Drowning

by Jassy Mackenzie

  The bush looked so different at night. The truck’s lights threw the trees and bushes into sharp, uncompromising relief. In the harsh bright headlights, the muted greens and golds of the veld had morphed into subdued grays, sooty blacks, and bright, blinding whites.

  Narrowing my eyes, I stared into the tangle of brush and undergrowth. Surely they would not hide near a road—but then again, in the darkness, perhaps they did not know where all the roads were. Certainly they would not be standing up. I needed to keep my eyes down, where the vegetation was thickest, looking for any signs of a human being—without being misled by a rock, or a twisted branch, or stump.

  “Take the light, Erin,” Nicholas told me, and I grasped the large spotlight before buzzing the window down and hooking it over the side of the door. I noticed that he had his rifle at the ready, its muzzle jutting out of his open window. He was driving slowly now, easing his way along the road, giving us both plenty of time to take in what lay on either side.

  Shoot first…

  As a photographer I knew the saying all too well, even though my interpretation of the phrase had involved a shutter and a lens rather than bullets and a gun.

  The spotlight was intensely bright and penetrated deep into the undergrowth, but it produced a confusion of shadows and shapes. More than once I drew breath, ready to tell Nicholas to stop, but each time whatever I was looking at resolved itself into a natural and unsuspicious form. It struck me powerfully that this issue was bigger than affairs or infidelity—this was a matter of life and death, good against evil, a hellish battle playing out in what I had perceived to be paradise.

  We traveled for another ten minutes before I saw the movement in the undergrowth.

  It was such a tiny motion, a slow downward easing of a shadow, and the only reason I noticed it was that the night was otherwise so perfectly still. I strained my eyes but could see nothing more… all the same, what could have caused it? An animal would have moved fast, bursting out of the undergrowth.

  “Nicholas,” I said in a low voice. “I saw something there, on the left.”

  “Where?” His voice was soft but urgent. He stopped the vehicle and leaned across to stare out of my window.

  “Just beyond that taller bush, the one straight ahead.” I pointed. “You can’t see it now, but there was a movement there.”

  Nicholas eased the truck backwards a few yards and then we caught our breath simultaneously as we both saw it through a clearing in the grass. An unmistakably human form, lying prostrate on the ground.

  He got onto his cell phone, I supposed because it was quieter than the crackling radio, and within seconds was speaking in a low voice to the game rangers.

  “We’ve got at least one of them here, possibly others,” he said. “Hiding out about twenty yards east of where we are on the road.” He gave the ranger the exact coordinates. “How far away are you?”

  He listened, then spoke again. “Okay. We’ll stay here and watch them. We’ll see straight away if they try to move.” He paused. “Good. In five, then.”

  “The rangers are five minutes away,” he whispered. “They’re going to walk up a parallel track, then head toward us from the western side and hopefully bracket the poachers. Just be careful, Erin. There’s a chance these guys may panic and try to shoot their way out of here. Any gunfire, and you get down, okay?”

  “Yes,” I murmured, and swallowed, my mouth suddenly dry.

  Five minutes had never passed so slowly, nor seemed to race by so fast. The poacher, or poachers, must suspect that we had spotted them because we were stopped nearby. Why were they still laying low? Were they, too, making frantic contingency plans in the same way we were? I supposed that with the powerful spotlight blinding them, they didn’t have many options but to stay where they were, cowering face down in the muddy soil.

  Suddenly, another brilliant flashlight illuminated the bush from a point beyond the poachers. Over a crackling megaphone, a loud voice demanded the criminals’ surrender.

  “Give yourselves up! Put your weapons down immediately. Hands in the air!”

  I tensed as gunfire exploded around us. In a split-second, Nicholas had shoved me down onto the seat.

  He leaned over me, protecting my body with his own as he flattened his foot on the gas pedal. The engine roared and we followed a haphazard route along the track, with the big vehicle swaying and jouncing. He must be finding it difficult to steer, I thought dazedly, since I could still feel his body over mine. Or was there another reason for his erratic driving? Surely—surely—he could not have been hit?

  As the Land Cruiser finally skidded to a stop, my heart raced with anxiety at the thought of Nicholas wounded. I was desperate to confirm he was unhurt. Was it safe to speak now? Surely it must be.

  “Nicholas?” I whispered.

  “Erin?

  “You okay?”

  “Keep down for now. I’m fine. You okay?”

  As I said, “Yes,” another deafening round of gunfire broke out. Then silence my ringing eardrums couldn’t register. Soon, it was broken by shouts, a scream and a groan, and another, louder noise I recognized—the sound of a helicopter.

  “That’s the police,” Nicholas said, straightening up. That crazy, zigzag drive had taken us a long way down the track. One of the rangers, his clothes wet and streaked with mud, stood on a flat section of the road with a flashlight, guiding the helicopter down.

  Nicholas let out a deep breath. Then he reached for me and held me tightly in his arms.

  “That was a very close call. We could easily have been hit. Thank God you’re all right. Thank God.”

  “Well, you’re the one who got us out of the way,” I stammered. I was shaking uncontrollably. I wanted to say thank God that he was unhurt.

  Slowly, Nicholas reversed toward the scene and climbed out. “Stay in the truck until I say otherwise,” he cautioned me, before striding toward the group gathered some distance away.

  A minute later, I heard him calling.

  “Erin! Could you come along and bring my first aid kit? The box in the back.”

  Oh, Jesus, we’d been lucky, but somebody was wounded.

  I scrambled out of the car and snatched the heavy box out of the back before jogging over to the group. The four poachers lay face down in the mud, their khaki outfits slathered in grime. Their hands were cuffed behind them and one ranger stood over them, his Kalashnikov pointed at the prisoners. A mud-spattered armory of confiscated weapons and tools was strewn on the ground a short distance away.

  Nicholas bent over a fifth man who lay on his back, groaning, while another ranger trained a flashlight on them. In the bright light I could see the crimson stream of blood spurting from his drenched khaki leg. The man’s face looked Asian… Surprised, I realized the injured man was one of the poachers.

  “Thanks,” Nicholas said to me. He opened up the box and snapped on a pair of surgical gloves. I crouched down beside him and passed him equipment as he asked for it.

  “He gonna die?” the ranger asked, his tone implying that he didn’t really care. For one fierce moment, I couldn’t help sympathizing with his viewpoint. After all, shots had been fired from both sides, and if the poachers’ aim had been better, it could now be one of the rangers bleeding on the ground.

  “Bullet hit his thigh,” Nicholas said to the ranger. “Quick, Erin, scissors! And the gauze.” He worked swiftly and in silence for a minute before adding, “Just missed the femoral artery, but it’s ruptured a major vein. I suspect the bone’s broken if not shattered. I’ll get the bleeding under control, but he’ll need hospital fast!”

  Carefully, Nicholas cut the man’s bloodied trouser leg away.

  “Police are here now,” the ranger observed. “They can fly him to hospital. Be nice if he survived,” he added with heavy humor. “The others told us he’s the ringleader so he’ll have all the intel.”

  The poacher stared blankly up at Nicholas, biting his lip in pain as his wounds were attended to. His fa
ce looked drawn with shock, and his eyes were shadowed. I wondered whether he would survive, and if he did, whether he would keep his leg. Either way, I was glad the rhino were safe for now. I watched, feeling dazed by the trauma of the night’s events, as the three armed policemen interviewed the rangers and took photographs of the scene.

  “Erin,” Nicholas said to me in a gentle voice once he’d finished stabilizing the injured man, “I’m going to have to fly out with the police, and accompany this patient to Hoedspruit hospital. That means I’ll only be home tomorrow. Joshua should arrive any minute. When he does, could you follow him back to the lodge in my car? He’ll stay there with you until Miriam arrives.”

  Nicholas—leaving? I felt stricken at the thought, and he must have seen my expression change because he added, “I’ll get a ride to the Nelspruit police headquarters tomorrow morning, and fly my own helicopter from there back to Leopard Rock.”

  “Ready?” one of the rangers asked.

  “Ja,” the other agreed. In a strong Afrikaans accent, he continued, “There’s a police van on the way to meet us on the other side of the floods.”

  Accompanied by two of the policemen, the handcuffed rhino poachers were escorted the way they had come, in convoy with the rangers. Nicholas and the third policeman strapped the injured man to a makeshift stretcher and lifted him into the helicopter. And then, just as the lights of Joshua’s vehicle appeared over the hill, Nicholas approached me. He looked exhausted, and his gloves and sleeves were spattered with blood to the elbow. Leaning forward, he kissed me gently.

  I felt tears stinging my eyes. Nicholas must never guess the truth of my feelings for him. It was going to be hard enough saying goodbye to this man—but dealing with his compassion would be unbearable.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said. “Please, Erin…”

  He didn’t finish what he was saying. Instead, with a shake of his head, he climbed quickly into the helicopter. A minute later, they were airborne and out of sight.

  I got into the driver’s seat of the Land Cruiser. The seat was too far back and I had to adjust it forward to reach the pedals. Then, following Joshua, I drove slowly back down the hill toward the estate, noticing that the first faint light of the rising sun was brightening the horizon.

  This would be the first day I would spend without Nicholas at Leopard Rock, and I could not help wondering, with a twinge of anxiety, what it would bring.

  CHAPTER 19

  Joshua drove the whole way back behind me and despite my reassurances that I would be fine, he waited at the lodge until Miriam and the other staff arrived. Despite his presence, I was aware of how silent the place was, how loud my footsteps sounded on the shiny tiled floor.

  I did not go into Nicholas’s bedroom. I felt strangely reluctant to do so—as if I had no right to walk in there on my own, to see the bed with its sheets still crumpled from the hours we had spent together.

  Instead, I went back to my room and turned on my phone. As I waited for it to power up and find a signal, my resolve crystallized.

  I was going to accept Vince’s proposal for the trial separation. Given the cracks our relationship had shown over the past few days, I felt my husband had a valid point. We both needed a chance to think things through—although how spending more time apart was going to help our marriage, I wasn’t sure. Perhaps counseling was the answer. We needed to develop better coping structures for communicating, to avoid the inevitable arguments. Getting Vince to agree to counseling might be tricky, though, because I knew he would consider it a sign of failure.

  Suddenly and fervently, I wished that the damned bridge had never been washed away. That, instead, I’d ended up at the hotel with Vince that afternoon, where I could have apologized and we would have been able to make up. We would never have gone through the issues, the bitterness, that had been caused by our enforced separation. I would never have been tempted by Nicholas. I would never have betrayed my husband.

  I took a deep breath but my chest suddenly felt tight. My hands were cold. I sank down onto the chair, feeling physically crushed by the weight of my guilt.

  This was it—the moment I had been expecting and dreading. With Nicholas gone, I had no defense against the onslaught of emotion that battered me.

  Feeling nauseous, I rested my head on my folded arms, tears squeezing their way from out of my tightly shut eyes. I stayed like that for a few minutes, paralyzed by the intensity of my regret.

  I’d only just started to struggle for coherence, to try and plan what on earth my next step should be, when my thoughts were interrupted by the loud ringing of my borrowed phone.

  A sense of doom settled on me as I saw Vince’s number on the line. I didn’t want to answer, but I forced myself to press the connect button and take the call.

  “Hey, hon,” I said, realizing how tired my voice sounded.

  “Hey, hon.”

  My eyes widened as I heard the gentleness in his words.

  “How’re you doing?” he continued.

  “I… I’m fine. You’re calling early. Is everything okay?”

  “I’m not okay,” he said. “I’m missing you, baby. I just wanted to tell you.”

  I let out a long breath. He hadn’t mentioned the trial separation, nor made any accusations. This was the old Vince back again—the man I knew, the man I loved. The sharpness was gone from his voice; the edge of anxiety and distrust was no longer there. This was the man who had put his arms around me the first time he’d invited me back to his apartment, nuzzling my neck as we stared out of the window together at the shimmering Manhattan skyline. This was the man who had patiently spent an entire day shopping with me and who had paid for a new wardrobe at Bergdorf, Goodman, Bendel’s, and Chanel, one that would improve my image and reflect my beauty, he had said. This was the man who liked to make love in front of a mirror—so he could watch us both from every angle.

  This was the man who had enslaved me, captivated me, swept me off my feet. Who had proposed to me. Asked me—invited me—implored me to spend my life with him. My life… not six salacious days of love-shack.

  Now the tears were streaming down my cheeks. I needed to get back to Vince, and do so now, while everything was good between us, before it could all go wrong again.

  “I’m missing you, too,” I said. “Vince, the bridge has been partway rebuilt. It isn’t totally safe yet, but I can wade the part that’s not sandbagged, I think. I’m going to walk down there now. Please meet me. Can you find your way? You should remember the road, right?”

  “Baby, are you sure?” Vince asked. “I don’t want you putting yourself in danger for me.”

  “I’m sure. I can’t wait any longer.”

  “If you can’t wait, I’ll come and get you. I’ll be there in an hour and a half.”

  This was the Vince I wanted back. Upbeat and positive, not stewing in jealousy. He was going to come and get me. In an hour and a half, I could have my life back. I could be taking the first step to be free of this debilitating guilt that was made all the more intense knowing that on this side, my bridges were already burned. Even if Vince had refused to see me ever again, staying with Nicholas would not be an option. Telling Nicholas how I felt about him would never be possible. Falling in love with Nicholas would be a huge, heartbreaking mistake and the thought of it happening was making me feel very afraid. Compared to this, my shaky marriage seemed like a refuge.

  “I’ll be there, Vince,” I said.

  I dressed quickly in my own clothes, the ones I’d been wearing when I had drowned. I needed shoes, though, so I took the pair of too-big sandals. I left behind me the computer and, after some thought, the cell phone too.

  I paused for a long moment deciding what I should say to Nicholas. In the end I wrote a brief note in the book he’d provided for me.

  Hi Nicholas. I’m going back over the bridge this morning. Thank you for saving my life, and I will never forget your generous hospitality.

  I wanted to add something pe
rsonal, to tell him what this time had really meant to me, but I did not know what to write. Staring down at the paper, I was swamped with depression, as if by leaving Leopard Rock, I would be leaving an essential part of my life—of myself—behind me. But I wasn’t, of course. I was going back to what was important, and I was leaving behind me nothing more than a short week which Nicholas, and I hoped I, would swiftly forget.

  Anyway, better not to dwell on that now. Not when I needed to get going. I didn’t want to go back into Nicholas’s bedroom. I could not.

  I left the book on the desk in my bedroom and hurried down the passage and out of the front door before making my way at a slow jog, in the early morning light, down the paved driveway. As I pushed the main gate of the estate closed behind me and set off on the long walk down to the river, I tried to focus on what lay ahead, and did my best to endure the welling pain of knowing I was turning my back on Nicholas forever.

  The steel girders that had been laid across the river banks had seemed more solid yesterday than they did now. There were only two of them, each only a few inches wide and placed a foot apart. They looked flimsy against the vast expanse of rapids and they seemed only just to reach the sandbagged portion of the far bank. A few yards below, the river looked shallower now, but was still flowing fiercely. I noted with a twist of my stomach that some of the sandbags below the girders had been washed away. Hopefully, the upper ones would hold.

  I took a deep breath. Changing my mind now was impossible. This had to be done. I slipped and slid my way down the sandbags and managed to bash my toe against the edge of the girder. Cursing softly, I rubbed it before wedging my feet against the slick surface of the bags and staring down at the metal, covered in condensation and, up close, looking even more treacherous. I slipped my sandals off, hoping I would have better grip with bare feet.

  Clutching the side of the bank with my mud-streaked hand, I reached tentatively forward with my right foot and placed it on the steel support.

  Yup—it was as slippery as I’d feared, and my bare feet offered frighteningly little traction. Even with one foot on each of the girders, I was not able to shuffle my way along. The risk of falling in the river was too great.