Star of Africa

Chapter 60

The soldiers instantly raised their rifles. Over the roars of the trapped lion below them came the metallic rattle of actions being cocked, safeties being released. Jude stood very still, very stiff, very pale. He raised his chin and looked resolutely into Ben’s eyes, as if to say ‘It’s all right.’

‘No,’ Ben said.

Khosa slowly turned back to gaze at Ben. ‘No?’

‘Don’t kill him.’

‘Are you commanding your king?’

‘I’m asking,’ Ben said, fighting to keep his voice steady. His eyes were locked on Jude’s.

‘Does one now ask a king, as an equal?’

‘All right,’ Ben said. ‘I’m begging.’

Jude gave a single shake of his head. It’s okay. Really.

Khosa smiled and said, ‘Better. Now tell me why I should not kill him.’

‘Because if you do, it ends our arrangement,’ Ben said.

‘Then you have accepted my offer, soldier? Because I was not sure that you had, in your heart. I am not sure that you did not try to trick me before. A clever man like you is full of tricks, hmm?’

Ben said, ‘Yes. I accept and agree.’

‘With all your heart?’

‘With all my heart.’

‘Am I a wise and just king?’

‘Yes,’ Ben said. ‘Very wise and very just.’

‘You will serve me with loyalty?’

‘To the last,’ Ben said.

‘And obey my orders?’

‘Without question,’ Ben said.

Khosa looked pleased. He glanced at the soldiers still pointing their rifles at Jude’s head, then looked back at Ben. ‘As you are my military advisor, let me ask your advice. Should I order my men to kill the boy, or should I send Hercules into combat with this lion?’

The huge tawny cat was still struggling to escape from the ditch. It was clawing and raking at the earth banks in a desperate attempt to clamber up and away to safety, but without the power in its hindquarters it still couldn’t gain the momentum to scramble up the sheer slope. The bank was becoming eroded away by its efforts and becoming only more vertical as the lion dug itself in deeper.

Ben said nothing. He could feel Jeff’s presence behind him, and Tuesday’s, and Gerber’s. He could sense the grim strain coming off all three of them like electric charge from a high-voltage cable. Nobody spoke. Ben looked down at the lion. Looked across at Jude. Then at Hercules.

‘I am waiting for my advisor’s counsel,’ Khosa said with a raised eyebrow.

‘Shoot me,’ Jude called out. ‘It’s my choice. Go ahead and shoot me and let Hercules live.’

Khosa kept his eyes on Ben as he said, ‘It is not your decision to make, White Meat. It is for my advisor to choose. But I hear nothing from him. Perhaps he is not a good advisor after all. Perhaps I have misplaced my faith in his judgement, and should replace him.’

Ben looked again at Hercules.

There’s nothing I can do, he said with his eyes.

Hercules looked back at him. I know.

I’m so sorry.

I know.

Forgive me.

‘I don’t want my son to die,’ Ben said to Khosa.

Khosa asked keenly, ‘That is your choice?’

Ben swallowed hard. ‘Yes. That’s my choice.’

Khosa nodded. ‘So it will be. For the moment.’ He turned to the soldiers by Jude and waved down the rifles. Then he turned to the soldiers by Hercules.

‘Put him in the hole.’

The soldiers closed in around Hercules. Hands grabbed his thick arms. He didn’t try to resist. His shoulders sagged and his eyes were full of nothing but sadness.

Ben bowed his head as they shoved Hercules to the edge of the ditch and toppled him down the slope. The big man went slithering and sliding downwards, throwing up a plume of loose dirt and grunting as he hit the bottom.

The lion saw him and turned. Sensing a new threat, it lost interest in trying to escape. The law of nature. Flight was impossible. Now it had something to fight, instead. It lowered its maned head close to the ground and its shoulder muscles coiled and rippled under the matted fur. Its black lips gaped open in a snarl, showing fangs like devil’s horns.

Hercules backed away. He threw a helpless, wide-eyed glance up at the crowd above him.

‘In the legend,’ Khosa declared, ‘Hercules used a club to kill the lion. Even a mighty warrior should have a weapon. Throw him a club.’

One of the soldiers jerked the magazine out of his AK-47, jacked the round from the chamber and then tossed the rifle into the ditch. Hercules hesitated and then picked up the empty weapon, holding it by the barrel with the triangular wooden buttstock raised shoulder-high like a bat.

Ben’s knees sagged under him. He wanted to curl up on the ground and sleep, but he knew he couldn’t sleep again for a long time. Maybe for the rest of his life.

Hercules faced the lion. ‘Come on then, motherfucker!’

The lion’s snout wrinkled into another snarl. It made explosive huffing sounds from its chest and blew from its nostrils and pawed at the ground. Its great amber eyes gazed impassively at its trapped prey.

Then it attacked with all the massive force and shocking aggression of the most dangerous land predator in Africa. A lame, sick, starving lion. But still a lion. Five hundred pounds or more of muscle and teeth and lashing claws. Twice Hercules’s weight. Ten times the strength of even the strongest human. It was only in the story world of old legends that a man armed with nothing but a club could defeat such an animal.

Hercules never had a chance. His first and only swing of the empty rifle struck the lion with what to a human would have been a skull-crushing blow across the side of the head, but the cat barely flinched and kept on coming. It swatted Hercules to the ground with one swipe of a forepaw the size of a dinner plate. Then it crushed him with its weight and closed its jaws around his thick neck and shook him from side to side like a terrier shaking a rat.

The screaming didn’t last very long. Hercules was soon almost dead, although he was still moving, the fingers of an outflung and bloody arm flexing and twitching in the dirt. The lion backed away, sniffing at him, one paw cocked to prod and roll him to test if he was still alive. Then it closed back in and bit him again, ripping into his flesh. Hercules’s arms and legs flailed and jerked spasmodically as the lion tore into the muscles of his shoulder and back, but ninety percent of it was just nerve response. He couldn’t feel much any longer.

At least, Ben hoped he couldn’t.

Khosa watched with a smile as the lion pulled Hercules apart. It ripped off one arm, tossed it aside, then ripped off the other. Then it buried its face into what was left of his throat. Chewing, tugging, tearing, swallowing.

By now Lou Gerber was on the ground, weeping openly.

‘Make the goat man watch,’ Khosa commanded. The soldiers seized Gerber’s arms and yanked him back to his feet.

It was another long, agonising minute before Khosa got bored with the bloody spectacle. ‘He has failed the test,’ he declared. ‘It is as I thought. This man was never a true warrior. Now let us return to the village. I have more business to attend to there.’