The Burning Shore

On the third night, he was confident enough to tell the women, We can make fire. And by its ruddy wavering light he danced with dedicated frenzy and sang the praise of the spirits in turn, including Mantis and Eland, for, as he explained seriously to Centaine, it was uncertain who had aided their escape, who had directed the wind to carry the warning scent to them in the first place, and who had subsequently placed the zebra carcass so conveniently to hand. It is necessary, therefore, to thank them all. He danced until moonset, and the next morning slept until sunrise. Then they resumed the familiar leisurely pattern of march, and even halted early that first day when O'wa discovered a colony of spring-hare.

This is the last time we can hunt, the spirits are most insistent. No man of the San may kill any living thing within five days march of "the Place of All Life", he explained to Centaine, as he selected long whippy saplings of the grewia bush, peeled them and lashed them together until he had a strong flexible rod almost thirty feet long. On the final section, he left a side branch that grew back at an acute angle to the main stem, like a crude fish-hook, and he sharpened the point of this hook and hardened it in the fire. Then he spent a long time carefully examining the burrows of the spring-hare colony, before selecting one which suited his design.

While the women knelt beside him, he introduced the hooked end of the rod into the opening of the burrow, and like a chimney-sweep worked it gently down the shaft, deftly guiding it around the subterranean curves and bends until almost the entire length was down in the earth.

Suddenly the rod pulsed strongly in his hands, and immediately O'wa struck, jerking back like a hardline fisherman who feels the pull of the fish.

He is kicking at the rod now, trying to hit it with his back legs, O'wa grunted, pushing the rod deeper into the hole, tempting the trapped spring-hare to kick out at it again.

This time, as he struck, the rod came alive in his hands, kicking and twitching and jerking.

U I have hooked him! He threw his weight back on the i k rod, driving the sharpened wooden point deeper into the El t animals flesh. Dig, H'ani. Dig, Nam Child!

The two women flew at the soft friable earth with their staves, digging down swiftly. The muffled shrieks of the ".

I hooked spring-hare grew louder as they came nearer to i the end of the long gaff, until finally O'wa heaved the furry creature clear of its earth. It was the size of a large yellow cat, and it leaped about wildly on the end of the pliant rod on its powerful kangaroo back legs, until H'ani despatched it with a swinging blow of her stave.

By nightfall they had killed two more spring-hare, and after they had thanked them, they feasted on the sweet tender roasted flesh, the last they would eat for a long time.

in the morning when they set out again on the final leg of the journey, a sharp hot wind blew into their faces.

Although it was taboo for O'wa to hunt, the Kalahari bloomed in a rich and rare abundance both below and above the ground. There were flowers and green leafy plants to be eaten as salads, roots and tubers, fruits and protein-rich nuts, and the water-holes, all of them brimming, were easy marches apart. Only the wind hampered them, standing steadily into their faces, hot and abrasive with blown sand, forcing them to cover their faces with their leather shawls and lean into it.

The mixed herds of fat handsome zebra and ungainly blue wildebeest with their scraggy manes and skinny legs standing out on the wide pans or on the grassy glades turned their rumps into the sultry blast. The wind ripped the talcum-fine dust off the surface of the pans and whirled it into the sky, turning the air misty, so the sun itself was a hazy orange globe and the horizons shrank in upon them.

The dust floated on the surface of the water-holes in a thin scum, and it turned to mud in their nostrils and grated between their teeth. It formed little wet beads in the corners of their eyes and dried and cracked their skins so that H'ani and Centaine had to roast and crush the seeds of the sour plum tree to extract the oil to dress their skins and the soles of their feet.

However, with each day's march the old people became stronger, more active and excited. They seemed less and less affected by the scouring wind. There was a new jauntiness in their step and they chattered animatedly to each other on the march, while Centaine faltered and dropped far behind, almost as she had done at the beginning.

On the fifth evening after crossing the ridge, Centaine staggered into the camp that the San had already set up on the edge of yet another open pan. Centaine lay on the bare earth, too hot and exhausted to gather grass for her bed.

When Rani came to her with food, she pushed it away petulantly. I don't want it. I don't want anything. I hate this land, I hate the heat and the dust. Soon, H'ani soothed her, very soon we will reach the Place of All Life, and your baby will be born. But Centaine rolled away from her. Leave me, just leave me alone. She woke to the cries of the old people, and she dragged herself up, feeling fat and dirty and unrested, even though she had slept so late that the sun was already tipping the tops of the trees, on the far side of the pan. immediately she saw that the wind had dropped during the night and most 0 f the dust had settled out of the air. The residue transformed the dawn to a kaleidoscope of flamboyant colour.

Nam Child, do you see it! H'ani called to her, and then trilled like a Christmas beetle, inarticulate with excitement. Centaine straightened up slowly and stared at the scene that the dust clouds had obscured the previous evening.

Across the pan a great whale-backed mountain rose abruptly out of the desert, steep-sided and with a sym.

A metrically rounded summit. Aglow with all the rich reds and golds of the dawn, it looked like a headless monster.

Parts of the mountain were bald and bare, glowing red rock and smooth cliffs, while in other places it was heavily forested; trees much taller and more robust than those of the plain crowned the summit or grew up the steep sides. The strange reddish light suffused with dust and the silences of the African dawn cloaked the entire mountain in majestic serenity.

Centaine felt all her miseries and her woes fall away as she stared at it.

"The Place of All Life"! As H'ani said the name, her agitation passed and her voice sank to a whisper. This is the sight we have travelled so far and so hard to look upon for the last time.

Olwa had fallen silent as well, but now he bobbed his head in agreement. This is where we will make our peace at last with all the spirits of our people. Centaine felt the same sense of deep religious awe that had overcome her when first she had entered the cathedral of Arras, holding her father's hand, and looked up at the gemlike stained glass in the high gloomy recesses of the towering nave. She knew that she stood on the threshold of a holy place, and she sank slowly to her knees and clasped her hands over the swell of her stomach.

The mountain was further off than it had seemed in the red light of the dawn. As they marched towards it, it seemed to recede rather than draw closer. As the light changed, so the mountain changed its mood. It became remote and austere, and the stone cliffs glittered in the sunlight like a crocodile's scales.

O'wa sang as he trotted at the head of the file: See, spirits of the San We come to your secret place With clean hands, unstained by blood.

Al See, spirit of Eland and Mantis, We come to visit you with joyous hearts, and songs for your amusement The mountain changed again, began to quiver and tremble i in the rising heat. It was no longer massive stone, but rippled like water and wavered like smoke.

It broke free of the earth and floated in the air on a shimmering silver mirage.

O, bird mountain That flies in the sky We bring YOU praises.

O, Elephant Mountain, greater than Any beast of earth or sky, we hail you, O'wa sang, and as the sun swung through its zenith and the air cooled, so the Mountain of All Life settled to earth again and loomed high above them.

They reached the scree slopes, loose stone and debris that lay piled against the cliffs, and paused to look up at the high summit. The rocks were painted with lichen growth, sulphur-yellow and acid-green, and the little hyrax rock rabbits had stained the cliffs with seepage from their middens, like tears from an elephant's eyes.

On a ledge three hundred feet above them stood a tiny antelope. It took fright and with a bleat like a child's penny whistle, shot straight up the cliff, leaping from ledge to unseen ledge with all the nimbleness of a chamois, until it disappeared over the crest.

The y scrambled up the steep scree slope until they touched the base of the cliff. The rock was smooth and cool and overhung them, leaning out at a gentle angle like a vast cathedral roof.

Be not angry, ye spirits, that we come into your secret place, H'ani whispered, and tears were coursing down her ancient yellow cheeks. We come in humble peace, kind spirits, we come to learn what our offence has been, and how we can make amends. O'wa reached out and took his wife's hand and they stood like two tiny naked children before the smooth rock.

We come to sing for you and to dance, O'wa whispered. We come to make peace, and then with your favour to be reunited with the children of our clan who died of the great fever in a far place. There was such vulnerability in this intimate moment that Centaine felt embarrassed to watch them. She drew away from the two old people, and wandered alone along the narrow gallery before the cliff. Suddenly she stopped, and stared up in wonder at the high rock wall that hung out over her head.

Animals, she whispered.

She felt the goose-flesh of superstitious fear rise along her forearms, for the walls were decorated with paintings, frescoes of weirdly wrought animals, the childlike simplicity of form giving them a beauty that was dreamlike, and yet a touching resemblance to the beasts that they depicted. She recognized the darkly massive outlines of tusked elephants and horned rhinoceros, the wildebeest and sassaby with horns like crescent moons marching in closely packed phalanxes across the rock walls.

And people, Centaine whispered, as she picked out the sticklike human shapes that ran in pursuit of the herds of wild game. Fairy beings, the San's view of him self, armed with bows and crowned with wreaths of arrows, the men adorned with proudly erect penises, disproportionately large, and the women with prominent breasts and buttocks, the badges of feminine beauty.

The paintings climbed so high up the sheer walls that the artists must have built platforms, in the fashion of Michelangelo, to work from. The perspectives were naive, one human figure larger than the rhinoceros he was hunting, but this seemed to deepen the enchantment, and Centaine lost herself in wonder, sinking down at last to examine and admire a lovely flowing waterfall of overlapping eland, ochre and red, with dewlaps and humped shoulders, so lovingly depicted that their special place in San mythology could not be overlooked.

H'ani found her there, and squatted beside her.

Who painted these things? Centaine asked her.

The spirits of the San, long, long ago.

Where they not painted by men?

No! No! Men do not have the art, these are spirit drawings.

So the artists skills were lost. Centaine was disappointed . She had hoped that the old woman was one of , i the artists and that she would have an opportunity to J

watch her work.

Long ago, H'ani repeated, before the memory of my father or my grandfather.

Centaine swallowed her disappointment and gave her self up to enjoyment of the marvelous display.

There was little left of the daylight, but while it lasted, they picked their way slowly around the base of the cliff, i walking with heads thrown back to marvel at the gallery of ancient art. At places the rock had broken away, or the storms and winds of the ages had destroyed the frescoes, L but in the protected gulleys and beneath the sheltering overhangs the paint seemed so fresh, and the colours so vivid, that they might have been painted that very day.

In the last minutes of daylight they reached a shelter where others had camped before them, for the hearth was thick with wood ash and the cliff was blackened with soot, and there was a pile of dead wood left beside it, ready for use.

Tomorrow we will learn if the spirits are hostile still, or if we will be allowed to proceed, H'ani warned Centaine. We will start very early, for we must reach the hidden place before the sun rises, while it is still cool.

The guardians become restless and dangerous in the heat."What is this place? Centaine insisted, but once again the old woman became vague and deliberately absentminded. She repeated the San word which had the various meanings hidden place or safe shelter, or vagina, and would say no more.

As Hlani had warned, they started out long before sunrise the next morning and the old people were quiet and anxious and, Centaine suspected, fearful.

The sky was barely lighting with the dawn when abruptly the path turned a sharp corner in the cliff and entered a narrow wedge-shaped valley, the floor was thickly covered with such luxuriant growth that Centaine realized there must be good water below the surface. The path was ill-defined, overgrown and clearly had not been trodden for many months or years. They had to duck under the interlocking branches and step over fallen boughs and new growth. In the cliffs high above them Centaine made out the huge shaggy nests of vultures, and the grossly ugly birds with their bare pink heads crouched on the rim of their nests.

The Place of All Life, H'ani saw her interest in the nesting birds. Any creature born here is special, blessed by the spirits. Even the birds seem to know this The high cliffs closed in upon them as the valley narrowed, and at last the path ended against the rock in the angled corner where the valley finally pinched out, and the sky was hidden from them.

O`wa stood before the wall and sang in his hoarse ghostchant, We wish to enter your most secret place, Spirits of all Creatures, Spirits of our clan. open the way for us. He spread his arms in entreaty. May the guardians of this passage let us pass through. O'wa lowered his arms, and stepped into the black rock of the cliff and disappeared from Centaine's sight. She gasped with alarm, and started forward, but Ham touched her arm to restrain her.

There is great danger now, Nam Child. If the guardians reject us, we will die. Do not run, do not wave your arms.

Walk slowly, but with purpose, and ask the blessing of the spirits as you pass through. H'ani released her arm, and stepped into the rock following her husband.

Centaine hesitated. For a moment she almost turned back, but at last curiosity and fear of loneliness spurred her and she went slowly to the wall where H'ani had disappeared. Now she saw the opening in the rock, a narrow vertical crack, just wide enough for her to pass through if she turned her shoulders.

She drew a deep breath and slipped through.

Beyond the narrow portals she paused to allow her eyes to become accustomed to the gloom, and she found herself in a long dark tunnel. It was a natural opening, she saw at once, for the walls had not been worked by tools, and there were side branches and openings high overhead.

She heard the rustle of the old people's bare feet on the rocky floor ahead of her, and then another sound. A low, murmurous hum, like the sea surf heard from afar.

Follow, Nam Child. Stay close, H'ani's voice floated back to her, and Centaine went forward slowly, staring into the shadows, trying to find the source of that deep vibrating murmur.

In the gloom above her she saw strange shapes, platelike projections from the walls, like the leaves of fungus growing on the trunk of a dead tree, or the multiple wings of roosting butterflies. They drooped so low that she had to duck beneath them, and with a sudden chill she realized where she was.

The cavern was an enormous beehive. These deep winglike structures were the honeycombs, so massive that each would contain hundreds of gallons of honey. Now she could see the insects swarming over the combs, glittering dully in the poor light, and she remembered the stories that Michael had told her of the African bees.

Bigger and blacker than your bees, he had boasted, land so vicious that I have seen them sting a bull buffalo to death Barely allowing herself to breathe, her skin crawling in anticipation of the first burning dart, forcing herself not to run, she followed the diminutive figures ahead of her.

The swarming masses of venomous insects were only inches above her, and the humming chorus seemed to rise angrily until it threatened to deafen her, This way, Nam Child. Do not fear, for the little winged people will smell your fear, H'ani called softly, and a bee alighted on Centaine's cheek.

She raised her hand instinctively to strike it off her, and then with an effort checked the movement. The bee tickled across her face on to her upper lip, then another settled on her upraised forearm.

She peered at it in horror. It was enormous, black as coal, with dark golden rings around its abdomen. The filmy wings were closed like scissor-blades and its multiple eyes twinkled in the poor light. Please, little bee, Please Centaine whispered, and the insect arched its back, and from its banded abdomen the point of its sting protruded, a dark red needle-point. Please, let me and my baby pass! The bee curved its body and the sting touched the soft skin of her inner elbow. Centaine tensed herself; tanned she knew that the stabbing pain would be followed by the sickly sweet odour of the venom that would madden and infuriate the vast swarm above her. She imagined herself smothered under a living carpet of bees, writhing on the floor of the cavern, dying the most hideous of deaths.

Please, she whispered. Let my baby be born in your secret place, and we will honour you all the days of our lives. The bee retracted the throbbing sting and performed an intricate weaving dance upon her arm, turning and curtseying and reversing, and then with a quicksilver flicker of its wings darted away.

Centaine walked on slowly, and ahead of her she saw a golden nimbus of reflected light. The insect on her face crawled down over her lips, so she could not speak again, but she prayed silently.

"Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death" please, little bee, let me go for my baby's sake. A sharp buzz and the bee flashed before her eyes, a golden mote as it left her, and though her skin tingled and itched from the memory of its horny feet, she kept her hands at her sides and walked on with a measured step. It seemed for ever, then she reached the tunnel's end and stooped through it into the early dawn light, and her legs began to fold in reaction to her terror. She might have fallen if O'wa had not steadied her.

You are safe now. The guardians have allowed us to enter the sacred place.

The words roused her, and though she still trembled and her breathing was rough, Centaine looked around her.

They had passed through into a hidden basin in the heart of the mountain, a perfectly round amphitheatre in the rock. The walls were sheer, hundreds of feet high and with a dark satanic sheen to them, as though scorched in the flames of a blast furnace, but above that it was open to the sky, The deep bowl of rock was perhaps a mile across at its widest point. At this time of day the sunlight had not penetrated down to the floor, and the groves of graceful trees that covered it were cool and dewy. They reminded Centaine of olives, with fine pale leaves and bunches of reddish-yellow fruit on the wide-spread boughs. The floor of the valley was gently dished, and as Centaine followed H'ani down through the trees, the ground beneath them was carpeted with fallen fruit.

H'ani picked up one of them and offered it to Centaine.

Mongongo, very good Centaine bit into it and exclaimed as her tooth struck painfully on the large kernel in its centre. There was only a thin layer of flesh around it, but it was tart and tasty as a palm date, though not as sweet.

From the branches above them a flight of plump green pigeons exploded into noisy flight, and Centaine realized that the valley was alive with birds and small animals come in the dawn to feast on the fruits of the mongongo groves.

The Place of All Life, she whispered, entranced by the weird beauty, by the stark contrast of bare blasted rock cliffs against this gently wooded bottom land.

O'wa hurried along the rough path that led down into the centre of the bowl, and as Centaine followed she glimpsed a small hillock of black volcanic rock through the trees ahead. Centaine saw that the hill was symmetrical and cone-shaped, and set in the exact centre of the amphitheatTe like the boss in the centre of a shield.

Like the valley floor, the hill itself was heavily forested.

Tall elephant grass and niongongo trees grew profusely among the black volcanic boulders. A troop of black-faced vervet monkeys chattered at them from the trees and ducked their heads threateningly, grimacing with alarm, as they approached the hillock.

When Centaine and H'ani caught up with O'wa, he was standing facing a dark opening in the side of the hill. It looked like the mouth of a mine-shaft, but as she peered into it Centaine realized that the floor of the shaft sloped down at a gentle angle. She pushed past O'wa the better to examine it, but the old man seized her arm.

Be not hasty, Nam Child, we must make preparation in the correct manner. And he drew her back and led her gently away.

A little further on, there was an ancient San camp-site amongst the sheltering rocks. The thatched roofs of the shelters had collapsed with age. O'wa burned them to the ground, for disused huts harbour snakes and vermin, and the two women rebuilt them with saplings and freshly cut grass.

I am hungry. Centaine realized that she had not eaten since the previous evening.

Come. H'ani led her into the grove, and they filled their satchels with the fallen fruit of the mongongo trees.

Back in the camp, HaM showed Centaine how to strip off the outer layer of flesh and then to crack the hard central nut between two flat stones. The kernel looked like a dried almond. They ate a few of these, to take the edge off their hunger. They tasted like walnuts.

We will eat them in many ways, H'ani promised. And each way they taste different, roasted, pounded with leaves, boiled like maize bread, they will be our only food in this place where all killing is forbidden. While they prepared the meal, O'wa returned to camp with a bundle of freshly dug roots, and went aside to prepare them in private, scraping and chopping with his beloved clasp knife.

They ate before dark, and Centaine found the meal of nuts unexpectedly satisfying. As soon as her stomach was filled, the effect of the day's excitements and exertions caught up with her, and she could barely drag herself to her shelter.

She awoke refreshed and with a sense of unexplained excitement. The San were already busy around the camp fire and as soon as she joined them and squatted in the circle, O'wa, puffed up with nervous anticipation and self importance, told them, We must now prepare to go down into the most secret of places. Do you agree to the purification, old grandmother? It was obviously a formal question.

I agree, old grandfather. H'ani clapped softly in acquiescence.

Do you agree to the purification, Nam Child? I agree, old grandfather.

Centaine clapped in imitation and O'wa bobbed his head and from the pouch on his belt brought out a buck-horn. The top had been pierced, and O'wa had stuffed the horn with the chopped roots and herbs that he had gathered the previous afternoon.

Now he picked a live coal out of the fire with his fingers, and juggling it to prevent it burning his skin, he dropped it into the trumpet-shaped opening of the buckhom. He blew upon it and a tendril of blue smoke rose in the still air as the herbs smouldered.

Once the pipe was burning evenly, Ofwa rose and stood behind the two squatting women. He placed his mouth over the pierced tip of the horn and sucked on it strongly, then blew the smoke over them. It was acrid and sharply unpleasant, and left a bitter taste in Centaine's throat.

She murmured a protest and began to rise, but H'ani pulled her down again. O'wa kept puffing and exhaling, and after a while Centaine found the smoke less offensive.

She relaxed and leaned against H'ani. The old woman placed an arm around her shoulders. Slowly Centaine became aware of a marvelous sense of well-being. Her body felt as light as that of a bird, she felt she could float up with the spirals of blue smoke.

Oh, H'ani, I feel so good, she whispered.

The air around her seemed sparkling clear, her vision sharp and magnified so she could see every crack and 4A crevice in the surrounding cliffs, and the groves of trees A seemed to be made of green crystals. They reflected the sunlight with an ethereal radiance.

She became aware that O'wa. was kneeling in front of her, and she smiled at him dreamily. He was offering something, holding it out towards her with both hands. I It is for the child, he told her, and his voice seemed A to come from far away and echo strangely in her ears. It is the birthing mat. His father should have made it for him, but that could not be. Here, Nam Child, take it and bear a brave son upon it. O'wa leaned forward and placed the gift upon her lap.

it took long seconds before she realized that it was the gemsbok skin over which O'wa had worked so long and so intently. She unfolded it with exaggerated care. The skin had been scraped and tanned to the pliability and softness of fine cloth. She stroked it and the fur felt like satin. I i Thank you, old grandfather, her voice came from far away, and reverberated strangely in her own ears.

It is for the child, he repeated, and sucked on the buckhorn pipe.

For the child, yes Centaine nodded and her head seemed to float free of her body. O'wa gently exhaled a Stream of blue smoke into her face and she made no effort to av old it, rather she leaned forward to stare into his eyes. O'wa's pupils had shrunk to glittering black pinpricks, the irises were the colour of dark amber with a fanlike pattern of black lines surrounding the pupils.

They mesmerized her.

For the child's sake, let the peace of this place enter your soul. O`wa spoke through the smoke, and Centaine felt it happen.

Peace, she murmured, and at the centre of her being was a wondrous stillness, a monumental calm.

Time and space and white sunlight mingled and became one. She sat at the centre of the universe and smiled serenely, She heard O`wa singing far away, and she swayed gently to the rhythm and felt each beat of her heart and the slow pump of her blood through her veins.

She felt the child lying deep within her, curled in an attitude of prayer, then, unbelievably, she felt the tiny heart beating like that of a trapped bird, and the wonder of it engulfed her whole being.

We have come to be cleansed O'wa sang. We have come to wash away all offence, we have come to make atonement Centaine felt H'ani's hand creep into hers like a fragileboned animal, and she turned her head slowly and smiled into the beloved old face.

It is time, Nam Child Centaine drew the gemsbok skin over her shoulder. It required no effort to rise. She floated above the earth, with H'ani's little hand clutched in hers.

They came to the opening in the hillside, and though it was dark and steep, Centaine went forward smiling, and she did not feel the coarse volcanic rock beneath her feet. The passageway descended for a short distance, and then levelled out and opened into a natural cavern. They followed O'wa down.

Light filtered from the stairway behind them and from a number of small openings in the domed roof. The air was warm and moist and steamy. The clouds of steam tly from the surface of a circular pool that filled rose gen the cavern from side to side. The surface of the pool seethed and bubbled softly, and the steam smelled strongly of sulphur. The waters were cloudy green.

O'wa let his loincloth fall to the rocky floor and stepped into the pool. It reached to his knees but as he waded forward it deepened, until only his head was above the surface. H'ani followed him naked into the pool, and Centaine laid the gemsbok skin aside, and let her skirt fall.

The water was hot, almost scalding, a thermal spring welling up out of the matrix, but Centaine felt no discomfort . She moved deeper and then sank down slowly on to her knees until the water came to her chin. The floor of the pool was coarse pebble and gravel. The fierce heat of the waters soaked into her body. It swirled and eddied about her, kneading her flesh, as it bubbled up out of the depths of the earth.

She heard O'wa singing softly, but the steam clouds closed in around her and blinded her.

We wish to make atonement, O'wa sang. We wish to be forgiven our offences to the Spirits- Centaine saw a shape forming in the steam, clouds, a dark, insubstantial phantom.

Who are you? she murmured, and the shape firmed, and she recognized the eyes, the other features were obscure, as those of the old seaman she had sacrificed to the shark.

Please, she whispered, forgive me. It was for my baby.

Please forgive my offence. It seemed that for a moment there was understanding in those sad old eyes, and then the image faded and vanished in the steam banks, to be replaced by others, a host of memories and dream creaand she spoke to them.

tures, Oh, Papa, if I had only been strong enough, if only I could have filled Mama's place-, She heard the voices of the San in the steam, crying out in greeting to their own ghosts and memories. O'wa hunted again with his sons, and H'ani saw her babies and her grandchildren and crooned her love and mourning.

Oh, Michel, his eyes were a Marvellous blue, I will love you for ever. Yes, oh yes, I will name your son for you. I promise you that, my love, he will carry your name. How long she remained in the pool she did not know, but gradually the fantasies and the phantoms faded, and then she felt H'ani's hands leading her to the rocky lip.

The scalding waters seemed to have drained all the strength from her. Her body glowed a bright brick colour, and the ingrained dirt of the desert was scoured from the pores of her skin. Her knees were weak and rubbery.

H'ani draped the gemsbok skin over her wet body and helped her up the rocky passage to the surface. Night had fallen already, and the moon shone bright enough to cast shadows at their feet. H'ani led her to the rude shelter and wrapped her in the gemsbok skin.

The Spirits have forgiven, she whispered. They are pleased that we have made the journey. They sent my babies to greet me and tell me so. You can sleep well, Nam Child, there is no more offence. We are welcome in this place.

Centaine woke in confusion, not sure what was happening to her, not even certain where she was, imagining for the first few seconds that she was back in her chamber at Mort Homme and that Anna was standing beside her bed. Then she became aware of the coarse grass and hard earth beneath her and the smell of the rawhide that covered her, and immediately following that the pain came again. It was as though a claw had closed on her lower body, a cruel taloned claw, cramping and crushing her, and she cried out involuntarily and doubled over, clutching her stomach.

With the pain, reality rushed back upon her. Her mind was clear and sharp after the hallucinations of the previous day. She knew what was happening, she knew instinctively that the immersion in the heated waters of the pool and the drugged smoke she had breathed must have precipitated it.

H'ani! she called, and the old woman materialized out of the grey half light. It has begun! H'ani helped her to her feet, then gathered up the gemsbok skin.

Come, she whispered. We must go where we can be alone. H'ani must have already chosen the place, for she led Centaine directly to a hollow a short way beyond the camp, but screened from it by the mongongo grove. She spread the gemsbok skin at the base of a large mongongo tree and settled Centaine upon it. She knelt over her and removed her ragged canvas skirt, then with quick, strong fingers, she made a brief but thorough examination and then rocked back on her heels.

Soon, Nam Child, very soon now, she smiled happily, but Centaine's reply choked off as another spasm caught her. Ah, the child is impatient! H'ani nodded.

The spasm passed and Centaine lay and panted, but she had barely caught her breath before she stiffened again.

Oh, H'ani, hold my hand, please! PleaseV

Something burst deep within Centaine's body and hot liquid poured from her, and sprayed down her legs.

Close, very close now, H'ani assured her, and Centame gave a little hunted cry.

Now- H'ani pulled her into a sitting position, but she slumped back.

It's coming, Hlani. Get up! H'ani snapped at her. You must help it now.

Get up. You cannot help the baby if you lie on your back! She forced Centaine into a squatting position, with her feet and knees splayed apart, the natural position for voiding.

Hold the tree to steady yourself, she instructed her urgently. There! She guided Centaine's hands on to the rough bark and Centaine moaned and pressed her forehead hard against the trunk.

Now! H'ani knelt behind her, and encircled Centaine's body with her thin wiry arms.

Oh, H'ani, Centaine's cry rose sharply.

Yes! I will help you push him out. And she tightened her grip as Centaine bore down instinctively. Push, Nam Child, hard! Hard! Push! H'ani entreated her as she felt the girl's stomach muscles bunch up and harden into bands of iron.

There was a great blockade within her and Centaine clung to the tree and strained and moaned, and then she felt the obstruction move a little, then jam hard again.

H'ani! she cried, and the thin arms locked around her and the old woman moaned with her as they strained together. H'ani's naked body was pressed to Centaine's arched back, and she felt strength flowing out of the old wizened flesh like an electrical current.

Again, Nam Child, H'ani grunted in her ear. He is close, so close. Now! Nam child, push hard. Centaine bore down with all her strength and will. Her jaws were clenched so that she thought her teeth would crack, and her eyes swelled in their sockets. Then she felt something tear, a stinging burning pain, but despite the pain she found strength for another rigorous convulsion. it moved again, then there was a rush, a release and something enormous and impossibly heavy slid out of her at the same moment H'ani's hand reached under I her buttocks to guide and welcome and protect.

Like a benediction, the pain wilted away, and left her I shaking as though in high fever and running with her I own sweat, but empty, blessedly empty, as though her viscera had been drawn out of her.

H'ani released her grip, and Centaine clutched at the treetrunk for support, and drew long ragged breaths.

Then she felt something hot and wet and slippery squirming between her feet, and she pushed herself wearily away from the treetrunk and looked down. A tangle of fleshy glistening tubes still dangled out of her, and joined to them, enmeshed in their coils, the infant lay in a pool of blood-speckled fluid on the gemsbok-skin mat.

it was small, she was surprised at how small, but its clutching and kicking limbs were stretching in spasmodic gestures. The face was turned away from her but the M;, small neat head was covered with a dense cap of sodden black curls, plastered to the skull.

H'ani's hands reached down between her legs from behind and lifted the baby out of her sight. Instantly Centaine felt a devastating sense of deprivation, but she was too weak to protest. She felt a gentle twitching and tugging on the umbilical cord as H'ani handled the child, and then suddenly there was a furious squalling howl. It struck Centaine to the heart.

Then H'ani's laughter joined in chorus with the angry bawls. Centaine had never heard a sound of such unequivocal joy.

Oh, listen to him, Nam Child. He roars like a lion cub! Centaine waddled around awkwardly, hampered by the fleshy ropes dangling from her own body and still linking her to the infant. He was struggling in H'ani's hands, all wet and defiant, his face red with anger and his bee-stung eyes tight closed, but his toothless pink mouth wide as he howled his outrage.

A boy, H'ani? Centaine panted wildly.

Oh yes, H'ani laughed, by all means, a boy, and with the tip of her forefinger she tickled his tiny penis. it stuck out stiffly as though to endorse his anger, and at H'ani's touch released a powerful arcing jet of urine.

Look! Look! H'ani choked with laughter. He pisses on the world. Bear witness, all the Spirits of this place, a veritable lion cub has been birthed this day. She offered the squirming red-faced infant to Centaine.

Clean his eyes and nose, she ordered, and, like a mother cat, Centaine did not need further instruction.

She licked the mucus from the tiny swollen eyelids, from his nostrils and mouth.

Then H'ani took the child, handling him with familiar expertise, and she tied off the umbilical cord with the soft white inner bark threads of the mongongo tree, before severing it with a quick slash of her bone knife. Then she rolled the end of the tube in the medicinal leaves of the wild quince and bound it in place with a rawhide strip around his middle.

Sitting on the soiled gemsbok skin, in a puddle of her own blood and amniotic fluids, Centaine watched her work with shining eyes. Now! H'ani nodded with vast self-satisfaction.

He is ready for the breast. And she placed him in Centaine's lap.

He and Centaine needed only the barest introduction.

H'ani squeezed Centaine's nipple and touched the milkwet tip to the infant's lips, and he fastened on it like a leech, with a noisy rhythmic suction. For a few moments Centaine was startled by the sudden sharp sympathetic contractions of her womb as the child suckled, but this was lost and forgotten in the wonder and mystery of examining her incredible accomplishment.

Gently she unfolded his fist and marvelled at the perfection of each tiny pink finger, at the pearly nails, each no bigger than a grain of rice, and when he suddenly seized her finger in the surprisingly powerful grip, he squeezed her heart as well. She stroked his damp dark hair, and as it dried it sprang up into ringlets. It awed her to see the pulsing movement under the thin membrane that covered the opening of his skull.

He stopped suckling and lay quiescent in her arms, so she could take him from her breast and examine his face.

He was smiling. Apart from the puffy eyelids, his features were well formed, not squashed and rubbery like those of the other newborn infants she had seen. His brow was broad and deep and his nose was large. She thought of Michael, no it was More arrogant than Michael's nose and then she remembered General Sean Courtney. t That's it! she chuckled aloud. The true Courtney nose.

The infant stiffened and broke wind simultaneously both fore and aft, a trickle of her milk dribbled from the i corner of his mouth, and instantly he began to hunt for I the nipple again, mouthing demandingly, rolling his head from side to side. Centaine changed him to her other arm, and guided her nipple into his open mouth.

Kneeling in front of her, H'ani was working between Centaine's knees. Centaine winced and bit her lip as the afterbirth came free, and H'ani wrapped it in the leaves of the elephant-ear plant, tied it with bark and scampered away into the grove with the bundle.

When she returned, the child was asleep in Centaine's lap, with his legs splayed and his belly tight as a balloon.

If you permit, I will fetch O'wa, H'ani suggested. He will have heard the birth cries. Oh, yes, fetch him quickly. Centaine had forgotten the old man, and now was delighted at the opportunity to exhibit her marvelous acquisition.

O'wa came shyly and squatted a little way off, showing the usual masculine lack of temerity when faced with the feminine mystery of birth.

Approach, old grandfather, Centaine encouraged him, and he shuffled closer on his haunches and peered solemnly at the sleeping child.

What do you think? Centaine asked. Will he be a hunter? As skilful and brave a hunter as O'wa?

O'wa made the little clicking sound reserved for those rare occasions when he was at a loss for words, and his face was a web of convoluted wrinkles like that of a worried Pekinese lap dog. Suddenly the child kicked out strongly and yelped in his sleep, and the old man dissolved into uncontrolled giggles.

I never thought I would see it again, he wheezed, and gingerly reached out and took a tiny pink foot in his hand.

The child kicked again and it was too much for O'wa.

He sprang up and began to dance. Shuffling and stamping, circling the mother and child on the gemsbok skin, around and around he went, and H'ani controlled herself for three circuits, then she too leaped to her feet and danced with her husband. She followed him, with her hands on his hips, leaping when he leaped, twitching her protruding backside, performing the intricate stamp and double shuffle, and singing the chorus to O'wa's praise song: His arrows will fly to the stars and when men speak his name it will be heard as far and H'ani came in with the chorus. -And he will find good water, wherever he travels, he will find good water.

O'wa squeaked and jerked his legs and made his shoulders shake.

His bright eye will pick out the game when other men are blind.

Effortlessly he will follow the spoor over rocky ground -And he will ri. nd good water, at every camp site he will find good water -prettiest maidens will smile and tiptoe to his camp fire in the night And H'ani reiterated in her reedy singsong: -And he will find good water, wherever he goes, he will find good water.

They were blessing the child, wishing upon him all the treasure of the San people, and Centaine felt that her heart would break with love for them and for the small pink bundle in her lap.

When at last the old people could dance and sing no more, they knelt in front of Centaine.

As the great-grandparents of the child, we would like to give him a name, H'ani explained shyly. Is it permitted? Speak, old grandmother. Speak, old grandfather. H'ani looked at her husband and he nodded encouragement. We would name the child Shasa. Tears prickled Centaine's eyelids as she realized the great honour. They were naming him after the most precious, life-sustaining element in the San universe. Shasa, Good Water. Centaine blinked back the tears and smiled at them.

I name this child Michel Shasa de Thiry Courtney, she said softly, and each of the old people reached out in turn and touched his eyes and mouth in blessing.

The sulphurous, mineralized waters of the subterranean pool were possessed of extraordinary qualities. Every noon and evening Centaine soaked in their heat, and the manner in which her birth injuries healed was almost miraculous. Of course, she was in superb physical health, without an ounce of superfluous fat or flesh upon her, and Shasa's neat lean body and the ease of his delivery was a consequence of this. Furthermore the San looked upon parturition as such a routine process that H'ani neither pampered her, nor encouraged her to treat herself as an invalid.

Young muscles, elastic and well exercised, swiftly regained their resilience and strength. Her skin, not overstretched, was free of stria, and her belly swiftly shrank back into its greyhound profile. Only her breasts were swollen hard with copious milk, and Shasa gorged and grew like one of the desert plants after rain.

Then again there was the pool and its waters.

It is strange, H'ani told her, the nursing mothers who drink this water always grow children with bones as hard as rock and teeth that shine like polished ivory. It is one of the blessings of the spirits that guard this place. At noon the sun struck through one of the apertures in the domed roof of the cavern, a solid white shaft of light through the steam-laden air, and Centaine loved to bask in it, moving across the pool as the beam swung, to keep in its charmed circle of light.

She lay chin-deep in the seething green water, and listened to Shasa snuffling and mewing in his steep. She had wrapped him in the gemsbok skin and laid him on the ledge beside the pool where she could see him merely by turning her head.

The bottom of the pool was lined with gravel and pebbles. She scooped up handfuls of them and held them up in the sunlight, and they gave her a special kind of pleasure for they were strange and beautiful. There were veined agates, waterworn and smooth as swallows eggs, stones of soft blue with lines of red through them, or pink or yellow, and Jaspers and carnelians in a hundred shades of burgundy, shiny black onyx and tiger's eyes of gold barred with iridescent waves of shifting colour.

I will make a necklace, for H'ani. A gift to thank her, from Shasa! She began to collect the prettiest stones with the most interesting and unusual shapes.

I need a centrepiece for the necklace, she decided, and she dredged handfuls of gravel and washed them in the hot green waters, then examined them in the sunlight until at last she found exactly what she was searching f or.

It was a colourless stone, clear as water, but when it caught the sunlight it contained a captive rainbow, an internal fire that burned with all the colours of the spectrum . Centaine spent a long lazy hour in the pool, turning this stone slowly in the beam of sunlight to make it flash and sparkle, staring into its depths with delight, watching it explode into wondrous cascades of light. The stone was not large, only the size of one of the ripe mongongo fruit - but it was a symmetrical many-sided crystal, perfect for the centrepiece of the necklace.

She designed H'anils necklace with infinite care, spending many hours while Shasa nursed at her breast, arranging and rearranging her collection of pebbles until at last she had them in the order which most pleased her. Yet still she was not entirely satisfied, for the colourless central stone, so sparkling and regular in shape, made all the other coloured stones seem somehow drab and uninteresting.

Nevertheless, she began to experiment in stringing the pebbles in a necklace and here she immediately encountered problems.

One or two of the pebbles were so soft that by dint of persistent effort and many worn-out bone augers she was finally able to drill a stringing hole through them. Others were brittle and shattered, and others again were too hard. In particular, the sparkling crystal resisted her best efforts, and remained absolutely unblemished after she had broken a dozen bone tools upon it.

She appealed to O'wa for assistance, and once he understood what she was working on, he was boyishly enthusiastic. They experimented and met with failure a dozen times before they finally worked out a means of cementing the harder stones on to the plaited sansevieria twine with acacia gum. Centaine began to assemble the necklace, and almost drove O'wa to distraction in the process, for she discarded fifty lengths of twine.

This is too thick, she would say. This is not strong enough. And Uwa, who, when working on his own weapons and tools, was also a perfectionist, took the problem very seriously.

Finally Centaine unravelled the hem of her canvas skirt and by plaiting the threads with the sansevieria fibres, they had a string for the necklace that was fine and strong enough to satisfy both of them.

When the necklace was at last finished, O'wa's selfsatisfaction could not have been more overbearing had he conceived, planned and executed the project entirely on his own. It was a more of a pectoral than a necklace, with a single string around the back of the neck and the stones woven together in a plate-like decoration which hung on the breast with the big crystal in the centre, and a mosaic of coloured agates and jaspers and beryls surrounding it.

Even Centaine was delighted with her handiwork.

It's turning out better than I had hoped, she told O'wa, speaking in French and holding it up and turning it to catch the sunlight. Not as good as Monsieur Cartier, she remembered her father's wedding gift to her mother which he had allowed her to wear on her birthdays -but not too bad for a wild girl's first effort in a wild place! Th y made a little ceremony of the presentation, and H'ani sat beaming like a little amber-coloured hobgoblin while Centaine thanked her for being such a paragon of a grandmother and the best midwife of the San, but when she placed the gift around the old woman's neck it seemed too big and weighty for the frail wrinkled body.

Ha, old man, you are so proud of that knife of yours, but it is as nothing to this, H'ani told O'wa as she stroked the necklace lovingly. This is a true gift. Look you! Now I wear the moon and the stars around my throatV She refused to remove it. It thumped against her breastbone as she wielded her digging stick or stooped to gather the mongongo nuts. When she crouched over the cooking fires, it dangled between the empty pouches of her swinging dugs. Even in the night as she slept with her head cradled on her own bare shoulder, Centame looked across from her own shelter and saw the necklace shining on her chest, and it seemed to weigh the little old body down to the earth.

Once Centaine's preoccupation with the necklace was over, and her strength and vitality fully recovered after childbirth, she began to find the days too long and the rock cliffs of the valley as restrictive as the high walls of a prison.

The daily routine of life was undemanding, and Shasa slept on her hip or strapped to her back while she gathered the fallen nuts in the grove or helped H'ani bring in the firewood. Her menses resumed their course, and she itched with unexpected energy.

She had sudden moods of black depression, when even H'ani's innocent chatter irritated her, and she went off alone with the baby. Though he slept soundly through it all, she held him on her lap and spoke to him in French or English. She told him about his father and the chateau, about Nuage and Anna and General Courtney, and the names and the memories instilled in her a deep and undirected melancholy. Sometimes in the night, when she could not sleep, she lay and listened to the music in her head, the strains of Afda or the songs the peasants sang in the fields at Mort Homme during the vendange.

So the months passed and the seasons of the desert rotated. The mongongo tree flowered and fruited again, and one day Shasa lifted himself on to hands and knees and to the delight of all set off on his first explorations of the valley. Yet Centaine's mood swung more violently than the seasons, her joy in Shasa and her contentment in the old people's company alternating with blacker moods when she felt like a life prisoner in the valley.

They have come here to die, she realized as she saw F how the old San had settled into an established routine, i but I don't want to die, I want to live, to live! H'ani watched her shrewdly until she realized it was e, and then told Uwa, Tomorrow Nam Child and I tim are going out of the valley. Why, old woman? O'wa looked startled.

He was entirely contented and had not yet thought about leaving.

We need medicines, and a change of food. That is no reason to risk passing the guardians of the tunnel We will go out in the cool of the dawn, when the bees are sleepy, and return in the late evening, besides, the guardians have accepted us. O'wa started to protest further, but she cut him short.

It is necessary, old grandfather, there are things that a man does not understand. As Hlani had intended, Centaine was excited and happy with the promised outing, and she shook H'ani awake long before the agreed hour. They slipped quietly through the tunnel of the bees, and with Shasa bound tightly to her back and her carrying satchel stung over one shoulder, Centaine ran down the narrow valley and out into the endless spaces of the desert like a schoolchild released from the classroom. Her mood lasted through the morning and she and H'ani chattered happily as they moved through the forest, searching and digging for the roots that H'ani said she needed.

In the heat of the noonday they found shelter under an acacia, and while Centaine nursed the baby, H'ani curled up in the shade and slept like an old yellow cat. Once Shasa had drunk his fill, Centaine leaned back against the trunk of the acacia and dozed off as well.

The stamp of hooves and horsey snorts disturbed her, and she opened her eyes, but remained absolutely still.

With the breeze behind them, a herd of zebra had grazed down upon the sleeping group, not noticing them in the waist-high grass.

There were at least a hundred animals in the herd newly born foals with legs too long for their fluffy bodies and w th smudged chocolate-coloured stripes not yet set into definite patterns, staying close to their dams and staring around at the world with huge dark apprehensive eyes, older foals quick and surefooted as they chased each other in circles through the trees, the breeding mares, sleek and glossy, with stiff upstanding manes and pricked ears, some of them huge with foal, milk already swelling in their black udders. Then there were the stallions with powerful bulging quarters, necks arched proudly as they challenged each other or snuffled one of the mares, reminding Centaine vividly of Nuage in his prime. Barely daring to breathe, she lay against the acacia trunk and watched them with deep pleasure. They moved down still closer, she could have reached out and touched one of the foals as it gambolled past her. They passed so close that she could see that each animal was different from the others, the intricate patterns of their hides as distinct as finger-prints, and the dark stripes were shadowed by a paler orangey-cream duplicate, so that every animal was a separate work of art.

As she watched, one of the stallions, a magnificent animal standing twelve hands and with a bushy tail sweeping below his hocks, cut a young mare out of the main pack of the herd, nipping at her flanks and her neck with square yellow teeth, heading her off when she tried to circle back, pushing her well away from the other mares, but closer to the acacia tree, before he started to gentle her by nuzzling her neck.

The mare bridled flirtatiously well aware of her highly desirable condition, and she rolled her eyes and bit him viciously on his muscled glossy shoulder so that he snorted and reared away, but then circled back and tried to push his nose up under her tail where she was swollen tensely with her season. She squealed with a modest outrage and lashed out with both back legs, her shiny black hooves flying high past his head, and she spun around to face him, baring her teeth.

Centaine found herself unaccountably moved. She shared the mare's mounting excitation, empathized with her charade of reluctance that was spurring the circling stallion to greater ardour. At last the mare submitted and stood stock-still, her tail lifted as the stallion nosed her gently. Centaine felt her own body stiffen in anticipation - then when the stallion reared over her and buried his long pulsing black root deeply in her, Centaine gasped and pressed her own knees together sharply.

That night in her rude thatched shelter beside the steaming thermal pool, she dreamed of Michael and the old barn near North Field, and woke to a deep corroding loneliness and an undirected discontent that did not subside even when she held Shasa to her breast and felt him tugging demandingly at her.

Her dark mood persisted, and the high rocky walls of the valley closed in around her so she felt she could not breathe. However, four more days passed before she could wheedle H'ani into another expedition out into the open forests.

Centaine looked for the zebra herd again as they meandered amongst the mopani trees, but this time the forests seemed strangely deserted and what wild game they did see was mistrusting and skittish, taking instant alarm at the first distant sign of the upright human figures.

There is something, H'ani muttered as they rested in the noon heat, I do not know what it is, but the wild things sense it also. It makes me uneasy, we should return to the valley that I might talk with O'wa. He understands these things better than I do. Oh Rani, not yet, Centaine pleaded.

Let us stay here a little longer. I feel so free. I do not like whatever is happening here, H'ani insisted.

The bees- Centaine found inspiration, we cannot pass through the tunnel until nightfall, and though H'ani grumped and frowned, she at last agreed.

But listen to this old woman, there is something unusual, something bad- and she sniffed at the air and neither of them could sleep when they rested at noon.

H'ani took Shasa from her as soon as he had fed.

He grows so, she whispered, and there was a shadow of regret in her bright black eyes. I wish I could see him in his full growth, straight and tall as the mopani tree."You will, old grandmother, Centaine smiled, you will live to see him as a man. H'ani did not look up at her. You will go, both of you, one day soon. I sense it, you will go back to your own people. Her voice was hoarse with regret. You will go, and when you do there will be nothing left in life for this old woman. No, old grandmother, Centaine reached out and took her hand. Perhaps we will have to go one day. But we will come back to you. I give you my word on that. Gently H'ani disentangled her grip, and still without looking at Centaine, stood up. The heat is past. They worked back towards the mountain, moving widely separated through the forest, keeping each other just in sight, except when denser bush intervened. As was her habit, Centaine chatted to the sleeping infant on her hip, speaking French to train his ear to the sound of the language, and to keep her own tongue exercised.

They had almost reached the scree slope below the cliffs when Centaine saw the fresh tracks of a pair of zebra stallions imprinted deeply in the soft earth ahead of her. Under H'ani's instruction, she had developed acute powers of observation, and O'wa had taught her to read the signs of the wild with fluent ease. There was something about these tracks that puzzled her. They ran side by side, as though the animals that made them had been harnessed to each other. She hefted Shasa on to her other hip and turned aside to examine them more closely.

She stopped with a jerk that alarmed the child, and he squawked in protest. Centaine stood paralysed with shock, staring at the hoof prints, not yet able to comprehend what she was seeing. Then suddenly a rush of emotions and understanding made her reel back. She understood the agitated behaviour of the wild creatures, and H'ani's undirected premonition of evil. She began to tremble, at the same moment filled with fear and joy, with confusion and shaking excitement.

Shasa, she whispered, they are not zebra prints. The hooves that had made these chains of tracks were shod with crescents of steel. Horsemen, Shasa, civilized men riding horses shod with steel! It seemed impossible. Not

here, not in this desert fastness.

Instinctively her hands flew to the opening of the canvas shawl she wore about her shoulders, and from which her breasts thrust out unashamedly. She covered them and glanced around her fearfully. With the San she had come to accept nudity as completely natural. Now she was aware that her skirts rode high on her long slim thighs, and she was ashamed.

She backed away from the prints as though from an accuser s finger.

Man, a civilized man, she repeated, and immediately the image of Michael formed in her mind, and her longing overcame her shame. She crept forward again and knelt beside the spoor, staring at it avidly, not able to bring herself to touch it in case it proved to be hallucination.

It was fresh, so very fresh that even as she watched the crisply outlined edge of one hoofprint, it collapsed and slid in upon itself in a trickle of loose sand.

An hour ago, Shasa, they passed only an hour ago, not longer. The riders had been walking their horses, moving at less than five miles an hour, There is a civilized man within five miles of us at this very moment, Shasa. She jumped up and ran along the line, fifty paces, before she stopped again and dropped to her knees. She would not have seen it before, without O'wa's instruction she had been blind, but now she picked out the alien texture of metal, even though it was only the size of a thumbnail and had fallen into a clump of dry grass.

She picked it out and laid it in her palm. It was a tarnished brass button, a military button with an embossed crest, and the broken thread still knotted in the tang.

She stared at it as though it were a priceless jewel.

The design upon it depicted a unicorn and an antelope guarding a shield and below there was a motto in a ribbon.

Ex Unitate Vires, she read aloud. She had seen the same buttons on General Sean Courtney's tunic, but his were brightly polished. From Unity Strength. The coat of arms of the Union of South Africa. A soldier, Shasa! One of General Courtney's men! At that moment there was a distant whistle, H'ani's summons, and Centaine sprang to her feet and hovered undecidedly. All her instinct was to race desperately after the horsemen, and to plead to be allowed to travel with them back to civilization, but then H'ani whistled again and she turned to look back.

She knew how terrified the San were of all foreigners, for the old people had told her all the stories of brutal persecution. H'ani must not see these tracks. She shaded her eyes and stared longingly in the direction in which the spoor pointed, but nothing moved amongst the mopani trees. She will try to stop us following them, Shasa, she and O'wa will do anything to stop us. How can we leave the old people, and yet they can't come with us, they will be in great danger- she was torn. and undecided -but we can't let this chance go. It might be our only- H'ani whistled again, this time much closer, and Centaine saw her small figure amongst the trees coming towards her. Centaine's hand closed guiltily on the brass button and she thrust it into the bottom of her satchel.

H'ani mustn't see the tracks, she repeated, and glanced quickly up at the cliffs, orientating herself so that she could return and find them herself, and then whirled and ran to meet the old woman and led her away, back towards the hidden valley.

That evening, as they performed the routine camp chores, Centaine had difficulty disguising the nervous excitement that gripped her, and she replied distractedly to H'ani's questions. As soon as they had eaten and the short African dusk ended, she went to her shelter and settled down as though to sleep, pulling the gemsbok skin over both the infant and herself. Although she lay quietly, and regulated her breathing, she was fretting and worrying, as she tried to reach her decision.

She had no means of guessing who the horsemen were, and she was determined not to lead the San into mortal danger, yet she was equally determined to take her own chances and to follow up those tantalizing tracks for the promise they held of salvation and return to her own world, of escape from this harsh existence which would at last turn her and her infant into savages.

We must give ourselves a start, so that we can catch up with the horsemen before H'ani and O'wa even realize we have gone. That way they will not follow us, will not be exposed to danger. We will go as soon as the moon rises, my baby. She lay tense and still, feigning sleep, until the gibbous moon showed over the rim of the valley. Then she rose quietly and Shasa murmured and grunted sleepily as she gathered up her satchel and stave and crept quietly out on to the path.

She paused at the corner of the hill and looked back.

the fire had died to embers, but the moonlight played into the old people's shelter. O'wa was in the shadows, just a small dark shape, but the moonlight washed H'ani.

Her amber skin seemed to glow in the soft light, and her head, propped on her own shoulder, was turned towards Centaine. Her expressed seemed forlorn and hopeless, a harbinger of the terrible sorrow and loss that Centaine knew she would suffer when she woke, and the necklace of pebbles gleamed dully on her bony old chest.

Goodbye, old grandmother, Centaine whispered. Thank you for your great humanity and kindness to us.

I will always love you. Forgive us, little H'ani, but we have to go. Centaine had to steel herself before she could turn the rocky corner that cut her off from the camp. As she hurried up the rough pathway to the tunnel of the bees, her own tears blurred the moonlight and tasted of seawater as they ran into the corners of her mouth.

She groped her way through the utter darkness and the warm honey smell of the tunnel and out into the moon light in the narrow valley beyond. She paused to listen for the sound of bare feet on the rocks behind her, but the only sound was the yelp of the jackal packs out on the plains below, and she started forward again.

As she reached the plain Shasa mewed and wriggled on her hip, and without stopping she adjusted his sling so that he could reach her breast. He fastened on it greedily, and she whispered to him as she hurried through the forest, Don't be afraid, baby, even though this is the first time we have been alone at night. The horsemen will be camped just a short way ahead. We will catch up with them before sunrise, before H'ani and O'wa are even awake. Don't look at the shadows, don't imagine things, Shasa- She kept talking softly, trying to shore up her own courage, for the night was full of mystery and menace, and she had never realized until that moment how she had come to rely on the two old people.

We should have found the spoor by now, Shasa. Centaine stopped uncertainly and peered about her. Everything looked different in the moonlight. We must have missed it. She turned back, breaking into an anxious trot. I'm sure it was at the head of this glade. And then, with a rush of relief, There it is, the moon was against us before. Now the hoof-prints were rimmed clearly with shadow and the steel shoes had bitten deeply into the sandy earth.

How much O'wa had taught her! She saw the tracks so clearly that she could break into a trot.

The horsemen had made no effort to hide their spoor, and there was no wind to wipe it out. They had ridden the easy line, keeping out in the open, following wellbeaten game paths, not pushing their mounts above an easy ambling walk, and once Centaine found where one of them had dismounted and led his horse for a short distance.

She was elated when she saw that this man wore boots.

Riding-boots with medium high heels, and well-worn soles. Even in the uncertain moonlight, Centaine could tell by the length of his stride and the slight toe-out gait that he was a tall man with long narrow feet and an easy, yet confident stride. It seemed to confirm all her hopes.

Wait for us, she whispered. Please, sir, wait for Shasa and me to catch up. She was gaining rapidly. We must look for their camp fire, Shasa, they will be camped not far from- she broke off. There! What's that, Shasa? Did you see it? She stared into the forest.

I'm sure I saw something. She stared about her. But it's gone now. She changed Shasa to her other hip.

What a big lump you are becoming! But never mind, we'll be there soon. She started forward again, and the trees thinned out and Centaine found herself at the head of another long open glade. The moonlight laid a pale metallic sheen on the short grass.

Eagerly she surveyed the open ground, focusing her attention on each dark irregularity, hoping to see hobbled horses near a smouldering fire and human shaped rolled into their blankets, but the shapes were only tree stumps or anthills, and at the far side of the glade a small herd of wildebeest grazing heads down.

Don't worry, Shasa, she spoke louder to cover her own intense disappointment, I'm sure they'll be camped in the trees. The wildebeest threw up their heads and erupted into a rumbling snorting stampede, streaming away into the trees, fine dust hanging behind them like mist.

What frightened them, Shasa? The wind is with us, they could not have taken our scent. The sound of the running herd dwindled. Something chased them! She looked around her carefully. I'm imagining things.

I'm seeing things that aren't there. We mustn't start panicking at shadows. Centaine started forward firmly, but within a short distance she stopped again fearfully.

Did you hear that, Shasa? There is something following us. I heard the footfalls, but it's stopped now. It's watching us, I can feel it. At that moment a small cloud passed over the moon and the world turned dark.

The moon will come out again soon. Centaine hugged the infant so hard that Shasa gave a little bleat of protest. I'm sorry, baby. She relaxed her grip and then stumbled as she started forward.

I wish we hadn't come, no, that's not true. We had to come. We must be brave, Shasa. We can't follow the spoor without the moon. She sank down to rest, looking up into the sky. The moon was a pale nimbus through the thin gunmetal cloud, and then it broke out into a hole in the cloud layer and for a moment flooded the glade with soft platinum light.

Shasa! Centaine's voice rose into a high thin Scream.

There was something out there, a huge pate shape, as big as a horse, but with sinister, stealthy, unhorselike carriage. At her cry, it sank out of sight below the tops of the grass.

Centaine leapt to her feet and raced towards the trees, but before she reached them the moon was snuffed out again, and in the darkness Centaine fell full length. Shasa waited fretfully against her chest.

Please be quiet, baby. Centaine hugged him, but the child sensed her terror and screamed. Don't, Shasa. You'll bring it after us. Centaine was trembling wildly. That big pale thing out there in the darkness was possessed of an unearthly menace, a palpable aura of evil, and she knew what it was. She had seen it before.

She pressed herself flat to the earth, trying to cover Shasa with her own body. Then there was a sound, a hurricane of sound that filled the night, filled her head seemed to fill her very soul. She had heard that sound before, but never so close, never so soul-shattering.

Oh, sweet mother of God, she whispered. It was the full-blooded roar of a lion. The most terrifying sound of the African wilds.

At that moment, the moon broke out of the cloud again, and she saw the lion clearly. It stood facing her, fifty paces away, and it was immense, with its mane fully extended, a peacock's tail of ruddy hair around the massive flat head.

Its tail swung from side to side, flicking the black tuft like a metronome, and then it extended its neck and humped its shoulders, lowering and opening its jaws so that the long ivory fangs gleamed in the moonlight like daggers, and it roared again.

All the ferocity and cruelty of Africa seemed to be distilled into that dreadful blast. Though she had read the descriptions of the travellers and hunters, they could not prepare her for the actuality. The blast seemed to crush her chest, so that her heart checked and her lungs seized.

It loosened her bowels and her bladder so she had to clench fiercely to keep control of herself. In her arms Shasa screeched and wriggled, and that was enough to jar Centaine out of her paroxysm of terror.

The lion was an old red torn, an outcast from the pride.

His teeth and claws were worn, his skin scarred and almost bald across the shoulders. In the succession battle with the young prime male who had driven him from the pride, he had lost one eye, a hooked claw had ripped it from the socket.

He was sick and starving, his ribs racked out under his scraggy hide, and in his hunger he had attacked a porcupine three days before. A dozen long poisonous barbed quills had driven deeply into his neck and cheeks and were already suppurating and festering. He was old and weak and uncertain, his confidence shattered, and he was wary of man and the man odour. His ancestral memories, his own long experience had warned him to stay clear of these strange frail upright creatures. His roarings were symptoms of his nervousness and uncertainty. There was a time when, as hungry as he was now, he would have gone in swiftly and silently. Even now his jaws had the strength to crunch through a skull or thighbone and a single blow of one massive forepaw could shatter a man's spine. However, he hung back, circling the prey. Perhaps, if there had been no moon, he would have been bolder, or if he had ever eaten human flesh before, or if the agony of the buried quills had been less crippling, but now he roared indecisively. Centaine leaped to her feet. It was instinctive. She had watched the old black stable torn cat at Mort Homme with a mouse, and his reflex action to his victim's attempted flight. Somehow she knew that to run would be to bring the great cat down on her immediately.

She screamed, -and holding the pointed stave high, she rushed straight at the lion. He whirled and galloped off through the grass, fifty paces, and then stopped and looked back at her, lashing his tail from side to side, and he growled with frustration.

Still facing him, clutching Shasa under one arm and the stave in the other hand, Centaine backed away. She glanced over her shoulder, the nearest mopani tree stood isolated from the rest of the forest. It was straight and sturdy with a fork high above the ground, but it seemed to be at the other end of the earth from where she stood.

We mustn't run, Shasa, she whispered, and her voice shook. Slowly. Slowly, now. Her sweat was running into her eyes though she shivered wildly with cold and terror.

The lion circled around towards the forest, swinging its head low, ears pricked, and she saw the gleam of his single eye like the flash of a knife-blade.

We must get to the tree, Shasa, and the infant whined and kicked on her hip. The lion stopped and she could hear it sniffing.

Oh God, it's so big. Her foot caught and she almost fell. The lion rushed forward, grunting terrible exhalations of sound, like the pistons of a locomotive, and she screamed and waved the stave.

The lion stopped, but this time stood its ground, facing her, lowering its great shaggy head threateningly and lashing the long, black-tipped tail, and when Centaine began to back away, it moved forward, slinking low to the earth. The tree, Shasa, we must reach the tree! The lion started to circle again, and Centaine glanced up at the moon. There was another dark blot of cloud trundling down from the north.

Please don't cover the moon! she whispered brokenly.

She realized how their lives depended on that soft uncertain light, she instinctively knew how bold the great cat would become in darkness. Even now its circles were becoming narrower, it was working in, still cautious and wary, but watching her and perhaps beginning to realize how utterly helpless she was. The final killing charge was only seconds away.

Something hit her from behind and she shrieked and almost fell, before she realized that she had walked backwards into the base of the mopani tree. She clung to it for support, for her legs could not hold her, so intense was her relief.

Shaking so much that she almost dropped it, she unslung the leather satchel from her shoulder and tipped the ostrich-egg bottles out of it. Then she pushed Shasa feet first into the bag, so only his head protruded, and slung him over her back. Shasa was redfaced and yelling angrily.

Be quiet, please be quiet- She snatched up her stave again, and stuck it into her rope belt like a sword. She d to catch the first branch above her head and she jumped got a hold and scrambled with her bare feet for a grip on the rough bark. She would never have believed it possible, but in desperation she found untapped reserves and she hauled herself and her load upwards by the main strength of arms and legs, and crawled on to the branch.

Still, she was only five feet above the ground, and the lion grunted fearsomely and made a short rush forward.

She teetered on the branch and reached up for another hold, and then another. The bark was rough and abrasive as crocodile skin and her fingers and shins were bleeding by the time she scrambled into the fork of the mopani thirty feet above the ground.

The lion smelled the blood from her grazed skin and it drove him frantic with hunger. He roared and prowled around the base of the mopani stopping to sniff at the ostrich eggs that Centaine had dropped, and then roaring again.

We are safe, Shasa, Centaine was sobbing with relief, crouched in the high fork, holding the child on her lap and peering down through the leaves and branches on to the broad muscled back of the old lion. She realised that she could see more clearly, the light of dawn was flushing the eastern sky. She could clearly make out that the great cat was a gingery reddish colour, and unlike the drawings she had seen, his mane was not black but the same ruddy colour.

O'wa called them red devils, she remembered, hugging Shasa and trying to still his outraged yells. How long until it's light? She looked anxiously to the east and saw the dawn coming in a splendour of molten copper and furnace reds.

It will be day soon, Shasa, she told him. Then the beast will go away- Below her the lion reared up on its hindlegs and stood against the trunk, looking up at her.

One eye, he's only got one eye. The black scarred socket somehow made the other glowing yellow eye more murderous, and Centaine shuddered wildly.

The lion ripped at the trunk of the tree with the claws of both front feet, erupting into those terrible crackling roars once more. It ripped slabs and long shreds of bark from the trunk, leaving wet wounds weeping with sap.

Go away! Centaine screamed at it, and the lion gathered itself on its hindquarters and launched itself upwards, hooking with all four feet.

No! Go away! Michael had told her and she had read in Levaillant that lions did not climb trees, but this great red cat came swarming up the trunk and then pulled itself on to the main branch ten feet above the ground and balanced there staring up at her.

Shasa! She realized then that the lion was going to get her, her climb had merely delayed the moment. We've got to save you, Shasa. She dragged herself upward, standing in the fork, and clutching the side branch.

There! Above her head there was a broken branch that stuck out like a hatpeg, and using all that remained of her strength, she lifted the rawhide bag with Shasa in it and hooked the strap over the peg.

Goodbye, my darling, she panted. Perhaps H'ani will find you. Shasa was struggling and kicking, the bag swung and twisted, and Centaine sank back on to the fork and drew the sharpened stave from her belt. Be still, baby, please be still. She did not look up at him. She was watching the lion below her. If you are A quiet it might not see you, it might be satisfied. The lion stretched up with its forelegs, balancing on the branch, and roared again. She smelt it now, the stink of its festering wounds and the dead carrion reek of its breath, and then the beast hurled itself upwards.

With claws ripping the bark, clinging with all four paws, it came up in a series of convulsive leaps. Its head I was thrown back, its single yellow eye fastened on Centaine, and with those monstrous explosions of sound bursting up out of its gaping pink jaws, it came straight i at her.

Centaine screamed and drove the point of her stave down into the jaws with all her strength. She felt the sharpened end bite into the soft pink mucus membrane in the back of its throat, saw the spurt of scarlet blood, and then the lion locked its jaws on the stave and with a toss of its flying mane ripped it out of her hands and sent it windmilling out and down to hit the earth below.

Then with bright blood streaming from its jaws, blowing a pink cloud every time it roared, the lion reached up with one huge paw.

Centaine jack-knifed her legs upwards, trying to avoid it, but she was not quick enough; one of the curled yellow claws, as long and thick as a man's forefinger, sank into her flesh above her bare ankle, and she was jerked savagely downwards.

As she was pulled out of the fork, she flung both her arms around the side branch and with all her remaining strength she held on. She felt her whole body racked, drawn out, the unbearable weight of the lion stretching her leg until she felt her knee and hip joint crack, and pain shot up her spine and filled her skull like a bursting sky rocket.

She felt the lion's claw curling in her flesh, and her arms started to give way. Inch by inch she was drawn out of the tree.

Look after my baby, she screamed. Please God, protect my baby.

It was another wild-goose chase, Garry was absolutely convinced of it, though of course he would never be foolhardy enough to say so. Even the thought made him feel guilty, and he glanced sideways at the woman he loved.

Anna had learned English and lost a little weight in the eighteen short sweet months since he had met her, and the latter was the only circumstance in his life he would have altered if it had been in his power, indeed he was always urging food upon her. There was a German pitisserie and confectioner's opposite the Kaiserhof Hotel in Windhoek where Garry had taken a permanent suite. He never passed the shop without going in to buy a box of the marvelous black chocolates or a creamy cake, Black Forest Cherry Cake was a favourite, which he took back to Anna. When he carved, he always reserved the fattest, juiciest cuts for her, and replenished the plate without allowing her time to protest. However, she had still lost weight.

They didn't spend enough time in the hotel suite, he brooded. They spent too much of their time chasing about the bush, as they were doing now. No sooner had he put a few pounds on her than they were off again, banging and jolting over remote tracks in the open Fiat tourer that had replaced the T model Ford, or when the tracks faded, resorting to horses and mules to carry them over rugged ranges of mountains or through the yawning canyons and rock deserts of the interior, chasing the will-o'-the-wisp of rumour and chance and often of deliberately misleading information.

The crazy old people, Die twee ou onbeskofters that was the title which they have gained themselves from one end of the territory to the other, and Garry took a perverse and defiant pleasure in the fact that he had earned it the hard way. When he had totted up the actual cost in hard cash of the continuing search, he had been utterly appalled, until suddenly he had thought, What else have I got to spend it on anyway, except Anna? And then, after a little further reflection, What else is there except Anna? And with that discovery he had thrown himself headlong into the madness.

Of course, sometimes when he woke in the night and thought about it clearly and sensibly, he knew that his grandson did not exist, he knew that the daughter-in-law that he had never seen had drowned eighteen months ago, out there in the cold green waters of the Atlantic, taking with her the last contact he could ever have with Michael.

Then that terrible sorrow came upon him once again, threatening to crush him, until he groped for Anna in the bed beside him and crept to her, and even in her sleep she seemed to sense his need and she would roll towards him and take him to her.

Then in the morning he awoke refreshed and revitalized, logic banished and blind faith restored, ready to set out on the next fantastic adventure that awaited them.

Garry had arranged for five thousand posters to be printed in Cape Town, and distributed to every police station, magistrate's court, post office and railway station in South West Africa. Wherever he and Anna travelled, there was always a bundle of posters on the back seat of the Fiat or in one of the saddle-bags, and they stuck them SIO on every blank wall of every general dealer's or barroom they passed, they nailed them to tree trunks at desolate crossroads in the deep bush, and with a bribe of a handful of sweets dished them out to black and white and brown urchins they met on the roadside, with instructions to take them to their homestead or kraal or camp and hand them to their elders.

X5000 REWARD L5ooo For information leading to the rescue Of CENTAINE DE THIRY COURTNEY A SURVIVOR OF THE HOSPITAL SHIP PROTEA CASTLE most barbarously torpedoed by a GERMAN SUBMARINE on the 28th Aug. 1917 off the coast Of SWAKOPMUND.

MRS COURTNEY would have been cast ashore and may be in the care of wild TRIBESMEN or alone in the WILDER NESS.

Any information concerning her whereabouts should be conveyed to the undersigned at the KAISERHOF HOTEL

WINDHOEK.

LT. COL. G. C. COURTNEY Five thousand pounds was a fortune, twenty yearssalary for the average working man, enough to buy a ranch and stock it with cattle and sheep, enough to provide a man with a secure living for his entire life, and there were dozens eager to try for the reward, or for any lesser amount that they could wheedle out of Garry by vague promises and fanciful stories and outright lies.

In the Kaiserhof suite he and Anna interviewed hopefuls who had never ventured beyond the line of rail but were willing to lead expeditions into the desert, others who knew exactly where the lost girl could be found, still others who had actually seen Centaine and only needed a grubstake of SI,Ooo to go and fetch her in. There were spiritualists and clairvoyants who were in constant con Sir tact with her, on a higher plane, and even one gentleman who offered to sell his own daughter, at a bargain rate, to replace the missing girl.

Garry met them all cheerfully. He listened to their V stories and chased their theories and instructions, or sat around an ouija board with the spiritualists, even followed one of them who was using one of Centaine's rings suspended on a piece of string as a lodestone, on a fivehundred-mile pilgrimage through the desert. He was presented with a number of young ladies, varying in texture and colour from blonde to caM all lait, all claiming to be Centaine de Thiry Courtney, or willing to do for him anything that she could do. Some of them became loudly abusive when they were refused and had to be evicted from the suite by Anna in person.

No wonder she is losing weight, Garry told himself, and leaned over to pat Anna's thigh as she sat beside him in the open Fiat tourer. The words of the blasphemous old grace came into his mind:We thank the Lord for what we have, But for a little more we would be glad. He grinned at her fondly, and aloud he told her, We should be there soon. She nodded and replied, This time I know we will find her. I have a sure feeling! Yes, Garry agreed dutifully. This time will be different. He was quite safe in that assertion. No other of their many expeditions had begun in such a mysterious manner.

One of their own reward posters had arrived folded upon itself and sealed with wax, bearing a postmark dated four days previously at Usakos, a way station on the narrow-gauge railway line halfway between Windhoek and the coast. The package was unstamped, Garry had been obliged to pay the postage, and it was addressed in a bold but educated band, the script unmistakably German.

When Garry split the wax seal and unfolded it he found a laconic invitation to a rendezvous written on the foot of the sheet, and a hand-drawn map to guide him. The sheet was unsigned.

Garry immediately telegraphed the postmaster at Usakos, confident that the volume of business at such a remote station would be so low that the postmaster would remember every package handed in for postage.

The postmaster did indeed recall the package and the circumstances of its delivery. It bad been left on the threshold of the post office during the night and nobody had

even glimpsed the correspondent.

As the writer probably intended, all this intrigued both Garry and Anna, and they were eager to keep the rendezvous. it was set for a site in the barren Kamas Hochtland a hundred and fifty miles from Windhoek.

It had taken them all of three days to negotiate the atrocious roads, but after losing themselves at least a dozen times, changing approximately the same number of punctured tyres, and sleeping rough on the hard ground beside the Fiat, they had now almost reached the appointed meeting place.

The sun blazed down from a cloudless sky and the breeze from behind blew eddies of red dust over them as they rattled and rumbled over the stony ruts. Anna seemed impervious to all the heat and dust and hardship of the desert and Garry, gazing at her in unstinted admiration, almost missed the next tight bend in the track. His off-wheels skidded over the verge, and the Fiat teetered and rocked over the yawning void that opened abruptly before them. He hauled the steering over, and as they bumped back into the wheel ruts he pulled on the handbrake.

They were on the rim of a deep canyon that cut the plateau like an axe stroke. The track descended into the depths in a series of hairpin twists like the contortions of a maimed serpent, and hundreds of feet below them the river was a narrow ribbon that threw dazzling reflections of the noon sun up the orange-coloured cliffs.

This is the place, Garry told her, and I don't like it.

Down there we will be at the mercy of any bandit or murderer. Mijnheer, we are already late for the meeting-'I don't know if we'll ever get out of there again, and ows, nobody is likely to find us here. Probably God kn just our bare bones. Come, Mijnheer, we can talk later. Garry drew a deep breath. Sometimes there were distinct drawbacks to being paired with a strong-willed woman. He let off the handbrake and the Fiat rolled over the rim of the canyon, and once they were committed, there was no turning back.

It was a nightmare descent, the gradient so steep that hairpin bends so tight the brake shoes smoked, and the that he had to back and fill to coax the Fiat through them. Now I know why our friend chose this place. He has us at his mercy down here. Forty minutes later they came out in the gut of the canyon. The walls above them were so sheer that they blotted out the sun. They were in shadow, but it was stiflingly hot. No breeze reached down here, and the air had a flinty bite on the back of the throat.

There was a narrow strip of level land on each bank of the river, covered with coarse thorn growth, and Garry nd they clim backed the Fiat off the track a bed down stiffly and beat the red dust from their clothing. The m bubbled sullenly over a low causeway of rock, and strea the water was opaque and a poisonous yellow colour like the effluent from a chemical factory.

J Y Well, Garry surveyed both banks and the cliffs above them, we seem to have the place to ourselves. Our friend is nowhere to be seen. We will wait. Anna forestalled the suggestion she knew was coming.

Of course, Mevrou. Garry lifted his hat and mopped his face with the cotton bandanna from around his neck. May I suggest a cup of tea? Anna took the kettle and went down the bank. She tasted the river water suspiciously, and then filled it.

When she climbed back, Garry had a fire of thomwood crackling between two hearthstones. While the kettle boiled, Garry fetched a blanket from the back of the Fiat, and the bottle of schnapps from the cubbyhole. He poured a liberal dram into each of the mugs, added a heaped spoon of sugar, then topped them up with strong hot tea.

He had found that schnapps, like chocolate, had a most tempering effect on Anna, and he was never without a bottle. Perhaps the journey would not be entirely wasted, he thought, as he added another judicious splash of spirits into Anna's mug and carried to to where she sat in the middle of the rug.

Before he reached her, Garry let out a startled cry and dropped the mug, splashing his boots with hot tea. He stood staring into the bush behind her, and raised both hands high above his head. Anna glanced round and then bounded to her feet and seized a brand of firewood which she brandished before her. Garry edged swiftly to her side and stood close to her protective bulk.

Keep away! Anna bellowed. I warn you, I'll break the first skull- They were surrounded. The gang had crept up on them through the dense scrub.

Oh Lord, I knew it was a trap! Garry muttered. They sis were almost certainly the most dangerous-looking band of cut-throats he had ever seen.

We have no money, nothing worth stealing- How many of them? he wondered desperately. Three, no, there was another behind that tree, four murderous ruffians. The obvious leader was a purple-black giant with bandoliers of ammunition crisscrossing his chest, and a Mauser rifle in the crook of his arm. A ruff of thick woolly beard framed his broad African features like the mane of a man-eating lion.

The others were all armed, a mixed band of Khoisan Hottentots and Ovambo tribesmen, wearing odd items of military uniform and civilian clothing, all of it heavily worn and faded, patched and tattered, some of them barefooted and others with scuffed boots, shapeless and battered from hard marches. Only their weapons were well cared for, glistening with oil and home lovingly, almost the way a father might carry his firstborn son.

Garry thought fleetingly of the service revolver he kept bolstered under the dashboard of the Fiat, and then swiftly abandoned such a reckless notion.

Don't harm us, he pleaded, crowding up behind Anna, and then with a feeling of utter disbelief, Garry found himself abandoned as Anna launched her attack.

Swinging the burning log like a Viking's axe, she charged straight at the huge black leader.

Back, you swine! she roared in Flemish. Get out of here, you bitch-born son of Hades! Taken by surprise, the gang scattered in pandemonium, trying to duck the smoking log as it hissed about their heads.

How dare you, you stinking bastard spawn of diseased whores-, Still shaking with shock, Garry stared after her, torn A between terror and admiration for this new revelation of cursers in his life, there had been the legendary sergeantmajor whom he had known during the Zulu rebellion; men travelled miles to listen to him addressing a parade ground. The man was a Sunday School preacher in comparison. Garry could have charged admission fees to Anna's performance. Her eloquence was matched only by her dexterity with the log.

She caught one of the Hottentots a crashing blow between the shoulders and he was hurled into a thorn bush, his jacket smoking with live coals, shrieking like a wounded wart hog. Two others, reluctant to face Anna's wrath, leaped over the river bank and disappeared with high splashes beneath the yellow waters. That left only the big black Ovambo to bear the full brunt of Anna's onslaught. He was quick and agile for such a big man, and he avoided the wild swings of the log and danced behind the nearest camel-thorn tree. With nimble footwork he kept the trunk between Anna and himself, until at last she stopped, gasping and redfaced, and panted at him, Come out, you yellow-bellied black-faced apology for a blue-testicled baboon! Garry noticed with awe how she managed to cram the metaphor with colour. Come out where I can kill you! Warily the Ovambo declined, backing off out of reach. No! No! We did not come to fight you, we came to fetch you- he answered in Afrikaans. She lowered the log slowly.

Did you write the letter? and the Ovambo shook his head. I have come to take you to the man who did. The Ovambo ordered two of his men to remain and guard the Fiat. Then he led them away along the floor of the canyon. Although there were stretches of open easygoing on the river bank, there were also narrow gorges through which the river roared and swirled, and the path was steep and so narrow that only one man could pass at a time.

These gaps were guarded by other guerillas. Garry saw only the tops of their heads and the glint of their rifle barrels amongst the rocks, and he noticed how cunningly the site for the rendezvous had been chosen. Nobody could follow them undetected. An army would not be able to rescue them. They were totally vulnerable, completely at the mercy of these rough hard men. Garry shivered in the sweltering gut of the canyon.

We'll be damned lucky to get out of this, he muttered to himself, and then aloud, My leg is hurting. Can't we rest? But no one even looked back at him, and he stumbled forward to keep as close to Anna as he was able.

Quite unexpectedly, long after Garry had relapsed into resigned misery, the Ovambo guide stepped around the corner of a yellow sandstone monolith and into a temporary camp site under an overhanging cliff on the river bank. Even in his exhaustion and unhappiness, Garry saw that there was a steep pathway up the canyon wall behind the camp, an escape route against surprise attack.

They have thought of everything. He touched Anna's arm and pointed out the path, but all her attention was on the man who sauntered out from the deep shadow of the cavern.

He was a young man, half Garry's age, but in the first seconds of their meeting he made Garry feel inadequate and foolish. He didn't have to say a word. He merely stood in the sunlight and stared at Garry with a catlike stillness about his tall elegant frame, and Garry was reminded of all the things he was not.

His hair was golden, hanging to his bare shoulders, streaked white by the sun, yet as lustrous as raw silk, offering a startling contrast to his deeply tanned features.

These might once have been as beautiful as those of a comely girl, but all softness had been burned by the flames of life's furnace, and like forged iron, the marks of the anvil had been left upon them.

He was tall but not gawky or round-shouldered, and he was lean, with hard, flat muscle. He wore only ridingbreeches and boots, and the hair on his chest sparkled like fine copper wire. Around his neck on a gold chain he had hung a small gold locket, something that no English gentleman would ever do. Garry tried to feel superior, but under that flat level gaze it was difficult.

Colonel Courtney, he said, and again Garry was taken off balance. Though accented, it was the voice of an educated and cultivated man, and his mouth altered shape, losing its hard stern line as he smiled.

Please do not be alarmed. You are Colonel Courtney, are you not? Yes. It took an effort for Carry to speak. I am Colonel Courtney, did you write the letter? He took the poster from his breast pocket, and tried to unfold it, but his hands were shaking so that it fluttered and tore in his fingers. The man's smile gently mocked him as he nodded, Yes, I sent for you. You know where the lost girl can be found? Anna demanded, stepping closer to him in her eagerness.

Perhaps, he shrugged.

You have seen her? Anna insisted.

First things come first. You want money- Garry's voice was unnecessarily loud. Well, I have not brought a single sovereign with me. You can be sure of that. If your intention is to rob us, I have nothing of value on me. Ah, Colonel, the golden man smiled at him, and it was so charming, so unexpectedly exuberant and boyish that he could feel Anna's stiff and antagonistic stance melt beneath that smile, my nose tells me that is not true. He sniffed theatrically. You have something of immense value, Havana! he said and sniffed again. No doubt about it, Havana! Colonel, I must warn you that I would kill for a Havana cigar. took a hurried step backwards involuntarily Garry before he realized it was a jest. Then he grinned weakly and reached for the cigar case in his hip pocket.

The golden man inspected the long black cigar. Romeo y Julieta! he murmured reverently and then sniffed it lovingly. A whiff of Paradise. He bit off the tip and struck a match off the sole of his boot. He sucked the flame into the cigar and closed his eyes with ecstasy.

When he opened them again, he bowed slightly to Anna.

I beg your pardon, madam, but it has been a long time, over two years, since I tasted a good cigar.

All right, Garry was bolder now. You know my name and you are smoking my cigar, the least you can do is introduce yourself. Forgive me. He drew himself up and snapped his heels together in the teutonic manner. I am Lothar De La Rey, at your service. ,oh my God, all Garry's new-found courage deserted him. I know all about you. There is a price on your head - they'll hang you when they catch you. You are a wanted criminal and a notorious outlaw, sir. My dear Colonel, I prefer to think of myself as a soldier and patriot.

Soldiers do not go on fighting and destroying property after a formal surrender. Colonel Franke capitulated nearly four years ago- I did not recognize Colonel Franke's right to surrender, Lothar interjected contemptuously. I was a soldier of the Kaiser and Imperial Germany. Even Germany surrendered three months ago.

Yes, Lothar agreed. And I have not perpetrated an act of war since then. But you are still in the field, Garry pointed out indignantly. You are still under arms, and- I have not gone in to give myself up yet for the very good reason that you have so succinctly stated: if I do, your people will hang me As if under Garry's scrutiny he had suddenly become aware that he was bare to the waist, Lothar reached for his tunic. Freshly laundered, it hung from a thorn bush beside the entrance to the cave. As he shrugged into it, the brass buttons sparkled and Garry's eyes narrowed, Damn you, sir, your insolence is insupportable. That's a British military tunic, you are wearing one of our uniforms. That in itself is cause enough to shoot you out of hand! Would you prefer I went naked, Colonel? It must be obvious even to you that we are reduced in circumstances. It gives me no pleasure to wear a British jacket.

Unfortunately there is no choice. You insult the uniform in which my son died I take no pleasure in your son's death, just as I take no pleasure in these rags. By God, man, you have the effrontery- Garry puffed himself up to deliver a devastating broadside, but Anna cut across him impatiently.

Mijnheer De La Rey, have you seen my little girl? And Garry subsided as Lothar turned back to her, his features taking on a strangely compassionate cast.

I saw a girl, yes, I saw a young girl in the wilderness, but I do not know if she was the one you seek Could you lead us to her? Garry demanded, and Lothar glanced at him, his expression hardening again. I would try to find her again on certain conditions. Money, said Garry flatly.

Why are rich men always obsessed with their money? Lothar drew on the cigar, and let the fragrant smoke trickle over his tongue. Yes, Colonel, I would need some money, he nodded. But not 5,000. I would need 1,000 to equip an expedition to go into the desert fastness where I first saw her. We will need good horses, ours are from out, and wagons to carry water, and I would almost w need to pay my men. 1,000 would cover those expenses. What else?

Garry demanded, There must be some other price. Yes, Lothar nodded. There is. I am tired of living in the shadow of the gallows. you want a pardon for your crimes! Garry stared incredulously. What makes you think that is in my power! A personal friend of You are a powerful man, Colonel.

both Smuts and Botha, your brother is a general, a cabinet minister in the Botha Government, I would not thwart the course of justice. to the I fought an honourable war, Colonel. I fought it d Botha once fought bitter end, like your friends Smuts an their war. I am no criminal, I am no murderer. I lost a father, a mother, a wife and a son, I paid the price of defeat in a heavy coin. Now, I want the right to live the life of an ordinary man, and you want this girl. ,I couldn't agree to that. You are an enemy, Garry blustered.

You find the girl, said Anna softly, and you will be a free man. Colonel Courtney will arrange it. I give you my word on it. Lothar glanced at her and then back at Garry, and he smiled again as he divined the true chain of authority here.

Well, Colonel, do we have an agreement? How do I know who this girl is? How do I know she is my daughter-in-law? Garry hedged uncomfortably. Will You agree to a test?

Lothar shrugged. As You wish And Garry turned to Anna.

Show him, he said. Let him choose this test Between them, Garry and Anna had designed to thwart the rogues and chancers that the reward posters had attracted. Anna snapped open the clasp of the voluminous carpet bag she carried on a strap over one shoulder and took out a thick buff envelope. It contained a pack of postcard-sized photographs, and she handed these to Lothar.

He studied the top photograph. it was a studio portrait of a young girl, a pretty girl in a velvet dress and feathered hat; dark ringlets hung to her shoulders. Lothar shook his head and placed the photograph at the bottom of the pack.

Swiftly he flicked through the rest of them, all of young women, and then handed them back to Anna.

No, he said. I'm sorry to have brought you so far for nothing. The girl I saw is not amongst those, he lookedVery well, Hend over his shoulder at the big Ovambo.

rick, take them back to the drift.

Wait, Mijnheer."Anna dropped the pile of photographs into the bag and took out another smaller stack. There are more. You are careful, Lothar smiled in acknowledgement.

We have had many try to cheat us, 5,000 pounds is a great deal of money, Garry told him, but Lothar did not even look up from the photographs.

He turned over two of the paste boards, then stopped at the third. That's her. Centaine de Thiry, in her white confirmation dress, smiled self-consciously up at him.

She is older now, and her hair, Lothar made a gesture describing a thick wild bush. But those eyes. Yes, that's her. Neither Garry nor Anna could speak. For a year and a half they had worked for this moment, and now that it had come they could not truly believe it.

I have to sit down! Anna said faintly, and Garry helped her to the log beside the entrance to the cave. While he tended her, Lothar pulled the gold locket from his shirt front, and snapped open the lid. He took out a lock of dark hair and offered it to Anna. She accepted it from him almost fearfully, and then with a fiercely protective gesture she pressed the lock to her lips. She closed her eyes, but from the corners of her clenched lids two fat oily tears squeezed out and began to trickle slowly down her red cheeks.

It's just a Thank of hair. It could be anyone's hair. How do you know? Garry asked uncomfortably.

Oh, you silly man, Anna whispered hoarsely. On a thousand nights I brushed her hair. Do you think I would not know it again, anywhere?

How long will you need? Garry asked again, and Lothar frowned with irritation.

In the name of all that's merciful, how many times must I tell you I don't know? The three of them were seated around the fire at the entrance to the overhanging cave. They had been talking for hours, already the stars showed along the narrow strip of sky that the canyon walls framed.

I have explained where I saw the girl, and the circumstances. Didn't you understand, must I go over it all again?

Anna lifted a hand to placate him. We are very anxious.

We ask stupid questions. Forgive us. Very well. Lothar relit the butt of the cigar with a burning twig from the fire. The girl was the captive of the wild San. They are cunning and cruel as animals.

They knew I was following them and they threw me off the spoor with ease. They could do it again, if I ever find their spoor. The area I will have to search is enormous, almost the size of Belgium. It's over a year since I last saw the girl, she could be dead of disease or wild animals or those murderous little yellow apes Do not even say it, Mijnheer, l Anna pleaded, and Lothar threw up both hands.

I do not know, he said. Months, a year? How can I tell how long I will need? We should come with you, Garry muttered.

We should be allowed to take part in the search, at least be told in what area of the territory you first saw her. Colonel, you did not trust me. Very good. Now I don't trust you. As soon as the girl is in your hands, my usefulness to you is at an end. Lothar took the cigar butt from his mouth and inspected it ruefully. There was not another puff left in it; sadly he dropped it into the fire.

No, Colonel, when I find the girl we will make a formal exchange, amnesty for me, and your daughter for you. We accept, Mijnheer. Anna touched Garry's elbow. We will deliver the sum of 1,000 pounds to you as soon as possible. When you have Centaine safely with you, you will send us the name of her white stallion. Only she can tell you that, so that way we will know you are not cheating us. We will have your pardon signed and ready. Lothar held out his hand across the fire. Colonel, is it agreed? Garry hesitated a moment, but Anna prodded him so heavily in the ribs that he grunted and reached to take the preferred hand. It's agreed. One last favour, Mijnheer De La Rey.

I will prepare a package for Centaine. She will need good clothes, women's things. I will deliver it to you with the money.

Will you give it to her when you find her? Anna asked. If I find her, Lothar nodded. When you find her, Anna told him firmly.

It took almost five weeks for Lothar to make his preparations and then trek back to that remote water-hole below the Cunene river where he had cut the spoor of his quarry.

There was still water in the pan, it was amazing how long those shallow unshaded basins retained water even in the sweltering desert conditions, and Lothar wondered, as he had before, if there wasn't some subterranean seepage from the rivers in the north that found its way into them. In any event, the fact that there was still surface water boded well for their chances of being able to penetrate deeper eastwards, the direction which the long-dead spoor had taken.

While his men were refilling the water barrels from the water-hole, Lothar strolled around the periphery of the circular pan and there, incredibly, was the girl's footprint still preserved in the clay, just as he had last seen it.

He knelt beside it, and with his finger traced out the shape of the small, graceful foot. The cast was baked by the sun as hard as a brick. Though all around it the mud had been trampled by buffalo and rhinoceros and elephant, this single print remained.

It's an omen, he told himself, and then chuckled cynically . I've never believed in omens, why should I begin now? Yet his mood was buoyant and optimistic when he assembled his men around the camp fire that evening.

Apart from the camp servants and the wagoners, he had four mounted riflemen to help him conduct the actual search. All four of them had been with him since the days of the rebellion. They had fought and bled together, shared a looted bottle of Cape smoke, or a woollen blanket on a frosty desert night, or the last shreds of tobacco in the pouch, and he loved them a little, though he trusted them not at all.

There was Swart Hendrick or Black Henry, the tall, purplish-black Ovambo and Klein Boy, or Little Boy, his bastard son by a Hereto woman. There was Vark Janor Pig John, the wrinkled yellow Khoisan. Mixed blood of Nama and Bergdama and even of the true San ran in his veins, for his grandmother had been a Bushman slave, captured as a child on one of the great commando raids of the last century that the Boers had ridden against the San people. Lastly there was Vuil Lipped, the Bondelswart Hottentot with lips like fresh-cut liver and a vocabulary that gave him his name Dirty Lips.

My hunting pack, Lothar smiled, half-affectionately and half in revulsion as he looked them over. Truly the term outlaw had meaning when applied to them, they were beyond the rules of tribe or tradition. He studied their faces in the firelight. Like half-tamed wolves, they would turn and savage me at the first sign of weakness, he thought.

All right, you sons of the great hyena, listen to me. We are looking for San, the little yellow killers. Their eyes sparkled. We are looking for the white girl they had as their captive, and there are a hundred gold sovereigns for the man who cuts her spoor. This is how we will conduct the hunt, Lothar smoothed the sand between his feet and then traced out the plan for them with a twig.

The wagons will follow the line of the water-holes, here and here, and we will fan out, like this and like this.

Between us we can sweep fifty miles of country. So they rode into the east, as he had planned it, and within the first ten days they cut the spoor of a small party of wild San. Lothar called in his outriders and they followed up the trail of tiny childlike footprints.

They moved with extreme caution, carefully spying out the terrain ahead through Lothar's telescope, and skirting each stand where an ambush could be laid. The idea of a poisoned bone arrowhead burying itself in his flesh made Lothar shudder every time he let himself think about it.

Bullets and bayonets were the tools of his trade, but the filthy poisons that these little pygmies brewed unmanned him, and he hated them more each hot tortuous nervewracking mile that they followed the spoor.

Reading the sign, Lothar learned that there were eight San in the party they were following: two adult males and two women, probably their wives. There were also four small children, two still at the breast and two just old enough to walk on their own.

The children will slow them down, Vark Jan gloated, they will not be able to stand the pace. I want one of them alive, Lothar warned them.

I want to know about the girl. Vark Jan's slave grandmother had taught him enough of the San language to interrogate a captive and he grinned. Catch one of them and I will make him talk, be sure of that. The San were hunting and foraging and Lothar's band gained on them rapidly. They were only an hour behind when the San, with their animal perceptions, sensed their presence.

Lothar found the spot where they had become aware, the spot where the trail seemed to vanish.

They are anti-tracking, he growled. Get down and search, he ordered.

They are carrying the children, Vark Jan squatted to examine the earth, the babies are too young to cover their own spoor. The women are carrying them, but they will tire quickly under the load. Though the trail seemed to end and the ground beyond seemed unmarked even to Lothar's experienced eye, yet even the San had left sign that Vark Jan and Swart Hendrick could follow. The pace was slower, for they had to dismount to be closer to the earth, but still they followed, and within four hours Swart Hendrick nodded and grinned.

The women are tiring quickly. They are leaving better sign and moving slower. We are gaining on them now. Far ahead the San women, toiling under the weight of the children, looked back and wailed softly. The following horses showed across the plain, magnified by the mirage until they loomed like monsters, but even the sight of their pursuers could not drive the women on at a better speed.

So I must play the plover, said the oldest of the San hunters. He was re erring to t e way the plover feigns injury to lead a predator away from its nest. If I can make them follow me, I may be able to burn up their horses with thirst, he told his clan. Then when you reach the next water-hole and after you have drunk and filled the water-eggs- He proffered a sealed buckhom container to his wife and he did not have to say the fateful words.

Poisoning a water-hole was such a desperate deed that none of them wanted to talk of it. If you can kill the horses, you will be safe, the hunter told them. I will try to give you time to do it.

The old San hunter went quickly to each of the children and touched their eyelids and lips in blessing and farewell, and they stared at him solemnly. When he went to his woman who had borne him two sons, she gave a short keening wall. He admonished her with a glance which told her clearly, Show no fear in front of the little ones. Then as he shed his clothing and his leather satchel, the old San whispered to the younger man, his companion in a thousand hunts, Be a father to my sons. He handed his satchel to him, and stepped back. Now, go!

While he watched his clan trot away, the old man restrung his little bow and then carefully unwound the strips of leather that protected the heads of his arrows.

His family disappeared across the plain, and he turned his back upon them and went to meet his pursuers.

Lothar was fretting at the pace. Though he knew that the quarry was only an hour ahead, they had lost the spoor again and were held up while his flanks cast forward to pick it up. They were in open country, a flat plain that stretched away to an indeterminate meeting with the sky.

The plain was dotted with dark clumps of low scrub, and the mirage made them dance and squirm in the field of the telescope. It would be impossible to pick out a human figure amongst them at more than a mile distance.

The horses were almost knocked up, they had to have water soon. Within the next hour he would have to call off the pursuit and turn back to the water wagon. He lifted the telescope again, but a wild shout made him start and glance around. Swart Hendrick was pointing out to the left. The man on the extreme left flank, Vuil Lippe, the Bondelswart, was trying to control his mount.

It was rearing and walking on its hindlegs, dragging him with it in a sheet of flying dust.

Lothar had heard that a horse would react to the hot scent of a wild Bushman as though to that of a lion, but he had doubted it. Vuil Lippe was helpless, both hands on the reins, his rifle in the boot on the saddle, and as Lothar watched he was dragged over one of the salt bushes and sprawled in the dirt.

Then quite miraculously another human shape seemed to appear out of the very earth. The tiny naked pixie-like shape stood up only twenty paces beyond the dragging rider. Unlikely as it seemed, he must have been completely concealed behind a clump of scrub that should not have hidden a hare.

As Lothar watched with helpless horror, the little mannikin drew his bow and let fly. Lothar saw the flight of the arrow, like a dust mote in the sunlight, and then the naked Bushman whirled and trotted directly away from the line of horsemen.

Lothar's men were all shouting and struggling to remount, but terror seemed to have infected the horses, and they pranced and circled. Lothar was the first up. He did not touch the stirrups, but with a hand on his horse's withers, sprang into the saddle, turned its head and galloped down the line.

Already the running Bushman was disappearing amongst the low mirage-shrouded scrub, in a swinging trot that carried him away at an incredible rate. The man he had fired at had let his horse run free and had pulled himself to his feet. He stood with his legs braced apart, swaying slightly from side to side.

Are you all right? Lothar shouted as he rode up, and then he saw the arrow.

It dangled down Vuil Lippe's chest, but the arrow-head was buried in his cheek, and he stared up at Lothar with a bewildered expression. Lothar jumped down and caught him by the shoulders.

I'm a dead man, Lippe said softly, his hands hanging by his sides, and Lothar seized the dangling arrow and tried to pull it free. The flesh of Lippe's cheek was drawn out in a peak and he screamed and staggered. Gritting his teeth, Lothar heaved again, but this time the frail reed shaft snapped, leaving the bone arrowhead embedded in the man's flesh, and he began to struggle.

Lothar seized a handful of his greasy black hair and twisted his head over to examine the wound. Keep still, damn you. A short length of bone protruded from the wound. It was caked with a black rubbery coating.

Euphorbia latex. Lothar had examined San weapons before, his father had once possessed an important collection of tribal artefacts. Now Lothar recognized the poison, the distilled latex from the roots of one of the rare desert euphorbia plants. Even as he studied it, he could see the poison spreading beneath the skin, discolouring it a deep lavender-purple, blooming like crystals of permanganate of potash dropped into water, following the course of the shallow blood vessels as it was absorbed.

How long? Lippe's tortured eyes held Lothar's, beseeching comfort.

The latex looked freshly distilled, none of its virulence dissipated, but Vuil Lippe was big and strong and healthy, his body would fight the toxin. It would take time, a few dreadful hours that would seem like eternity.

Can't you cut it out? Lippe pleaded.

It's gone deep, you'd bleed to death. Bum it out!

The pain would kill you. Lothar helped him down into a sitting position, just as Hendrick rode up with the bunch.

Two men stay to look after him, Lothar ordered. Hendrick, you and I will go after the little yellow swine. They pushed the tired horses, and within twenty minute s they saw the Bushman ahead of them. He seemed to dissolve and dance in the heat mirage, and Lothar felt a dark rage seize him, the kind of hatred a man can only feel towards something he fears in the deep places of his soul.

Go right Lothar waved Hendrick over. Head him off if he turns. And they spurred forward, riding down swiftly on the fleeing figure.

I'll give you a death to wipe out the other, Lothar promised grimly, and he loosened his blanket roll from the pommel in front of him.

The sheepskin that he used as a mattress would shield him from the frail bone-tipped arrows. He wrapped it around his torso, and tucked the end over his mouth and nose. He pulled his wide-brimmed hat low, leaving only a slit for his eyes.

The running Bushman was two hundred yards ahead.

He was naked, except for the bow in one hand and the halo of tiny arrows in the leather thong around his head.

His body shone with a coating of sweat, and it was the colour of bright amber, almost translucent in the sunlight. He ran lightly as a gazelle, his small neat feet seemed to skim the earth.

There was the crack of a Mauser and a bullet kicked a fountain of pale dust just beyond the running Bushman like the spout of a sperm whale, and the Bushman jerked and then, unbelievably, increased the speed of his flight, drawing away from the two galloping horsemen. Lothar glanced across at Hendrick; he was riding with a loose rein, using both hands to reload the Mauser.

Don't shoot! Lothar yelled angrily. I want him alive! and Hendrick lowered the Mauser.

For another mile the Bushman kept up that last wild spring, then gradually he faltered. Once again they began to overhaul him.

Lothar saw his legs begin to wobble under him, his feet flopping from the ankles with exhaustion, but Lothar's mount was almost blown. it was lathering heavily, and froth splattered his boots as he drove it forward.

Fifty yards ahead the exhausted Bushman spun round to face him, standing at bay, his chest pumping like a bellows, and sweat dripping from his small spade-shaped beard. His eyes were wild and fierce and defiant as he fitted an arrow to the bow.

Come on, you little monster! Lothar yelled, to draw the Bushman's aim from the horse to himself, and the ruse succeeded.

The Bushman threw up the bow, and drew and loosed in a single movement, and the arrow flew like a beam of light. It struck Lothar at the level of the throat, but the thick wool of the sheepskin smothered it, and it fell away, tapping against his riding boot and falling to the dry earth.

The Bushman was trying desperately to notch another arrow as Lothar leaned out of the saddle like a polo player reaching for a forehand drive, and swung the Mauser. The rifle barrel crunched into the side of the Bushman's skull above the ear and he collapsed.

Lothar reined down his horse and sprang from the saddle, but Hendrick was there before him, swinging wildly with his Mauser butt at the Bushman's head as he lay against the earth. Lothar grabbed his shoulder and pushed him away with such force that he staggered and almost fell.

Alive, I told you! Lothar snarled, and went down on his knees beside the sprawling body.

There was a sluggish trickle of blood out of the Bushman's earhole, and Lothar felt a prickle of concern as he felt for the pulse of the carotid artery in the throat, and then grunted with relief. He picked up the tiny bow and snapped it in his hands and threw the pieces aside, then with his hunting knife he cut the leather thong around the Bushman's forehead and one at a time broke the poisoned arrow beads from their shafts, and handling them with extreme care threw them as far from him as he could.

As he rolled the Bushman on to his belly, he shouted at Hendrick to bring the leather thongs from his saddlebag. He trussed the captive securely, surprised at his perfect muscular development and at the graceful little feet and hands. He knotted the leather thongs at wrist and elbow, and at knee and ankle, and pulled the knots so tight that they bit deeply into the bright amber skin.

Then he picked up the Bushman in one hand, as though he were a doll, and slung him over the saddle. The movement revived the Bushman and he lifted his head and opened his eyes. They were the colour of new honey, and the whites were smoky yellow. It was like looking into the eyes of a trapped leopard, so ferocious that Lothar stepped back involuntarily.

They are animals, he said, and Hendrick nodded.

Worse than animals, for they have the cunning of a man without being human. Lothar took the reins and led his exhausted steed back to where they had left the wounded Vuil Lippe.

The others had rolled him in a grey woollen blanket and laid him on a sheepskin. Clearly they were waiting on Lothar to attend to him, but Lothar was reluctant to involve himself. He knew that Vuil Lippe was beyond any help he could give, and he put off the moment by dragging the bound Bushman out of the saddle and dropping him on the sandy earth. The little body curled up defensively, and Lothar hobbled his horse and went slowly to join the circle around the blanket-wrapped form.

He could see immediately that the poison was acting swiftly. One side of Lippe's face was grotesquely swollen and laced with furious purple lines. One eye was closed by the swelling, and the lid looked like an over-ripe grape, shining and black. The other eye was wide open but the pupil was shrunken to a pinprick. He made no sign of recognition as Lothar stooped over him and had probably already lost his sight. He was breathing with extreme difficulty, fighting wildly for each breath as the poison paralysed his lungs.

Lothar touched his forehead and the skin was cold and clammy as that of a reptile. Lothar knew that Hendrick sions and the others were watching him. On many occa they had seen him dress a bullet wound, set a broken leg, draw a rotten aching tooth, and perform all manner of minor surgery. They were waiting for him to do something for the dying man, and their expectations and his own helplessness infuriated Lothar.

Suddenly Lippe uttered a strangled cry and began to shake like an epileptic, his single open eye rolled back into his skull, showing the yellow blood-shot white, and his body arched under the blanket.

Convulsions, said Lothar, like a mamba bite. It won't be long now. The dying man bit down, grinding his teeth together, and his swollen protruding tongue was caught between them. He chewed -on his tongue, mincing it to ribbons while Lothar tried desperately and futilely to prise his jaws open, and the blood poured down the Hottentot's own throat into his semi-paralysed lungs and he choked and moaned through his locked jaws.

His body arched in another rigid convulsion, and there was a spluttering explosion beneath the blanket as his wracked body voided itself. The sweet fecal stench was nauseating in the heat. It was a long-drawn-out and messy death, and when it was over at last, it left those hardened men shaken and morose.

They scraped a shallow grave and rolled Vuil Lippe's corpse, still in the soiled grey blanket, into it. Then they hastily covered it, as though to be rid of their own loathing and horror.

One of them built a small fire of brush twigs, and brewed a canteen of coffee. Lothar fetched the half-bottle of Cape brandy from his saddle-bag. As they passed it from hand to hand, they avoided looking at where the Bushman lay curled naked in the sand.

They drank the coffee in silence, squatting in a circle, and then Vark Jan, the Khoisan Hottentot who spoke the San language, flicked his coffee grounds on to the fire and stood up.

He crossed to where the San lay and picked him up by his bound wrists, forcing his arms high behind him as they bore his full weight. He carried him back to the fire and picked out a burning twig. Still holding the San dangling from one hand, he touched the naked glans of his penis with the glowing tip of the twig. The San gasped and wriggled wildly and a blister formed miraculously on the skin of his genitals. It looked like a soft silver slug.

The men around the fire laughed, and in their laughter was the sound of their loathing and their terror of the death by poison, and their sorrow for their companion, of their craving for vengeance and the sadistic need to inflict pain and humiliation the worst that they could devise.

Lothar felt himself shaken by the quality of that laughter, felt the insecure foundations of his humanity totter, and the same animal passions arise in him. With a supreme effort he forced them back. He rose to his feet.

He knew he could not prevent what was about to happen, just as you cannot drive hungry lions from their fresh kill. They would turn on him if he tried.

He averted his eyes from the Bushman's face, from those wild haunted eyes. It was clear that he knew that death awaited him, but even he could not guess at the manner of it. Instead Lothar looked at the faces of his own men, and he felt sickened and soiled by what he saw.

Their features seemed distorted as though seen through a poorly glazed window, thickened and smeared with lust.

He thought that after the Bushman had been mounted by each of them in turn, ravished as though he were a woman, he would probably welcome what awaited him at the very end.

So. Lothar tried to keep his expression neutral, but his voice was hoarse with disgust. I am returning to the wagons now. The San is yours, but I must know if he has seen or has heard of the white girl. He must answer that one question. That is all. Lothar went to his horse and mounted. He rode away towards the wagons without looking back. just once, far behind, he heard a cry of such outrage and agony that it made his skin prickle, but then it was muted and lost on the moan of the desert wind.

Much later when his men rode up to the wagons, Lothar was lying under the side awning of his living wagon, reading his faithful old copy of Goethe by the light of a hurricane lantern, stained and battered, it had sustained him a hundred times before when the substance of his being had been drawn thin.

The laughter of his men as they dismounted and unsaddled had a fat, satisfied sound, like that of men who had well feasted and drunk, and were replete. Swart Hendrick came to where he lay, swaggering as though he had taken wine, and the front of his breeches was speckled with black drops of dried blood.

The San had not seen a white woman, but there was something strange and unexplained that he had heard whispered at the fire when they met other San in the desert; a tale of a woman and a child from a strange land

?

where the sun never shines, who lived with two old people of the San. Lothar came up on his elbow. He remembered the two little Bushmen he had seen with the girl. Where? Did he say where? he demanded eagerly. There is a place, deep in the Kalahari, that is sacred to all the San. He gave us the direction-'Where, Hendrick, damn you.

Where? A long journey, fifteen days of their travel."What is this place? How will we know it?

That, Hendrick admitted sadly, he did not say. His will to stay alive was not as great as we thought it might be. He died before he could tell us. Tomorrow we will turn in that direction, Lothar ordered.

There are the other San that we lost today. With fresh horses we might catch them before sundown tomorrow.

They have women with them- No! Lothar snarled at him. We go on towards this sacred place in the wilderness.

When the great bald mountain rose abruptly out of the plain, Lothar believed at first that it must be some trick of the desert light.

He knew of no description in the folklore or verbal history of the desert tribes to warn that the existence of such a place was possible. The only white men who had travelled this country, Livingstone and Oswell on their route to the discovery of Lake Ngarni, and Anderson and Galton on their hunting forays, had made no mention of such a mountain in their writing.

Thus Lothar doubted what he was seeing in the uncertain evening light, and the sunset was so laden with dust, so garish and theatrical as to heighten the effect of a stage illusion.

However, in the first light of the next day when he looked for it eagerly, the silhouette was still there, dark and clearly incised against a sky that was turned to mother-of-pearl by the coming of the dawn. As he rode towards it, so it rose higher and still higher from the plain, and finally detached itself from the earth and floated in the sky on its own shimmering mirage.

When at last Lothar stood beneath the tall cliffs, he did not doubt that this was the sacred place of which the San had spoken as he died, and his conviction was made complete when he scrambled up the scree slopes and discovered the wondrous paintings upon the sheltered cliff face.

This is the place, but it's so extensive, Lothar realized. If the girl is here, we might never find her. So many caves and valleys and hidden places, we could search for ever. He divided his men again and sent them on foot to explore and search the nearest slopes of the mountain.

Then he left the wagons in a shaded grove in the charge of Swart Hendrick, whom he mistrusted least, and taking only a spare horse set out to circumnavigate the mountain's bulk.

After two days of travel, during which he kept notes and sketched a rough map with the aid of his pocket compass, he could estimate with some certainty that the mountain was probably about thirty miles long and four or five miles wide, a long extended ridge of gneiss and intruding sandstone strata.

He rounded the eastern extremity of the mountain and deduced from his compass headings that he was heading back along the opposite side from where he had left the wagons. Whenever some feature of the cliffs caught his attention, a fissure or a complex of caves, for instance, he hobbled the horses and climbed up to explore.

Once he discovered a small spring of clear sweet water welling up from the base of the cliff and trickling into a natura I rock basin. He filled his water canteens, then he stripped and washed his clothes. At last he bathed, gasping with delight at the cold, and went on refreshed.

At other places he found more of the San paintings covering the rock face, and he marvelled at the accuracy of the artist's eye and hand that depicted the shape of eland and buffalo so that even his hunter's eye could find no fault. However, these were all ancient signs and he found nothing of recent human presence.

The forest and plain below the cliffs teemed with game, and he had no difficulty in shooting a plump young gazelle or antelope each day and keeping himself in fresh meat. On the third evening, he killed an impala ewe and made a kebab of the tripes and kidneys and liver, impaling them on a green twig and grilling them over the coals.

However, the scent of fresh meat attracted unwelcome attention to his camp, and he had to spend the rest of the night standing by the horses with his rifle in his hand while a hungry lion grunted and moaned in the darkness just outside the circle of firelight. He examined the beast's tracks in the morning and found that it was an adult male, past its prime and with a damaged limb that forced it to limp heavily.

A dangerous brute, he muttered, and hoped that it had moved away. But this was a vain hope, he discovered that evening when the horses began to fidget and whicker as the sun set. The lion must have followed him at a distance during the day, and emboldened by the gathering dusk, it again closed in and began to prowl around his camp fire. Another sleepless night. He resigned himself and heaped wood on the fire. Preparing to stand guard, he pulled on his overcoat, and suffered another minor irritation. One of the brass buttons was missing, which would let in the cold of the desert night.

it was a long, unpleasant night, but a little after midnight the lion seemed at last to tire of its fruitless vigil and it moved away. He heard it utter one last string of moaning grunts at the head of the grassy vlei half a mile away, then there was silence.

Wearily Lothar checked the head halters on the horses and then went to the fire and rolled himself in his blankets, still fully dressed, and keeping his boots on. Within minutes he had fallen into a deep dreamless sleep.

He came awake with bewildering suddenness and found himself sitting up with the rifle in his hands, and the din of an angry lion's thunderous roars echoing in his ears.

The fire had died down to white ash but the tree-tops were black against the paling morning sky. Lothar threw off his blankets and scrambled to his feet. The horses were stiff with alarm, their ears pricked forward, staring towards the open glade whose silver grasses just showed through the screen of mopani forest.

The lion roared again, and he judged it as a half-mile distant, in the direction in which the horses were staring.

So clearly does the roar of a lion carry in the night, that an inexperienced ear would have reckoned it much closer and been unable to pinpoint the direction, for it played ventriloquist tricks upon the ear.

Once more the awful cacophony filled the forest. Lothar had never heard one of these beasts behaving like this, such sustained anger and frustration in those great blasts of sound, and then his head jerked with shock. In the lull between this roar and the next, he heard another unmistakable sound, a human scream of utmost terror.

Lothar reacted without thought. He seized the head halter of his favOUTite hunting horse and leaped to its bare back. He socked his heels into its ribs, urging it into a gallop, and guided it with his knees, turning it towards the head of the glade. He lay forward on the horse's neck as the low branches lashed past his head, but as he broke into the open glade, he straightened and looked about him frantically.

In the few minutes since he had woken, the light had strengthened, and the eastern sky was a throbbing orange glow. There was a single tall mopani tree standing detached from the rest of the forest, surrounded by the low dry grass of the glade. High in its branches was a huge dark mass, and indistinct but violent movement made the branches of the mopani wave and thrash against the sky.

Lothar turned his horse towards it, and the thunderous growls of a lion were punctuated by yet another highpitched shriek.

Only then could Lothar distinguish what was happening in the top of the mopani, and he found it hard to believe.

Great God! he swore with surprise, for he had never heard of a lion climbing a tree. There was the great tawny cat high in the waving branches, clinging with its hindlegs to the trunk and reaching up with vicious swipes of its forepaws towards the human shape just beyond its reach.

Ya! Ya! Lothar worked his horse with elbows and heels, urging it to its top speed, and as he reached the mopani he flung himself from its back, and rode the shock of landing with his legs and back. Then he danced out to one side, head thrown back, rifle at high port across his chest, trying for a clear shot at the animal high above him.

The lion and its victim made an indistinguishably confused silhouette against the sky, a shot from below could hit one as easily as the other, and there were thick intervening branches of the mopani to deflect his bullet.

Lothar dodged sideways until he found a hole in the branches, and he flung the rifle up to his shoulder, braced himself over backwards, aiming straight up, but still reluctant to chance the shot. Then the lion snatched the human shape half off its precarious perch, dragging it down, and the screams were so piteous, so agonized, that Lothar could not wait longer.

He aimed for the lion's spine, at the root of the tail, a point as far as possible from the twisting body of its victim who was still clinging with desperate strength to one of the mopani branches. He fired and the heavy Mauser bullet smashed into the base of the lion's spine, between its bunched and straining haunches, and tore upwards, following the line of the vertebrae for the span of a hand, shattering and crushing the bony knuckles, destroying the great nerves of the legs at their roots, before ripping out again from the centre of the lion's back.

The lion's hindlegs spasmed, the long yellow claws retracted involuntarily into their sheaths in the leathery pads, loosening their grip on the mopani bark, and the paralysed legs could hold no longer. The great tawny cat came sliding and twisting and roaring down out of the tree, crashing against the lower branches as it fell, arching back on itself, snapping at the pain in its shattered spine with gaping pink jaws.

It brought its human victim down with it, its foreclaws still hooked deeply into tender flesh, shaking and throwing the frail body about with its convulsions. They hit the earth in a tangle, with an impact that jarred up through the soles of Lothar's boots. He had jumped clear as they came down through the branches, but now he ran forward.

The lion's back legs were splayed behind it like those of a toad, and it lay half over the human body. Now it reared up on its forelegs, pinned by its paralysed hindquai ters, and as it dragged itself towards Lothar, it opened its jaws and bellowed. The stench of its breath was carrion and corruption, and hot stinking froth splattered his face and bare arms.

Lothar thrust the muzzle of the Mauser almost into that dreadful mouth and without aiming, he fired. The bullet entered the soft palate at the back of the lion's throat, tore through the back of its skull, and erupted in a fountain of pink blood and brains. For a second longer, it stood braced on its stiff forelegs, then with a gusty sigh its lungs emptied and it rolled slowly over on to its side.

Lothar dropped the Mauser and fell on his knees beside the huge twitching yellow carcass, and tried to reach the body beneath it, but only the bottom half protruded, a pair of slim brown naked legs, the narrow, boyish loins bound up in a tattered canvas kilt.

Lothar sprang up and seized the lion's tail; he flung all his weight upon it, and sluggishly the furry carcass rolled over on to its back, freeing the body beneath it. A woman, he saw at once, and he stooped and lifted her. Her head with its thick mop of dark curling hair flopped lifelessly, and he cupped his hand at the back of her neck, as though he were holding a newborn infant, and he looked into her f ace.

It was the face of the photograph, the face he had glimpsed so long ago in the field of his telescope, the face that had haunted and driven him, but there was no life in it.

The long dark eyelashes were closed and meshed together, the smooth, darkly tanned features were without expression, and the strong wide mouth was slack; the soft lips drooped open to reveal the small white even teeth and a little string of saliva dribbled from one corner of her mouth.

No! Lothar shook his head vehemently. You can't be dead, no, it's not possible, after all this. I won't- He broke off. Out of the thick dark mane of her hair a serpent crawled down across the broad forehead towards her eye, a slow dark red serpent of new blood.

Lothar snatched the cotton bandanna from around his neck and wiped away the blood, but it flooded down her face as fast as he could clear it. He parted her crown of curls and found the wound in her shiny white scalp, a short but deep cut where she had hit one of the mopani branches. He could see the gleam of bone in the bottom of the wound. He pressed the lips of the cut together and wadded his kerchief over it, then bound it in place with the bandanna.

He cradled the injured head against his shoulder and lifted the limp body into a sitting position. One of her breasts flopped out of her skimpy fur cloak, and he felt an almost blasphemous shock, it was so pale and tender and vulnerable. He covered it swiftly and guiltily, then turned his attention to her injured leg.

The wounds were frightening; parallel slashes that had ripped deep into the flesh of her calf, cutting down to the heel of her left foot. He laid her back gently and knelt at her feet, lifting the leg and dreading the sudden spurting rush of arterial blood. It did not come, there was only the dark seepage of venous blood, and he sighed.

Thank you, God. He dragged off his heavy military greatcoat, and placed the wounded leg upon it to keep it out of the dirt, then he pulled his shirt over his head. It had not been washed since the rock spring two days before and it stank of his stale sweat.

Nothing else for it. He ripped the shirt into strips and bound up the leg.

He knew that this was the real danger, the infections that a carrion eater, such as a lion, carried on its fangs and its claws were almost as deadly as the poisons of a Bushman's arrowhead. The claws of a lion particularly were sheathed in deep scabbards in the pads. Old blood and putrefied meat lodged in the cavities, an almost certain source of virulent mortification and gas-gangrene.

We have to get you to the camp, Centaine. He used her name for the first time, and it gave him a tiny flicker of pleasure, quickly smothered by fear as he touched her skin again and felt the cold, the mortuary chill upon it.

Quickly he checked her pulse and was shocked at its weak, irregular flutter. He lifted her shoulders and wrapped her in the thick greatcoat, then looked about him for his horse. It was down at the far end of the glade, grazing head down. Bare to the waist and shivering in the cold, he ran after it and led it back to the mopani.

As he stooped to lift the girl's unconscious body, he froze with shock.

From above his head came a sound that ripped along his nerves and triggered his deepest instincts. It was the loud cry of an infant in distress, and he straightened swiftly and stared up the tall trunk. There was a bundle hanging in the top branches, and it twitched and swung agitatedly from side to side.

A woman and a child. The words of the dying Bushman came back to Lothar.

He pillowed the unconscious girl's head against the warm carcass of the lion, then jumped to catch the lowest mopani branch. He drew himself bodily upwards and swung one leg over the branch. He climbed swiftly up to the suspended bundle, and found it was a rawhide satchel.

He unhooked the straps and lowered it until he could peer into the opening.

A small, indignant face scowled up at him, and as it saw him it flushed and yelled with fright.

The memory of Lothar's own son assailed him so suddenly and bitterly that he winced and swayed on the high branch, and then drew the kicking, yelling child more securely against his own body and smiled, a painful, lopsided smile.

That is a big voice for a small man, he whispered huskily. it never occurred to him that it might be a girl that arrogant anger could only be male.

It was easier to shift his camp to the mopani tree under which Centaine lay, than move her to the camp. He had to carry the child with him, but he managed it in less than twenty minutes. He was fearful every minute that he left the helpless mother alone, and vastly relieved when he led the pack horse back to where she lay. Centaine was still unconscious, and the child he carried had soiled itself and was ravenous with hunger.

He wiped off the boy's small pink bottom with a handful of dry grass, remembering how he had performed the same service for his own son, and then placed him under the greatcoat where he could reach his unconscious mother's breast.

Then he set a canteen of water on a small fire and dropped the curved sacking needle and a Thank of white cotton thread from his canvas housewife into the boiling water to sterilize. He washed his own hands in a mug of hot water and carbolic soap, emptied the mug, refilled it and began to scrub out the deep tears in the girl's calf.

The water was painfully hot, and he lathered carbolic soap and forced his finger to the bottom of each wound, poured hot water into it, and then washed it out again and again.

Centaine moaned and thrashed about weakly, but he held her down and scrubbed grimly at the fearful lacerations. At last, not truly satisfied, but certain that if he persisted in his rough cleansing he would do irreparable damage to delicate tissue, he went to his saddle-bag and fetched a whisky bottle which he had carried with him for four years. It had been given to him by the German Lutheran missionary doctor who had nursed him through the wounds he had received during the campaign against Smuts and Botha's invasion. It may save your life one day, the doctor had told him. The handwritten label was illegible now, Acriflavin'- with an effort he remembered the name, and the dark yellow-brown liquid had evaporated to half its volume.

He poured it into the open wounds and worked it in with his forefinger, making certain that it reached the bottom of each deep cut. He used the last drops from the bottle on the rent in Centaine's scalp.

He fished the needle and cotton from the boiling canteen. With the girl's leg in his lap, he took a deep breath. Thank the Lord she's unconscious, and he held the lips of raw flesh together and worked the point of the needle through them.

It took him nearly two hours to sew the meat of her tattered calf together again, and his stitches were crude but effective, the work of a sailmaker rather than a surgeon, He used strips from one of his clean shirts to bind up the leg, but as he worked he knew that despite his best efforts, infection was almost certain. He transferred his attention to her scalp. Three stitches were sufficient to close that wound, and afterwards the nervous strain of the last hours swamped him, and he felt shaken and exhausted.

it took an effort of will to begin work on the litter. He skinned out the carcass of the lion, and strung the wet hide between two long limber mopani saplings with the fur side uppermost. The horses shied and fidgeted at the rank smell of lion, but he gentled them and fitted the straight poles of the drag litter on to the pack horse, then tenderly lifted Centaine's limp body, wrapped in the greatcoat, into the litter and strapped her securely with strips of mopani bark.

Carrying the now sleeping child in the satchel and leading the pack horse with the litter sliding along behind it, he set off at a walk towards the wagons. He calculated that it was a full day's march, and it was now long past noon, but he could not force the pace without risk of injuring the girl in the litter.

A little before sundown, Shasa woke and howled like a hungry wolf. Lothar hobbled the horses and took him to his mother. Within minutes Shasa was howling with frustration and kicking under the flap of the greatcoat, presenting Lothar with a difficult decision.

It's for the child, and she will never know, he decided.

He lifted the flap of the greatcoat, and hesitated again before touching her so intimately.

Forgive me, please, he apologized to the unconscious girl, and took her barest breast in his hand. The weight and the heat and velvet feel of it was a shock in his loins, but he tried to ignore it. He pressed and kneaded, with Shasa blustering and mouthing furiously at his hand, and then rocked back on his heels and covered Centaine with the coat.

Now, what the hell do we do, boy? Your mother's lost her milk. He picked Shasa up. No, don't try me, my friend, this is another dry house, I'm afraid. We'll have to camp here while I go shopping. He cut thorn branches and dragged them into a circular laager to keep out hyena or other predators and built a large fire in the centre.

You'll have to come with me, he said to the querulous infant, and strapping the canvas bag across his shoulder, he rode out on his hunting horse.

He found a herd of zebra around the next bluff of the mountain. Using his horse as a screen, he worked to within easy rifle-shot of the herd and picked out a mare with a young foal at her side. He hit her cleanly in the head and she dropped instantly. When he walked up to the dead zebra, the foal ran only a few yards, and then circled back.

Sorry, old fellow, Lothar said to it. The orphan would have no chance of survival and the bullet he gave it in the head was swift mercy.

Lothar knelt beside the dead mare and pulled back her top leg to expose the swollen black udders. He was able to draw half a canteen of warm milk from her. It was rich and topped with thick yellow cream. He diluted it with an equal quantity o warm water and soaked a folded square of cotton torn from his shirt into the mixture.

Shasa spluttered and kicked and turned his head away, but Lothar persisted. This is the only item on the menu Suddenly Shasa learned the trick of it. Milk dribbled down his chin, but some of it went down his throat, and he yelled impatiently every time Lothar pulled the wad of shirt out of his mouth to resoak it.

Lothar slept that night with Shasa against his chest, and woke before dawn when the child demanded his breakfast. There was zebra milk remaining from the previous evening.

By the time he had fed the boy, and then washed him in a mug of water warmed on the fire, it was after sunrise. When Lothar set him down, Shasa set off at a gallop on his hands and knees towards the horses, giving breathless cries of excitement.

Lothar felt that swollen feeling in his chest that he had not known since the death of his own son, and lifted him on to the horse's back. Shasa kicked and gurgled with laughter, and the hunting pony reached back and snuffled at him with ears pricked.

We'll make a horseman of you before you walk, Lothar laughed.

However, when he went to Centaine's litter and tried gently to rouse her, his concern was intense. She was still unconscious, though she moaned and rolled her head from side to side when he touched the leg. It was swollen and bruised, and clotted blood had dried on the stitches.

My God, what a mess, he whispered, but when he searched for the livid lines of gangrene up her thigh, he found none.

There was another unpleasant discovery, however, Centaine needed the same attention as her son.

He undressed her quickly. The canvas skirt and mantel were her only clothing, and he tried to remain unmoved and clinical when he looked at her.

He could not do so. Up to this time Lothar has based his concept of feminine beauty on the placid round blonde Rubensesque charms of his mother, and after her, his wife Amelia. Now he found his standards abruptly overturned.

This woman was lean as a greyhound, with a tucked-in belly in which he could see the separate muscles clearly defined beneath the skin. That skin, even where it was untouched by the sun, was cream rather than pure milk.

Her body hair, instead of being pale and wispy, was thick and dark and curly. Her limbs were long and NVillowy, not round and dimpled at elbow and knee. She was firm to the touch, his fingers did not sink into her flesh as they had into other flesh he had known, and where the sun had reached her legs and arms and face, she was the colour of lightly oiled teak.

He tried not to dwell upon these things, as he rolled her deftly but gently on to her face, but when he saw that her buttocks were round and hard and white as a perfect pair of ostrich eggs, something flopped in his stomach, and his hands shook uncontrollably as he finished cleaning her.

He experienced no revulsion at the task, it was as natural as his attention to the child had been, and afterwards he wrapped her in the greatcoat again and squatted on his heels beside her to examine her face minutely.

Again he found her features differed from his previous conception of feminine beauty. That halo of thick, kinky dark hair was almost African, those black eyebrows were too stark, her chin too thrusting and stubborn, the whole cast and set of her features was far too assertive to bear comparison with the gentle compliance of those other women. Even though she was totally relaxed, Lothar could still read on her face the marks of great suffering and hardship, perhaps as great as his own, and as he touched the smooth brown cheek, he felt almost fatalistically drawn to her, as though it had been ordained from that first glimpse of her so many months before. Abruptly he shook his head with annoyance and a quick sense of his own ridiculous sentimentality.

I know nothing of you, or you of me. He looked up quickly, and with a guilty start realized that the child had crawled away under the horses hooves. With chuckles of glee, he was snatching at their inquisitive puffing nostrils, as they stretched down to him, sniffing at him.

Leading the pack horse and carrying the child, Lothar reached his wagons late that same afternoon.

Swart Hendrick and the camp servants ran out to meet him, agog with curiosity, and Lothar gave his orders.

I want a separate shelter for the woman, alongside mine. Thatch the roof to keep it cool, and hang canvas sides we can raise to let in the breeze, and I want it ready by nightfall. He carried Centaine to his own cot and bathed her again before dressing her in one of the long nightgowns that Anna Stok had provided.

She was still not conscious, though once she opened her eyes. They were unfocused and dreamy, and she muttered in French so he could not understand.

He told her, You are safe. You are with friends. The pupils of her eyes reacted to light, which he knew was an encouraging sign, but the lids fluttered closed and she relapsed into unconsciousness, or sleep from which he was careful not to rouse her.

With access to his medicine chest again, Lothar was able to redress her wounds, spreading them liberally with an ointment which was his favourite cure-all inherited from his mother. He bound them up in fresh bandages.

By this time the child was once again hungry and letting it be widely known. Lothar had a milch-goat amongst his stock, and he held Shasa on his lap while he fed him the diluted goat's milk. Afterwards he tried to make Centaine drink a little warm soup, but she struggled weakly and almost choked. So he carried her to the shelter which his servants had completed, and laid her on a cot of laced rawhide thongs with a sheepskin mattress and fresh blankets. He placed the child besided her and during the night he woke more than once from a light sleep to go to them.

just before dawn he at last fell into deep sleep, only to be shaken awake almost immediately.

What is it? He reached instinctively for the rifle at his head.

Come quickly! Swart Hendrick's hoarse whisper at his ear. The cattle were restless. I thought it might be a lion. What is it, man? Lothar demanded irritably. Get on with it, spit it out. It was not a lion, much worse! There are wild San out there. They have been creeping around the camp all night. I think they are after the cattle. Lothar swung his legs over the cot and groped for his boots.

Have Vark Jan and Klein Boy returned yet? It would be easier with a large party.

Not yet, Hendrick shook his head.

Very well, we'll hunt alone. Saddle the horses. We must not let the little yellow devils get too much of a start on us. As he stood up, he checked the load of the Mauser, then pulled the sheepskin off his cot and stooped out of the shelter. He hurried to where Swart Hendrick was holding the horses.

O'wa had not been able to force himself to approach closer than two hundred paces to the camp of the strangers.

Even at that distance the strange sounds and odours that carried to him confused him. The ring of axe on wood, the clatter of a bucket, the bleat of a goat made him start; the smell of paraffin and soap, of coffee and woollen clothing troubled him, while the sounds of men speaking in unfamiliar cadence and harsh sibilance were as terrifying to him as the hissing of serpents.

He lay against the earth, his heart hammering painfully, and whispered to H'ani, Nam Child is with her own kind at last. She is lost to us, old grandmother. This is a sickness of the head, this crazy following after her. We both knew well that the others will murder us if they discover that we are here. Nam Child is hurt. You read the sign beneath the mopani tree where the naked carcass of the lion lay, H'ani whispered back. You saw her blood on the earth She is with her own kind, O'wa repeated stubbornly. They will care for her. She does not need us any more.

She went in the night and left us without a word of farewell. Old grandfather, I know that what you say is true, but how will I ever smile again if I never know how badly she has been hurt? How will I ever sleep again if I never see little Shasa safe at her breast? You risk both our lives for a glimpse of someone who has departed. They are dead to us now, leave them be. I risk my own life, my husband, for to me it has no further value if I do not know that Nam Child, the daughter of my heart if not of my own womb, is alive and will stay alive. I risk my own life for the touch of Shasa once more. I do not ask you to come with me. H'ani rose, and before he could protest, scuttled away into the shadows, heading towards the faint glow where the watch-fire showed through the trees. O'wa came up on his knees, but his courage failed him again, and he lay and covered his head with an arm.

Oh, stupid old woman, he lamented. Do you not know that without you my heart is a desert? When they kill you, I will die a hundred deaths to your one. H'ani crept towards the camp, circling downwind, watching the drift of smoke from the fire, for she knew that if the cattle or the horses scented her, they would stamp and mill and alert the camp. Every few paces she sank to the ground and listened with all her soul, staring into the shadows around the wagons and the crude huts of the encampment, watching for those tall, very black men, dressed in outlandish apparel and hung with glittering metal weapons.

They were all asleep, she could make out the shapes around the fire and the stink of their bodies in her nostrils made her shake with fear. She forced herself to rise and go forward, keeping one of the wagons between her and the sleeping men, until she could crouch beside the tall rear wheel of the wagon.

She was certain that Nam Child was in one of the thatched shelters, but to choose the wrong one would bring disaster upon her. She decided on the nearest of the shelters and crawled on her hands and knees to the entrance. Her eyes were good in the gloom, almost like those of a cat, but all she could see was a dark indefinite bundle on a raised structure at the far end of the shelter, a human shape, perhaps, but there was no way of being certain.

The shape stirred, and then coughed and grunted.

A man! Her heart thudded so loudly, she was certain it would wake him. She drew back, and crawled to the second shelter.

Here there was another sleeping form. H'ani crept towards it timidly, and when she was within arm's length, her nostrils flared. She recognized the milky smell of Shasa, and the odour of Nam Child's skin which to the old woman was as sweet as the wild melon.

She knelt beside the cot, and Shasa sensed her presence and whimpered. H'ani touched his forehead, and then slipped the tip of her little finger into his mouth. She had taught him well, all Bushmen children learned to be still under this special restraint, for the safety of the clan could depend on their silence. Sasha relaxed under the familiar touch and smell of the old woman.

H'ani felt for Nam Child's face. The heat of her cheeks told her that Nam Child was in light fever, and she leaned forward and smelled her breath. It was soured with pain and sickness, but lacked the rank feral stench of virulent infection. H'ani longed for the opportunity to examine and dress her wounds, but knew it was vain.

Instead she placed her lips against the girl's ear and whispered, My heart, my little bird, I call all the spirits of the clan to protect you. Your old grandfather and I will dance for you, to strengthen and cure you. The old woman's voice reached something deep in the unconscious girl's being. Images formed in her mind.

Old grandmother, she muttered, and smiled at the dream images. Old grandmother- I am with you, H'ani replied. I will be with you always and always- That was all she could say, for she could not risk the sob that crouched in her throat ready to burst through her lips. She touched them each once more, the child and the mother, on their lips and their closed eyes, then she rose and scuttled from the shelter. Her tears blinded her, her grief swamped her senses, she passed close to the thorn laager where the horses stood.

One of the horses snorted and stamped and tossed its head at the sharp unfamiliar scent. As H'ani disappeared into the night, one of the men lying beside the fire sat up and threw aside his blanket to go to the restless horses.

Halfway there, he paused and then stooped over the tiny footprint in the dust.

It was strange how weary H'ani felt now, as she and O'wa made their way back around the base of the mountain towards the secret valley.

While they had followed the trail of Nam Child and Shasa, she had felt as though she could run for ever, as though she were a young woman again, imbued with boundless energy and strength in her concern for the safety of the two she loved as dearly as she loved her ancient husband. Now, however, when she had turned her back upon them for ever, she felt the full weight of her age, and it pressed her down so that her usual alert swinging trot was reduced to a heavy plod, and the weariness ached in her legs and up her spine.

In front of her O'wa moved as slowly, and she sensed the effort that each pace cost him. in the time that it had taken the sun to rise a handspan above the horizon, both of them had been deprived of the force and purpose that made survival in their harsh world possible. Once more they had suffered terrible bereavement, but this time they did not have the will to rise above it.

Ahead of her O'wa hatted and sank down on his haunches. She had never in all the long years seen him so beaten, and when she squatted beside him, he turned his head slowly to her. Old grandmother, I am tired, he whispered. I would like to sleep for a long time. The sun hurts my eyes. He held up his hand to shield them.

It has been a long hard road, old grandfather, but we are at peace with the spirits of our clan, and Nam Child is safe with her own kind. We can rest awhile now. Suddenly she felt the grief come up her throat and she choked upon it, but there were no tears. It seemed that all the moisture had dried from her wizened old frame.

There were no tears, but the need to weep was like an arrow in her chest, and she rocked on her heels and made a little humming sound in her throat to try to alleviate the pain, so she did not hear the horses coming.

It was O'wa who dropped his hand from his eyes and cocked his head to the tremor on the still morning air, and when H'ani saw the fright in his eyes, she listened and heard it also.

We are discovered, said O'wa, and for a moment H'ani felt drained of even the will to run and hide.

They are close already. The same resignation was in his eyes, and it spurred the old woman.

She pulled him to his feet. On the open ground they will run us down with the ease of a cheetah taking a lame gazelle. She turned and looked to the mountain.

They were at the foot of the scree slope, with scattered brush and loose rock ramping gently up to the mountain's bulk.

If, H'ani whispered, if we could reach the top, no horse could follow us. It is too high, too steep, O'wa protested.

There is a way. With a bony finger, H'ani pointed out the faint track that zigzagged up the vast bare rocky flank of the mountain.

Look, old grandfather, see, the spirits of the mountain are showing us the way. Those are klipSpTinger, O'wa muttered. The two tiny chamois-like antelope, alarmed by the approach of horsemen in the forest below, went prancing lightly up the barely discernible track. They are not mountain spirits, O'wa repeated, watching the nimble brown animals fly almost straight up the tall rock-face.

I say they are spirits in the guise of antelope. H'ani dragged him towards the scree slope. I say they are showing us the way to escape our enemies. Hurry, you stupid and argumentative old man, there is no other way open to us. She took his hand in hers, and together they hopped and skipped from boulder to boulder, climbing with the awkward agility of a pair of ancient baboons up the tumbled rock of the scree slope.

However, before they reached the base of the cliff, O'wa was dragging back on her hand, and gasping with pain, reeling weakly as she urged him on.

My chest, he cried and staggered. In my chest an animal is eating my flesh, I can feel its teeth- and he fell heavily between two boulders.

We cannot stop, H'ani pleaded as she stood over him. We must go on.

She tried to drag him up.

There is such pain, he wheezed. I can feel its teeth ripping out my heart. With all her strength she heaved him into a sitting position, and at that moment there was a faint shout from the foot of the scree slope below them.

They have seen us, H'ani said, looking down at the two horsemen as they rode out of the forest. They are coming up after us. She watched them jump down from their horses, tether them and then come at the slope. One was a black man and the other had a head that shone like sunlight off a sheet of still water, and as they came on to the slope they shouted again, a fierce and jubilant sound, like the clamour of hunting hounds when they first take the scent.

That sound roused O'wa and with H'ani's help he came unsteadily to his feet, clutching at his chest. His lips had blanched and his eyes were like those of a mortally wounded gazelle; they terrified her as much as the shouts of the men below.

We must go on. Half-carrying, half-dragging him, she led him to the base of the cliff.

I cannot do it. His voice was so faint she had to put her ear to his lips. I cannot go up there. You can, she told him stoutly. I will lead you, place your feet where I place mine. And she went on to the rock, on to the steep pathway that the klipspringer had marked with their sharp pointed hooves, and behind her the old man came on unsteadily.

one hundred feet up they found a ledge, and it shielded them from the men below. They toiled upwards, clinging to the harsh abrasive surface with their fingertips, and the open drop below them seemed to steady O'wa. He climbed more determinedly. Once when he hesitated and swayed outwards from the wall, she reached back and caught his arm and held him until the fit of vertigo passed.

Follow me, she told him. Do not look down, old grandfather. Watch my feet and follow me. They went upwards, higher and still higher, and although the plain opened below them, yet the hunters were hidden beneath the sheer of the cliff.

Only a little further, she told him. See, there is the crest, just a little further and we will be safe. Here, give me your hand. And she reached out to help him over a bad place where the drop opened below them and they had to step across the void.

H'ani looked down between her feet and she saw them again, dwarfed by distance and foreshortened and misshapened by the overhead perspective. The two hunters were still at the base of the cliff, directly below her, looking up at her. The white man's face shone like a cloud, so strangely pale and yet so malignant, she thought. He lifted his arms and pointed at her with the long staff he carried.

H'ani had never seen a rifle before, and made no effort to hide herself as she stared down at him. She knew she was far out of range of an arrow from even the most powerful bow, and, unafraid, she leaned out from the narrow ledge for a better view of her enemy. She saw the white man's extended arms jerk, and a little feather of white smoke flew from the tip of his staff.

She never heard the rifle shot, for the bullet arrived before the sound. It was a soft lead-nosed Mauser bullet and it entered low down in the front of her stomach and passed obliquely upwards, traversing her body, tearing through her bowels and her stomach, up through one lung and out through her back a few inches to one side of the spinal column. The force of the impact flung her backwards against the rock wall, and then her lifeless body bounced loosely forward and spun out over the edge.

Opwa cried out and reached for her as she went over.

He touched her with his fingertips, before she fell away from him and he teetered on the brink of the precipice.

My life! he called after her. My little heart! And the pain and the grief were too intense to be borne. He let his body sway outwards, and as it passed its centre of gravity, he cried softly, I am coming with you, old grandmother, to the very end of the journey."And he let himself plunge unresisting into the void, and the wind ripped at him as he fell, but he made not another sound, not ever.

Lothar De La Rey had to climb twenty feet to where the body of one Bushman had wedged in a crack in the cliff face.

He saw it was the corpse of an old man, wrinkled and skeletal-thin, crushed by the fall and with the skin and flesh ripped away to expose the bone of his skull. There was very little blood, almost as though the sun and the wind had desiccated the tiny body while it was still alive.

About the narrow, childlike waist there was a brief loin-cover of tanned rawhide and then, remarkably, a Ianyard from which dangled a clasp knife. It was an Admiralty-type knife with a horn handle such as British sailors carried, and Lothar had not expected to find a tool like this one on a Bushman's corpse in the wastes of the Kalahari. He unlooped the lanyard and dropped the knife into his pocket. There was nothing else of value or interest on the body, and he certainly would not bother to bury it. He left the old man jammed into the rocky crevice and climbed back down to where Swart Hendrick waited for him.

What did you find? Hendrick demanded.

Just an old man, but he had this. Lothar showed him the knife and Swart Hendrick nodded without particular interest.

Ja. They are terrible thieves, like monkeys. That's why they were creeping around our camp. Into the kloof there, amongst that horn bush. It will be dangerous to climb down. I would leave it. Stay here, then, Lothar told him and went to the edge of the deep ravine and looked down. The bottom was choked with dense Thorn growth, and the climb would indeed be dangerous, but Lothar felt a perverse whim to go against Swart Hendrick's advice.

it took him twenty minutes to reach the bottom of the ravine, and as long again to find the corpse of the Bushman he had shot. It was like trying to find a dead pheasant in thick scrub without a good gundog to sniff it out, and in the end it was only the buzz of big metallic-blue flies that led him to the hand protruding from a clump of scrub, with the pink palm uppermost. He dragged the body out of the thorn scrub by the wrist and realized that it was a female, an ancient hag with impossibly wrinkled skin and dangling breasts like a pair of empty tobacco pouches.

He grunted with satisfaction when he saw the bullet hole exactly where he had aimed. It had been an extremely difficult shot, at that range and deflected. He transferred his attention immediately from the bullet wound to the extraordinary decoration that the old woman wore around her neck.

Lothar had never seen anything like it in southern Africa, although in his father's collection there had been a Masai necklace from east Africa, which was vaguely similar. However, the Masai jewellery had been made with trade beads, while for this collar the old woman had collected coloured pebbles and had graded and arranged them with remarkable aesthetic appreciation. Then she had most cunningly fastened them into a breast plate that was at once strong and decorative.

Lothar realized that it would have considerable value for its rarity, and he rolled the old woman on to her face to unknot the string that held it at the back of her neck.

Blood from the massive exit wound had soaked the string, run down it and clotted on some of the coloured stones, but he wiped it off carefully.

Many of the stones were in their original crystalline form, and others were water-worn and polished. The old woman had probably picked them out of the gravel banks in the dry river beds. He turned them to catch the light and smiled with pleasure at the lovely sparkle of reflected sunlight. He wrapped the necklace in his bandanna and placed it carefully in his breast pocket.

One last glance at the dead Bushwoman convinced him that there was nothing else of interest about her, and Lothar left her lying on her face and turned to the difficult climb up the ravine wall to where Swart Hendrick waited above him.

Centaine became aware of the feeling of woven cloth upon her body, and it was so unfamiliar that it brought her to the very threshold of consciousness. She thought that she lay upon something soft, but she knew that was impossible, as was the filtered light through green canvas.

She was too tired to ponder these things, and when she tried to keep her eyelids open, they drooped against her best efforts and she became aware of her weakness. Her insides had been scooped out of her as though she were a soft-boiled egg, and only her brittle outer shell remained. The thought made her want to smile, but even that effort was too great and she drifted away into that lulling darkness again.

When next she became aware, it was to the sound of someone singing softly. She lay with her eyes closed and realized that she could understand the words. It was a love song, a lament for a girl that the singer had known before the war began.

It was a man's voice, and she thought it was one of the most thrilling voices she had ever heard. She did not want the song to end, but suddenly it broke off, and the man laughed.

So, you like that do you? he said in Afrikaans, and a child said, Da! Da! so loudly and so clearly that Centaine's eyelids flew open. It was Shasa's voice and every memory of that night with the lion in the mopani came rushing back at her, and she wanted to scream again.

My baby, save my baby! and she rolled her head from side to side, and found she was alone in a hut with thatched roof and canvas sides. She lay on a camp cot, and she was dressed in a long cool cotton nightgown.

Shasa! she called out, and tried to sit up. She managed only a spasmodic jerk, and her voice was a dull, hoarse whisper.

Shasa! This time she summoned all her strength. Shasa! and it came out as a croak.

There was a startled exclamation, and she heard a stoat clatter as it was overturned. The hut darkened as someone stepped into the doorway, and she rolled her head towards the opening, A man stood there. He was holding Shasa on his hip.

He was tall, with wide shoulders, but the light was behind him so she could not see his face.

So, the sleeping princess awakes- that deep, thrilling voice -at last, at long last. Still carrying her son, he stepped to the side of her cot and bent over her.

We have been worried, he said gently, and she looked up into the face of the most beautiful man she had ever seen, a golden man, with golden hair and yellow leopard's eyes in his tanned golden face.

On his hip Shasa bounced up and down and reached towards her.

Mama! My baby! She lifted one hand, and the stranger swung Shasa off his hip and placed him beside her on the cot.

Then he lifted Centaine's shoulders and propped her into a sitting position with a bolster behind her. His hands were brown and strong, yet the fingers were as elegant as those of a pianist.

Who are you? Her voice was a husky whisper, and there were dark smears below her eyes, the colour of fresh bruises.

My name is Lothar De La Rey, he answered, and Shasa clenched his fists and pounded his mother's shoulder in a gesture of overwhelming affection.

Gently! Lothar caught his wrist to restrain him. Your mama is not up to so much love, not yet. She saw how Lothar's expression softened as he looked at the child.

What happened to me? Centaine asked. Where am YOU were attacked and mauled by a lion. When I shot the beast, you fell out of the tree. She nodded. Yes, I remember that, but afterwards You suffered concussion and then the wounds from the lion claws mortified. How long? she breathed.

Six days, but the worst is past. Your leg is still very swollen and inflamed, Mevrou Courtney. She started. You use that name.

Where did you learn that name? i know that your name is Mevrou Centaine Courtney and that you were a survivor from the hospital ship Protea Castle. How? How do you know these things? I was sent by your father-in-law to search for you. My father-in-law? Colonel Courtney, and that woman, Anna Stok. Anna? Anna is alive? Centaine reached out and seized his wrist. is no doubt about that at all! Lothar laughed. ThereShe is very much alive. That is the most wonderful news! I thought she was drowned -Centaine broke off as she realized that she was still holding his wrist. She let her hand fall to her side and sank back against the bolster.

Tell me, she whispered, tell me everything. How is she? How did you know where to find me? Where is Anna now? When will I see her? Lothar laughed again. His teeth were very white. So many questions! He drew the stool to her cot. Where shall I begin? Begin with Anna, tell me all about her. He talked and she listened avidly, watching his face, asking another question as soon as one was answered, fighting off the weakness of her body to revel in the sound of his voice, in the intense pleasure of hearing glad tidings of the real world from which she had been so long excluded, of communicating with one of her own kind and looking on a white and civilized face again.

The day was almost gone, the evening gloom filling her little shelter when Shasa let out a demanding shout and Lothar broke off.

He is hungry."I will feed him if you will leave us a while, Mijnheer."No, Lothar shook his head. You have lost your milk.

Centaine's head jerked as though the words were a blow in her face, and she stared at him while thoughts tumbled and crowded in her mind. Up to that moment she had been so wrapped up in listening and questioning that she had not considered that there was no other woman in the camp, that for six days she had been entirely helpless, and that somebody had tended her, washed her and changed her, fed her and dressed her wounds. But his words, such an intimate subject spoken of in direct fashion, brought all this home to her, and as she stared at him, she felt herself begin to blush with shame. Her cheeks flamed, those long brown fingers of his must have touched her where only one other man had touched before. She felt her eyes smart, as she realized what those yellow eyes of his must have looked upon.

She felt herself burning up with embarrassment, and then incredibly with a hot and shameful excitement, so that she had difficulty breathing, and she lowered her eyes and turned her head away so that he could not see her scarlet cheeks.

Lothar seemed to be entirely unaware of her predicament. Come on, soldier, let's show mama our new trick. He lifted SHasa and fed him with a spoon, and Shasa bounced on his lip and said, Hum! Hum! as he saw each spoonful coming, and then launched himself at it with mouth wide open. He likes you, Centaine said.

We are friends, Lothar admitted, as he removed the heavy coating of gruel from Shasa's forehead and chin and ears with a damp cloth.

You are good with children, Centaine whispered and saw the sudden biting pain reflected in the darkening gold of his eyes.

Once I had a son, he said, and placed Shasa at her side, then picked up the spoon and empty bowl and went to the doorway.

Where is your son? she called softly after him, and he paused in the opening, then turned slowly back to her. My son is dead, he said softly.

She was ripe and over-ripe for love. Her loneliness was a hunger so intense that it seemed it could not be assuaged, not even by those long languid conversations under the awning of the wagon tent when, with Shasa between them, they talked away the hottest hours of those lazy African days.

Mostly they discussed the things she held dearest, music and books. Although he preferred Goethe to Victor Hugo and Wagner to Verdi, these differences gave them grounds for amusing and satisfying dispute. in those arguments she discovered that his learning and scholarship far exceeded her own, but she strangely did not resent it.

it merely made her more attentive to his voice. It was a marvelous voice; after the clicking and grunting of the San language, she could listen to it for the lilt and cadence as though it were music in itself.

Sing for me! she ordered, when they had for the moment exhausted a particular topic. Both Shasa and I command it.

Your servant, of course! he smiled, and gave them a mocking little bow, then he sang without any selfconsciousness.

Take the chick and the hen will follow you Centaine had often heard Anna repeat the old proverb, and when she watched Shasa riding around the camp on Lothar's shoulder, she realized the wisdom behind it, for her eyes and her heart followed both of them.

At first she felt quick resentment whenever Shasa greeted Lothar with cries of Da! Da! That name should have been reserved for Michael alone. Then with a painful stab she remembered that Michael was lying in the cemetery at Mort Homme.

After that it was easy to smile when Shasals first attempts at walking unaided on his own two legs ended with a precipitous and headlong return to earth and he bawled for Lothar and crawled to him, seeking comfort.

It was Lothar's tenderness and gentleness with her son that nudged her affections and her need for him forward, for she recognized that beneath that handsome exterior he was a hard man and fierce. She saw the awe and respect in which his own men held him, and they were tough men themselves.

just once she witnessed him in a cold, killing rage that terrified her as much as it did the man against whom it was directed. Vark Jan, the wrinkled yellow Khoisan, in indolence and ignorance had ridden Lothar's hunting horse with an ill-fitting saddle and galled the creature's back almost to the bone. Lothar had knocked Vark Jan down with a fist to the head, and then cut the jacket and shirt off his back with razor strokes from his sjambok, a five-foot whip of cured hippo-hide, and left him unconscious in a puddle of his own blood.

The violence had appalled and frightened Centaine, for she had witnessed every brutal detail from where she lay on her cot beneath the awning. Later, however, when she was alone in her shelter, her revulsion faded and in its place was a trembly feeling of exhilaration and a heat in the pit of her stomach.

He's so dangerous, she thought, so dangerous and cruel, and she shivered again and could not sleep. She lay and listened to his breathing in the shelter beside hers, and thought about how he must have undressed her and touched her while she was unconscious, and her flesh tingled at the memory and she blushed in the darkness.

In startling contrast the next day he was gentle and tender, holding her injured leg in his lap while he snipped the threads of cotton and plucked them from her swollen, inflamed flesh. They left dark punctures in her skin, and he bent over her leg and sniffed the wound.

It's clean now. That redness is only your body attempting to rid itself of the stitches. It will heal swiftly now they are gone. Lothar was right. Within two days she was able, with the help of the crutch he had whittled for her, to make her first foray out of the canvas shelter.

My legs feel wobbly, she protested, and I am as weak as Shasa. You'll soon be strong again. He placed his arm around her shoulders to steady her, and she trembled at his touch and hoped he would not notice and withdraw his arm.

They paused by the horse lines and Centaine petted the animals, stroking their silky muzzles and revelling in that nostalgic horse odour.

I want to ride again, she told him.

Anna Stok told me you were a skilled horsewoman she told me you had a stallion, a white stallion. Nuage. Tears prickled her eyes as she remembered, and she pressed her face against the neck of Lothar's hunting horse to hide them. My white cloud, he was so beautiful, so strong and swift.

Nuage, Lothar took her arm, a lovely name. Then he went on, Yes, you will ride again soon. We have a long journey ahead of us, back to where your father-in-law and Anna Stok will be waiting for you. It was the first time she had considered an end to this magical interlude, and she pulled away from the horse and stared at him over its back. She didn't want it to end, she didn't want him to leave her, as she knew he soon would.

I'm tired, she said. I don't think I am ready to start riding just yet. That evening as she sat under the awning with a book in her lap, pretending to read, while watching him from under her lowered lids, he looked up suddenly and smiled with such a knowing glint in his eye that she blushed and looked away in confusion, I'm writing to Colonel Courtney, he told her, sitting at the collapsible travelling bureau with the pen in his hand smiling across at her, I will send a rider back to Windhoek tomorrow, but it will take him two weeks or more to get there and back. I am letting Colonel Courtney know when and where we can meet, and I have suggested a rendezvous for the i9th day of next month. She wanted to say, So soon? but instead, she nodded silently.

I am sure you are most anxious to be reunited with your family, but I don't think we will be able to reach the rendezvous before that date. I understand. However, I would be delighted to send any letter that you might care to write, with the messenger Oh, that would be wonderful, Anna, dear Anna, she will be fussing like an old hen. Lothar stood up from the bureau.

Please seat yourself here and use the pen and what paper you need, Mrs Court they. While you are busy, master Shasa and I will see to his dinner. Surprisingly, once she penned the opening salutation, My dearest dear Anna, she could think of nothing to follow it mere words seemed so paltry.

I give thanks to God that you survived that terrible night, and I have thought of you every day since then-The dam holding back the words burst, and they flooded out on to the paper.

We will need a pack horse to carry that epistle. Lothar stood behind her shoulder, and she started as she realized that she had covered a dozen sheets with close script.

There is so much still to tell her, but the rest will have to wait. Centaine folded the sheets and sealed them with a wax wafer from the silver box fitted into the top of the bureau, while Lothar held the candle for her.

It was strange, she whispered. I had almost forgotten how to hold a pen. It has been so long. You have never told me what happened to you, how you escaped from the sinking ship, how you survived so long, how you came to be so many hundreds of miles from the coast where you must have come ashore- I don't want to talk about it. She cut him off quickly.

She saw for a moment in her mind's eye, the little heartshaped, wrinkled, amber-coloured faces, and suppressed her nagging guilt at having deserted them so cruelly.

I don't even want to think about that. Kindly never address the subject again, sir. Her tone was stingingly severe.

Of course, Mrs Courtney."He picked up the two sealed letters. If you will excuse me, I will give these to Vark Jan now. He can leave before dawn tomorrow. He was stiff-faced and resentful of the rebuff.

She watched him cross to the servants fire and heard the murmur of voices as he gave Vark Jan his orders.

When he returned to the shelter, she made a pretence of being engrossed with her book, hoping that he would interrupt her, but he seated himself at the bureau and opened his journal. It was his nightly ritual, his entry in the leather-bound journal. She listened to his pen scratching on the paper, and she resented his attention being focused anywhere but on herself.

There is so little time left to us, she thought, and he squanders it so. She closed her book loudly but he did not look up.

What are you writing? she demanded.

You know what I am writing, since we have discussed it before, Mrs Courtney Do you write everything in your journal? Almost everything. Do you write about me?