immortal Trish face.

  I realized that Trish was one of the few people who’d alluded to the murders at all. And that was only because I’d brought it up, mentioned Alice. And no one said anything. There was just a silence. And Trish finally said I wonder if she would have made a Trish face. Skillfully diverting the conversation by dismissing it with a joke.

  Was it significant that she had? She was tired of jokes about the Trish face, that was apparent. And here she was making one. Inviting ridicule again. Why would she have done that? Did she have something to hide?

  Aside from her, the only one to mention the murders was Annabel. And she’d brought it up herself. Daniel had been killed, and Alice had been killed, and who was next? She’d dragged that remark in from left field just because she was scared about paddling through the current. That had to make her innocent, right? Or why would she have brought it up?

  Unless it was an elaborate double-bluff. Which she didn’t appear capable of. But then who knew what she was capable of? She was a jealous, fearful, and possessive woman, always on the lookout for any threat to her sister, and not just of bodily harm.

  Daniel was a handsome young stud. If he were making a play for Victoria, Annabel might have felt impelled to protect her virtue. And what if Alice had gotten an inkling? She’d been questioning the staff. Suppose they’d told her about Daniel’s success with women. Tourist women in particular. It might have been enough to send Alice to Victoria. And Victoria, suspecting no
thing, could have cast blame on her sister. Alice could have confronted Annabel with the truth, and Annabel could have been forced to act.

  Or—

  What if Victoria hadn’t taken kindly to Daniel’s advances? In the same way she’d been rebuffing Keith. And what if Daniel was persistent? Victoria had sneaked off to meet Daniel in his camp, just to give her sister a hard time. She’d rebuffed his advances, and he wouldn’t take no for an answer. And she had to fight him off. And happened to pick up a stick.

  And what if Alice had suspected? And questioned Annabel. Not for confirmation of Annabel’s guilt, but to confirm her suspicions about Victoria. Annabel could have sprung into action to protect her sister.

  That would mean two separate murderers, unforgivable in a mystery novel, possible in real life.

  I drifted down the river, not paddling, lost in idle speculation.

  35

  RIVER CAMP

  AROUND FOUR-THIRTY WE ARRIVED at bush camp. It differed from our previous bush camp by being semi-permanent. Our Zambian bush camp was totally mobile. Had we stayed there longer and not done the canoe trip, we’d have taken hikes into the bush and the camp would have come with us. While we were hiking, the staff would have broken everything down, driven to the next site, pitched the tents, and dug a straight-drop toilet.

  The Zimbabwean bush camp had permanent tents with individual toilets.

  I was delighted to have my own toilet, until I tried it. It did not flush. On inspection, there seemed little likelihood of that ever happening. The hose supposedly bringing water up to the flushable tank above was so badly crushed and twisted, it was a wonder it was still connected. The chance of water flowing through was negligible. So the only way to flush the toilet was to scoop water out of one of our two sinks, canvas pouches on wooden frames which the staff filled with water for us to wash up in. That was in theory. In practice, one canvas pouch was ripped so all the water ran out. That left one sink-full of water to either wash your hands in or pour down the toilet to flush it.

  I missed the straight-drop toilet.

  I missed other things too. The tents were exactly like the ones in bush camp. Except, since they were never moved, they were never maintained. There were holes in the canvas, most of the ties were gone so it was impossible to keep the side flaps up, and the zipper on the netting was stuck open so mosquitoes were likely to get in and give me malaria no matter how much Malarone I took.