The Devil's breath

11

Kallie van Reenen left the house while everyone else was still sleeping. She felt wretched. The photos of the dead Anton Leopold and the note to Peterson confirmed that Chief Inspector Mike Kapuo, the man she and her father trusted, was connected to those hunting down Max. Not wanting her absence to initiate a search, she left a scribbled message telling Kapuo that she had gone into the city for a few hours and that she would return to his office later that morning. She knew she could not simply disappear, she had to see this through, so she mustn’t arouse his suspicions.

Only Thandi Kapuo was awake when she left, and Kallie convinced her quite easily to let her use the girl’s cell phone to send an urgent text message to Sayid. Fourteen-year-old Thandi was currently grounded by her parents and no one was speaking to anyone, so helping Kallie was one way of getting back at her parents. Kallie felt some sense of relief that she had at least managed to warn Sayid about Peterson and his connections.

By the time she reached the docks, the port was busy. Shipping containers were stacked high, and cranes plucked them one by one and dropped them onto the backs of waiting trucks. Released air brakes hissed like steam engines urgently wanting their power set free. With a shift into gear, the long-haul trucks eased away to take their cargo to its final destination.

Kallie unfolded the photograph she had taken from Kapuo’s file. It was a picture showing the location where Anton Leopold’s body had been found. It took her a couple of hours, but she finally orientated herself and found the place. She looked at the photo again and saw that his body had been moved gently by the tide so that it was caught against a ship. She knew about prevailing winds which could push a plane off-course, and tides did the same thing to anything afloat. The photograph was date- and time-coded. She checked her watch-about an hour and a half later in the day than when the picture was taken. The tide would have shifted quite a bit, but she could make allowances. The deep-water harbor would also have had a lot of shipping moving through the port, so the ebb and flow of the displaced water would have influenced where the body ended up, although there was no way she could ever work that out. She would stick with the tides, she decided.

“ ‘Scuse me, can you tell me when high tide is?”

The man with a clipboard, talking into a two-way connected to an overhead crane, had just guided a container down from ship to shore.

He looked at her, liking what he saw. She was attractive. The flying cap shielded her eyes, but he could see they were blue with a fleck of green, and she had a great smile.

“Why would you want to know that?” He smiled at her.

“My dad is buying me a kayak.”

“Lucky girl. But you should be over at the marina, not here.” The man couldn’t take his eyes off her. There was a squawk on the radio which he ignored. “You have to be careful out there. Tides are fast. And what with the trawlers over there and the seals, well, they bring in the sharks. You don’t want to get tipped into the water. You shouldn’t be wandering down here, either. Harbor’s a rough place.”

Kallie glanced around. Dockside workers were coming and going, forklift trucks ferried smaller crates around. She was sure that if anyone tried anything, there were enough people around to help.

“I’m just checking the place out, there’s a lot of shipping out there. All a bit scary.” She was unsure whether the look of worry on her face conveyed the right degree of helplessness.

“Yeah. It changes all the time. There’s usually a couple of meters between tides. Look, I’ve got my break coming up, why don’t we go and have a cup of coffee and I’ll tell you whatever you need to know.”

“Thanks, but my dad wouldn’t like that.”

“Well, maybe you don’t have to tell your dad everything you do.”

“He’d find out anyway.”

“You think?”

“Yeah. He’s head of police here,” she lied easily. She could barely keep herself from laughing aloud at the look on the man’s face. “But thanks anyway.”

She walked past him as he managed to mutter, “No problem.”

The quayside was one and a half kilometers long, divided into eight berths for the big ships. Kallie walked its length; every berth was full except for the one at the end, and two tugs were busy fussing and nudging a big container ship into place.

If Anton Leopold’s body had been found, or at least photographed, at the time the police said it was, it must have bobbed down the tide from one of these furthest points. A chain-link fence topped with razor wire stopped her getting any closer to the ship being edged against the quayside. This berth had its own unloading facility; a massive shed acted as an on-shore warehouse and she could see containers stacked inside. On the far side of the shed, a barrier, manned by an armed guard, was the only way in or out of the facility. An emblem was painted on the roof of the warehouse, identifying the company: a cobra, its fangs bared, entwined itself around a spear, which she recognized as an assegai, the short, broad-bladed stabbing spear used by Zulu warriors in their many wars. On each side of the spear was the letter S. She caught her breath. SS-Shaka Spear. Chang’s company owned the facility.

A shadow appeared. Kallie turned. The man she had spoken to minutes earlier was standing a few meters behind her. She had boxed herself in-the wire fence behind her, stacked containers to her left and, to her right, the sea.

Now the man had an unpleasant smile-his tongue licked his lips nervously. “So, you’re more interested in Mr. Chang’s ships than in me.”

The big ship had been nudged against the quayside. She looked up at the name bending across the curved stern: Zulu King. Shaka Chang owned the shipping line and the warehouse, and he was bringing in hundreds of containers. If Anton Leopold had seen this, had it aroused his suspicions? Had he found out what was in that warehouse, or in the containers? As thoughts raced through her mind, the man reached out and caught her by surprise. Twisting her around, he dragged her into the stacked containers’ dark alleyway. She struggled, but he clamped his callused, oil-smeared hand, as rough as sand, over her mouth.

“You can scream as much as you want when I’m finished with you,” he growled.

The stench of his breath made her want to gag. She dropped her shoulders, reached behind her, dug her nails into his face and eyes, and then rammed her heel down his shin into his instep, just as her dad had taught her. The man yelled in pain, but still he kept hold of her despite her struggling. She sank her teeth into his hand, yanking his wrist down as she did so, and, as she held his arm as tightly as she could away from her mouth, screamed: “FIRE! FIRE!”

He tightened his grip on her but she kept screaming, “FIRE! FIRE!” And then she did what her dad had said might be the last resort in attack, she willed herself to relax every muscle in her body and collapsed in a heap. Even strong men could lose their hold on a dead weight. She had to be ready to roll clear when she hit the ground. She went down; the sudden lack of resistance took the man by surprise and he failed to hold her.

She rolled. He stumbled over her, fell forward and tried to stop himself from slamming into the nearest container. His hand partially broke his fall, but he banged his head on the harsh, ribbed metal. It was enough for Kallie to break free, get to her feet and run.

As she raced back into the sunlight, three or four men were running from one of the ships being unloaded. In a split second she knew that if they were hostile she would plunge into the freezing water and take her chances with the current and the sharks. But as soon as they saw her, one of them shouted, “Where’s the fire?” A quayside blaze could be deadly serious, especially with a ship riding high out of the water, less than thirty meters away, its fuel tanks nearly empty except for highly explosive fumes.

Kallie pointed towards the containers and, as they went past her, she ran as hard as she could in the opposite direction. She wanted to get as far away from the danger and violence as she could. At least in the wilderness savage animals could be identified.

Max had spent the last few hours trying to come to an understanding about what!Koga and the others had told him. He had inherited his father’s sense of practicality, of not believing in any waffle or mumbo-jumbo about seeing the future, trances or seances or just about anything that he couldn’t experience directly. Scientists liked to prove things, and if the data and research added up, then the results were duly accepted-up to a point, or until someone else came along with a better argument. But his dad had also taught him to respect other cultures. Emotional belief was a powerful force to be reckoned with and, if!Koga and the others believed that the BaKoko, the shapeshifter, could take on the form of animals, then Max was going to have a hard time convincing them that there was no reason on earth why!Koga would, or should, kill him.

These were just thoughts. What Max needed was to take action, and if some crazy guy’s vision was distancing the boy who had helped him this far, then Max had to press on alone. All day the Bushmen had gone about their business in the camp, but!Koga had also stayed away from him, keeping to himself, obviously as troubled about the prophecy as Max was confounded by it. So Max had decided he would make his own way from the camp. He only needed a general direction to follow, and the sun’s journey across the sky would give him that. And his watch; without!Koga’s instinctive sense of direction, he would use it to navigate his way onwards. It used to be his father’s and was Max’s prized possession. If Max held it horizontally so that the number 12 pointed towards the sun, then the midpoint between that and the hour hand would give him the north-south line.

He was ready to go. He would steal provisions. He had identified where the women stored water in empty ostrich eggs, and the dried meat hanging in strips would keep him going for a few days. He realized he could not simply wander off; he needed a way out of the camp. For the past couple of hours he had moved casually through the area, behind the grass huts, near where the children played, and had skirted the hunters, who now slept in the heat of the day. There were two ways he could strike out-the first through the gnarled shepherd’s trees, which were low enough to obscure the upright figure of someone moving away. A hundred meters or so from the camp, the trees were less dense and he would have to sweep around the far edge of the settlement. He caught himself thinking that what he was actually doing was not continuing on his journey but escaping from a threat of death.

There was a second option for a way of escape. The trees behind one of the huts had been cut down to form the framework for its grass coverings, so there was a bare patch of land which he would have to walk across with the stolen provisions; but once he reached the trees, a mound ran almost sixty meters to the right, then fell away into a narrow gully. He could crawl or crouch behind the embankment and then make a run for it when he got into the deeper ground. It would have to be in daylight, probably at the hottest part of the day when everyone was sleeping. He couldn’t be sure if the hunters would go out again, but he wasn’t going to hang around to find out. Moving across the open space would be a bigger risk-but sometimes big risks paid off, provided everything had been taken into account.

He sat with his back against the embankment, letting the mottled shade cool him as he thought through his options. Tomorrow might be too late. He decided to go that night-hoping the gully would run further than he could see. He needed distance. He needed darkness.

His eye caught a movement at the edge of the trees and he froze.!Koga stood ten meters away. Max had been concentrating and had not heard a thing. The boys stared at each other,!Koga stepping quietly, almost cautiously, closer. Max waited.!Koga held his spear, but there was no sense of immediate threat. “Max.”!Koga spoke barely above a whisper as he made a delicate gesture with his hand. “Come here, Max.”

“You following me?” Max smiled, hoping his voice sounded casual enough, but his back muscles tightened. How long had!Koga been there? Why had he followed him into the half-light of the trees? Why was!Koga slowly raising his spear? He was closer now, no more than five meters away, and Max had not moved, mesmerized by the effortless grace of the boy’s walk.

!Koga stared, unblinking, then, like a bird dipping to snatch a grub, his shoulders dropped, turned slightly and the spear cut through the air. Max barely had time to duck; he swiveled, the lethal projectile a few centimeters from his head. He fell, supporting himself with one hand as he hit the sand. The spear thudded into the tree where only seconds before he had leaned, but now a twisting, coiled cobra, fully three meters long, as thick as a man’s arm and with a flared hood the size of an open hand, was pinioned by!Koga’s spear. It must have been seconds away from striking the unsuspecting Max.

“Bloody hell! You gave me a fright,” he managed to splutter.!Koga chopped the snake’s head off, letting the writhing mass squirm in the dirt as he pulled his spear free, still treating the poisoned head with respect.

The unchanging laws of nature allowed Max a moment of gratitude towards the boy who was still his friend; they gave him the few seconds of life where, crystal clear, the etched tree trunks, the bloodied spear and the smiling Bushman froze like a picture snared in a digital frame.

Max grinned, pushed himself out of the sand and felt a sudden hot pain on his wrist. He looked down at the most primitive member of the Arachnidae-scuttling, black and yellow, a fourteen-centimeter scorpion that had just stung him.

He staggered back a pace, more as a natural reaction than any great fear. “It’s OK,” he said. And laughed. After a monster of a cobra had nearly sunk its fangs into him, this was nothing. There was barely a mark on his wrist. No swelling appeared, no inflamed skin. Not initially. Then pain started at the wound site, alerting Max that perhaps this wasn’t something to be laughed off so easily. Acidlike heat burned inside his veins.

!Koga took his arm, looked at the wound, brought the end of his spear down on the scorpion that was scuttling away, and called Max’s name. Max didn’t respond.!Koga broke the shaft, put a piece of the wood in the crook of Max’s elbow, and forced it closed. That would help slow the poison. Max thought he had sweat in his eyes because!Koga was slightly blurred, yet Max’s body felt paper-dry; the sensation that seared his arm and into his chest made him feel sick. Neurotoxins were flooding into his system. Something that felt like a claw wrenched at his stomach muscles and, as a wave of light-headedness swept over him, he sank to his knees. He felt!Koga trying to pull him up, and the boy was saying something, but he couldn’t hear him. He was going down, further. He could see the grains of sand now,!Koga’s face next to his, slapping him, shouting, mouthing words he could not hear.

Then the boy ran.

Alone, Max heard sounds within his own body. His heart thumped, like a boxer’s glove beating him on the side of his head. He mustn’t stay here, it was too dangerous. He had to move. Come on, legs, come on, gotta go, he told himself. But his body wasn’t listening, it was fighting the poison that attacked his vital organs, disabling his central nervous system like a computer virus worming its way deep inside and destroying all essential data.

His throat was closing, the air unable to reach his lungs. He felt a strange sensation. Men were carrying him, honey-colored men with narrow eyes and leathered hands. Tree branches’ shadows fluttered across his eyelids like swarming butterflies, then an old man-where had he seen that old man before? — was pushing his fingers into Max’s mouth. Maybe he was trying to get air inside. Pain knifed through him, putting intolerable torsion into his muscles, closing down his windpipe. If he had been in a city, doctors would have realized that he had had an unusually rapid reaction to the lethal venom and would aim to neutralize the effects of the overstimulation of his autonomic nervous system. They would have put him on an intravenous drip and administered a solution of calcium gluconate over ten to twenty minutes to help decrease the muscle pain and cramps; they would have sedated him for the convulsions that now racked him and put drugs into him to stop his heart failing.

Out here, life was not available by prescription.

Help me, someone whispered in his darkening mind. Help me, don’t let me die, said the disembodied voice. Mum? Dad? Where are you?

Like a spider touched by fire, his body curled in a final spasm, turning in on itself, his consciousness sending blackness as the only comfort against the indescribable agony.

A final thought, like the devil laughing: by saving his life from the cobra, by making him fall into the sand,!Koga had killed him.

The prophecy was true.

His heart stopped.

His lungs failed.

Max Gordon was dead.