Far Horizon (35 page)

S
arah was brimming with excitement as they crossed the border into Zambia and started the long, tortuous climb up the escarpment on the other side of the Zambezi River. Unlike the Zimbabwe side, where elephant, buffalo, zebra and various antelope species were often seen around town, the Zambian bush was devoid of wildlife, thanks to decades of unchecked poaching. She busied herself in the back of the cab, taking portrait shots of the other travellers and making notes of their names, ages, occupations and backgrounds.

He could already imagine the break-out stories being picked up by wire services around the world: ‘American tourist in African firefight' or ‘New Zealander narrowly escapes injury in battle with poachers'. That sort of thing. Mike cringed at the thought of his photo being beamed to newspapers everywhere, and he wondered how Rian would react.

Mike was surprised by how much his brief fling with Sarah – for that was how he was determined to
remember it – had meant to him. Jane had reawoken the sexual feelings he had suppressed after Isabella's death, but Sarah had rekindled something else. After they made love he had drifted off to sleep with the thought that from now on there could be nothing better in the entire universe than to lie down next to this woman every night and wake up next to her every morning, no matter where in the world they were.

Once they reached the top of the escarpment and the countryside levelled out, they made better time. The road to Lusaka was in good condition for a Zambian road, and they raced on through the hot, slanting mid-afternoon sun, past the turn-off to the spectacular Kafue Gorge, where the river of the same name cut its way down to the Zambezi.

Mike longed to slow down and show these beautiful places to Sarah, to stop at roadside fruit stalls and buy newly ripened bananas, to sip cold Zambian Mosi beers while watching a lingering sunset. He wanted the pair of them to giggle at the antics of shy African children pushing toy cars made out of wound fencing wire along dusty side tracks, to introduce her to African music and to have their fortunes told by a village
sangoma
. But she was going back to her world, to a world of deadlines and airports and faxes and computers and e-mail. He lit another cigarette and tried to let the whine of the engine drown out his thoughts.

Lusaka was a seething mass of suicidal taxis and blind pedestrians, all determined to raise Mike's ire and force him continually to bip Nelson's horn. They
stopped and started along the main street, Cairo Road, a wide boulevard split by tree-lined median strips. The street might have been attractive once, he thought, before the build-up of blue-black smoke that blanketed the traffic.

‘Fuckin' idiot!' he yelled out the open window to the driver of a brand new Mitsubishi Pajero. The man gave Mike the finger as he cut in front of the overlander, forcing him to stand on the brakes.

They crawled up to a big roundabout and Mike followed the sign to the airport, turning right on to the Great East Road. The buildings dropped in height as they slowly headed back into the flatlands. They passed a big single-storey shopping centre that was surrounded by a high fence and patrolled by an army of security guards, including two at a checkpoint on the gate.

Too soon, much too soon, they were through town and turning off towards the airport. Mike found a parking space in the half-full car park and turned around to face the group in the rear cab.

‘This is it. Last stop.' His heart was heavy but his tone belied it.

‘Not a chance,' Nigel said.

‘What do you mean? Trip's over, mate,' Mike said.

‘Bullshit,' Nigel said. ‘A few of us have taken a vote and we're coming with you. We've paid for this trip and we're not ready to go home yet. Tell your boss to shove his airfares and hotel rooms.'

‘We wouldn't miss the rest of this trip for the world, mate,' George said. ‘I joined the Territorial Army back home for a bit of action, but I've never seen anything like last night.'

‘Better than
Match of the Day
. . . well, almost,' Terry added.

‘Count me in too,' Kylie said. ‘As long as there's no more gunfire,' she added with a nervous laugh.

‘We're staying, right?' said Linda, looking at Mel, who was sitting next to her.

‘Right,' Mel confirmed.

Mike held up a hand. ‘Listen, all of you, I'm touched, but I shouldn't have even let you come this far.'

‘But you said the cops had told you the baddies have left,' Mel said.

‘That's true, but –'

‘Then it's settled,' Sam said. ‘Most of us are in, Mike.'

Mike nodded, grateful for their understanding. He resolved to make it up to each of them by ensuring they had a fun, safe holiday for the rest of their time together. But not everyone was happy with the way things had panned out.

‘Come on, Julie, let's go,' Jane said, edging her way between the seats. Julie cast a quick glance at Mike as she followed her mother down the steps, but he couldn't read the emotions in her face. ‘I can't stand any more of this musketeer bullshit.'

‘Sorry,' said Sarah, with a little smile. She bit her lower lip, and then bent her head out of sight to retrieve a daypack from under her seat.

Everyone else filed out behind Jane and Julie, including Sarah, and the guys helped unload the backpacks and other bags of those who were departing. Hazy waves of baking heat wafted up from the
tarmac of the car park and in the distance Mike heard thunder. Black clouds gathered along the horizon and the air was pregnant with moisture. He felt his shirt stick to his back as he climbed down from the driver's cab.

Jane and Julie hugged and kissed all the members of the group, including Nigel, but not Sarah, who would be travelling on the same BA flight as them back to England that night. Mike stared idly at the long, three-storey terminal building of Lusaka International Airport. To the left were offices and a dark-brick air traffic control tower bristling with radio aerials. The white concrete section to the right of the building housed the arrival and departure halls and an old-fashioned observation deck, where friends and lovers could wave goodbye. They wouldn't be staying for lingering farewells, though, as they would have to get back on the road in order to reach a camping site before nightfall.

Jane had dressed in a matching short khaki skirt and sleeveless blouse for the trip home. She walked towards Mike but stopped out of arm's reach. ‘Julie's all I've got, Mike, and she means more to me than anything . . . any man. You put us in danger, and I can't forgive that.'

She turned her back on Mike and started walking away. He realised she was right. He could have told her that he would miss her, but that would have been lying.

‘Have a safe flight,' he said, as she and Julie walked off.

Sarah had her backpack on and was saying the last of her goodbyes to the people she had finally got to
know, too late to make an impact on them, and vice versa. Except for Mike. Mike was aware of other eyes on them as she walked across to him, stopping close to his chest.

‘You'll take care of yourself, won't you, Mike?' she asked, looking up at him and blinking.

‘I'll stay off the main roads for a few days, watch my back, just in case. But I can't imagine Hess and Orlov would be stupid enough to hang around after last night,' Mike said.

He couldn't put his arms around her while she had her pack on, so he put the fingers of both hands under her chin and raised her face to his. She blinked again and he glimpsed a tear in the corner of each eye.

‘I've got to go, Mike . . . I'm so sorry. I . . .'

Mike lowered his face to Sarah's and kissed her on the mouth. Her lips parted and he tasted the salt of her tears running down her cheeks and into their mouths. Behind them, he was aware of some hooting and whistling. Sarah encircled his neck with slender arms and pulled him closer.

‘Bye, Mike. I'll write,' she said after a few seconds as she pushed herself gently away.

Mike started to speak, but a Boeing 767 screamed over their heads on its final approach, drowning him out.

‘What?' she asked, as the roar passed over them.

‘Nothing. Nothing at all. Have a safe trip.'

Vassily Orlov was angry and bored. He paced the hall idly looking in the windows of the few duty-free
shops in the departure lounge of Lusaka International Airport. His mind was not on cheap cigarettes and whisky – he controlled a large percentage of the distribution of both in Moscow, anyway – it was on the previous night's debacle in a Zimbabwean national park.

Hess, who sat calmly in a plastic chair in the open bar area smoking a cigarette and reading a news magazine, had relayed all that he had learned from his brief trip back across the border into Zimbabwe that morning. While Orlov fretted that the police may be tracking them at this very moment, he reminded himself that apart from having been in a national park with a weapon – a crime no one had seen him commit – he had broken no laws. It had been Hess who had engaged in a running gun battle and wounded, or possibly killed, a park ranger. And still there was the nagging question of how much the authorities actually knew about their identities and their plans.

Orlov was concerned at Hess's report that Gerald O'Flynn had been contacted by the police, but satisfied that the Namibian had dealt with that problem in his own inimitable fashion. The death of the guide was another good reason for them both to part company as soon as possible.

After checking in on the ground floor of the terminal at their respective airline counters, the two men had turned right and passed through Zambian immigration and customs procedures and then headed upstairs to the departure hall without incident. Although neither would admit it to the other, both
had feared that at any second armed police would emerge and detain them for questioning. When they had passed through all the checks Orlov had thanked God. Hess had thanked African bureaucracy. At Hess's insistence they had left all their firearms, even Orlov's personal hunting rifle he had brought from Russia, with Klaus in the Land Cruiser.

Orlov was booked on a British Airways flight to London. Hess had purchased a ticket to Nairobi and would later connect to a flight to Windhoek, where he planned to lie low for a week or two before crossing back into South Africa by road at a quiet border post. Klaus would return the four-wheel drive to Jo'burg, ship the hunting rifles to their respective owners and then make his own way back to Hess's game ranch.

‘Relax, Vassily,' Hess said as the Russian joined him at the table. ‘Let me buy you a drink.'

Orlov didn't need anyone to tell him to relax, but he accepted Hess's offer. ‘Yes, thank you, Karl. A scotch.'

Hess nodded and walked to the bar. Orlov noticed three women, all of them slim and attractive, enter the departure hall. One of them had short dark hair, and carried a notebook and an expensive camera. He didn't get a good look at her face, as she disappeared through a door that read ‘Private, National Airports Corporation Staff Only', which struck him as odd. The other two women walked towards the bar.

Both women were blonde, one slightly older than the other. They might have been related, he thought. He was mildly jealous when the elder of the pair struck up a conversation with Hess.

Hess saw the two women approaching in the mirror behind the bar as he waited for the elderly African barman to finish serving a man at the far end. The barman finally arrived, but looked to the two women to take their order, even though Hess had been waiting first. Hess bridled at the man's inefficiency, if that's what it really was.

‘Gin and tonic and a Bloody Mary, please,' the older of the two women said in an English accent. ‘Oh, sorry, I think you were first,' she said, noticing Hess standing nearby.

‘No, it's fine, carry on,' Hess said.

‘Thanks.' The woman fumbled in a daypack and produced a packet of cigarettes. To the barman, she said, ‘Do you sell matches?'

‘No, sorry, madam, we have run out,' the barman said as he reached for two glasses.

Hess noted the woman's obvious annoyance. ‘Please, allow me,' he said, and pulled a gold lighter from his shirt pocket and struck the flint. The woman leaned close enough for him to smell cheap perfume.

‘Ta,' she said, exhaling smoke. ‘You really are quite the gentleman, a change from the company we've been keeping lately!'

She smiled, and Hess had the distinct and vaguely discomforting feeling that she was looking him over as she waited for the barman to finish pouring their drinks. The younger of the two women peered around the older and stole a look at Hess as well.

‘My pleasure,' he said, pocketing the lighter. ‘You haven't had an enjoyable experience in Africa?'

‘Hardly,' said the older woman with disgust.

The younger of the pair leaned around again and said to Hess, ‘We were shot at last night!'

‘You don't say. Where was that?' Hess asked, raising his eyebrows in genuine surprise.

‘Zim-bloody-babwe on Lake bloody Kariba somewhere,' said the older woman.

‘Amazing. Who would shoot at a couple of pretty ladies like you two?'

Hess noted that the older woman smiled at the compliment. ‘A couple of hunters – one of them a mafia boss, no less! It's a long story,' she said.

‘I've got a couple of hours until my plane leaves,' Hess said. He thought quickly. He could not introduce the women to Orlov, whose Russian accent was too thick to mask. He ordered a beer for himself and invited the women to join him.

‘Yeah, why not,' the mature woman said. ‘Grab us a table, Julie.'

As they seated themselves around the small table, Hess caught Orlov's look of confused indignation from across the room. He dismissed his employer with a curt shake of his head. Hess reopened the conversation. ‘So, who was shooting at you?'