Salticidae (21 page)

The look in Derek’s eyes was bordering on hysteria, and Jack understood why, having been in the clutches of one of the spiders just moments earlier. “
First I want to find the leg.”

“What? Why!”

“We can use it for proof. We lost the camera and the backpack with the web, so we need something. It’s right around here. Hurry! Help me look!”  Jack scanned the foliage for the severed appendage. So much green, he thought, it’s almost impossible to see anything. But it has to be here somewhere. I saw it flying this way.

“Sirs?” Banga was wiping yellow spider blood o
ff his arms.

“Hang on. Help me find the leg.”

“Sirs?”

“Jack, let’s
get the fuck outta here. I can barely stand. My legs are still shaking.”

“Sirs?”

“The leg went over here. Help me find it.”

“Sirs!”

Jack finally turned toward Banga, who was looking back up the hill toward the cave mouth. “What?”

“They are coming. We made too much noise and they are coming.”

At the top of the slope, Jack could see at least a dozen black, hairy legs hanging over the edge, twitching.

Derek stepped in front of Jack and spoke as calmly as his shaking body could muster. “I think they’re done with the orgy. It’s time to fucking go.”

***

“I can hear water gushing.” Janet eased by a low overhang and crawled into a sunlit area inside the cave. A second, tighter tunnel met theirs and continued on toward a blazing opening of blue light that was so intense it forced her to turn away for a second.

Gellis emerged behind her, pushed past and held his backpack above his head to keep it dry from the running water around their hands and knees. “It’s the mountain’s inner river. Look, that is the falls.”

Janet turned back and realized he was right. But how could that be? They
’d traveled so far down they should be near the jungle floor. Had they not descended as far as they’d thought? It didn’t matter; the sight of sunlight made her want to cry. She moved like a crawling baby toward the opening, the water rushing up to her elbows. It was cold and fresh and she now realized how thirsty she was but she was too preoccupied with getting to the opening to think about gulping it down. She grabbed onto the jagged walls as she went to keep the water from sweeping her away and pitching her over the falls.

“Antoine! Look! I see treetops.”

Gellis was beside her now, backpack held aloft with one hand as he gazed out over the falls as well. Below them flowed a river of brown mud, and beyond it the mighty jungle of the Congo. The mist from the crashing water rose up into tiny spectrums of light before his eyes.

Janet grabbed his shoulder. Another time he would have noted
this sudden tendency to touch him, but he wasn’t sure if she was just excited to see the outdoors or not. “Look, we’re not at the top of the falls,” she said. “I’m so confused.”

They
were perhaps three stories high above the river, not the staggering height of the water that ran from the top of this mountain. It was a secondary set of falls, he realized, just to the side of the larger one. It must get masked from down below by all the mist and spray coming from above, he thought. “I think it is still too high to jump,” he said.  “I do not know how deep the water is below but if we jump and it is shallow it will break our bones.”

“We need rope. There’s none left in the bag?”

“Only sticks of dynamite. Nothing else.”

“Lot of good that does us. Why are you bothering to keep it dry then?”

“There is no use ruining it. It is expensive, yes?”

“Hardly. My father’s company makes it. I can get it by the truck load if I need it. Besides…” She grabbed the bag and dug around inside, brought out two sticks of dynamite labeled Beaudette Mining on the side. “There are no blasting caps in the bag so these are worthless.
”

Gellis
took something from the back pocket of his pants. When Janet saw what they were her eyes nearly jumped out of her head.

Caps.

“Where did you get those!”

“At the camp. Two of the men
had stolen them from the crates when your gunmen were not looking. I took them back.”

“What! They stole them? What the fuck! This is exactly the kind of shit my father talks about. Why the hell are people stealing this shit from me? Those fucking mor
ons could have blown up the whole camp!”

“They steal them to sell them in the villages
and to the militias. Any weapon is worth money here in Africa. Sometimes having something to offer will save your life.”

She was beside herself with anger and wanted to scream at Gellis. This was why she
hated working with the local tribes. They stole and they lied and they would cut your head off if you weren’t looking. Low life pieces of scum they were.

No
, just stop
. She cut the rest of her thoughts off, seeing that look of disappointment in Gellis’ eyes. It’s not all of them, she realized, just a couple idiots who tried to make an extra buck. Would she or any of the others have ever noticed that the caps were even gone? Probably not.

Sometimes having something to offer will save your life.

“Why did you take them back?” She asked.

“Because they would
eventually cause someone harm. Someone would die from these.”

“Did you plan to give them back to me? Did you care they belonged to my father’s company?”

“Honestly…no. I was going to slip them back when I had a chance to do so unseen. That is all. But then we blew the mountain and the spiders came.”

It’s a world I don’t understand, she realized. These people are left to fend for their lives and their families against unyielding civil war and to do so they must steal and lie to…to what? She saw the truth in Gellis’ eyes, the history of his own life in these shantytowns. She saw the history of his family and what he was doing now to try and put food on the table for his wife. And yes, then it fell into place, that last thought.

To keep their loved ones from getting raped and maimed and kidnapped and murdered.

The water flowed under her, r
an out of the small opening, diving down to freedom. She wanted nothing more to do right now than follow it, not argue about company theft. “You do realize how dangerous it is to keep caps on you when you’re carrying dynamite.”

“I am not a demolition expert, but I understand their danger.”

“You’re lucky those are fuse caps. We have electric caps too. In fact, these fuses here are backups just in case something goes wrong with the electric ones. If those idiots had stolen the electric ones, and they were in your pocket, we’d be pasted all over the insides of this God forsaken mountain.”

“I am sorry.”

“Hey, don’t be sorry. Be thankful. We’ve got dry dynamite and fuses. If we have to blow our way out of the mountain, at least now we’ve got the means.”

“Let us pray it does not come to that.”

The interior of the cave was damp, the water cold, and Janet was starting to shiver now. “Well, how else do we get down? I want out of this place
now
. I really don’t see any other way out but to jump.”

“We can try to climb down the outside.”

“Ever try to climb on wet rock? It doesn’t work. It’s like trying to grip oil. Slippery as all bloody hell. If we don’t jump we’ll have to find another way down through these caves.”

“
But if we jump and the water is shallow…If we hurt ourselves we won’t be able to run. Those spiders are still out there.”

“
They’re in here too. Remember?”

Gellis nodded. “It is hard to forget.
I am thinking you are right, jumping is worth the risk. Perhaps I will go first. If I am injured, you will be aware of the danger.”

“Not on your life. If you’re injured I can’t carry you. If I’m injured, well, you can give me a piggyback or something.
I’m much lighter than you are.”

“Are you sure?”

“Antoine, I’m still your boss and I’m not asking you. I’m jumping first. Just make sure that if I do get hurt you fish my body out of the water at some point.”

S
he turned to gauge the jump. Gellis grabbed her shoulder. “Madam, I do not feel right letting you do this.”

“Antoine…I’m sorry for some of the things I’ve said. But if you don’t let me go, I will fire you.” She smiled.
It felt good.

Gellis smiled back.

She moved close to the edge, holding on to cracks in the rock wall, sat down and swung her legs out. The water rushed by so fast now it threatened to tear her shoes off. “Here goes nothing.”

With a gentle push, she let the falls carry her out.
She could feel herself falling but she could not see anything around her but white water. Her body was now soaked in cold, fresh mountain falls, her breathing cut off as liquid rushed into her mouth and nose.

Whe
n am I going to hit the river, she wondered.

And then she did, and her back screamed in pain.

***

Gellis inched
as close to the edge as he could without letting the current overtake him. He saw Janet’s body disappear into the sheets of water, joined from the larger falls above, and then she was gone.  Seconds passed and he waited for a sign of her, but he could not find her anywhere down below. Where the water crashed into the river there was nothing but thick white foam throwing mist two stories into the air. Even if the water was deep enough the force of the falls could very well break her in two.

“Please be okay,” he whispered. “Show yourself.”

More seconds passed without sign of his employer. He knew this was a stupid idea, but he had conceded she was right. What other choice did they have? Staying inside the mountain was too dangerous. At least outside they had a chance.

He cau
ght sight of something below, far to his left, out near the bank of the river. Something crawling out of the water. The mist played tricks with his eyes and he thought he saw two long black legs rise from the rippling currents. Dear God, he thought, not another spider. If it found Janet she was a goner.

The two legs pulled a bulbous abdomen after it,
crawled up onto dry land and rolled itself over onto its back.

It
wasn’t a spider. It was Janet! She was soaked, her hair plastered to her face, her clothing torn from the force of the crashing water.

He yelled to her. “Madam! Madam can
you hear me! Are you all right!”

On the river
bank Janet sat up, rubbed her back continuously and looked up at him. She looked like she was in pain but she brushed her wet hair out of her eyes and waved at him.

“It’s deep enough,” she yelled, her voice almost lost behind the sound of the falls. “
But I threw my back out. When you jump stay straight.” With that she lay back down and continued to rub her back.

Well, at least she’s not broken, he thought.
Time for me to get out of here as well. He stuffed the wet fuse caps in the backpack now and leaned out over the edge of the opening. “Madam, I am throwing you the dynamite. Please look out.”

He aimed for the bushes a good distance to her right and hurled the backpack out over the water. It tumbled through the air and hit its mark
, the bushes cushioning the bag’s impact.

Leaning
out over the falls, he tried to gauge the timing before he’d hit the water, so he wouldn’t be caught off guard. There was a new sound behind him. Turning back, he saw a collection of hairy legs emerging from the darkness of the caves. A bulbous spider jutted out into the light, half submerged in the water. Droplets from the falls collected on its black eyes like sugar crystals.

It raced forward.

Gellis stepped off the edge and went rigid. He looked up, and the last thing he saw as the falls took away all visibility, was the spider running out and giving chase, tumbling down in the water right above him.

***

This is a shit job, thought Atamato, as he exited his Jeep, shouldered his rifle and grabbed his camera from the passenger seat. It was a brand new digital Nikon, bought from money through sponsorships offered by elementary school children in London. Atamato had never been to London and probably never would. His world was here in the Congo, trying in vain to protect the wildlife from poachers and the tribes from rebels.

He was a muscular man, standing six feet four, with a bald head and fearsome brown eyes. Like many native Congolese, he cherished and respected the wildlife in these jungles, saw its usefulness for society and understood its impact on nature. When he’d taken the job as a DRC ranger he’d known it was dangerous, but he’d
thought he’d have more support. Guns and cameras were well and good, and his training kept him safe from most wildlife, but the rebel bands had been forming faster these days than most could count. Just last week his colleague Deo was captured and killed by a new offshoot of the Mari Mari, a deadly band of warlords who’d long since taken over the outskirts of Virunga. The rebels had been tracking mountain gorillas to kill and sell on the black market, and Deo had been stupid enough to try and talk them out of their activities. It was his job, but even Atamato knew you called for backup and waited. And if you were outnumbered, then you left the gorillas to fend for themselves. Like Atamato, Deo had a wife and children.