A Sparrow Falls

White again, unnatural white, a round blob of it against dark foliage and he froze staring at it. Long seconds passed before he realized that it was the raw wood of a cut log, a short fork-shaped log as thick as a young girl's waist, so freshly cut that the gum was still bleeding from it in sticky wine-coloured drops. He saw also the twist of stolen fencing wire that held the chain to the log. The log was the anchor, a sliding drag weight which would hold the trapped animal without giving it a solid pull against which to pit itself and tear itself free.

The chain clinked again.

The leopard was within twenty paces of him. He knew exactly where it was but he could not see it, and as he stared, his mind was racing, remembering everything he had heard about the animal, the old man's stories. You won't see him until he comes, and even then he will only be a yellow flash of light, like a sunbeam. He won't warn you with a grunt, not like a lion. He comes absolutely silently, and he won't chew your arm or grab you in the shoulder. He'll go for your head. He knows all about two-legged animals, he feeds mostly on baboon, so he knows where your head is. He'll take the top off your skull quicker than you open your breakfast egg, and for good measure his back legs will be busy on your belly.

You've seen a cat lie on his back and hook with his back legs when you scratch his belly. He'll cat you the same way, but he'll strip your guts out of you just like a chicken, and he'll do it so quickly that if there are four of you in the hunting-party he'll kill three of them before the fourth man gets his gun to his shoulder. Mark stood absolutely still and waited. He could not see the animal, but he could feel it, could feel its eyes, they stung his skin like the feet of poisonous crawling insects, and he remembered the shiny marble white scar tissue that Sean Courtney had shown him once in one of those mellow moments after the fourth whisky, pulling up his shirt and flexing muscle, so the cicatrice bulged with the gloss of satin. Leopard" he had said. Devil cat, the worst bastard in all the bush. He felt his feet pulling back slowly, and the dead leaves rustled. He could walk away and leave it, come back when the vultures told im the anima was dead or too weak to be a danger. Then he imagined the terror and anguish of the animal, and suddenly it was not the animal, but his animal, his charge, his sacred charge, and he stepped forward.

The chain clinked again and the leopard came. It came with a terrible silent rush, and in the blurring streaming charge, only the eyes blazed, they blazed yellow with hatred and fear and agony. The chain flailed out behind it, spinning and snapping, and as Mark brought the rifle up the last six inches to his shoulder he saw the trap hanging on its fore-leg like a sinister grey metallic crab. The heavy steel trap slowed the charge just that fraction.

Time seemed to pass with a dreamlike slowness, each microsecond falling heavily as drops of thick oil, so that he saw that the leopard's foreleg above the grip of the steel jaws was eaten through. He felt his stomach turn over as he realized that the frenzied animal had gnawed through its own bone and flesh and sinew in its desperate try for freedom. The leg was held by only a thread of bloody ragged skin, and that last thread snapped at the heavy jerk of the steeltrap.

The leopard was free, mad with pain and fear, as it launched itself at Mark's head.

The muzzle of the Marmlicher almost touched the broad flat forehead; he was so close that he could see the long white whiskers bristling from the puckered snarling lips like grass stalks stiff with the morning frost, and the yellow fangs behind wet black lips, the furry pink tongue arched across the open throat, and the eyes. The terrible hating yellow eyes.

Mark fired and the bullet clubbed the skull open, the yellow eyes blinked tightly at the jarring shock, and the head was wrenched backwards, twisted on the snakelike neck, while the lithe body lost its grace and lightness and turned heavy and shapeless in mid-air.

It fell like a sack at Mark's feet, and tiny droplets of brilliant red blood spattered the scuffed toe cap of Mark's boot, and glittered there like cut rubies.

Mark touched the open staring eye, but the fierce yellow light was fading and there was no blinking reflex of the eyelids with their long beautiful fans of dark lashes. The leopard was dead, and Mark sat down heavily in the leafmould beside the carcass and groped for his cigarette tin.

The hand that held the match shook so violently that the flame fluttered like a moth's wing. He shook out the flame, threw the match away, and then stroked his open palm across the soft thick fur, the amber gold dabbed with the distinctive rosettes of black, as though touched by the five bunched fingertips of an angel's right hand. Pungushe, you bastard! he whispered again. The animal had died for that golden dappled hide, for the few silver shillings that it would bring when sold in the village market, at a country railway halt, or on the side of a dusty road. A death in unspeakable agony and terror to make a rug, or a coat for a lady. Mark stroked the glowing fur again, and felt his own fear give way to anger for the man who had saved his life once, and who he had hunted these two months.

He stood up and went to the steel trap, lying at the end of its chain. The severed leg was still held between the relentless jaws, and Mark squatted to examine it. The trap was the type they call a Slag Yster, a killing iron, and the spikes of the jaws had been carefully filed to bite but not sever. It weighed at least thirty pounds and it would take a thick branch to lever those jaws open, and reset the mechanism.

The steel was dark and sooty where the poacher had scorched it with a torch of dry grass to kill the man-smell on the metal. Lying at the edge of the thicket was the half decomposed carcass of a baboon, the odiferous bait which had been irresistible to the big yellow cat.

Mark reloaded the Mannlicher, and his anger was so intense that he would have shot down the man who had done this thing, if he had come across him in that moment, despite the fact that he owed him his life.

He walked back up the slope and unsaddled Trojan, hobbled him with the leather straps, and hung his saddlebags in the branches of the leadwood out of the way of a questing hyena or badger.

Then he went back and picked up the poacher's spoor at the edge of the thicket. He knew it would be useless to follow on the mule. The poacher would be alerted at a mile range by that big clumsy animal, but he had a chance on foot.

The spoor was fresh and the poacher's camp would be close, he would not stray far from such a valuable asset as his steel trap. Mark had a very good chance.

He would be cagey, of course, sly and cunning, for he would know that it was now forbidden to hunt in the valley. Mark had visited each village, spoken with each tribal headman and drank his beer while he explained to him the new order.

The poacher knew that he was outside the law. Mark had followed his spoor so often, and the precautions Pungushe took, the elaborate ruses to throw any pursuit, made it clear that he was in guilt, but now Mark had a good chance at him.

The spoor crossed the river half a mile down-stream, and then started to zigzag back and forth among the scrub and forest and brush as the poacher visited his trap line.

The leopard trap was clearly the centre of his line, but he was noosing for small game, using light galvanized baling wire, probably purchased for a few shillings at a country general dealer's store. He was also using copper telegraph wire, probably obtained by blatantly scaling a telegraph pole in some lonely place.

He was trapping for jackal, baiting with offal, and he was trapping indiscriminately at salt licks and mud wallows, any place that might attract small game.

Following the trap line diligently, Mark sprang every wire noose and ripped it out. He closed rapidly with his quarry, but it was three hours before he found the poacher's camp.

Itw as under the swollen, bloated reptilian grey branches of a baobab tree. The tree was old and rotten, its huge trunk cleaved by a deep hollow, a cave that the poacher had used to shield his small smokeless cooking fire. The fire was dead now, carefully smothered with sand, but the smell of dead smoke led Mark to it. The ashes were cold.

Tucked away in the deepest recess of the hollow tree were two bundles tied with plaited bark string. One bundle held a greasy grey blanket, a carved wooden head-rest, a small black three-legged pot and a pouch of impala skin which contained two or three pounds of yellow maize and strips of dried meat. The poacher travelled light, and moved fast.

The other bundle contained fifteen jackal skins, sundried and crackling stiff, beautiful furs of silver and black and red, and two leopard skins, a big dark golden torn and a smaller half -grown female.

Mark relit the fire and threw the blanket, the head-rest and the bag upon it, deriving a thin vindictive satisfaction as they smouldered and blackened. He smashed the iron pot with a rock and then he slung the roll of dried skins on his shoulder and started back.

It was almost dark when he got back to the leopard thicket beside the river.

He dropped the heavy bundle of dried skin, which by this time felt like a hundredweight sack of coal on his shoulder and he stared uncomprehendingly at the leopard's carcass.

It swarmed with big green metallic shiny flies. They were laying their eggs on the dead flesh, like bunches of white boiled rice, but what astonished Mark was that the carcass was naked. It had been expertly stripped of its golden fur, and now it was a raw pink, laced with yellow fat and the white tracery of muscle ligaments. The head was bare, the mask stripped away so that dull startled eyes started out of the skull like marbles, and tufts of black hair sprang from the open ear holes, the fangs were exposed in a fixed yellow grin.

Quickly Mark ran to the anchor log. The chain and trap were gone.

It was fully a minute before the next logical step occurred to him. He ran up the slope to the leadwood tree.

Trojan was gone. The hobbling straps had been cut with a razor-sharp blade and laid out neatly under the leadwood tree.

Trojan, unexpectedly relieved of his hobble, had reacted gratefully in a fully predictable manner. He had set off, arrow-straight through the forest, back home to his rude stable, his nightly ration of grain, and the congenial company of his old buddy Spartan.

it was a fifteen-mile walk back to main camp, and it would be dark in fifteen minutes.

The saddle-bags had been taken down from the tree, and the contents meticulously picked over. What Pungushe had rejected, he had folded and stacked neatly on a flat rock. He clearly did not think much of William Shakespeare, his tragedies had been put aside, and he had left Mark his chamois hunting-jacket, a last minute gift from Ruth Courtney.

He had taken the gentleman's sleeping bag, which had once belonged to General Courtney, with its built-in ground sheet and genuine eider filling, twenty-five guineas worth from Harrods of London, good exchange for a threadbare greasy blanket and wooden head-rest.

He had taken the cooking pot, pannikin and cutlery, the salt and flour and bully beef, but had left a single tin of beans.

He had taken the clean shirt and khaki trousers, but had left the spare woollen socks and rubbeT-Soled boots.

Perhaps it was chance that the boots pointed downstream to Mark's camp, or was it mockery? A can of beans and boots to carry Mark home.

Through the red mists of his humiliation and mounting rage, Mark glimpsed suddenly a whimsical sense of humour at work. The man had been watching him. Mark was sure of that now, his selection from the saddle-bags echoed too faithfully what Mark had burned of his.

In his imagination, Mark heard the deep bell of Zulu laughter, and he snatched up the Mannlicher and picked up Pungushe's outgoing spoor.

He followed it for only a hundred yards and then stopped.

Pungushe was heavily laden with trap, wet skin, and booty, but he had hit the Zulu's stride Minza umhlabathi, and he was eating ground to the north at a pace which Mark knew was pointless to try and imitate.

He walked back to the leadwood tree and sank down beside the trunk. His rage turned to acute discomfort at the thought of the fifteen-mile walk home, carrying the saddle-bags, and the roll of dried skins, for honour dictated he did not abandon his meagre spoils.

Suddenly he began to laugh, a helpless, hopeless shaking of his shoulders, and he laughed until tears ran down his cheeks and his belly ached. Pungushe, I'll get even for this, he promised weakly, through his laughter.

It rained after midnight, a quick hard downpour, just enough to soak Mark and to bow the grass with clinging drops.

Then a small chill wind came nagging like an old wife, and the wet grass soaked his boots until they squelched and chafed with each step, and his cigarettes had disintegrated into a yellow porridge of mangled tobacco and limp rice paper, and the roll of skin and the saddle and the bags cut into his shoulders, and he did not laugh again that night.

in the pre-dawn, the cliffs of Chaka's Gate were purple and milky smooth, flaming suddenly with the sun's ardent kiss in vivid rose and bronze, but Mark plodded on under his burden, tired beyond any appreciation of beauty, beyond feeling or even caring, until he came out of the forest on to the bank of the Bubezi River and stopped in midstride.

He sniffed in total disbelief, and was immediately assailed by the demands of his body, the quick flood of saliva from under his tongue and the cramping of his empty belly. it was the most beautiful odour he had ever smelled, bacon frying and eggs in the pan, slowly gelling and firming in the sizzling fat. He knew it was only a figment of his exhaustion, for he had eaten his last bacon six weeks before.

Then his ears played tricks also, he heard the ring of an axe-blade on wood and the faint melody of Zulu voices, and he lifted his head and stared ahead through the forest into his old camp below the wild figs.

There was a cone of pristine white canvas, an officer's bell tent, recently pitched beside his own rudely thatched lean-to shelter. The camp fire had been built up, and Hlubi, the old Zulu cook, was busy with his pans over it, while, beyond the flames, in a collapsible canvas camp chair, sitting comfortably, was the burly figure of General Courtney, watching his breakfast cook with a critical eye.

He looked up and saw Mark, bedraggled and dirty as an urchin at the edge of the camp, and his grin was wide and boyish. Hlubi, he said in Zulu. Another four eggs and a pound of bacon. Sean Courtney's vast energy and enthusiasm were the beacon flames that made the next week one of the memorable interludes in Mark's life. He would always remember him as he was in those days, belly-laughing at Mark's Lair Ur woe and frustration with Pungushe, and then still chuckling, calling to his servants and repeating the story to them, with his own comments and embellishments, until they rocked and reeled with mirth and old fat Hlubi overturned a pan of eggs, his great paunch bouncing like a ball and his cannon-ball of a head, with its hoar-frosting of pure white wool, rolling uncontrollably from side to side.

Mark, half-starved on a diet of bully and beans, gorged himself on the miraculous food that flowed from Hlubi's spade-sized, pink palmed hands. He was amazed at the style in which Sean Courtney braved the hardships of the African bush, from his full sized hip-bath to the portable kerosene-burning ice-box that delivered endless streams of frothing cold beer against the stunning heat of midday. Why travel in steerage, when you can go first class? Sean asked, and winked at Mark as he spread a large-scale map of northern Zululand on the camp table. Now, what have you got to tell me? Their discussions lasted late into each night, with a Petromax hissing in the tree overhead and the jackals yipping and piping along the river, and in the days they rode the ground. Sean Courtney up on Spartan, so clearly enjoying every moment of it, with the vitality of a man half his age, keeping going without a check even in the numbing heat of noon, inspecting the site that Mark had chosen for the main camp, arguing as to where the Bubezi bridge should be built, following the road through the forest where Mark had blazed the trees, exulting at the sight of a big black nyala ram with his heavy mane and ghostly stripes, as it raced away panic-stricken by the approach of man, sitting in his hip-bath under the fig trees, up to his waist in creaming white suds, with a cigar in his mouth and a long glass of beer in his hand, bellowing for Hlubi to top up with boiling water from the big kettle when his bath cooled. Big and scarred and hairy, and Mark realized then what a wide space this man had filled in his life.

As the day drew closer when he must leave again, Sean's mood changed, and in the evenings he brooded over the list of animals that Mark had compiled.Fifty zebra, he read Mark's estimate, and poured the last few inches of whisky from the pinch-bottle into his glass. On the Sabi River in 98 a single herd crossed in front of my wagons. It took forty minutes at the gallop to go by, and the leaders were over the horizon when the tail passed us. There were thirty thousand animals in that one herd."No elephant? he asked, looking up from the list, and when Mark shook his head, he went on softly, We thought it would last for ever. In 9 9 when I rode into Pretoria from the north, I had ten tons of ivory on board. Ten tons, twenty thousand pounds of ivory. No lions there? and again Mark shook his head.I don't think so, General. I've seen no sign of them, nor heard them in the night, but when I was a boy I shot one near here. I was with my grandfather. Yes, Sean nodded. When you were a boy, but, what about your son, Mark? Will he ever see a lion in the wild? Mark did not answer, and Sean grunted, No lions on the Bubezi River, God! What have we done to this land? He stared into the fire. I wonder if it was mere chance that you and I met, Mark. You have opened my eyes and conscience. It was I, and men like me, that did this, He shook that great shaggy head and groped in the sidepocket of his baggy hunting-jacket, and produced a leatherbound pocket-size book, a thick little volume, well-thumbed and shiny with the grease of grubby hands.

Mark did not recognize it for a moment, but when he did, he was startled.I did not know you read the Book, he exclaimed, and Sean glanced up at him from under beetling brows.I read it, he said gruffly. The older I get, the more I read it. There is a lot of solace here. But, sir, Mark persisted, you never go to church. This time Sean frowned as though he resented the prying questions. I live my religion, he said. I don't go singing about it on Sunday, and drop it for the rest of the week, like some I know. His tone was final, forbidding further discussion, and he turned his attention to the battered volume.

He had marked his place with a pressed wild flower, and the Bible fell open at the right page.

I found it last night, he told Mark, as he propped the steel-rimmed spectacles on his nose. It seemed like an omen, and I marked it to read to you. Matthew x. He cleared his throat and read slowly: Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing?

And one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. When he had finished, he tucked the Bible away in his pocket, and they were both silent, thinking about it and watching the shapes in the ashes of the fire.

Then perhaps he will help us to save the sparrow from its fall, here at Chaka's Gate, said Sean, and he leaned forward to take a burning twig from the fire. He lit a fresh cigar with it and puffed deeply, savouring the taste of wood smoke and tobacco before speaking again. It is just unfortunate that it all comes at a time like this. It will be the end of the next year before we can make an official move to have the proclamation ratified and budget for full development here. Mark was instantly alert, and his voice sharp as he demanded, Next year? I'm afraid so. But why so long? The grim reality of politics, son, Sean growled. We have just received a shattering blow, and all else must wait while we play the game of power. What has happened? Mark asked with real concern now. I haven't read a newspaper in two months. I wish I were that lucky. Sean smiled without humour. There was a by-election in a little place up in the Transvaal. It's a seat that has always been ours, a good safe seat, in the hands of a respected backbencher of great loyalty and little intellect. He had a heart attack in the diningroom of the House, expiring between the soup and the fish.

We went to our safe little constituency to elect a new member, here Sean paused, and his expression went bleak, and we got the trouncing of our lives. A fifteen percent swing to the Hertzog Party. They fought us on our handling of the strike last year, and it was a disaster. I didn't know. I'm sorry. If that swing, fifteen percent, carries for the whole country, then we will be in opposition after the next election.

Everything else is of no significance. General Smuts has decided to go to the country next year in March, and we will be fighting for our existence. Until then, we cannot introduce this type of legislation, or ask for funds. Mark felt cold despair spread out to numb his very fingertips. What happens here? he asked. In the meantime must we stop what I am doing? Do we just leave it? Another year of poaching and hunting, another year without protection or development? Sean shook his head. I've had my people studying the existing proclamation. We have powers there that we can enforce, but no money to do it. You can't do anythingwithout money, said Mark miserably. Ah, so at last a little respect for the power of money Sean shot him a thin smile across the fire, and then went on seriously. I've decided to finance the development and running of the proclaimed area until I get a budget allocation for it.

I'll foot the bill from my own pocket. Perhaps I'll get reimbursed from the budget later, but if I don't, he shrugged, I reckon I owe that much at least. I've had a pretty good run. It won't need much, Mark rushed in eagerly but Sean quieted him irritably. You'll get the same salary as before, and we'll make a start on the main camp. I'm going to give you four men to do the work, he went on, speaking quietly. We'll have to make do without a bridge across the river, and only a wagon track for our first road, but it'll be a start, and let's just hope like hell we win our election. on the last day at breakfast, Sean laid a folder in front of Mark. I talked Caldwell, the man who did the drawings for Jock of the Bushveld, into designing the layout, he smiled, as Mark opened the folder. I wanted you to get the best for your three thousand pounds. in the folder was a mock-up of the full-page Press announcement which would launch the Friends of African Wildlife, .

The margin contained magnificent line-drawings of wild animals, and under the heavy typed announcement was set out the objects of the Society, and an eloquent plea for support and membership. I had my lawyers draft the articles and draw up the wording. We'll run it in every newspaper in the country.

The Society's address is the Head Office of Courtney Holdings and I have taken on a full-time clerk to handle all the paper work. I've also got a young journalist to edit the Society's newspaper. He's full of ideas and caught up in the whole thing. With luck, we'll get huge public support behind us. It's going to cost more than three thousand pounds. Mark was torn between delight, and concern for the size to which his simple idea had grown. Yes, Sean laughed. It's going to cost more than three thousand pounds, which reminds me. I sent Dirk Courtney a receipt for his money, and a life membership of the Society! The joke carried them over the awkwardness of the last moments before departure.

Sean's bearers disappeared among the trees, carrying head loads of equipment to where the motor lorry had been left on the nearest road twenty miles beyond the cliffs of Chaka's Gate, and Sean lingered regretfully. I'm sad to go, he admitted. It's been a good time, but I feel stronger now, ready to face whatever the bastards have got to throw at me. He looked about him, taking farewell of river and mountain and wilderness. There is magic here. He nodded. Look after it well, son, and he held out his hand. .

It was Mark's last opportunity to ask the question which he had tried to ask a dozen times already, but each time Sean had turned it aside, or simply ignored it. But now he had to have an answer, and he took Sean's big gnarled bony fist in a grip that would not be denied. You haven't told me how Storm is, sir. How is she? Is she well? How is her painting? he blurted.

It seemed even then that Sean would not be drawn. He stiffened angrily, made as if to pull his hand away, and then the anger faded before it reached his eyes. For a moment there showed in the deep-set eyes a dark unfathomable grief, and his grip tightened on Mark's hand like a steeltrap. Storm was married a month ago. But I have not seen her since you left Lion Kop, he said, and he dropped Mark's hand. Without another word, he turned and walked away.

For the first time he went slowly and heavily, swaying against the drag of his bad leg, shuffling like an old man a very tired old man.

Mark wanted to run after him, but his own heart was breaking and his legs would not carry him.

He stood forlornly and watched Sean Courtney limp away into the trees.

The Natal Number Two came in along the line, his pony's hooves kicking up little spurts of white markinglime like a machine gun traversing, and he caught the ball two feet before it dribbled out of play.

He leaned low out- of the saddle and took it backhanded under his pony's neck, a full-blooded stroke that finished with the mallet high above his head, and the ball rose in a floating arc, a white blur against the stark blue of summer sky.

From the club house veranda, and the deck-chairs beneath the coloured umbrellas, applause splattered above the drum of hooves, and then rose into a swelling hum as they saw that Derek Hunt had anticipated.

He was coming down in a hard canter with Saladin not yet asked to extend. Saladin was a big pony, with a mean and ugly head that he cocked to watch the flight of the white ball, his over-large nostrils flaring so the shiny red us membrane flashed like a flag. The eye that muco watched the ball rolled in the gaunt skull, giving the horse a wild and half -crazed air. He was of that raggedy roan and grey that no amount of currying would ever brighten into a gloss, and his hooves looked like those of a cart-horse.

He had to lift them high in the ungainly action that was quickly carrying him ahead of the hard-running Argentinian pony at his shoulder.

Derek sat him as though he were an armchair, idly penduluming his stick from his wrist, his pith helmet hard down over his ears and strapped up tightly under the chin. His belly bulged out over the belt of his breeches, his arms were long and thick as those of a chimpanzee, covered in a thick fuzz of ginger hair. The skin was heavily freckled and had a raw red look between the freckles, as though it had been scalded with boiling water. His face was the same raw painful looking red, tinged by the purplish glaze of the very heavy drinker, and he was sweating.

The sweat glistened like early dew on his face and dripped from his chin. His short-sleeved cotton singlet looked as though he had been caught in a tropical downpour. It clung to the thick bearlike shoulders, and was stretched so tightly over his bulging paunch and so transparent with wetness, that you could see the deep dark pit of his belly button from the sidelines.

At each jar, as Saladin's hooves struck the hard-baked earth, Derek Hunt's great backside in the tight-fitting white breeches quivered like a jelly in the saddle.

Two Argentinian ponies were cutting across field to cover, their handsomeriders olive-skinned and dashing as cavalry officers, ridingwithhuge verge and excited Spanish cries, and Derek grinned under his bristling ginger mustache, as the ball started its long plummeting curve back to earth. Christ, drawled one of the members on the club house steps. The ugliest horse in Christendom. And he raised his pink gin to salute Saladin. And the ugliest four-goal handicapper in the entire world on his back, agreed the masher beside him. Poor bloody dagoes should turn to stone just looking at them. Saladin and the Argentinian Number One arrived at the drop of the ball at exactly the same moment. The Argentinian rose in the saddle to trap the fall, his white teeth sparkling under the trim black pencil-line of his mustache, the smooth darkly tanned muscles of his arm bulging as he prepared to go on to the forehand drive, his sleekly beautiful pony wheeling into line for the shot, nimble and quick as a ferret.

Then an extraordinary thing happened. Derek Hunt sat fat-gutted and heavy in the saddle and nobody could see the touch of rein and heel that made Saladin switch his quarters. The Argentinian pony cannoned off him as though she had hit a granite kopje, and the rider went over her head, going in an instant from balanced perfection to sprawling windmilling confusion, falling heavily in a cloud of red dust, and rolling to his knees to scream hysterical protest to the umpire and the skies.

Derek leaned slightly and there was the tap of mallet against bamboo root, a gentle almost self-err acing little tap, and the ball dropped meekly ahead of Saladin's slugging, hammering head.

It bounced once, twice, and then came up obediently for the next light tap that kept it hopping down the field. The Argentinian Number Four swept in from the right, with all the smooth-running grace of a charging lioness, and the roar of the crowd carried across the open field, spurring him on to make the challenge. He shouted a wild Spanish oath, his eyes flashing with excitement.

Smoothly, Derek changed the mallet from his right hand to his left, and tapped the bouncing white ball on to his off-side, forcing the Argentinian to increase the angle of his interception.

The instant he was drawn, Derek cropped hard, lofting the ball in an easy lob high over the Argentinianis head.

He said, Ha! but not loudly, and touched Saladin with his heels. The big ugly roan stretched out his neck and extended, with Derek moving now to help him push.

They ran past the Argentinian as though he had indeed turned to stone, they left him floundering in their wake and picked up the ball beyond him. Tap! Tap! And tap again, he ran it down through the exact centre of the stubby goal-posts and then turned and trotted back to the pony lines.

Chuckling so that his belly bounced, Derek swung one leg forward over Saladin's neck and slid down to the ground, letting him go free to the grooms. I'll take Satan for the next chukka, he shouted in that beery throaty voice.

Storm Courtney saw him coming, and knew what was going to happen. She tried to rise, but she was slow and clumsy, the child in her womb anchored her like a stone. One for the poor, what! shouted Derek, and caught her with one long, ginger-fuzzed, boiled red arm.

The sweat on his face was icy cold and smeared down her own cheek, and he smelled of sour beer and horse. He kissed her with an open mouth, in front of Irene Leuchars and the four other girls, and their husbands, and all the grinning grooms, and the members on the veranda.

She thought desperately that she was going to be ill. The acid vomit rose into her throat, and she thought she was going to throw up in front of them all. IDerek, my condition! she whispered desperately, but he held her under his one arm as he took the bottle of beer that one of the white-jacketed club servants brought on a silver tray, and, scorning the glass, he drank straight from the bottle.

She struggled to be free, but he held her easily with immense and careless strength, and he belched, a ripping explosion of gas. One for the poor, he shouted again, and they all laughed, like courtiers at the king's jest. Good old Derek. Law unto himself, old Derek.

He dropped the empty bottle. Keep it until I get back, wifey! he laughed, and took one of her swollen breasts in his huge raw-knuckled, red-boiled hand and squeezed it painfully. She felt cold and trembly and weak with humiliation and hatred.

She had missed a month many times before, so Storm did not begin to worry until the second blank came up on her pocket diary. She had been about to tell Mark then, but that had been the time they had parted. Still, she had expected it all to resolve itself, but as the weeks passed, the enormity of it all began to reach her in her gold and ivory castle. This sort of thing happened to other girls, common working girls, ordinary girls, it did not happen to Storm Courtney. There were special rules for young ladies like Storm.

When it was certain, beyond all doubt, the first person she thought of was Mark Anders. As the panic caught at her heart with fiery little barbs, she wanted to rush to him and throw her arms about his neck. Then that stubborn and completely uncontrollable pride of the Courtneys smothered the impulse. He must come to her. She had decided, he must come on her terms, and she could not bring herself to change the rules she had laid down. Though still, even in her distress, her chest felt tight and her legs shaky and weak, whenever she thought of Mark.

She had wept, silently in the night, when she had first left Mark, and now she wept again. She longed for him even more now with his child growing in the secret depths of her body. But that perverse and distorted pride would not release its bulldog hold on her, would not allow her even to let him know of her predicament. Don't challenge me, Mark Anders, she had warned him, and he had done it. She hated him, and loved him for that.

But now she could not bend.

The next person she thought of was her mother. She and Ruth Courtney had always been close, she had always been able to rely on her mother's loyalty and shrewdly practical hard sense. Then she was stopped dead by the knowledge that if Ruth were told, then her father would know within hours. Ruth Courtney kept nothing from Sean, or he from her.

Storm's soul quailed at the thought of what would happen once her father knew that she carried a bastard.

The immense indulgent love he had for her, would make his anger and retribution more terrible.

She knew also Mark would be destroyed by it. Her father was too strong, too persistent and single-minded for her to believe she would be able to keep Mark's name from him.

He would squeeze it out of her.

She knew of her father's affection for Mark Anders, it had been apparent for anyone to see, but that affection would not have been sufficient to save either of them.

Sean Courtney's attitude to his daughter was bound by iron laws of conduct, the old-fashioned view of the father that left no latitude for manoeuvre. Mark Anders had contravened those iron laws and Sean would destroy him, despite the fact he had come to love him, and in doing so, he would destroy a part of himself. He would reject and drive out his own daughter, even though it left him ruined and broken with grief.

So, for her father's sake and for Mark Anders sake, she could not go for comfort and help to her mother.

She went instead to Irene Leuchars, who listened to Storm's hesitant explanations with rising glee and anticipation. But you silly darling, didn't you take precautions? Storm shook her head glumly, not quite certain what Irene meant by precautions, but certain only that she hadn't taken them. Who was it, darling? was the next question, and Storm shook her head again, this time fiercely. Oh dear, Irene rolled her eyes. That many candidates for the daddy? You are a dark horse, Storm darling. Can't one, well, can't one actually do something?

Storm asked miserably. You mean an abortion, darling? Irene asked brutally, and smiled a sly spiteful smile when Storm nodded.

He was a tall pale man, very grey and stooped, with a reedy voice and hands so white as to be almost transparent.

Storm could see the blue veins and the fragile ivory bones through the skin. She tried not to think of those pale transparent hands as they pried and probed, but they were cold and cruelly painful.

Afterwards, he had washed those pale hands at the kitchen sink of his small grey apartment with such exaggerated care that Storm had felt her pain and embarrassment enhanced by a sense of affront. The cleansing seemed to be a personal insult. I imagine you indulge in a great deal of physical activity horse-riding, tennis? he asked primly, and when Storm nodded he made a little sucking and glucking sound of disapproval. The female body was not designed for such endeavour. You are very narrow, and your musculature is highly developed. Furthermore, you are at least ten weeks pregnant. At last he had finished washing, and now he began to dry his hands on a threadbare, but clinically white towel. Can you help me? Storm demanded irritably, and he shook his pale grey head slowly from side to side. If you had come a little earlier, and he spread the white transparent hands in a helpless gesture.

They had drawn up a list of names, she and Irene, and each of the men on the list had two things in common.

They were in love, or had professed to be in love with Storm, and they were all men of fortune.

There were six names on the list, and Storm had written cards to two of them and received vague replies, polite good wishes, and no definite suggestion for a meeting.

The third man on the list she had contrived to meet at the Umgeni Country Club. She could still wear tennis clothes, and the pregnancy had given her skin a new bloom and lustre, her breasts a fuller ripeness.

She had chatted lightly, flirtatiously, with him, confident and poised, giving him encouragement he had never received from her before. She had not noticed the sly, gloating look in his eyes, until he leaned close to her and asked confidentially, Should you be playing tennis, now? She had only been able to keep herself from breaking down until she reached the Cadillac parked in the lot behind the courts. She was weeping when she drove out through the gates, and she had to park in the dunes above the ocean.

After the first storm of humiliation had passed, she could think clearly.

It had been Irene Leuchars, of course. She must have been blind and stupid not to realize it sooner. Everybody, every single person, would know by now, Irene would have seen to that.

Loneliness and desolation overwhelmed her.

Derek Hunt had not been on the list of six, not because he was not rich, not because he had never shown interest in Storm.

Derek Hunt had shown interest in most pretty girls. He had even married two of them, and both of them had divorced him in separate blazes of notoriety, not before they had, between them, presented him with seven offspring.

Derek Hunt's reputation was every bit as vast and flamboyant as his fortune. Look old girl, he had told Storm reasonably. You and I have both got a problem. I want you, have always wanted you. Can't sleep at night, strewth! and his ginger whiskers twitched lasciviously. And you need me. The word's out about you, old girl, Mark of the beast, condemnation of society, and all that rot, I'm afraid.

Your loss, my gain. I've never given a stuff for the condemnation of society. I've got seven little bastards already.

Another one won't make any difference. What about it, then? One for the poor, what? They had driven up to Swaziland, and Derek had been able to get a special licence, lying about her age.

There had been nobody she knew at the ceremony, only five of Derek's cronies, and she had not told her father, nor her mother, nor Mark Anders.

She heard him coming home, like a Le Mans Grand Prix winner, a long cortege of motor cars roaring up the driveway, then the squeal of brakes, the cannonade of slamming doors, the loud comradely shouts and the snatches of wild song.

Derek's voice, louder and hoarser than the rest. Caramba, me heartiest Whipped your pants off on the field, going to drink you blind now. This way, the pride of the Argentine - the stamping and shouting, as they trooped up the front staircase.

Storm lay flat on her back and stared at the plaster cupids on the ceiling. She wanted to run, this senseless panicky urge to get up and run. But there was no place to run to.

She had spoken to her mother three times since the wedding, and each time had been agony for both of them. If only you had told us. Daddy might have been able to understand, to forgive, Oh darling, if you only knew the plans he used to make for your wedding. He was so proud of you, and then not to be at your wedding. Not even invited, Give him time, please, Storm. I am trying for you.

Believe me darling, I think it might have been better, if it was anybody in the world but Derek Hunt. You know what Daddy thinks of him. There was nowhere to run, and she lay quietly, dreading, until at last the heavy unsteady boots came clumping up the staircase, and the door was thrown open.

He had not changed, and he still wore riding-boots. The backside of his breeches was brown with dubbin from the saddle, and the crotch drooped almost to his knees, like a baby's soiled napkin; the sweat had dried in salty white circles on the cotton singlet. Wake up, old girl. Time for every good man and true to perform his duty. He let his clothing lie where it fell.

His bulging belly was fish white, and fuzzed with ginger curls. The heavy shoulders were pitted and scarred purple with the old cicatrices of myriad carbuncles and small boils, and he was massively virile, thick and hard and callous as the branch of a pine tree. One for the poor, what? he chuckled hoarsely, as he came to the bed.

Suddenly and clearly, she had an image of Mark Andersslim and graceful body, with the clean shape of young muscle, as he sat in the dappled sunlight of the glade.

She remembered with a terrible pang of loss the lovely head with the fine strong lines of mouth and brow, and the serene poet's eyes.

As the bed dipped beneath the solid weight of her husband, she wanted to scream with despair and the knowledge of coming pain.

For breakfast Derek Hunt liked a little Black Velvet, mixing the Guinness stout and champagne in a special crystal punch bowl. He always used a Bollinger Vintage

1911 and drank it out of a pewter tankard.

He believed in a substantial breakfast, and this morning it was scrambled eggs, Scotch kippers, devilled kidneys, mushrooms and a large well-done fillet steak, all of it on the same plate.

Although his eyes were watery and pink-rimmed with the previous night's revelry, and his face blazed crimson as the rising sun, he was cheerful and loudly friendly, guffawing at his own jokes, and leaning across the table to prod her with a thick red thumb like a boiled langouste to emphasize a point.

She waited until he had picked up the bowl and tilted the last of the Black Velvet into his tankard, and then she said quietly, Derek, I want a divorce. The grin did not leave his face, and he watched the last drops fall into the tankard. Damn stuff evaporates, or the dish has got a hole in it, he wheezed, and then chuckled merrily. Get it? A hole in it! Good, what? Did you hear what I said? Aren't you going to answer? Needs no answer, old girl. Bargain is a bargain, you've got a name for your bastard, I've still got my share coming. You've had that, as many times as you could wish, Storm answered quietly, with a whole world of resignation in her voice. Won't you let me go now? Good God! Derek stared at her over the rim of his tankard, his mustache bristling and the pink eyes wide with genuine amazement. You don't think I was really interested in the crumpet, do you? Can get that anywhere, all of it looks the same in the dark. He snorted with real laughter now. Good God, old girl, you didn't really think I fancied your lily-white titties that much? Why? she asked. Ten million good reasons, old girl. He gulped a mouthful of scrambled eggs and kidney, and every single one of them in General Sean Courtney's bank account. She stared at him. Daddy's money? Right first time, he grinned. Up you go to the head of the class. I But-but -she made fluttery little gestures of in comprehension with both hands. I don't understand. You are so rich yourself. Was, old girl, used to be, past tense. And he let out another delighted guffaw. Two loving wives, two unsympathetic divorce judges, seven brats, forty polo ponies, friends with big right hands, rocks that shouldn't have been where the road was going& a mine with no diamonds, a building that fell down, a dam that burst, a reef that pinched out, cattle that got sick and myopic lawyers who don't read the small print, that's the way the money goes, pop goes the weasel! I don't believe it. She was aghast. Would never joke about that, he grinned. Never joke about money, one of my principles. Probably my only principle. And he prodded her. My only principle, get it?

Skunked, absolutely flatters, I assure you. Daddy is the last resort, old girl, you'll have to speak to him, I'm afraid.

Last resort, what? One for the poor, don't you know? There was no answer to the front door and Mark almost turned away and went back into the village, feeling a touch of relief and a lightening of heart that he recognized as cowardice. So instead, he jumped down off the veranda and went around the side of the house.

The stiff collar and tie chafed his throat and the jacket felt unnatural and constricting, so that he shrugged his shoulders and ran a finger around inside his collar as he came into the kitchen yard of the cottage. It was five months since last he had worn clothes or trodden on a paved sidewalk, even the sound of women's voices was unfamiliar. He paused and listened to them.

Marion Littlejohn was in the kitchen with her sister, and their merry prattle had a lilt and cadence to which he listened with new ears and fresh pleasure.

The chatter ceased abruptly at his knock, and Marion came to the door.

She wore a gaily striped apron, and her bare arms were floury to the elbows. She had her hair up in a ribbon but tendrils of it had come down in little wisps on to her neck and forehead.

The kitchen was filled with the smell of baking bread, and her cheeks were rosy from the heat of the oven. Mark, she said calmly. How nice, and tried to push the curl of hair off her forehead, leaving a smudge of white flour on the bridge of her nose. It was a strangely appealing gesture, and Mark felt his heart swell. Come in. She stood aside, and held the door open for him.

Her sister greeted Mark frostily, much more aware of the jilting than Marion herself. Doesn't he look well? Marion asked, and they both looked Mark over carefully, as he stood in the centre of the kitchen floor. He's too thin, her sister judged him waspishly, and began untying her apron-strings. Perhaps, Marion agreed comfortably, he just needs the proper food. And she smiled and nodded as she saw how brown and lean he was, but she recognized also, with eyes as fond as a mother's, the growing weight of maturity in his features. She saw also the sorrow and the loneliness, and she wanted to take him in her arms and hold his head against her bosom. There is some lovely butter-milk, she said instead. Sit down, here where I can see you. While she poured from the jug, her sister hung the apron behind the door and without looking at Mark said primly, We need more eggs. I'll go into the village When they were alone, Marion picked up the roller, and stood over the table, leaning and dipping as the pastry spread and rolled out paper thin. Tell me what you have been doing, she invited, and he began, hesitantly at first, but with blossoming sureness and enthusiasm, to tell her about Chaka's Gate, about the work and the life he had found there.

'That's nice. She punctuated his glowing account every few minutes, her mind running busily ahead, already making lists and planning supplies, adapting pragmatically to the contingencies of a life lived far from the comforts of civilization, where even the small comforts become luxuries, a glass of fresh milk, a light in the night, all of it has to be planned for and carefully arranged.

Characteristically she felt neither excitement nor dismay at the prospect. She was of pioneer stock. Where a man goes, the woman follows. It was merely work that must be done. The site for the homestead is up in the first fold of the hills, but you can see right down the valley, and the cliffs of Chaka's Gate are right above it. It's beautiful, especially in the evenings. I'm sure it is. I have designed the house so it can be added on to, a room at a time. To begin with there will only be two rooms -'Two rooms will be enough to begin with, she agreed, frowning thoughtfully. But we'll need a separate room for the children. He broke off and stared at her, not quite certain that he had heard correctly. She paused with the rolling-pin held in both hands and smiled at him. Well, that's why you came here today, isn't it? she asked sweetly.

He dropped his eyes from hers and nodded. Yes. He sounded bemused. I suppose it is. She lost her aplomb only briefly during the ceremony, and that was when she saw General Sean Courtney sitting in the front pew with his wife beside him, Sean in morning suit and with a diamond pin in his cravat, Ruth cool and elegant in a huge wagon-wheel sized hat, the brim thick with white roses. He came! Marion whispered ecstatically, and could not restrain the triumphant glance she threw to her own friends and relatives, like a lady tossing a coin to a beggar.

Her social standing had rocketed to dizzying heights.

Afterwards the General had kissed her tenderly on each cheek, before turning to Mark. You've picked the prettiest girl in the village, my boy. And she had glowed with pleasure, pink and happy and truly as lovely as she had ever been in her life.

With the help of the four Zulu labourers Sean had given him, Mark had opened a rough track in as far as the Bubezi River. He brought his bride to Chaka's Gate on the pillion of the motorcycle, with the side-car piled high with part of her dowry.

Far behind them, the Zulus led Trojan and Spartan under heavy packs, the rest of Marion's baggage.

In the early morning the mist lay dense along the river, still and flat as the surface of a lake, touched to shades of delicate pink and mauve by the fresh new light of coming day.

The great headlands of Chaka's Gate rose sheer out of the mist, dark and mysterious, each wreathed in laurels of golden cloud.

Mark had chosen the hour of return so that she might have the best of it for her first glimpse of her new home.

He pulled the cycle and side-car off the narrow, stony track and switched off the motor.

In the silence they sat and watched the sun strike upon the crests of the cliffs, burning like the beacons that the mariner looks for in the watery deserts of the ocean, the lights that beckon him on to his landfall and the quiet anchorage. It's very nice, dear, she murmured. Now show me where the house will be. She worked with the Zulus, muddy to the elbows as they puddled the clay for the unburned Kimberley bricks, joshing them in their own language and bullying them cheerfully to effort beyond the usual pace of Africa.

She worked behind the mules, handling the traces, dragging up the logs from the valley, her sleeves rolled high on brown smooth arms and a scarf knotted around her head.

She worked over the clay oven, bringing out the fat golden brown loaves on the blade of a long handled spade, and watched with deep contentment as Mark wiped up the last of the stew with the crust. Was that good, then, dear? In the evenings she sat close to the lantern, with her head bowed over the sewing in her lap, and nodded brightly as he told her of the day's adventures, each little triumph and disappointment. What a shame, dear. Or, How nice for you, dear. He took her, one bright, cloudless day, up the ancient pathway to the crest of Chaka's Gate. Holding her hand as he led her over the narrow places, where the river flowed six hundred sheer feet below their feet. She tucked her skirts into her bloomers, took a firm hold on the basket she carried and never faltered once on the long climb.

On the summit, he showed her the tumbled stone walls and overgrown caves of the old tribesmen who had defied Chaka, and he told her the story of the old king's climb, pointing out the fearsome path up which he had led his warriors, and finally he described the massacre and pictured for her the rain of human bodies hurled down into the river below. How interesting, dear, she murmured, as she spread a cloth from the basket she had carried. I brought scones and some of that apricot jam you like so much. Something caught Mark's eye, unusual movement far down in the valley below, and he reached for his binoculars. In the golden grass at the edge of the tall reed beds they looked like a line of fat black bugs on a clean sheet.

He knew what they were immediately, and with a surging uplift of excitement he counted them. Eighteen! he shouted aloud. It's a new herd, What is it, dear? She looked up from the scone she was spreading with jam. It's a new herd of buffalo, he exulted. They must have come in from the north. It's beginning to work already. In the field of the binoculars he saw one of the great bovine animals emerge into a clearing in the long grass.

He could see not only its wide black back, but the heavy head and spreading ears beneath the mournfully drooping horns. The sunlight caught the bosses of the polished black horns so that they glittered like gunmetal.

He felt an enormous proprietary pride. They were his own. The first to come into the sanctuary he was building for them. Look. He offered her the binoculars, and she wiped her hands carefully and pointed the glasses over the cliff. There on the edge of the swamp. He pointed, with the pride and joy shining on his face.

I can see them, she agreed smiling happily for him. How nice, dear. Then she swung the binoculars in a wide sweep across the river to where the roof of the homestead showed above the trees. Doesn't it look so nice with its new thatch? she said proudly. I just can't wait to move in. The following day they moved up from the shack of crude thatch and canvas at the old camp under the sycamore fig trees, and a pair of swallows moved in with them.

The swiftly darting birds began to build their neat nest with little shiny globs of mud under the eaves of the new yellow thatch against the crisply whitewashed wall of Kimberley brick.

That's the best of all possible luck, Mark laughed. They make such a mess, said Marion doubtfully, but that night, for the first time ever, she initiated their lovemaking; rolling comfortably on to her back in the doublebed, drawing up her nightdress to her waist, and spreading her warm womanly thighs. It's all right, if you want to, dear. And because she was kind and loved him so, he was as quick and as considerate as he could be. Was that good, then, dear? It was wonderful, he told her, and he had a sudden vivid image of a lovely vital woman, with a body that was lithe and swift and, and his guilt was brutal like a fist below the heart. He tried to thrust the image away, but it ran ahead of him through his dreams, laughing and dancing and teasing, so that in the morning there were dark blue smears beneath his eyes and he felt fretful and restless. I'm going up the valley on patrol. He did not look up from his coffee.

You only came back last Friday. She was surprised.

I want to look for those buffalo again, he said. Very well, dear. I'll pack your bag, how long will you be gone, I'll put in your sweater and the jacket, it's cool in the evenings, it's a good thing I baked yesterday -'she prattled on cheerfully, and he had a sudden terrible urge to shout at her to be silent. It will give me a chance to plant out the garden. It will be nice to have fresh vegetables again, and I haven't written a letter for ages. They'll be wondering about us at home. He rose from the table and went out to saddle Trojan.

The flogging explosion of heavy wings roused Mark from his reverie and he straightened in the saddle just as a dozen of the big birds rose from the edge of the reed-beds.

They were those dirty buff-coloured vultures, powering upwards as they were disturbed by Mark's approach, and undergoing that almost magical transformation from gross ugliness into beautiful planing flight.

Mark tethered Trojan and slipped the Marinlicher from its scabbard as a precaution. He felt a tickle of excitement, hopes high that he had come upon a kill by one of the big predatory cats. Perhaps even a lion, one of the animals for which he still searched the valley in vain.

The buffalo lay at the edge of the damp soft ground, half hidden by the reeds and it was so freshly dead that the vultures had not yet managed to penetrate the thick black hide, nor to spoil the sign which was deeply trodden and torn into the damp earth. They had only gouged out the uppermost eye and, with their beaks, scratched the softer skin around the bull's anus, for that was always their access point to a big thick-skinned carcass.

The buffalo was a big mature bull, the great boss of his horns grown solidly together across the crown of his skull, a huge head of horn, forty-eight inches from tip to tip. He was big in the body also, bigger than a prize Hereford stud bull, and he was bald across the shoulders, the scarred grey hide scabbed with dried mud and bunches of bush ticks.

Mark thrust his hand into the crease of skin between the back legs and felt the residual body warmth. He's been dead less than three hours, he decided, and squatted down beside the huge body to determine the cause of death. The bull seemed unmarked until Mark managed to roll him over, exerting all his strength and using the stiffly out-thrust limbs to move the ton and a half of dead weight.

He saw immediately the death wounds, one was behind the shoulder, through the ribs, and Mark's hunter's eye saw instantly that it was a heart-stroke, a wide-lipped wound, driven home deeply; the clotted heart blood that poured from it had jellied on the damp earth.

If there was any doubt at all as to the cause of that injury, it was dispelled instantly when he looked to the second wound. This was a frontal stroke, at the base of the neck, angled in skilfully between bone, to reach the heart again, and the weapon had not been withdrawn, it was still plunged in to the hilt and the shaft was snapped short where the bull had fallen upon it.

Mark grasped the broken shaft, placed one booted foot against the bull's shoulder and grunted with the effort it required to withdraw the blade against the reluctant suck of clinging flesh.

He examined it with interest. It was one of those broadbladed stabbing spears, the assegai which had been designed by the old king Chaka himself. Mark remembered Sean Courtney reminiscing about the Zulu wars, Isandhlwana, and Morma Gorge. They can put one of those assegais into a man's chest and send the point two feet out between his shoulder blades, and when they clear the blade, the withdrawal seems to suck a man as white as though he had his life blood pumped out of him by a machine. Sean had paused for a moment to stare into the camp fire. As they clear, they shout "Ngidhla! " -I have eaten! Once you have heard it, you'll not forget it. Forty years later, the memory still makes the hair come up on the back of my neck. Now still holding the short heavy assegai, Mark remembered that Chaka himself had hunted the buffalo with a similar weapon. A casual diversion between campaigns and as Mark glanced from the blade to the great black beast, he felt his anger tempered with reluctant admiration. His anger was for the wanton destruction of one of his precious animals, and his admiration was for the special type of courage that had done the deed.

Thinking of the man, Mark realized that there must have been special circumstances for that man to abandon such a valuable, skilfully and lovingly wrought weapon together with the prize he had risked his life to hunt.

Mark began to back-track the sign in the soft black earth, and he found where the bull had come up one of the tunnellike pathways through the reeds after drinking. He found where the huntsman had waited in thick cover beside the path, and his bare footprints were unmistakable.

Pungushe! exclaimed Mark.

Pungushe had lain upwind and, as the bull passed, he had put the steel behind his shoulder, deeply into the heart.

The bull had leapt forward, crashing into a ponderous gallop as Pungushe cleared his point, and the blood had sprayed from the wide wound as though the standing reeds had been hosed by a careless gardener.

The buffalo is one of the few wild animals which will turn and actively hunt its tormentor. Although the bull was dead on his feet, spurting blood with every lunging stride, he had swung wide into the wind to take Pungushe's scent and when he had it, he had steadied into that terrible crabbing, nose up, wide-homed, relentless charge that only death itself will stop.

Pungushe had stood to meet him as he came thundering down through the reeds, and he had picked the point at the base of the neck for his second stroke and put the steel in cleanly to the heart, but the bull had hit him also, before blundering on a dozen paces and falling to his knees with that characteristic death bellow.

Mark found where Pungushe had fallen, his body marks etched clearly in the soft clay.

Mark followed where he had dragged himself out of the edge of the reed beds and shakily regained his feet.

Slowly Pungushe had turned northwards, but his stride was cramped, he was heeling heavily, not up on his toes, not extended into his normal gait.

He stopped once where he had left his steel-jawed spring trap, and he hid it in an ant bear hole and kicked sand over it, obviously too sick and weak to carry it or to cache the valuable trap more securely. Mark retrieved the trap and, as he tied it on to Trojan's saddle, he wondered briefly to how many of his animals it had dealt hideous death.

A mile further on, Pungushe pausW to gather leaves from one of the little turpentine bushes, a medicinal shrub, and then he had gone on slowly, not using the rocky ridges, not covering or back-tracking as he usually did.

At the sandy crossing of one of the steep narrow dry water courses, Pungushe had dropped on one knee, and had used both hands to push himself upright.

Mark stared at the sign for there was blood now for the first time, black droplets that had formed little pellets of loose sand, and in his anger and jubilation, Mark felt a prick of real concern.

The man was hard hit, and he had once saved Mark's life. Mark could still remember the blessed taste of the bitter medicine in the black baked pot cutting through the terrible thirsts of malaria.

He had been leading Trojan up to this point, to keep down, to show a low silhouette, so as not to telegraph heavy hoof -beats ahead to his quarry.

Now he swung up into the saddle, and kicked the mule into a plunging sway-backed canter.

Pungushe was down. He had gone down heavily at last, dropping to the sandy earth. He had crawled off the game path, under a low bush out of the sun, and he had pulled the light kaross of monkey-skins over his head, the way a man settles down to sleep, or to die.

He lay so still that Mark thought he was indeed dead.

He slipped down off Trojan's back and went up cautiously to the prostrate body. The flies were buzzing and swarming gleefully over the bloody bundle of green turpentine leaves that were bound with strips of bark around the man's flank and across the small of his back.

Mark imagined clearly how he had received that wound, Pungushe standing to meet the charging buffalo, going for the neck with the short heavy-bladed assegai, putting the steel in cleanly and then jumping clear, but the bull pivoting hard on his stubby front legs and hooking with the massive bossed and wickedly curved horns, Pungushe had taken the hook low in the side, far back behind the hip-bone of the pelvis. The shock would have hurled him clear, giving him time to crawl away while the bull staggered on, fighting the deep steel in his chest, until at last he had gone down on his fore-legs with that last defiant death bellow, Mark shuddered in the harsh sunlight at the wound that bundle of leaves covered, and went down on one knee to brush the flies away.

Now for the first time, he became aware of the man's physique. The kaross covered his head and shoulders only, the great chest was exposed. A loin-cloth of softly tanned leather embroidered with blue beads was drawn up between his legs, leaving free the solid bulge of his buttocks, and the sinewy thews of his thighs and the flat hard plain of the belly.

Each separate muscle was clearly defined, and the ropey veins below the surface of the skin were like bunches of serpents, testimony to the man's tremendous physical development and fitness. The skin itself was lighter than that of the average Zulu. It had the smooth dark buttery colour and lustre of a woman's skin, but tight dark curls covered the chest.

I baited for a jackal, Mark thought wonderingly, and I caught myself a lion, a big old black-maned lion. And now he felt real concern that Pungushe was dead. For such a splendid animal, death was a shabby bargain.

Then he saw the gentle, almost imperceptible rise and fall of the deep muscled chest, and he reached out and touched the shoulder through the kaross.

The man stirred, and then painfully lifted himself on one elbow, letting the kaross fall back, and he looked at Mark. the full noon of his strength and pride He was a man in and dignity, perhaps forty years of age, with just the first frosts of wisdom touching the short cap of dark wool at his temples.

The agony did not show in his face, the broad forehead was smooth as polished amber, the mouth was in repose, and the eyes were dark and fierce and proud. It was the handsome moon face of the high-bred Zulu. Sakubona, Pungushe, said Mark. I see you, 0 jackal. The man looked at him for a moment, thinking about the name and the style of greeting, the language and the accent in which it was spoken. The calm expression did not change, no smile nor snarl on the thick sculptured lips, only a new light in the dark eyes. Sakubona, Jamela. I see you, O Seeker. His voice was deep and low, yet it rang on the still air with the timbre of a bronze gong, and then he went on immediately, Sakubona, Ngaga. Mark blinked. It had never occurred to him that the jackal might think of him by a name every bit as derogatory. Ngaga is the pangolin, the scaly ant-eater, a small creature that resembles an armadillo, a nocturnal creature, which if caught out in daylight, scurries around like a bent and wizened old man pausing to peer shortsightedly at any small object in its path, then hurrying on again.

The two names Jamela and Ngaga used together described with embarrassing clarity somebody who ran in small circles, peering at everything and yet blindly seeing nothing.

Suddenly Mark saw himself through the eyes of a hidden observer, riding a seemingly pointless patrol through the valley, dismounting to peer at anything that caught his interest, then riding on again, just like an ngaga. It was not a flattering thought.

He felt with sudden discomfort that despite Pungushe's wounds, and Mark's position of superiority, so far he had had the worst of the exchange. It seems that ngaga has at last found what he seeks, he _pointed out grimly, and went to the mule for his blanket roll.

Under the bloody bunch of leaves there was a deep dark hole where the point of the buffalo horn had driven in. It might have gone in as far as the kidneys, in which case the man was as good as dead. Mark thrust the thought aside, and swabbed out the wound as gently as he could with a solution of acriflavine.

His spare shirt was snowy white and still crisp from Marion's meticulous laundering and ironing. He ripped off the sleeves, folded the body into a wad and placed it over the gaping hole, binding it up with the torn sleeves.

Pungushe said nothing as he worked, made no protest nor showed any distress as Mark lifted him into a sitting position to work more easily. But when Mark ripped the shirt he murmured regretfully, It is a good shirt. There was once a young and handsome ngaga who might have died from the fever, Mark reminded him, but a scavenging old jackal carried him to a safe place and gave him drink and food. Ah, Pungushe nodded. But he was not such a stupid jackal as to tear a good shirt. The ngaga is much concerned that the jackal is in good health, so that he will be able to labour mightily at the breaking of rocks and other manly tasks when he is an honoured guest at the kraal of King Georgey. Mark ended that subject, and repacked his blanket roll. Can you make water, O jackal? It is necessary to see how deep the buffalo has speared you. The urine was tinged pinky brown, but there were no strings of bright blood. It seemed that the kidneys may merely have been badly bruised, and that the thick pad of iron muscle across the Zulu's back had absorbed much of the brutal driving thrust. Mark found himself praying silently that it was so, although he could not imagine why he was so concerned.

Working quickly, he cut two long straight saplings, and plaited a drag litter from strips of wet bark. Then he padded the litter with his own blankets and Pungushe's kaross, before hitching it up to Trojan.

He helped the big Zulu into the litter, surprised to find how tall he was, and how hard was the arm he placed around Mark's shoulder to support himself.

With Pungushe flat in the litter, he led the mule back along the game trail, and the ends of two saplings left a long snaking drag mark in the soft earth.

It was almost dark when they passed the scene of the buffalo hunt. Looking across the reed banks, Mark Could make out the obscene black shapes of the vultures in the trees, waiting their turn at the carcass. Why did you kill my buffalo? he asked, not certain that Pungushe was still conscious. All men know the new laws. I have travelled to every village, I have spoken with every induna, every chief, all men have heard. All men know the penalty for hunting in this valley. If he was your buffalo, why did he not carry the mark of your iron? Surely it is the custom of the Abelungu, the white men, to burn their mark upon their cattle? Pungushe asked from the litter, without a smile nor with any trace of mockery, yet mockery Mark knew it was. He felt his anger stir. This place was declared sacred, even by the old king, Chaka. No, said Pungushe. It was declared a royal hunt, and, his voice took a sterner ring, I am Zulu, of the royal blood.

I hunt here by my birthright, it is a man's thing to do. No man has the right to hunt here. Then what of the white men who have come here with their isibamu, their rifles, these past hundred seasons?

asked Pungushe. They are evil-doers, even as you are. Then why were they not taken to be guests at the kraal of King Georgey, as I am so honoured? They will be in future, Mark assured him. Ho! said Pungushe, and this time his voice was thick with contempt and mockery. When I catch them, they will go also, Mark repeated doggedly, but the Zulu made a weary gesture of dismissal with one expressive pink-palmed hand, a hand that said clearly that there were many laws, some for rich, some for poor, some for white and some for black. They were silent again until after dark when Mark had camped for the night, and put Trojan to graze on a head-rope.

As he squatted over the fire, cooking the evening meal for both of them, Pungushe spoke again from his litter in the darkness beyond the firelight. For whom do you keep the silwane, the wild animals of the valley? Will King George come here to hunt? Nobody will ever hunt here again, no king nor common man. Then why do you keep the silwane? Because if we do not, then the day will dawn when there will be no more left in this land. No buffalo, no lion, no kudu, nothing. A great emptiness. Pungushe was silent for the time it took Mark to spoon a slop of maize porridge and bully beef into the lid of the pannikin and take it to the Zulu. Eat, he commanded, and sat crosslegged opposite him with his own plate in his lap.

What you say is true, Pungushe spoke thoughtfully. When I was a child, of your age, Mark noted the barb but let it pass, there were elephant in this valley, great bulls with teeth as long as a throwing-spear, and there were many lions, herds of buffalo like the great king's cattle, he broke off. They have gone, soon what is left will go also. Is that a good thing? Mark asked. It is neither a good thing nor a bad thing. Pungushe shrugged and began to eat. It is merely the way of the world, and there is little profit in pondering it. They finished eating in silence and Mark cleared the plates and brought coffee, which Pungushe waved away. Drink it, snapped Mark. You must have it to cleanse the blood from your water. He gave Pungushe one of his cigarettes, and the Zulu carefully broke off the brown cork tip before putting it between his lips. He wrinkled his broad flat nose at the insipid taste, for he was accustomed to the ropey black native tobacco, but he would not belittle a man's hospitality by making comment.

When it is all gone, when the great emptiness comes here to this valley, what will become of you, O jackal?

Mark asked. I do not understand your question. You are a man of the silwane. You are a great hunter.

Your life is yoked to the silwane, as the herdsman is yoked to his cattle. What will become of you, O mighty hunter, when all your cattle are gone? Mark realized that he had reached the Zulu. He saw his nostrils flare, and something burn up brightly within him, but he waited while Pungushe considered the proposition at great length and in every detail. I will go to Igoldi, said Pungushe at last. I will go to the gold mines, and become rich. They will put you to work deep in the earth, where you cannot see the sun nor feel the wind, and you will break rocks, just as you go now to do at the kraal of King Georgey.

Mark saw the repugnance flit across the Zulu's face. I will go to Tekweni, Pungushe changed his mind. I will go to Durban and become a man of much consequence. In Tekweni you will breathe the smoke of the cane mills into your lungs, and when the fat babu overseer speaks to you, you will reply, yehbo, Nkosi, yes, master! This time the repugnance on the Zulu's face was deeper still and he smoked his cigarette down to a tiny sliver of paper and ash which he pinched out between thumb and forefinger.

Jarnela, he said sternly. You speak words that trouble a man. Mark knew well that the big Zulu's injury was- more serious than his stoic acceptance of it would indicate. It was womanly to show pain.

It would be a long time before he was ready to make the journey by side-car over the rough tracks and rutted dusty roads to the police station and magistrate's court at Ladyburg.

mark put him into the small lean-to tool-shed that he had built on the far wall of the mule stables. it was dry and cool, and had a sturdy door with a Yale padlock. He used blankets from Marion's chest and the mattress she had been saving for the children's room, despite her protests. But he's a native, dear! Every evening, he took the prisoner's meal down to him in the pannikin, inspected the wound and dressed it afresh.

Then while he waited for Pungushe to eat, he sat on the top step in the doorway to the shed and they smoked a cigarette while they talked. If the valley belongs now to King Georgey, how is it that you build your house here, plant your gardens and graze your mules? I am the king's man, Mark explained. You are an induna? Pungushe paused with a spoon of food halfway to his mouth, and stared at Mark incredulously. You are one of the king's counsellors? I am the keeper of the royal hunt. Mark used the old Zulu title, and Purigushe shook his head sadly. My father's father was once the keeper of the royal hunt but he was a man of great consequence, with two dozen wives, a man who had fought in a dozen wars and killed so many enemies that his shield was as thick with oxtails as there is grass on the hills in springtime. The oxtail was the decoration which the king grants a warrior to adorn his shield when he has distinguished himself in battle.

Pungushe finished his meal and added simply, 'King Chaka knew better than to send a child to do man's work. The next evening Mark saw that the wound was healing cleanly and swiftly. The man's tremendous fitness and strength were responsible for that. He was able to sit crosslegged now, and there was a new jauntiness in the way he held his head. It would be sooner than Mark had thought that Pungushe would be fit enough to make the journey to Ladyburg, and Mark felt an odd sinking feeling of regret. King Georgey is doubtlessly a great, wise and all-seeing king, Pungushe opened the evening's debate. Why then does he wait until sundown to begin work that should have been started at dawn? If he wanted to avoid the great emptiness in this valley, his father should have begun the work. The king's affairs are many, in far countries. He must rely on indunas to advise him who are not as wise or allseeing, Mark explained. The Abelungu, the white men, are like greedy children, grabbing up handfuls of food they cannot eat.

Instead they smear it over their faces. There are greedy and ignorant black men also, Mark pointed out. Some who even kill leopards with steel traps for their fur. To sell to the greedy white men, to dress their ignorant women, Pungushe agreed, and that makes the score deuce, Mark thought as he gathered up the empty pannikins.

The next evening Pungushe seemed sad, as at the time of leave-taking.

You have given. me much on which I must think heavI ily, he said. You will have much time to do so, Mark agreed. In between the breaking of rocks. And Pungushe ignored the reference. There is weight in your words, for one who is still young enough to be herding the cattle, he qualified the compliment. Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings, Mark translated into Zulu and Pungushe nodded solemnly, and in the morning he was gone.

He had opened the thatch at the back of the roof, and wriggled through the small hole. He had taken his kaross and left Marion's blankets neatly folded on the mattress.

He had tried for the steel spring-trap, but Mark had locked it in the kitchen, so he had left it and gone northwards in the night.

Mark was furious for so misjudging his prisoner's recovery, and he muttered darkly as he plunged along after him on Trojan. This time I'm going to shoot the bastard on sight, he promised, and realized at that moment that Pungushe had backtracked on him. He had to dismount and laboriously unravel the confused trail.

Half an hour later, Pungushe led him into the river, and it was well after noon when he at last found where the Zulu had left the water, stepping lightly on a fallen log.

He finally lost the cold spoor in the rocky ground on the far rim of the valley, and it was almost midnight when he rode weaffly back to the thatched cottage. Marion had his dinner ready and ten gallons of hot bath water bubbling on the fire.

Six weeks later, Pungushe returned to the valley. Mark sat astounded on the stoep of the cottage, and watched him come.

He walked with the long gliding stride that showed he was fully recovered from his wound. He wore the beaded loin-cloth and the jackal-skin cloak over his shoulders. He carried two of the short-shafted stabbing assegai, with the broad steel blades, and his wives followed at a respectable distance behind him.

There were three of them. They were bare-breasted, with the tall clay headdress of the Zulu matron. The senior was of the same age as her husband, but her dugs were flat and empty as leather pouches and she had lost her front teeth.

The youngest wife was a child still in her teens, a pretty plump little thingwith jolly melon breasts, and a fat brown infant on her hip.

Every wife carried an enormous bundle on her head, balancing it easily without use of hands, and they were followed by a gaggle of naked and half -naked children. Like their mothers, the little girls each carried a headload, the size of it directly proportional to the age and stature of the bearer. The smallest, perhaps four years of age, carried a beer gourd the size of a grapefruit, echoing faithfully the straight erect carriage and swaying buttocks of her seniors.

Mark counted seven sons and six daughters.

I see you, Jamela. Pungushe paused below the stoep. I see you also, Pungushe, Mark acknowledged cautiously, and the Zulu squatted down comfortably on the lowest step. His wives settled down at the edge of Marion's garden, politely out of earshot. The youngest wife gave one of her fat breasts to the infant and he suckled lustily. It will rain tomorrow, said Pungushe. Unless the wind goes into the north. In which case it will not rain again until the full moon. That is so, Mark agreed. Rain now would be good for the grazing. It will bring the silwane down from the Portuguese territory beyond the Pongola.

Mark's astonishment had now given way to lively curiosity. There is talk in the villages, common word among all the people that has only recently come to my ears, Pungushe went on airily. It is said that Jamela, the new keeper of the royal hunt of King Georgey, is a mighty warrior who has slain great multitudes of the king's enemies in the war beyond the sea. The jackal paused and then went on, Albeit, he is still unbearded and green as the first flush of the spring-time grass. Is that the word? Mark inquired politely. It is said that King Georgey has granted Jamela a black oxtail to wear on his shield. A black oxtail is the highest honour, and might loosely be considered the equivalent of a M. M. I am also a warrior, Pungushe pointed out. I fought with Bombata at the gorge, and afterwards the soldiers came and took away my cattle. This is how I became a man of silwane, and a mighty hunter. We are brothers of the spear, Mark conceded. But now I will make ready my isi-A-du-du, my motorcycle, so that we may ride to Ladyburg and speak with the magistrate there of matters of great interest to all of us. Jamela! The Zulu shook his head grievingly, like a father with an obtuse son. You aspire to be a man of the silwane, you aspire to fill the great emptiness, and yet who will there be to teach you, who will open your eyes to see and your ears to hear, if I am in the kraal of King Georgey breaking his rocks? You have come to help me? Mark asked. You and your beautiful fat wives, your brave sons and nubile daughters? It is even so. This is a noble thought, Mark conceded. I am Zulu of royal blood, Pungushe agreed. Also my fine steel trap was stolen from me, even as my cattle were stolen thus making me a poor man once more. I see, Mark nodded. It remains only for me to put out of my mind the business of leopard skins and dead buffalo? It is even so. Doubtless I will also find it in my heart, to pay you for this help and advice. That also is so. What size is the coin in which you will be paid? Pungushe shrugged with disinterest. I am royal Zulu, not a Hindu trader, haggling in the market-place. The coin will be just and fair, he paused delicately, always bearing in mind the multitude of my beautiful wives, my many brave sons and the host of nubile daughters. All of whom have unbelievable appetites. Mark had to remain silent, not trusting himself to speak until he controlled the violent urge to burst out laughing.

He spoke again, solemnly, but with laughter rippling his belly muscles. in what style will you address me, Pungushe? When I speak, will you answer "Yeh ho, Nkosi, Yes, Master. "? Pungushe stirred restlessly, and an expression flitted across the broad smooth features like a fastidious eater who has just discovered a large fat worm on his plate. I will call you Tamela, he said. And when you speak as you have just spoken, I will answer "Jamela, that is a great stupidity. "In what style will I address you? Mark inquired politely, fighting his mirth. You will call me Pungushe. For the jackal is the cleverest and most cunning of all the silwane, and it is necessary for you to be reminded of this from time to time. Then something happened that Mark had not seen before. Pungushe smiled. It was like the break-through of the sun on a grey overcast day. His teeth were big and perfect and white, and the smile stretched so wide that it seemed his face might tear.

Mark could no longer contain it. He laughed out loud, beginning with a strangled chuckle. Hearing it, Pungushe laughed also, a great ringing bell of laughter.

The two of them laughed so long and hard, that the wives fell silent and watched in amazement, and Marion came out on to the stoep. What is it, dear? He could not answer her, and she went away shaking her head at the craziness of men.

At last they both fell silent, exhausted with mirth, and Mark gave Pungushe a cigarette from which he carefully broke the corked tip. They smoked in silence for nearly a minute, then suddenly without warning Mark let out another uncontrolled guffaw, and it started them off again.

The cords of sinew stood out on Pungushe's neck, like columns of carved ebony, and his mouth was a deep pink cavern lined with perfect white teeth. He laughed until the tears ran down his face and dripped from his chin, and when he lost his breath, he let out a great whistling snort like a bull hippo breaking surface, and he wiped the tears away with his thumb and said, Ee, bee! and slapped his thigh like a pistol shot, between each fresh paroxysm of laughter.

Mark ended it by reaching out his shaking right hand, and Pungushe took it in a reverse grip, panting and heaving still.

Pungushe, I am your man, Mark sobbed. And I, Jamela, am yours. There were four men sitting in a semi-circle around the wall of the hotel suite. They were all dressed in such fashion that it seemed a uniform. The dark high-buttoned suits, the glazed celluloid collars and sober neckties.

Although their ages were spread over thirty years, although one of them was bald with grey wisps around his ears and another had a fiery red bush of hair, although one wore a prim gold pince-nez pinched on to a thin aquiline nose while another had the open far-seeing gaze of the farmer, yet all of them had those solid hewn Calvinistic faces, indomitable, unrelenting and strong as granite.

Dirk Courtney spoke to them in the young language Which had only recently received recognition as a separate entity from its parent Dutch, and had been given the name of Afrikaans.

He spoke it with an elegance and precision that softened the reserve in their expressions, and eased the set of jaw and the stiffness in their backs. It's a jingo area, Dirk told them. There is a Union Jack flying on every roof-top. It's a rich constituency, landowners, professional men, your party has no appeal there. He was talking of the parliamentary constituency of Ladyburg. In the last elections you did not even present a candidate, nobody fool enough to lose his deposit, and the Smuts party returned General Courtney unopposed, The eldest of his listeners nodded over his gold pincenez, inviting him to continue. If you are to fight the Ladyburg seat, you will need a candidate with a different approach, an English speaker, a man of property, somebody with whom the voters can identify It was a beautiful performance. Dirk Courtney, handsome, debonair, articulate in either language, striding back and forth across the carpeted lounge, holding all their attention, stopping dramatically to make a point with a graceful gesture of strong brown hands, then striding on again. He talked for half an hour, and he was watching his audience, noting the reaction of each, judging their weaknesses, their strengths.

At the end of that half hour, he had decided that all four of them were dedicated, completely committed to their political faith. They stirred only at appeals to patriotism, to national interest, at reference to the aspirations of their people. So, Dirk Courtney thought comfortably. It's cheaper to buy honest men. Rogues cost good bright gold, while honest men can he had with a few find words and noble sentiments. Give me an honest man every time. One of the older men leaned forward and asked quietly, General Courtney has had the seat since 1910. He is a member of the Smuts Cabinet, a war hero, and a man of huge popular appeal. He is also your father. Do you think the voters will take the young dog when they can have the sire? Dirk answered: I am prepared not only to risk my deposit if I achieve the National Party nomination, but I am confident enough of my eventual success to make a substantial earnest of my serious intentions to the campaign funds of the party. He named a sum of money that made them exchange quick glances of surprise.

In exchange for all this? the elder politician asked. Nothing that is not in the best interest of the nation, and of my constituency, Dirk told them soberly, and he pulled down the map that hung on the far wall facing them.

Again he began to speak, but now with the contagious fervour of the zealot. In burning words, he built up a vision of ploughed fields stretching to the horizon, and sweet clean water running deep in endless irrigation furrows.

The listeners were all men who had farmed and ploughed the rich but hostile soil of Africa, and all of them had searched blue and cloudless skies with hopeless eyes for the rain clouds that never came. The image of deeply turned furrows and slaking water was irresistible.

of course, we will have to repeal the proclamation on the Bubezi Valley, Dirk said it glibly, and not one of them showed shock or concern at the statement. Already they could see the inland sea of sweet limpid water ruffling in the breeze.

If we win at this election, the eldest politician began. No, Menheer, Dirk interrupted gently, when we win. The man smiled for the first time. When we win, he agreed.

Dirk Courtney stood high on the platform, with thumbs hooked into his waistcoat. When he smiled and tilted that noble lion head with the shining mane of curls, the women in the audience that packed the church hall rustled like flowers in the breeze. The Butcher, said Dirk Courtney, and his voice rang with a depth and resonance that thrilled them all, man and woman, young and old. The Butcher of Fordsburg, his hands red with blood of our countrymen. The applause began with the men that Dirk Courtney had in the audience, but it spread quickly. I rode with Sean Courtney against Bornbata -'one man was on his feet, near the back of the hall. I went to France with him, he was shouting to be heard above the applause. And where were you, Mr Dirk Courtney, when the drums were beating? The smile never left Dirk's face, but two little spots of hectic colour rose in his cheeks. Ah! He faced the man across the craning heads of the audience. One of the gallant General's gunmen. How many women did you shoot down at Fordsburg? That doesn't answer my question, the man shouted back, and Dirk caught the eye of one of the two big men who had risen and were closing in quietly on the questioner. Four thousand casualties, so*id Dirk. The Government would like to hide that fact from you, but four thousand men, women and children -The two big men had closed in on their quarry, and Dirk Courtney drew all eyes with a broad theatrical gesture. A Government that has that contempt for the life, property and freedom of its people. There was a brief scuffle, a yelp of pain and the man was hustled out of the side door into the night.

The newspapers started picking it up almost immediately, the same editorials which had ranted against theRed Cabal and the Bolshevik threat, which had praised Smuts"direct and timely action, were now remembering ia high-handed and brutal solution.

Across the nation, begun by Dirk Courtney and picked up by all the Hertzogites, the balance of public feeling was swinging back, like a pendulum, or the curved blade of the executioner's axe.

Dirk Courtney spoke in the Town Hall of Durban, to three thousand, in the Church Hall of Ladyburg to three hundred. He spoke at every country church in the constituency, at little crossroad general-dealer shops where a dozen voters assembled for an evening's entertainment, but always the Press was represented, Dirk Courtney worked slowly northwards, during the day visiting all his land holdings, each of his new cane mills, and each evening he spoke to the little assemblies of voters. Always he was vibrant and compelling, handsome and articulate, and he painted a picture for them of a land crossed with railways and fine roads, of prosperous towns, and busy markets. They listened avidly. There are two, said Pungushe. One is an old lion. I know him well. He stayed last year in Portuguese territory along the north bank of the Usutu River. He was alone then, but now he has found a mate. Where did they cross? Mark asked. They crossed below Ndumu, and came south between the swamp and the river. The lion was five years old, and very cunning, a lean torn, tall at the shoulder and with a short ruff of reddish mane. There was an ugly bald scar across his forehead, and he favoured his right foreleg where a piece of hammered pot-leg fired from a Tower musket two years previously had lodged against the shoulder joint. He had been hunted by man almost without remission since he was a cub, and he was getting old now, and tired.

He crossed the river in the dark, swimming his lioness ahead of him, going south from the hunters who had assembled to drive the bush along the river the next morning. He could hear the drums still beating, and smell'the smoke of their fires. He could hear also the yapping clamour of the dog packs. They had assembled, two or three hundred tribesmen with their hunting dogs and a dozen Portuguese half-breeds with breech-loading rifles, for the lions had killed two trek oxen on the outskirts of one of the river villages. In the morning the hunt would begin, and the lion took his mate south.

She was also a big animal, and though she was still very young and not as experienced, yet she was quick and strong, and she learned from him each day. Her hide was still clean and unscarred by claw or Thorn. Across the back she was a sleek olive tan shading down to a lovely buttery yellow at the throat and fluffy cream on the belly.

She still had traces of her kitten spots dappling her quarters, but the night they swam the Usutu, she came into season for the first time.

On the south bank, they shook the water from their bodies, with fierce shuddering spasms, and then the lion snuffed at her, drumming softly in his throat and then lifting his snout to the bright white stars, his back arching reflexively at the tantalizing musk of her pate blood-tinged oestrous discharge.

She led him half a mile up one of the thickly wooded tributary valleys, and then she crept into the heart of the thicket of tangled bush, a stronghold guarded by the fierce two-inch, wickedly hooked thorns, tipped in red as though they had already drawn blood.

Here in the dawn, he covered her for the first time. She crouched low against the earth, hissing and crackling with angry snarls, while he came over her, biting at her ears and neck, forcing her to submit. Afterwards, she lay close against him, licking at his ears, nuzzling his throat and belly, turning half away from him and nudging him flirtatiously with her hind quarters, until he rose and she crouched down submissively and snarled at him while he mounted her briefly once again.

They mated twenty-three times that day, and in the night they left the Thorn thicket and wandered southwards again.

A half hour before the set of the moon, they reached the edge of the ploughed land, and the lion stopped and growled softly at the smell of man and cattle.

Tentatively he reached out one paw and tested the freshly turned earth, then he drew his leg back and made a little troubled mewing sound of indecision. The lioness brushed herself lovingly against him, but he turned aside and led her along the edge of the ploughed land. Will they reach the valley, Pungushe? Mark asked, leaning out of the saddle to speak to the Zulu as he trotted at Trojan's shoulder.

Pungushe spoke easily, despite the fact he had run without rest for nearly three hours. They must cross almost half a day's march of land where men are working, where the ploughs of the new sugar-growers are busy. Besides, Jamela, they know nothing of your valley, and the mad Ngaga who would welcome them. Mark straightened in the saddle and rode on grimly. He knew that this pair, this mating pair, would be his last chance to have lions in his valley. Yet there was twenty miles of danger to cross such as these animals, coming out of the wilderness of Portuguese Mozambique, would never have experienced before, ploughlands, declared cattle area, where lions were vermin. An area devoid of wild prey, but heavily populated with domestic animals. An area where the cry of Lion would send fifty men running eagerly for a rifle, fifty white men competing fiercely for the trophy, hating the big predatory cats with a blind unthinking hatred, welcoming what was probably their only chance at one of them, safe in the knowledge that they were fair game, unprotected by law in the cattle areas.

The lions came to the camp downwind, and they lay flat in the short grass in the darkness at the edge of the camp.

They listened to the drowsy voices of the men at the fire, and smelled the myriad strange smells, of tobacco smoke, of cooking maize meal and the sour tang of Zulu beer, and they lay very flat and tense against the earth, only their round black-tipped ears cocked and their nostrils flaring and sucking the air.

The oxen were kraaled with a low circular enclosure of felled Thorn trees, arranged with their trunks inward and the bushy thorny tangle outwards. The smell of the cattle was strong and tempting.

There were seventy-two oxen in the kraal, two full spans. They belonged to Ladyburg Sugar Company and they were ploughing the new lands east of Chaka's Gate, after the labour teams had stumped out the standing timber and burned it in long windows.

The lion waited, patient, but alert and tensed and silent, while the silver moon went down below the trees and the men's voices dwindled into silence. He waited while the fires died down into puddles of dull ruddy ash. Then he rose silently.

The lioness did not move, except that the great muscles in her chest and limbs swelled, rigid with tension, and her ears cocked fractionally forward.

The lion circled cautiously upwind of the camp. There was a soft cool wash of breeze coming steadily out of the east and he used it skilfully.

The oxen caught the whiff of lion as he moved into the wind, and he heard them coming up, rising in that awkward plunging leap from where they had settled.

Horns clashed together as they swung into a tight group facing upwind, and one of them let out a soft mournful lowing. Immediately it was taken up, and their low bellows woke the -men at the fires. Somebody shouted, and threw a log on the fire. A torrent of sparks rose into the dark branches of the mimosa and the log caught, lighting the camp with a yellow leaping dancing light. The ploughmen and the lead boys were gathered fearfully around the fire, still with skin karosses draped around their shoulders, owl-eyed with sleep and alarm.

The lion slipped like a shadow, dark and flat against the earth towards the kraal, and the cattle bunched and bellowed wildly at the sharp rank cat smell.

Against the thorny windward side of the kraal, the lion crouched, arched his back and ejected a stream of urine.

The pungent, biting ammoniac stink was too much for the mass of cattle. In a single solid bunch, they swung away downwind and charged the thorny wall of the temporary kraal, crashing through it without check, and they thundered free, quickly spreading, losing the solid formation and scattering away into the night.

The lioness was ready for them, and she streaked in across the flank of the panicking plunging formation, selecting a single victim, a heavy young beast. She drove him onwards, chivvying him like a sheep dog, crossing and recrossing his frantic driving quarters, running him far from the fires and the ploughmen before coming snaking up alongside and hooking expertly at one of his powerfully driving forelegs, and the curved yellow claws biting in just above the hock until they grated against the bone. Then she went back on her own bunched quarters and dragged the leg to cross the other.

The ox dropped as though he had been shot through the brain, and he somersaulted haunch over head, and slid against the earth on his back, all four legs kicking to the starry sky.

In a rubbery flash of supple speed, the cat closed, judging finely the massive hooves that could have crushed her skull and the wide straight horns which could have impaled her rib to rib.

She bit in hard at the base of the skull, driving the long ivory yellow eye teeth into the first and second vertebrae, they crunched sharply like a walnut in the jaws of the cracker.

When the lion came padding hurriedly out of the night, she had already opened the belly cavity of the ox and her whole head was red and toffee sticky with blood as she went for liver and spleen and kidneys.

She flattened her ears against her bloody skull and snarled murderously at him, but he put his shoulder to her flank and pushed her aside, she snarled again and he cuffed her with a lordly paw and began to feed in the hole she had made.

She glared at him for a second, then her ears came erect and she began to lick his shoulder with long pink voluptuous strokes, purring with a deep soft rattle in her throat, pressing her long sleek body against him. The lion tried to ignore her and fed with snuffling grunts and wet tearing ripping sounds.

But she became bolder, the eternal female taking advantage of her new highly attractive condition, liberties which before would have brought swift and stern disciplinary action.

Desperately the lion tried to restrain her by placing a huge paw on her head, claws carefully retracted, and gulped furiously, trying to eat the entire ox before she could join in, but she wriggled out from under the paw and licked his ear. He growled halfheartedly, flickered the ear. She inched forward and licked his eyes, so he had to close them tightly, furrowing his brow and trying to feed blind, but finally he surrendered to the inevitable and allowed her to force her head into the bloody crater.

Side by side, purring and growling softly, they fed.

There were eighteen of them, gathered on the wide mosquito-screened veranda of the foreman's cottage under the hissing Petromax lamps. The brandy bottle had been out since sundown, and most of the men were red-faced and bright-eyed as they listened to Dirk Courtney. There will be schools and hospitals within a twenty mile ride of everybody, he promised, and the women looked up from their knitting. They knew what it was like to raise a young family out here. This is the beginning only, he promised the men. And those of you who were first in will be the first to profit. Once I am in Parliament, you'll have a strong voice speaking up for you. You'll see improvement here you couldn't imagine possible, and quickly. You're a rich man, Mr. Courtney, one of them said. He was a small trader, not directly employed by Ladyburg Sugar, but sufficiently reliant on it to phrase his question with respect. One of the bosses. How come you speak out for the working man? I'm rich because I worked hard, but I know that without you men, I won't be rich much longer. We are linked together like a team.

They nodded and murmured and Dirk went on quickly. One thing I promise you, When I can hire a white man at a-decent wage, I won't push in coolie or nigger labour! They cheered him then, and filled their glasses to toast him. Your present Government, the Smuts men, tried that on the gold mines. Two and tuppence a day for black men, and white men out on the street. When the workers protested, they sent the bloody Butcher of Fordsburg, a man who I am ashamed to call my father, There was an urgent hammering on the kitchen door, and the foreman excused himself quietly and hurried out.

He was back within a minute and whispered to Dirk Courtney. Dirk grinned and nodded, and turned back to his audience. Well, gentlemen, a fine bit of sport in the offing, a lion has killed one of my oxen, down on the new Buli block.

The plough boy has just come in to report it. It happened only an hour ago so we will have an excellent sporting chance at him. May I move closure of this meeting, and we'll meet here again at, he glanced at his watch, at five o'clock tomorrow morning, every man with a horse and rifle!

Mark and Pungushe slept, each under a single blanket, on the sunbaked earth, with Trojan cropping the scraggy dry yellow grass nearby. There was a cold little breeze out of the east, and they woke in the total dark of not-yet dawn and sat over the fire drinking coffee and smoking silently until Pungushe could take the spoor again.

From the back of Trojan it was still too dark to see the ground, but Pungushe ran confidently ahead, forcing the mule into a reluctant lumbering trot to keep pace.

At the edge of the ploughed land, he had to cast, but he cut the lion spoor on its new track almost immediately.

They went off again, with the sunrise outlining the upper branches of the trees, turning them black and spiky against the ruddy gold.

The soft amber rays were without warmth, and threw long distorted shadows of mule and men on the hard red earth.

Mark marvelled once again that the Zulu could run a spoor in this light over such ground, where he could see no mark or sign of the lions passing.

There was a single gun shot, so faint that Mark thought he might have imagined it, but Pungushe stopped instantly and signalled him to rein in the mule.

They stood and listened intently, and suddenly there was a distant popping fusillade, ten, eleven rifle-shots and then silence again.

Pungushe turned and looked at Mark expressionlessly.

The silence was complete, even the morning bird chorus was stilled by the gunfire for a moment. Then as the silence persisted, a troop of little brown francolin started chirruping again on the edge of the ploughed lands. Go on! Mark nodded to Pungushe, trying to keep his face as expressionless, but his voice shook with outrage.

They were too late. The last lions south of the Usutu were dead. He felt sick with helpless anger.

They did not notice Mark until he was right up to them.

They were too excited, too intent on their work.

There were eight white men, all heavily armed and dressed in rough hunting clothes, with two Zulu grooms holding the horses.

In a trampled opening among the mimosa trees lay the half-eaten carcass of a red and wite ox. However, this was not what was engaging their attention. They were grouped in a tight circle beyond the ox, and their voices were raucous, raised in rough jest and cheerful oath.

Mark dismounted and handed the reins to Pungushe. He walked slowly towards the group, dreading what he would find, but he stopped again as one of the men looked up and saw him. He recognized Mark instantly. Ah, warden! Dirk Courtney laughed, tossing that splendid head of glossy curls. We are doing your job for you. The laughter was sly and spiteful, the malice so apparent that Mark knew he was thinking of the bribe that Mark had accepted and then turned against him. Here is one that you can cross off your report, Dirk chuckled again, and gestured for his men to stand aside.

The circle opened and Mark stepped into the opening. The men around him were still red-faced and garrulous, and he could smell the stale liquor on them. Gentlemen, may I present the newly appointed warden of Chaka's Gate proclaimed area. Dirk stood opposite him, across the circle, with one hand thrust carelessly into the pocket of his chamois-leather jacket, a hand-made double barrelled . 450 elephant rifle by Gibbs of London tucked into the crook of his elbow.

The lion lay on its side with legs extended. He was an old, scarred torn, so lean and rangy that each rib showed clearly through the short tan hair. There were four bullet-holes in the body, the one behind the shoulder would have raked both lungs, but another heavy bullet had shattered the skull. The mouth hung open slackly and a little blood-stained saliva still oozed out on to the lolling pink tongue. Congratulations, gentlemen, Mark nodded, and only Dirk Courtney caught the irony in his voice. Yes, he agreed. The sooner we clear this area and make it safe for settlement the better for all. There was a hearty chorus of agreement and one of them produced a brown bottle from his back pocket, and passed it from hand to hand, each in turn pointing its base briefly heavenwards, then exclaiming appreciatively and smacking their lips. What about the lioness? Mark asked quietly, refusing his turn at the bottle. Don't worry about her, one of them assured him. She's down already. I hit her clean in the shoulder. We are just giving her a chance to stiffen up, before we go after her to finish her off. And he drew his sheath knife and began to skin out the carcass of the lion, while his comrades passed loud comment and advice.

Mark walked back to Pungushe who squatted patiently at Trojan's head. The lioness is wounded, but has run. I have seen the spoor, Pungushe nodded, and pointed it out with his eyes, not moving his head. How bad is she hit? I do not know yet. I must see how she settles to run before judging. Take the spoor, said Mark. Let us go quietly, without alerting these mighty hunters. They drifted away from the clearing, leading the mule casually, Mark following a dozen paces behind the Zulu.

Five hundred yards further on, Pungushe stopped and spoke quietly. She is hit in the right shoulder or leg, but I do not think the bone has gone, for she touches with every second pace.

She goes well on three legs, and at first there was a little blood, but it dries quickly. Perhaps she bleeds inside! Mark asked.

If that is so, we will find her within a short while dead, Pungushe shrugged. All right. Mark swung up into the saddle. Let us go swiftly, that we may outrun these others, none of them will be able to follow across such hard ground.

He was too late. Anders! Dirk Courtney shouted, riding up at the head of his band. What the hell do you think you are doing? My job, Mark answered. I'm following a wounded beast. We are coming with you. Mark glanced at Pungushe, and a silent accord flashed between them, then he turned back to the group. You all realize the danger involved? These animals have probably been hunted before, and my tracker thinks the lioness is only lightly hit. There was a little sobering and hesitation, but all eight of them rode on after Pungushe. He went hard, loping away, minza umhlabathi, stretching the horses into an easy canter and after the first hour Dirk Courtney swore bad-temperedly. I don't see any blood. The blood has dried, Mark told him. The wound has closed. The contents of the brown bottle were long ago exhausred. Red faces were sweating heavily in the rising heat, eyes were bloodshot and high good humour turning to headaches and woolly tongues; none of them had remembered to bring a water bottle.

Two of them turned back.

An hour later Dirk Courtney snarled suspiciously, This bloody nigger is giving us a bum run. Tell him I'll take the horse-whip to him. The lioness is going stronglyI don't believe it. I can't see any spoor. Pungushe stopped abruptly, motioned them to stay and went forward cautiously into a low thicket of waterbessie scrub. I've had a guts full of this, muttered one of the hunters miserably.

The too. I've got work to do. Three more of them turned back, and those that remained sat their restless horses until Pungushe emerged from the thicket and beckoned them forward.

In the heart of the thicket, impressed deeply into the soft mound of a mole heap he showed them the umnistakable pad of a lioness. It headed relentlessly southward. All right, Dirk Courtney acknowledged. He's still on the spoor. Tell him to keep going. An hour after noon, the lioness led them on to a low unbroken cap of solid grey granite, and Pungushe sat down wearily. His muscles shone in the sunlight with sweat, as though they had been oiled. He looked up at Mark on the mule and shrugged with an expressive gesture of helplessness. Dead spoor, said Mark. Gone away. Dirk Courtney pulled up his horse's head with a cruel jerk of the curb, and snapped at Mark'Anders. I want to speak to you. He trotted away out of earshot of the group, and Mark followed him.

They stopped and faced each other, and Dirk's mouth was twisted into a pinched and bitter line. This is the second time you have been clever at my expense, he started grimly. You could have had me as an ally, but instead you had my father send me a receipt for my gift Now you and your savage have pulled another trick. I don't know how you did it, but it's the last time it will happen. He stared at Mark, and the slant of the eyes altered, once again that mad malevolent light burned in their depths. A powerful friend I would have been, but a much more powerful enemy I am now. So far only my father's protection has saved you. That will change. No man stands in my way, I swear that to you.

He wheeled his horse, put spurs to it and galloped away.

The other two disconsolate hunters trailed away after him.

Mark rode back to Pungushe, and they drank from the water-bottle and smoked a little before Mark asked, Where is the lioness? We left her spoor two hours back. Mark glanced sharply at him, and Pungushe stood up and walked to another mole heap at the edge of the granite.

He squatted beside it, and with a roll of his open palm outlined the fleshy pad of a lion paw, then he bunched his knuckles and rolled them for the toe marks.

Miraculously, the spoor of a full-grown lion appeared in the soft earth, and Pungushe looked up at Mark's startled unbelieving expression and let out one of those whistling hippo-snorts of laughter, rocking back on his heels delightedly. For two hours we followed the Tokoloshe, "

he hooted.

I cannot see her, said Mark, carefully glassing the shallow wooded valley below them. Oh! Jamela, who cannot see. Where is she, Pungushe? Do you see the forked tree, beyond the three round rocks -'A step at a time he directed Mark's gaze, until suddenly he made out just the two dark round blobs of her ears above the short yellow grass, about six hundred yards from where they sat. She was lying close in under the spread of a thorn thicket, and even as he watched, she lowered her head and the ears vanished. Now that she is alone, she wishes to return to the place she knows well, beyond the Usutu. That is why she moves always that way, when the pain of the wound allows Before they had come up with her, they had found three places where she had lain to rest, and at one such place there had been a smear of blood and a dozen yellow hairs A Tokoloshe is a mythical creature from Zulu magical legend.

glued into the clot. Pungushe had inspected the hairs, minutely; by colour and texture he could tell from which part of the lioness body they had come. High in the right shoulder, and if she was bleeding inside she would be down already. But she is in great pain, for she walks short. The wound has stiffened. She cannot go far. Now Mark swung the glasses towards the west, and longingly stared through them at the blue misty loom of the cliffs of Chaka's Gate, half a dozen miles away. So close, he murmured, so close. But the exhausted cat was dragging herself painfully away from sanctuary, back towards the ploughed lands, towards cattle and men and the dog packs.

Instinctively he turned in that direction now, swinging the binoculars in a long slow traverse across the north and east.

From the low ridge he had a good field of sight, across miles of light forest to the open chocolate expanse of ploughed land.

Something moved in the field of the binoculars and he blinked his eyes and refocused carefully. Three horsemen were coming slowly in their direction, and even at this range Mark could see the dogs running ahead of them.

Quickly he looked back at the leading rider. There was no mistaking that arrogantly erect figure. Dirk Courtney had not given up the hunt. He had merely returned to assemble a hunting-pack, and now the dogs were coming down fast on the smell of the wounded cat.

Mark laid a hand on the hard muscle of Pungushe's shoulder, and with his free hand he pointed. The Zulu stood up and stared for a full minute at the oncoming horsemen, then he began to speak quickly.

Jamela, I will try to call the lioness, and lead her Mark started to ask a question, but Pungushe stopped him harshly. Can you pull the dogs away, or stop them? Mark thought for a moment, then nodded. Give me your snuff, Pungushe. He took the snuff horn that hung on a thong around his neck and handed it to Mark without question. Go, said Mark. Call my lioness for me. Pungushe slipped away down the ridge and left Mark to hurry to Trojan.

There were three sticks of black dried meat left in Mark's food bag. He found two flat stones and pounded the dry meat into a fine powder between them, glancing up every few seconds to see the huntsmen coming on rapidly.

Once the meat was powdered he scooped it into his pannikin and added an ounce of native snuff from the horn, mixin the two powders with his fingers as he ran back down the ridge to intersect the lioness trail at the point they had left it.

When he reached the shoulder of the ridge where the wounded cat had skirted a rocky outcrop, he knelt and made three neat piles of the mixed powder directly in the path of the oncoming dogs.

The dried meat would be irresistible when they reached it, the dogs would sniff at it greedily.

He could hear them already, baying excitedly, coming on swiftly, leading the hunters at a canter. As he ran back up the ridge to where Trojan stood, Mark smiled bleakly.

A hound with a good suck of fiery native snuff up his nose wasn't going to smell anything else for at least twelve hours.

The lioness lay on her side, with her mouth open. She panted for air, and her chest pumped like a blacksmith's bellows, and her eyes were tightly closed.

The bullet had been fired from her right quarter. It was a soft lead slug from a . 45 5 Martini Hendry and it had taken her high in the shoulder, but far forward, cutting in through the heavy muscle and grazing the big joint of the shoulder, lacerating sinew and shattering that extraordinary small floating bone, found only in the shoulder of a lion, the lucky bone so prized as a hunter's talisman.

The bullet had missed the artery as it plunged into the neck and lodged there beneath the skin, a lump the size of the top joint of a man's thumb.

The flies swarmed joyously into the mouth of the wound, and she lifted her head and snapped at them, and then mewing softly at the agony that movement had caused, she began to lick the bullet hole carefully, the long tongue rasping roughly against her hide, curling pink and dextrous as it cleansed the fresh little trickle of watery blood that had sprung from it. Then she sank back wearily and closed her eyes again.

Pungushe was aware of the wind in the same way as the helmsman of a tall ship is, for it was as important to him as it is to a mariner. He knew exactly at each moment of the day its force and direction, anticipated any change before it occurred and he did not have to carry an ash bag nor wet a finger, the knowledge was instinctive.

Now he moved carefully into a downwind position from the wounded animal. It did not occur to him to thank any providence for the constant easterly breeze that put him fairly between the cat and the near boundary of Chaka's Gate.

Silent as the cloud shadow moves across the earth, he moved in on the cat, judging the extreme limit of her acute hearing before kneeling facing where she lay three hundred yards away.

He filled and deflated his lungs rapidly a dozen times, the great muscled chest swelling and subsiding as he built up reserves of oxygen in his blood. Then he caught a full breath and stretched out his neck at a peculiar angle, cupping his hands to his gaping mouth to act as a sounding board.

From the depths of the straining chest issued a low drumming rattle, that rose and sank to a natural rhythm and ended with an abrupt little cough.

The lioness'head came up in a single flash of movement, her ears erect, her eyes alight with yellow lights, for in her pain and fear and confusion she had heard the old lion calling to her, that low, far-carrying assembly call with which he had directed her hunting so often, and which he had used to bring her to him when separated in thick bush.

The pain of rising was almost too much for her, the wound had stiffened and her neck and shoulder and chest were crushed under a granite boulder of agony, but at that moment she heard for the first time the distant yelping chorus of the dog pack. She and the old lion had been hunted by dogs before, and the sound gave her strength.

She came up and stood for a moment on three legs, favouring the right fore, panting heavily and then she went forward, whining softly at the pain, carrying the bad leg high, lunging for balance at each stride.

Mark watched from the ridge, saw the yellow cat start to move again, hobbling slowly westwards at last. Far ahead of her, keeping out of sight, the big Zulu trotted, pausing whenever she faltered to kneel and repeat the assembly call of a dominant male lion, and each time the lioness answered him with eager little mewling grunts and hobbled after him, westward towards the dreaming blue hills that guarded the Bubezi valley.

Mark had heard the old hunters stories before; old man Anders had always claimed that his gunbearer, who had been killed by an elephant on the Sabi River in 84, could call lions. However, Mark had never seen it done, and secretly had put the story into the category of the picturesque but apocryphal.

Now he saw it happening, and still wanted to doubt it.

He watched fascinated from his grandstand upon the ridge, and only a change in the clamour of the dog pack made him swing his binoculars back towards the east.

At the rocky shoulder of the ridge, where he had set his bait of powdered biltong and snuff, the pack milled confusedly. There were eight or nine dogs, a mongrel pack of terriers and boer hounds and ridgebacks.

The determined hunting chorus had disintegrated into a cacophony of whines and yelps, while Dirk Courtney over rode them, standing in his stirrups to lay about them furiously with the horse-whip.

Mark took Trojan's reins and led him down off the ridge, using what little cover there was, but confident that the huntsmen were too involved with their own problems to look ahead and see him.

When he reached the place beside the Thorn thicket where the lioness had last lain, he cut a branch with his clasp knife, and used it like a broom to brush away any sign the cat had left.

He followed slowly westwards towards Chaka's Gate, pausing every few minutes to listen for the drumming lion call, watching the ground as he moved, and using the branch to brush away all lion sign, covering for his lioness, until in the dusk they climbed a low saddle through the hills and in slow, drawn-out procession, went down to the Bubezi River.

Pungushe made his last call in darkness, and then ran out in a wide circle, leaving the lioness within a hundred yards of the river, knowing how she would be burned up by the heat of the wound and crazed for water.

He found Mark by the glow of his cigarette. Get up, said Mark, and gave him an arm. Pungushe did not argue. He had run almost without a pause since before dawn, and he swung up behind Mark.

They rode home, two up on Trojan's broad sway back, and neither of them spoke until they saw the lantern light in the cottage window.

Jamela, said Pungushe. I feel the way I did the day my first son was born. And there was a tone of wonder in his voice. I did not believe a man could feel thus for a devil that kills cattle and men. Lying in the darkness, with Marion beside him in the double bed, Mark told her about it. Trying to convey the wonder and the sense of achievement. He told her what Pungushe had said, and stumbled for words to describe his own feelings, to come haltingly at last into silence. That's very nice, dear. When are you going into town again? I want to buy some curtains for the kitchen. I thought a checked gingham would look pretty, what do you think, dear? The lioness gave birth to her cubs in the thick jessie bushes that choked one of the narrow tributary valleys which came down off the escarpment.

There were six cubs, but they were almost three weeks old when Mark first saw them. He and Pungushe lay belly down on the edge of the cliff that overlooked the valley when she led them back from the river in the dawn. The cubs followed her in an untidy straggle spread over a hundred yards.

The sinew in her right fore had healed crooked and slightly shorter, which gave her a heaviness in her gait, a roll like a sailor's, as she came up the draw. One of the cubs, more persistent than the rest was trying to suckle from her pendulant, heavy, multiple dugs as she walked.

He kept making clumsy flying leaps at them as they swung above his head, mostly he fell on his head and got trodden on by his mother's back feet, but once he succeeded and hung like a fat brown tick on one nipple. The lioness whirled about and cuffed him left and right, then began to lick him with a tongue that wrapped around his head entirely and knocked him on his back again.

One of the other cubs was stalking his siblings, crouching in ambush behind a single blade of grass, with flattened ears and viciously slitted eyes. When he leapt out on his brothers and sisters and they totally ignored his warlike manoeuvres, he covered his embarrassment by turning back and sniffing the grass blade with such attention that it seemed this had been his original intention.

Three of the others were hunting butterflies. There had been a new hatching of colotis lone. On white and purple wings they fluttered close to the earth and the cubs reared on their hind legs and boxed at them with more gusto than skill, over-balancing at the end of each attack and collapsing in a fluffy tangle of outsized paws.

The sixth cub was hunting the tails of the butterflyhunters. Every time they slashed their little tufted tails in the feverish excitement of the chase, he pounced upon them with savage growls and they were forced to turn and defend themselves against the sting of his needle-sharp baby teeth.

The progress of the family from river to jessie thicket was a long drawn out series of unseemly brawls, which the lioness finally broke up. She turned back and gave that drumming cough which promised imminent retribution if not obeyed instantly. The cubs abandoned their play, formed an Indian file and trotted after the lioness into the shelter of the jessie. I would like to know how many females there are in the litter, Mark whispered, grinning fondly like a new father as he watched them go. If you wish, Jamela, I will go down and look under their tails, Pungushe offered solemnly. And you will treat my widows generously. Mark chuckled and led the way back down the side of the hill.

They had almost reached the tree where Mark had left Trojan, when something caught his eyes. He turned aside and kicked hopefully at the little heap of stones, before he realized that they had not been erected by human hands, but had been pushed up by the surface roots of a siringa tree.

He gave a grunt of disappointment and turned away.

Pungushe watched him speculatively, but made no comment.

He had seen Mark perform that strange little ritual a hundred times before, whenever an unusual rock or pile caught his attention.

It had become a custom that every few evenings Mark would wander across from the thatched cottage at main camp, half a mile to where Pungushe's wives had erected the cluster of huts that was the family home.

Each hut was shaped in the perfect cone of a beehive, long whippy saplings bent in to form the framework and the thatch bound in place by the plaited string of bark stripped from the saplings.

The earth between the huts was smoothed and brushed, and Pungushe's carved wooden stool set before the low doorway of his personal sleeping hut. After Mark's fourth visit another, newly carved stool appeared beside it.

Though it was never spoken of, it was immediately apparent that this had been reserved exclusively for Mark's visits.

Once Mark was seated, one of the wives would bring him a bowl to wash his hands. The water had been carried laboriously all the way from the river, and Mark merely damped his fingertips so that it would not be wasted.

Then the youngest wife knelt in front of him, smiling shyly, and offered with both hands a pot of the delicious sour utshwala, the Zulu millet beer, thick as gruel and mildly alcoholic.

Only when Mark had swallowed the first mouthful would Pungushe look up and greet him. I see you, Jamela. Then they could talk in the relaxed desultory fashion of men totally at ease in each other's company. Today, when we came down off the hill after watching the lions, you turned off the path and kicked at some stones. It was for this strange custom I named you, this endless seeking, this looking and never finding Pungushe would never ask the direct question, it would have been the grossest bad manners to ask outright what r Mark was looking for; only a child or an umlungu, a white man, would be so callow. It had taken him many months to ask the question, and now he framed it in the form of a statement.

Mark took anotherpull athis beerpot and offered Pungushe his cigarette case. The Zulu declined with an open hand, and instead began to roll his own smoke, coarse tarry black tobacco in a thick roll of brown paper, the size of a Havana cigar. Watching his hands Mark replied:My father and my mother died of the white sore throat, diphtheria, when I was a child, and an old man became both father and mother to me. He started to answer the question in as devious a manner as it had been asked, and Pungushe listened, nodding and smoking quietly. So this man, my grandfather whom I loved, is buried somewhere in this valley. It is his grave I seek, he ended i simply, and realized suddenly that Pungushe was staring at him with a peculiar sombre expression.

What is it? Mark asked. When did this happen? Six seasons ago. Would this old man have camped beneath the wild figs? Pungushe pointed down the valley. Where first you camped? Yes, Mark agreed. He always camped there. He felt the surge of something in his chest, foreknowledge of something momentous about to happen. There was a man, said Pungushe, who wore a hat, a hat under which an impi could have camped, and he made a circle of his arms, exaggerating only a little the size of a double terai brim, and who had a beard, shaped thus like the wings of a white egret, An image of the old man's forked beard, snowy and stained only around the mouth with tobacco juice, leapt in Mark's mind. An old man who walked like the secretary bird when it hunts for locusts in the grass. The long thin legs, the stooped arthritic shoulders, the measured stride, the description was perfect. Pungushe! Mark exploded with excitement. You know him" Nothing moves in this valley, no bird flies, no baboon barks, but the jackal hears and sees. Mark stared at him, appalled at his own oversight. Of course Pungushe knew everything. Pungashe the silent watcher, why in God's name had he not thought to ask him before? He followed this path" Pungushe walked ahead of Mark, and with the natural skill of the born actor he mimicked John Anders, the halting gait, and stooped shoulders of an old man. If Mark half closed his eyes, he could see his grandfather as he had seen him so many times before. Here he turned off the path, Pungushe left the game trail and started up one of the narrow dried-out watercourses. Their feet crunched in the sugary sand. Half a mile further, Pungushe stopped and pointed at one of the shiny water-polished black boulders. Here he sat and set his rifle aside. He lit his pipe and smoked. Pungushe turned and scrambled up the steep bank of the water-course. While the old man smoked, the fourth man came up the valley. He came as a hunter, silently, following the easy spoor of the old man. He used the Zulu word of respect for an elder, ixhegu. Wait, Pungushe, Mark frowned. You say the fourth man? I am confused. Count the men for me.

They squatted down on the bank and Pungushe took a little snuff, offered the horn to Mark who refused, then sniffed the red powder out of his palm, closing one nostril at a time with his thumb. He screwed his eyes closed and sneezed deliciously before going on.

There was the old man, your grandfather, ixl2egu. That is one. Then there was another old man. Without hair on his head nor on his chin. That is two, Mark agreed. Then there was a young man with very black hair, a man who laughed all the time and walked with the noise of a buffalo herd. Yes. That is three. These three came together to the valley. They hunted together and camped together below the wild figs. Pungushe must be describing the Greylings, the father and son who had made the sworn deposition to the Ladyburg magistrate.

That was as he had expected, but now he asked, What of the fourth man, Pungushe? The fourth man followed them secretly and ixhegu, your grandfather, did not know of him. He had always the manner of the hunter of men, watching from cover and moving silently. But once when your grandfather, ixhegu, had left camp to hunt alone for birds along the river, this secret man came to the camp below the wild figs and all three of them spoke together, quietly but with closed faces and wary eyes of men who discuss affairs of deadly moment. Then the silent man left them again and went to hide in the bush before ixhegu returned.

$you saw all this, Pungushe? Mark asked. What I did not see, I read in the spoor. Now I understand about the fourth man. Tell me what happened that dayIxhegu was sitting there, smoking his pipe, Pungushe pointed down into the water-course. And the silent one came and stood here, even where we now sit, and he looked down at your grandfather without speaking, holding his isibamu, his rifle, thus. What did ixhegu do then? Mark asked. He felt nauseous with the horror of it. He looked up and asked a question in a loud voice, as a man does when he is afraid, but the silent one did not reply. Then? I am sorry, jamela, knowing that ixhegu was of your blood, the telling o it gives me pain. Go on, said Mark. Then the silent one fired once with his rifle, and ixhegu fell face down in the sand. He was dead? Mark asked, and Pungushe was silent a moment. He was not dead. He was shot here, in the belly. He moved, he cried out. The silent one fired again? Mark felt the acid bite of vomit in the back of his throat.

Pungushe shook his head. What did he do? He sat down on the bank, here where we sit, and he smoked silently, watching the old man ixhegu lying down there in the sand, until he died. How long did he take to die? Mark asked in a choked, angry voice.

Pungushe swept a segment of the sky to indicate two hours of the sun's course. At the end ixhegu was calling out in Zulu as well as his own language. What did he say, Pungushe? He asked for water, and he called to God and to a woman who might have been his mother or his wife. Then he died. Mark thought about it with surges of nausea alternating with flashes of bitter hating anger, and racking grief. He tried to imagine why the killer had let his victim die so slowly, and it was many minutes before he remembered that the story must have already been arranged that the old man was to die in a hunting accident. No man accidentally shoots himself twice. The body was to have only one gunshot wound.

But, the stomach was always the most agonizing wound. Mark remembered how the got -wounded screamed in the trenches as they were being carried back by the stretcher-bearers.

grieve with you, jarnela.

mark roused himself at Pungushe's words. What happened after ixhegu died? The other two men, the old bald one and the young loud one, came from the camp. All three of them talked here, beside the body. They talked for a long time, with shouting and red angry faces, and they waved their hands thus, and thus. Pungushe imitated men in heated argument. One pointed here, another pointed there, but in the end the silent one spoke and the other two listened. Where did they take him? First they opened his pockets, and took from them some papers and a pouch. They argued again, and the silent one took the papers and put them back in the dead man's pockets, Mark realized the wisdom of this. An honest man does not rob the corpse of an accident victim. Then they carried him up the bank, and this way, Pungushe stood and led Mark four hundred yards into the forest, below the first steep gradient of the escarpment. Here they found a deep ant-bear hole, and they pushed the old man's body down into it. Here? Mark asked. There was short rank grass and no sign of a cairn nor a mound. I see nothing. They collected rocks from the cliff there and placed them in the hole on top of the body, so that the hyena would not dig it out. Then they covered the rocks with earth, and they smoothed it with a tree branch.

Mark went down on one knee and inspected the ground. Yes, he exclaimed. There was a very shallow depression in the earth, as though it had subsided a little over an excavation.

Mark drew his sheath-knife and blazed four of the nearest trees, making it easier to return to this place, and he built a small pyramid of rocks on the depressed saucer of earth.

When he had finished, he asked Pungushe, Why did you not tell anybody of this before? Why did you not go to the police in Ladyburg?

jamela, the madness of white men does not concern me.

Also it is a very long journey to Ladyburg, to the policeman who would say, Ho, kaffir, and what were you doing in the Bubezi Valley to see such strange events? Pungushe shook his head. No, jamela, sometimes it better for a man to be blind and deaf. Tell me truly, Pungusbe. If you saw these men again, would you remember them? All white men have faces like boiled yams, red, lumpy and without shape. Then Pungushe remembered his manners. Except you, jamela, who are not so ugly as all thatThank you, Pungushe. So you would not know them again? The old bald one and the young loud one I might know Pungushe furrowed his brow in thought.

And the silent one? Mark asked. Ho. Pungushe's brow cleared. Does one forget what a leopard looks like? Does one forget the killer of men? The silent one I would remember at any time and in any place. Good! Mark nodded. Go back home now, Pungushe. He waited until the big Zulu was out of sight among the trees, then Mark went down on his knees and removed his hat. Well, Pops, he said, I'm not very good at this. But I know you'd have liked to have the words said. His voice was so hoarse and low that he had to clear his throat loudly before he went on.

The house on Lion Kop was shuttered, and the furniture all under white dust sheets, but the head servant met Mark in the kitchen yard. Nkosi has gone to Tekweni. He left two weeks ago.

He gave Mark a breakfast of grilled bacon and fried eggs.

Then Mark went out and mounted his motorcycle again.

It was a long hard run down to the coast, and Mark had plenty of time to think as the dusty miles spun away under the wheels of the Ariel Square Four.

He had left Chaka's Gate within hours of finding the old man's grave, going instinctively to one man for advice and guidance.

He had wanted Marion to come with him, at least as far as Ladyburg where she could have stayed with her sister.

However Marion had refused to leave her home or her garden, and Mark had felt secure in the knowledge that Pungushe would be sleeping in the toolshed behind the stables to guard the homestead in Mark's absence.

Mark had waded the river and trudged up the slope below to the beginning of the track where he kept the motorcycle in its thatched shelter.

It had been a slow, bumpy journey in the dark, and he had reached Lion Kop in the dawn to find Sean Courtney had moved his household to Durban.

Mark rode through the gates of Emoyeni in the late afternoon, and it was like coming home again.

Ruth Courtney was in the rose garden, but she dropped the basket of cut flowers and lifted her skirts to her knees as she ran to meet him, the wide-brimmed straw hat flying from her head and hanging by its ribbon around her throat and her delighted spontaneous laughter ringing like a young girl's. Oh Mark, we've missed you so. She took him in a motherly embrace, kissing both his cheeks. How brown and hard you look, and you've filled out beautifully. She held him at arm's length and felt his biceps in mock admiration before embracing him again. The General will be delighted to see you. She took Mark's arm and led him towards the house. He hasn't been well, Mark, but seeing you again will be a tonic to him. Mark stopped involuntarily in the doorway and felt the shock dry the saliva under his tongue.

General Sean Courtney was an old man. He sat at the bay windows of the bedroom suite. He wore a plaid dressing-gown and a mohair rug was tucked around his legs.

On the table beside him was a pile of files and reports, Parliamentary White Papers and a sheath of letters, all the documentation of his life that Mark remembered so well, but the General had fallen asleep, and the metal-rimmed spectacles had slid down on to the tip of his nose. He snored softly, his lips fluttering at each breath. His face seemed to have wasted so that the bones of cheek and brow stood out gauntly. His eyes receded into deep plum purple cavities, and his skin had a greyish lifeless tinge to it.

But the truly shocking thing was the colour of his beard and the once thick bush of his hair. On Sean Courtney the late snows were falling. His beard had turned into a silver cascade, and his hair was as white and as thin as the fine sun-bleached grasses of the Kalahari desert.

Ruth crossed to his chair and lifted the spectacles off his nose, then gently, with a loving wife's concern, she touched his shoulder. Sean, darling. There is somebody here to see you.

He woke the way an old man wakes, blinking and mumbling, with small inconclusive movements of his hands.

Then he saw Mark and his expression firmed, suddenly there was a little of the old sparkle in the dark eyes and the warmth in his smile. My boy! he said, lifting his hands, and Mark stepped forward quite naturally. Then for the first time they embraced like father and son, and afterwards Sean beamed at him fondly. I was beginning to believe we had lost you for ever to the ways of the wild. Then he looked up at Ruth beside his chair. In celebration I think we can advance the hour a little, my dear. Won't you have Joseph bring up the tray? Sean, you know what the doctor said yesterday. But Sean snorted with disgust. For fifty years, man and boy, my stomach has got used to its evening dash of John Haig pinch bottle. Lack of it will kill me more swiftly and surely than Doctor Henderson and all his pills and potions and blatant quackeries. He placed one arm about her waist and squeezed her winningly. There's a bonnie girl! When Ruth had gone, smiling and shaking her head disapprovingly, Sean waved Mark to the chair opposite him. What does the doctor say is wrong with you, sir? Doctor! Sean blew through his lips. The older I get, the less faith I have in the whole sorry bunch. He reached for the cigar box. They even wanted me to stop these. What on earth is the use of living, if you have to give up all the processes of life -I ask you. He lit the cigar with a flourish and drew on it with relish. I'll tell you what's wrong with me, son. Too many years of running hard, of fighting and riding and working. That's all it is. Now I'm having a nice little rest, and in a week or so I'll be chipper and fly as I ever was. Ruth brought the silver tray and they sat until it was dark, talking and laughing. Mark told them of the life at Chaka's Gate, about each little triumph, describing the cottage and the work done on the roads; he told them of the buffalo and the lioness and the cubs, and Sean told him of the progress made by their Wildlife Society.

It's disappointing, Mark, nothing like I had hoped for.

It's extraordinary just how little people care about things that don't affect their daily lives directly. I never expected instant success. How can people care about something they have never seen? Once we have made the wilderness accessible, once people can have the experience, like seeing these cubs, it will begin then. Yes, Sean agreed thoughtfully. That's what the true object of the Society is. To educate them. They talked on while darkness fell and Ruth closed the shutters and drew the curtains. Mark waited for an opportunity to speak of the true reason for his coming to Emoyeni, but he was uncertain of how it might affect a man who was already sick.

At last he could wait no longer. He drew a deep breath, hoped for grace, and told it quickly and without trimmings, repeating Pungushe's story exactly and describing what he had seen himself.

When he finished, Sean was silent for a long time, staring into his glass. At last he roused himself and began asking questions, shrewd cutting questions that showed his mind was as quick and crisp as it had been before.

Have you opened the grave? and Mark shook his head. Good, said Sean and went on. This Zulu, Pungushe, was the only witness. How reliable is he? They discussed it for another half hour, before Sean asked the one question he had obviously been avoiding.

You think Dirk Courtney is responsible for this?

Yes, Mark nodded. What proof is there? He is the only one who could have profited by my grandfather's murder, and the style is his. I asked what proof there is, Mark. There is none, he admitted, and Sean was silent again while he weighed it all. Mark, I understand just how you feel, and I think you know how I feel. However, there is nothing we can do now that will have any effect, beyond alerting the murderer, whoever he is. He leaned forward in his chair and stretched out a hand to grip Mark's forearm in a gesture of comfort. All we have now is the unsupported testimony of a Zulu poacher who speaks no English. A good lawyer would eat him without spitting out the bones, and Dirk Courtney would have the best lawyer, even if we could trace this mysterious "Silent One" to him and get him into court. We need more than this, Mark. I know, Mark nodded. But I thought we might be able to trace the Greyling father and son. They went to Rhodesia, I believe. The foreman at Ladyburg railway station told me that. Yes, I'll get somebody on to that. My lawyers will know a good investigator. He made a note on the pad at his side. But in the meantime, we can only wait. They talked on, but it was clear that the discussion had tired Sean Courtney, and grey and blue shadows etched the lines and wrinkles on his face. He settled down a little deeper in his chair, his beard lowered on to his chest and suddenly he had fallen asleep again. He sagged slowly sideways, the crystal glass fell from his hand to the carpet with a soft thud and splattered a few drops of whisky, and he snored a soft single snort.

Ruth picked up the glass, arranged the rug carefully around his shoulders and signalled Mark to follow her.

In the passage she chatted brightly. I have told Joseph to make up your bed in the blue room, and there is a good hot bath waiting. There will be only the two of us for dinner, Mark. The General will have a tray in his room. They had reached the door of the library and Mark could be silent no longer. He caught Ruth's arm. Mrs Courtney, he pleaded. What is it? What is wrong with him? The bright smile faded slowly, and she swayed slightly on her feet. Now for the first time he noticed how the few strands of white . had turned to deep iron grey wings at her temples. He saw also the little lines and creases around her eyes, and the deeper furrows of worry across her brow. His heart is broken, she said simply, and then she was weeping. No hysterical sobs or wild cries of grief, but a slow deep welling up of tears that was more harrowing, more poignant than any theatrical display. They have broken his heart, she repeated, and swayed again, so that Mark caught and steadied her.

She clung to him, her face pressed to his shoulder. First the estrangement from Dirk and then Michael's death, she whispered. He never let it show, but they destroyed some part of him. Now the whole world has turned against him. The people to whom he has devoted his life in peace and war. The newspapers call him the Butcher of Fordsburg, Dirk Courtney has whipped them upon him like a pack of wild dogs. He led her into the library and made her sit on the low buttoned sofa while he knelt beside her and found a crumpled handkerchief in his jacket pocket. on top of it all, there is Storm. The way she ran off and married that man. He was a horrible man, Mark. He even came here asking for money, and there was a terrible scene.

That's when Sean had his first attack, that night. Then finally there was further shame, further heartbreak when Storm was divorced. It was all too much, even for a man like Sean.

Mark stared at her. Storm is divorced? he asked softly.

Yes, Ruth nodded, and then her expression lightened. Oh Mark, I know you and Storm were becoming such good friends. I am sure she is fond of you. Can't you go to her? it might be the cure for which we all pray. Umhlanga Rocks was one of those little seaside villages that were scattered along the sandy coast line on each side of the main port of Durban. Mark crossed the low bridge over the Umgeni River, and headed north.

The road cut through the thick jungly coastal bush, dense as an equatorial forest, and hung with ropes of hanas from which the little blue vervet monkeys swung and chattered.

The road ran parallel with the white beaches, but at the twelfth milestone Mark reached the turn-off and went directly down to the coast.

The village was clustered around the iron-roofed Oyster Box Hotel where Mark and Dicky Lancome had danced and dined with Marion and that other nameless girl so long ago.

The only other buildings were twenty or thirty cottages set in large gardens, over-run by the rampant jungle, and overlooking the sea with its rowdy frothing surf and rocky points jutting out from the smooth white beaches.

Ruth had given him accurate directions andMark parked the motorcycle on the narrow dusty lane and followed the pathway that wound without apparent direction through a wild garden of purple bougainvillaea and brilliant poinsettia.

The cottage was small, and the bougainvillaea had climbed up the pillars of the veranda and spread in brilliant, almost blinding display across the thatched roof.

Mark knew at once that he had the right place, for Storm's Cadillac was parked in the open under the trees.

It looked neglected and in careless disrepair. The tread was worn from the tyres, there was a long deep scratch down one side. A side window was cracked, and the paintwork was dull with dust and splattered with the dung of the fruit bats hanging in the tree above.

Mark stopped and stared at the Cadillac for a full minute.

The Storm he had known would have stamped her foot and screamed for her father if anybody had tried to make her ride in that.

Mark climbed the veranda steps, and paused to look about him. It was a peaceful and lovely spot, such as an artist might choose, but in its remoteness and its neglected and untrimmed profusion hardly suitable for one of the elegant young ornaments of society.

Mark knocked on the front door, and heard somebody moving about inside for some minutes before the door was opened.

Storm was more beautiful by far than he had remembered. Her hair was long and bleached at the ends by salt water and sun. Her feet were bare, her arms and legs were tanned and slim and supple as ever, but it was her face that had changed.

Although she wore no cosmetics, the skin had the shine of vibrant youth like the lustre inside a sea shell, and her eyes were clear and bright with health, yet there were new depths to them, the petulant set of her mouth had softened, her arrogance had become dignity.

in that moment as they stared at each other he knew that she had indeed grown from girl to woman in the time since he had last seen her. And he sensed that the process had been agonizing, but that from it all was emerging a new value, a new strength, and the love which had been in him all this time spread out to fill his soul. Storm, he said, and her eyes opened wide as she stared at him. You! Her voice was a little cry of pain, and she tried to drag the door closed.

Mark jumped forward and held it. Storm, I must speak with you.

She tugged desperately at the door handle. Go away, Mark. Please go away. All the new dignity and poise seemed to crumble and she looked at him with the wide frightened eyes of a child waking from nightmare.

At last she knew that she could not force the door against his strength, and she turned away and walked slowly back into the house. You shouldn't have come, she said miserably, and the child seemed to sense the changed air. It squalled. Oh hush, baby, Storm called softly, but her voice goaded it into a fresh outburst, and she crossed the room on bare feet with the long veil of hair hanging down her back.

The room was starkly furnished, the cement floor bare and cool, no rugs to soften them, but along the walls were stacked her canvases, many of them blank, but others half-finished, or completed, and the familiar evocative smell of turpentine was heavy and pungent.

The child lay belly down on a kaross of monkey skins laid out on the cement floor. Legs and arms were spread in that froglike baby attitude, and except for a towelling napkin around the hips, it was naked and suntanned. The head was thrown back angrily, and the face flushed with the force of its yells.

Mark stepped into the room, and stared with sickly fascination at the child. He knew nothing of babies, but he could see that this was a sturdy and aggressively healthy small animal. The limbs were strong, kicking and working with a violent swimming motion, and the back was broad and robust. Hush now, darling, cooed Storm, she knelt beside him, and lifted him under the armpits. The napkin slid down to the child's knees and there was no doubting that he was a boy. His tiny penis stuck out at half mast, like a white finger with its little floppy chef's cap of loose wrinkled skin.

Mark found himself hating this Other man's child, with a sudden frightening hatred. Yet he went forward involuntarily to where Storm knelt with the baby in her lap.

Mother's touch had quelled the shouts of anger, and now the boy was smacking his lips and making little anticipatory hunger grants and pawing demandingly at Storm's bosom.

The child had a fine golden cap of hair, through which Mark could see the perfect round of his skull and the little blue veins under the almost translucent skin. Now that the furious crimson tide of anger had receded from his face, Mark saw how beautiful was the child, as beautiful as the mother, and he hated it, he hated it with a bitter sickening feeling in his stomach, and a corrosive taste in his mouth.

He moved closer, watching Storm wipe a dribble of saliva from the child's chin and hoist up his napkin to his waist.

The child became aware of a stranger. He started and lifted his head to stare at Mark, and there was something hauntingly familiar in that face. The eyes that looked at him had looked at him before, he knew them so well. You should not have come, said Storm, busy with her baby, not able to lift her eyes to him. Oh God, Mark, why did you come? Mark went down on one knee and stared into the child's face, and it reached out towards him with a pair of plump hands, dimpled and pink and damp with spit, What is his name? Mark asked. Where had he seen those eyes? involuntarily, he extended his forefinger and the child grabbed it with a fat little chuckle and tried to stuff it into his mouth.

john, Storm. answered, still not looking at him.

John was my grandfather's name, Mark said huskily. Yes, whispered Storm. You told me. The words meant nothing for a moment, all he was aware of was that the hatred he felt for this little scrap of humanity slowly faded. In its place there grew something else.

Then suddenly he knew where he had seen those eyes.

Storm? he asked.

Now she lifted her head, and stared into his face. When she replied she was half proud and half defiant.

Yes! she said, and nodded once.

He reached for her clumsily. They knelt facing each other on the monkey-skin kaross, and they embraced fiercely, the child held awkwardly between them, gurgling and hiccuping and drooling merrily as it chewed Mark's finger with greedy toothless gums. Oh God, Mark, what have I done to us? whispered Storm brokenly.

Baby John woke them in the silvery slippery-grey light of before dawn. Mark was grateful to him, for he did not want to miss a minute of that coming day. He watched Storm light the candle and then work over the cradle.

She made small soothing sounds as she changed the baby, and the candlelight glowed on the sweet clean lines of her naked back. Dark silky hair hung over her shoulders, and he saw that childbirth had not thickened her waist, it still had the flared graceful line, like the neck of a wine bottle above the tight round double, bulge-, of her buttocks.

At last she turned and carried the baby to the bed, smiling at Mark as he lifted the blankets for her. Breakfast time, she explained. Will excuse us, please? She sat cross-legged in the bed, and she took one of her nipples between thumb and forefinger and directed it into the open questing mouth.

Mark drew as close as he could and placed one arm around Storm's shoulders. He watched with total fascination. Her breasts were big now, and heavy, jutting out into rounded cones. There was a pale blue dappling of active veins deep below the skin, and the nipples were'the colour of almost ripe mulberries, with the same rough shiny texture. The child's tugging induced a sympathetic blue-white drop of milk to well, from the tip of her other breast. It glistened likeke a pearl in the candlelight.

John fed with tightly closed eyes and piglet grunts and snuffles. The milk ran from the corners of his mouth, and after the first pangs of his hunger were appeased, Storm had to prod him to keep him from falling asleep again.

At each prod, his jaw worked-busily for a minute or so, and then the level of activity slowly declined until the next prod.

Storm changed him from one breast to the other and laid her own cheek gratefully against the hard lean muscle of Mark's chest. I think I am happy, she murmured. But I've been unhappy for so long that I am not quite sure. John lay in a puddle of sea water two inches deep. He was stark naked and brown all over to prove this was no unusual state. He slapped at the water with both hands, and it splashed into his face so that he gasped and blinked his eyes and licked his lips, uncertain whether to be angry or to cry. Instead he repeated the experiment with exactly the same consequences, and he spluttered sand and sea water. Poor little devil, Storm watched him. He has inherited the Courtney pride and stubbornness. He won't give up until he drowns himself. She lifted him from the puddle and there was instantly such a howl of protest that she had to return him hurriedly. I am sure if you went to the General, with John, Mark persevered. You don't really understand us Courtneys. Storm sat back and began to plait her hair over one shoulder. We don't forget or forgive that easily. Storm, won't you try it? Please go to him. I know exactly how he is, Mark. Better than you, better than Daddy knows himself, I know him so well as I do myself, because we are one person. I am he, and he is me.

If I go to him now, having done what I did, having insulted him, having destroyed all the dreams he wove about me if I go now, when I am destitute of pride and honour, if I go as a beggar, he will despise me for ever. No, Storm, you are wrong. On this I am never wron& Mark darling. He would not want to despise me, just as he does not want to hate me now, but he would not be able to help himself. He is Sean Courtney, and he is trapped in the steel jaws of his own honour. He is a sick man, you must give him the chance. No, Mark. It would kill him. I know that, and it would destroy me. For both our sakes, I dare not go to him now. You don't know how much he cares for you. Oh I do, Mark. I also know how much I care for him and one day, when I am proud again, I will go to him. I promise you that. When I know he can be proud of me, I will take him that as a gift. Oh damn you and your stiff cruel pride, you nearly destroyed us with it also. Come, Mark, she stood up. Take John's other hand.

They walked the child between them along the firm sand at the edge of the surf. He hung on their hands, leaning forward to watch his own feet appear and disappear magically below him, and he let out great shouts of triumph at his accomplishment.

The day was bright and clean, and the gulls caught the wind and rode above them on smoky white wings, answering the child's shouts with their own harsh cries. Oh, I had so many fine clothes and fancy friends. Storm watched the gulls. I sold the clothes and lost the friends, and found how little any of it really meant to me. Look at the gulls! she said, head thrown back. See the sunlight through the spread feathers. I was so busy that I never had time to see clearly before. I never saw myself, not, those around me. But now I am learning to look. I saw that in your painting, Mark said, and lifted John to his chest, delighting in the hot restless little body. You are painting different subjects. I want to be a great artist. I think you will be. That Courtney stubbornness again. We don't always get what we want, she told him, and the spent surf came sliding up the beach and creamed around their ankles.

The child slept face down on the monkey-skin kaross, exhausted with sun and sea and play, his belly bulging with food.

Storm worked at the easel under the window with narrowed eyes and cocked head.

You are my favourite model, she said. That's just because I'm so cheap And she laughed lightly.

With what I pay you, I could be rich, she pointed out. You know what they call ladies who do it for money?

Mark asked lazily and relapsed into silence, giving himself up to the full pleasure of watching her and they were silent for nearly an hour, silent but close and Spiritually in tune.

Mark spoke at last. I know what you mean by seeing more clearly now. That one, he pointed at one of the larger canvases against the wall, that's probably the best thing you've ever done. I hated to sell it, the man who bought it is coming tomorrow. You've sold some of your paintings? he was startled. How do you think John and I live? I don't know. He hadn't thought about that. I supposed your husband. Her expression changed, darkening swiftly. I want nothing from him. And she tossed her head so that the braid of hair flicked like the tail of an angry lioness. I want nothing from him, and his friends, and my loving friends, all those nice loyal people who stay away from me in droves now that I am the scarlet divorcee. I've learned a lot since last I saw you, and especially I have learned about that kind of person. They are rich, Mark pointed out. You once told me how important that is. The dark anger went out of her, and she drooped a little, the brush falling to her side. Oh Mark, please don't be bitter with me. I don't think I could stand that. He felt something tear in his chest, and he rose swiftly and went to her, picked her up with a swing of his shoulders and carried her high, through the curtained doorway into the small cool dark bedroom.

It was strange, but their love-making was never the same, always there were new wonders, new accords of desire, the discovery of some little things that excited them both beyond all relation to its apparent significance.

Repetition could not weary nor dull the appetite they had for each other, and even as that appetite was totally satiated, so the endless well of their mutual desire began to fill again.

It would start again immediately with the lazy touch of fingers as they lay curled together like sleepy puppies, the sweat of their loving cooling on their skin, raising little goose bumps around the dark rosy aureoles of her nipples.

A finger drawn lightly down his cheek, rasping on the sandpaper of his beard, and then pushing lightly between his lips, making him turn his head for another gentle kiss, a mere touch of lips and the mingling of their breath so that he could smell that peculiar perfume of passion from her mouth, a smell like newly dug truffles, a mushroorny exciting smell.

She saw the new spark of interest in his eyes and drew softly away to chuckle at him, a throaty sensuous sound, and she drew one sharp finger-nail swiftly down his spine so that little sparks of fire flew along his nerves and his back arched.

I am going to claw you because you deserve it, you randy old tomcat. She made a growly sound in her throat and curled her nails into a lion's claw, drawing it lightly across his shoulder, and then hard down his belly, so that her nails left red lines against the skin.

She studied the red lines, with her lips parted and the tip of her pink tongue touching her small white teeth. The nipples of her breast swelled as she watched, growing like new buds, as though they were about to burst. She saw the direction of his eyes, and she put her hand behind his head, drawing him-in down gently, pulling back her shoulder so that the heavy rounded bosom was offered like a sacrifice.

Mark took some of the big scaly crayfish from the lowtide pools, and they smelled of kelp and iodine, thumping their tails furiously in his grip, snapping their legs and bubbling at the small mouths with their multiple mandibles.

Mark rose, streaming salt water, from the depths of the pool and handed them up to Storm, who squealed with excitement on the rocky edge of the pool and took them gingerly, using her straw hat as a glove against the spiky carapace and waving legs.

Mark built a fire in a scooped fireplace in the sand, while Storm held John on her lap and fed him through a discreetly unbuttoned blouse, offering advice and ribald comment as he worked.

Mark threw wet seaweed over the coals, put the crayfish on top of that and covered them with another layer of seaweed, topping it off with a final layer of sand, and while they waited for the crayfish to cook and John to finish his noisy guzzling, they drank wine and watched the setting sun turn the sea clouds into a brilliant display. God, Nature's an old ham. If I painted like that, they'd say I had no sense of colour, and I could go work for a chocolate company painting boxes. Afterwards, Storm lay John in the apple basket that served as a portable cradle and they ate crayfish, pulling the long luscious sticks of white meat from the horny legs and washing it down with the tart white Cape wine.

In the darkness the stars were stark pricks of brilliant white, and the su boomed in long soft phosphorescent lines. It's so wonderfully romantic. Storm watched it, sitting hugging her knees, and then turned her head and smiled wickedly. And you can take that as a hint, if you want to On the rug together she said, Do you know what some people do? No what do some people do? Mark seemed more interested in what he was doing than the actions of the nameless somebodies. You don't expect me just to say it out like that. Why not? It's rude. All right, so whisper it. So she whispered it, but she was giggling so much that he was not sure he had heard right.

She repeated it, and he had heard right. He was truly stunned, so that he found himself blushing in the dark. That's terrible, he answered huskily. You would never do that! However, he was over the first shock, and the idea intrigued him. of course not, she whispered, and then after a silence, Unless of course you want to. There was another long silence during which Storm made some investigations. If I'm any judge, and I should be by now, you want to, she stated flatly, Long afterwards, naked in the dark, they swam together out beyond the first line of breakers. The water was warm as fresh milk and they trod water to kiss with wet salty lips.

On the beach Mark built up the fire and they sat close to it, cuddled together in the yellow light of the flames, and they drank the rest of the wine. Mark, she said at last, and there was a sadness in her voice that he had never heard before. You have been with us two days now, which is two days too much. Tomorrow I want you to go. Go early before John and I are awake, so we don't have to watch you. Her words struck like a lash so that he writhed at the sting. He turned to her with a stricken face in the firelight.

What are you saying? You and John are mine. We belong together the three of us, always. You didn't understand a word of what I was saying, did you? she asked softly. You didn't understand when I said I must rebuild my pride, refashion my honour? I love you, Storm. I have always loved you. You are married to somebody else, Mark. That doesn't mean anything, he pleaded. Oh yes, it does. She shook her head. And you know it does. I will leave Marion. Divorce, Mark? Yes. He was desperate. I'll ask her for a divorce. That way we can both be truly proud. That will be a fine way for me to go to my father. Think how proud we will make him. His daughter, and the son he never had, for that's the way he thinks of you, both of them divorced.

Think of baby John. How high he will hold his head. Think of us, what a noble life we can build on the misery of the girl who was your wife. Looking into her eyes in the firelight, he saw that her pride was iron and her stubbornness was as steel.

Mark dressed quietly in the dark, and when he was ready he groped his way to the cradle and kissed his son. The child made a little whimpering sound in his sleep, and he smelt warm and milky, like a new-born kitten.

He thought that Storm was sleeping also as he stooped over her, but then he realized that she was lying rigidly with her face pressed into the pillow to stifle the harsh silent sobs that convulsed her.

She did not lift her face to him and he kissed her hair and her neck, then he straightened up and walked out into the dark. The motorcycle started at the first kick and he wheeled it out into the lane.

Storm lay in the dark and listened to the sound of the engine die away into the night, and afterwards there was only the lonely mournful sound of the surf and the clink of the tree frogs outside the window.

Mark sat on the carved wooden stool in the sunset, in front of Pungushe's hut, and he asked for the first time something that had been in his mind since their first meeting. Pungushe, tell me of the time when the Jackal pulled the Ngaga from the flooding river. And the Zulu shrugged. What is there to tell? I found you caught in the branches of a flooded tree on the edge of the river, and if I had sense, I would have walked away, for you were clearly a very dead Ngaga and the brown water was washing over your head. Did you see how it was that I fell into the river? There was a pause, while Pungushe steeled himself to admit ignorance. It seemed to me that you had been blinded with fever and fallen into the river. You did not see the man I killed, nor the man that fired at me with a rifle? Pungushe covered his amazement nobly, but shook his head. A little time before I found you in the river I heard the sound of guns, four, perhaps five shots, from up the valley. This must have been you and the one who hunted you, but I saw no man and the rain washed away all sign, before the next morning. The flood waters would have washed the dead man away and the crocodiles eaten him. They were silent again while the beer pot passed between them.

Did you see the man who fired at you? Pungushe asked. Yes, said Mark. But my eyes were weak with fever, and as you say, it was raining. I did not see him clearly. Hobday stood within the hall, against the wall, out of the crush of excited bodies. He stood like a rock, solid and immovable, his head lowered on the thick wrestler's neck.

His eyes were hooded, as though he were able like a great bird of prey to draw an opaque nictitating membrane across them. Only his jaw made an almost imperceptible chewing motion, grinding the big flat teeth together so that the muscle in the points of his jaw bulged slightly.

He was watching Dirk Courtney across the crowded hall, the way a faithful mastiff watches its master.

Tall and urbane, Dirk Courtney had a warm double handshake for each of those who crowded forward to assure him of support and to wish him luck. His gaze was straight and calm, but it kept flicking back to the long counting tables.

They were trestle tables that had done duty at a thousand church socials, and as many weddings.

Now the scrutineers sat along them, and the last ballot boxes from the outlying areas were carried in through the front doors of the Ladyburg Church Hall.

The sprawling shape of the constituency of Ladyburg meant that some of the boxes had come in sixty miles, and although the voting had closed the previous evening, it was now an hour before noon and no result had yet been announced.

Mark crossed slowly towards where General Sean Courtney sat, pushing his way gently through the throng that lined the roped-off area around the counting tables.

Mark and Marion had come in from Chaka's Gate three days before, especially to assist at the elections. There were never enough helpers, and Marion had been completely at home, cutting sandwiches and dispensing coffee, working with twenty other women under Ruth Courtney's supervision in the kitchens behind the hall.

Mark had scoured the village district with other party organizers. Like a press gang, they had hunted down missing or recalcitrant voters and brought them into the ballot stations.

It had been hard work, and then none of them had slept much the previous night. The dancing and barbecue had lasted until four in the morning, and after that the anticipation of the announcement of the result had kept most of them from sleep.

For Mark it all had a special significance. He knew now with complete certainty, that if Dirk Courtney was returned as the member of Parliament for Ladyburg, then his dreams for Chaka's Gate were doomed.

As the voters had come in during the day, their hopes had see-sawed up and down. Often it seemed that the end of the hall where Dirk Courtney's organizers sat under huge posters of their candidate was as crowded as Sean Courtney's end of the hall was deserted.

When this happened, Marion's brother-in-law, Peter Botes, removed his pipe from his mouth and smirked comfortably at Mark across the length of the hall. He had become an enthusiastic supporter of Dirk Courtney's, and his circumstances had altered remarkably in the last six months. He had opened offices of his own on the first floor of the Ladyburg Farmers Bank. He drove a new Packard and had moved from the cottage to a fine rambling house in three acres of garden and orchard, where he had insisted that Marion and Mark dine with him the previous night. The evening star sets, the morning star rises, my dear Mark. The wise man recognizes that, he had sermonized as he carved the roast. General Courtney's star has not set yet, said Mark stubbornly. Not yet, agreed Peter. But when it does, you will need new friends. Powerful friends. You can always rely on us, said Marion's sister kindly. You don't always have to live out there in the bush. You don't understand, Mark interrupted quietly. My life's work is out there, in the bush. Oh, I wouldn't bank on that. Peter heaped slices of roast beef onto Mark's plate. There are going to be changes in the Ladyburg district when Mr Dirk Courtney takes over. Big changes! Besides, it isn't fair on poor Marion. No woman wants to live out there. Oh, I am quite happy wherever Mark wants to go, Marion murmured. Don't worry, Peter assured them. We'll look after you.

And he patted Mark's shoulder in a brotherly fashion. Mr Dirk Courtney thinks the world of Peter said his wife proudly.

Now as Mark crossed the hall towards General Sean Courtney, he felt the heavy doughy feeling of dread in his guts. He did not want to bear the tidings he had for the General, yet he knew it was better that they came gently from a friend, rather than in gloating triumph from an enemy.

He paused to watch Sean Courtney from a distance, feeling both pity and anger. Sean had rallied strongly since those low days at Emoyeni. His shoulders had regained some of that wide rakish set, and his face had filled out.

Some of the gaunt shadows had smoothed away, and he had been in the sun again. The skin was tanned brown against the silver of his beard and his hair.

Yet he was seated now. The strain of the last few days had taxed him sorely. He sat erect on a hard-backed chair, both hands resting on the silver head of his cane. With him were many of his old friends who had gathered to give him support, and he listened seriously to his brother Garrick who sat in the chair beside him, nodding his agreement.

Mark did not want to go to him, he wanted to delay the moment, but then there was a stir across the hall. Mark saw Peter Botes scurrying across to where Dirk Courtney stood, and his face was bright scarlet with excitement. He spoke rapidly, gesticulating widely, and Dirk Courtney leaned forward to listen eagerly.

Mark could not delay a moment longer. He hurried forward and Sean saw him coming. Well, my boy, come and sit a while. They tell me the voting is extremely close so far, but we'll have the result before noon. Then he saw Mark's face. What is it? he demanded harshly.

Mark stooped over him, his mouth almost touching the General's ear, and his voice croaked in his own ears. It's just come in on the telegraph, General. We have lost Johannesburg Central, Doornfontein and Jeppe, They were all solid safe Smuts seats, they had been South Africa Party since Union in 19 10, and now they were gone. It was a-disaster, a stunning catastrophe. Sean gripped Mark's forearm as if to take strength from him, and his hand shook in a gentle palsy.

Across the hall they heard the wild gloating cheers start ringing out, and Mark had to hurry. That's not all, sir. General Smuts himself has lost his seat. The nation had rejected them, the coalition of the Labour and the National Party under Hertzog were sweeping; into power. My God, muttered Sean. It's come. I didn't believe it possible.

Still gripping Mark's arm, he pulled himself to his feet. Help me out to the car, my boy. I don't think I can bring myself to congratulate the new member for Ladyburg. But they were too late. The announcement came before they reached the door. It was shouted in a stentorian voice, by the chief scrutineer from the platform at the end of the hall.

Mr Dirk Courtney, National Labour Party: 2683 votes.

General Sean Courtney, South Africa Party: 2441 votes. I give you the new member for Ladyburg -'And Dirk Courtney leapt lightly on to the platform, clasping both hands above his head like a prize-fighter. Well. There was a twisted grin on Sean's face the skin had that greyish tone again and his shoulders had slumped. So, exit the Butcher of Fordsburg, and Mark took him out to where the Rolls waited in the street.

The champagne was aDorn Perignon of that superb 1904 vintage, and Sean poured it with his own hands, limping from guest to guest. I had hoped to toast victory with it, he smiled. But it will do as well to drown our sorrows. There was only a small gathering in the drawing-room of Lion Kop homestead, and the few attempts at joviality were lost in the huge room. The guests left early. Only the family sat down to dinner, with Marion in Storm's old seat and Mark between her and Ruth Courtney. Well, my boy, what are your plans now? Sean -abruptly asked in one of the silences, and Mark looked up with genuine astonishment. We'll be going back to Chaka's Gate, of course. Of course. Sean smiled with the first spontaneous warmth of that dark day. How foolish of me to think otherwise. But you do realize what this, Sean made a gesture with one hand, unable to say the word defeat, what this could mean for you? Yes, sir. But you still have enormous influence. There is our Wildlife Society, we can fight. We have to fight to keep Chaka's Gate. Yes, Sean nodded, and there was a little sparkle in his eyes again. We'll fight, but my guess is it will be a hard, dirty fight. At first there was no sign of the gathering clouds to darken the tall blue sky above Chaka's Gate. The only change was that Mark was submitting his monthly report, not to Sean Courtney, but to the new Minister of Lands, Peter Grobler, a staunch Hertzog man. His reports were acknowledged formally, but although his salary was still paid regularly by the Department, in a short official letter Mark was informed that the whole question of the proclaimed areas was now under consideration at Cabinet level, and that new legislation would be promulgated at the next session of Parliament. His appointment as game warden was to be considered a temporary post, without pension benefits, and subject to monthly notice.

Mark worked on doggedly, but many nights he sat late in the lantern light writing to General Courtney. The two of them were planning at long distance their campaign to awaken public interest in Chaka's Gate, but when Marion had gone off to bed in the next room, he would take a fresh page and cover it with the small cramped lines to Storm, pouring out to her all his thoughts and dreams and love.

Storm never replied to his letters, he was not even certain that she was still in that thatched cottage above the beach, but he imagined her there, thinking of her at odd hours of the day and the night, seeing her working at her easel, or walking the beach with baby John tottering at her side. One particular night he lay awake and imagined her in the tiny shuttered bedroom with the child at her breast, and the image was too vivid, too painful to allow him sleep.

He rose quietly, left a note for Marion as she slept heavily, and, with Pungushe trotting at Trojan's head, set off up the valley.

Marion woke an hour after he had gone, and her first waking thought was that if there was still no show on this morning then it was certain. She had waited all these weeks for that absolute certainty, before telling Mark.

Somehow she had been afraid that if she had spoken of it too soon, it would have been bad luck.

She slipped from the bed and crossed the still dark room to the bathroom. When she returned minutes later she was hugging herself with suppressed joy, and she lit the candle by her bedside, eager to see Mark's face when she woke him to tell him.

Her disappointment when she saw the empty rumpled bed and the note propped on the pillow was intense, but lasted only a short while before her usual gentle placid nature reasserted itself. It will give me more time to enjoy it by myself, she said aloud, and then she spoke again. Harold, Harold Anders? No, that's too common. I will have to think of a really fine-sounding name. She hummed happily to herself as she dressed, and then went out into the kitchen yard.

It was a cool still morning with a milky pink sky. A baboon called from the cliffs of Chaka's Gate, the short explosive bark ringing across the valley, a salute to the sunrise that was turning the heights to brazen splendour.

It was good to be alive and to have a child growing on such a day, Marion thought, and she wanted to do something to celebrate it. Mark's note had told her that he would be home by nightfall. I'll bake a new batch of bread, and, She wanted something very special for this day. Then she remembered that it had rained five days previously. There might be wild mushrooms coming up from the rains, those rounded buds with sticky brown tops; the rich meaty flesh was a favourite of Mark's and he had taught her when and where to find them.

She ate her breakfast absentmindedly with Mark's copy of The Home Doctor propped against the jam jar, re-reading the section on The Expectant Mother. Then she began on her housework, taking a comfortable pride in the slippery glaze of the cement floors and the burnish which she had worked on to the wood of the simple furniture, in the neatness and order, the smell of polish, the wild flowers in their vases. She sang as she worked and once laughed out loud for no reason.

It was midmorning before she tied her sun bonnet under her chin, put a bottle of Chamberlain's Superior Diarrhoea Remedy into her basket, and set off up the valley.

She stopped at Pungushe's kraal and the youngest wife brought the baby to her. Marion was relieved to see that he was much improved, and Pungushe's wife assured her that she had given him much liquid to drink. Marion took him in her lap and fed him a spoonful of the diluted remedy, despite his violent protests, and afterwards the five women sat in the sun and talked of children and men and childbirth, of sickness and food and clothing, and all the things that absorb a woman's life.

It was almost an hour later that she left the four Zulu women and went down towards the river.

The downpour of rain had disquieted the lioness. Some deep instinct warned her that it was but the harbinger of the great storms to come.

The jessie thickets in the valley were a suitable retreat for her litter no longer. Heavy rain on the escarpment would soon turn the steep narrow valley into a cascading torrent.

Twice already she had tried to lead the cubs away, but they were older now and had developed a stubbornness and tenacity. They clung to the haven of the thick thorny jessie, and her efforts had failed. Within half a mile, one or two of the faint-hearts would turn and scurry back to what they considered home. Immediately the lioness turned back to seize the deserter, it precipitated an undignified rush by the others in the same direction, and within five minutes they were all back in the jessie.

The lioness was distracted. This was her first litter, but she was governed by instinct. She knew that it was time to wean her cubs, to take them out of the trap of the narrow valley, to begin their hunting lessons, but she was frustrated by the size of her litter, six-cub litters were a rarity in the wilderness and so far there had been no casualties among the cubs; her family was becoming too ungainly for her to handle.

However, instinct drove her and in the middle of a cool bright morning in which she could smell the rain coming, she tried again. The cubs gambolled along behind her, falling over each other and sparring amicably, as far as the river. This was familiar ground and they went along happily.

When the lioness started out across the open white sandbanks towards the far side, there was immediately the usual crisis in confidence. Three cubs followed her willingly, two stood undecidedly on the high bank and whined and mewled with concern, while the sixth turned and bolted straight back up the valley for the ebony.

The lioness went after him at a gallop and bowled him on his back. Then she took the scruff of his neck and lifted him. The cubs were big now, and although she lifted him to the full stretch of her neck, his backside still bumped on every irregularity of the ground. He curled up his legs, wrapped his tail tightly up under his quarters and closed his eyes, hanging from her mouth as she carried him down into the bed of the Bubezi River.

The river was five hundred yards wide at this point, and almost completely empty at the end of the dry season.

There were still deep green pools of water between the snowy-white sand-banks, and the pools were connected by a slow trickle of warm clear water only a few inches deep.

While five cubs watched in an agony of indecision from the near bank, the lioness carried the cub through the shallows, soaking his dragging backside so he hissed and wriggled indignantly, then she trotted up the far bank and found a clump of dense watels where she placed him.

She turned back to fetch another cub, and he followed her with a panicky rush. She had to stop and box him about the ears, snarling until he squealed and fell on his back.

She grabbed him by the neck and dragged him back into the wit-els. She started back across the river to find the cub stumbling along on her heels again. This time she nipped hard enough to really hurt, and bundled him back into the thicket. She nipped again at his hindquarters until he cowered flat on the earth, so subdued and chastened that he could not gather the courage to follow again. He lay under the bush and made distraught little sounds of anguish.

Marion had never been this far from the cottage alone, but it was such a lovely warm clear morning, peaceful and still, that she wandered on in a mood of enchantment and happiness such as she had seldom known before.

She knew that if she followed the river bank, she could not lose herself, and Mark had taught her that the African bush is a safer place in which to wander abroad than the streets of a city, as long as one followed a few simple rules of the road.

At the branch of the two rivers she stopped for a few minutes to watch a pair of fish eagles on top of their shaggy nest in the main fork of a tall leadwood tree. The white heads of the two birds shone like beacons in contrast to the dark russet plumage, and she thought she could just make out the chirruping sound of the chicks in the cup of the hay-stack nest.

The sound of the young heightened the awareness of the life in her own belly, and she laughed and went on down the branch of the Red Bubezi.

Once a heavy body crashed in the undergrowth nearby, and there was a clatter of hooves on stony earth. She froze with a fleeting chill of fear, and then when the silence returned she regained her courage and laughed a little breathlessly and went on.

There was a perfume on the warm still air, sweet as fullblooming roses, and she followed it, twice going wrong but at last coming on a spreading creeper hanging over a gaunt dead tree. The leaves were dark shiny green and the dense bunches of flowers were pale butter yellow. She had never seen the plant before, nor the swarm of sunbirds that fluttered about it. They were tiny restless darting birds, with bright, metallic, shiny plumage like the little hummingbirds of America, and they dipped into the perfumed flowers with long slim curved beaks. Their colours were unbelievable in the sunlight, emerald greens and sapphire blue, black like wet anthracite and reds like the blood of kings.

They thrust their beaks deep into the open throats of the yellow blooms to sip out the thick clear drops of nectar through their hollow tubular tongues.

Watching them, Marion felt a deep pervading delight, and it was a long time before she moved on again.

She found the first batch of mushrooms a little further on, and she knelt to snap the stems off at the level of the earth and then hold the umbrella-shaped fleshy plant to her face and inhale the delicious musty odour, before laying it carefully, cap uppermost, in the basket so that grit and dirt would not lodge in the delicately fluted gills. She took two dozen mushrooms from this one patch, but she knew they would cook down to a fraction of their bulk.

She went on, following the lip of the steep bank.

Something hissed close by and her heart skipped again.

Her first thought was of a snake, one of those thick bloated reptiles, with the chocolate and yellow markings and flat scaly heads, which blew so loudly that they were called puff-adders.

She began moving backwards carefully staring into the clump of first growth wit-els from which the sound had come. She saw small movement, but it was some seconds before she realized what she was seeing.

The lion cub was flat on its belly in the dappled shadow of the thicket, and its own dappled baby spots blended beautifully against the bed of dried leaves and leaf mould on which it lay.

The cub had learned already the first lesson of concealment, absolute stillness; except for his two round fluffy ears. The ears flicked back and forth, signalling clearly every emotion and intention. He stared at Marion with wide round eyes that had not yet turned the ferocious yellow of full growth, but were still hazed with the bluish glaze of kittenhood. His whiskers bristled stiffly, and his ears signalled wildly conflicting messages.

Flattening against the skull: One step nearer and I'll tear you to pieces. Shooting out sideways: One step nearer and I'll die of fright. Coming up and cupping forward: What the hell are you anyway? Oh, exclaimed Marion. You darling little thing. She set down the basket, and squatted. She extended one hand and made soft cooing noises. There's a darling. Are you all alone then, poor baby?

She moved forward slowly, still talking and cooing. Nobody's going to hurt you, baby. The cub was uncertain, its ears rising into an attitude of curiosity and indecision as it stared at her. Are you all alone then? You'll make a lovely pet for my own baby, won't you? Closer and closer she edged, and the cub warned her with a half-hearted apologetic hiss.

What a cheeky darling we are, Marion smiled and squatted three feet from the cub.