Tom Cain - Dictator

Tonight he had been roaring his displeasure and frustration as he paced the bush, looking for something, anything, to eat but finding not a scrap. Now he was tired and hungrier than ever. So he lay down, as cats of all sizes will do, exactly where he pleased. And, like any other cat, once he had found his spot, he had absolutely no intention of moving from it.

For fifteen minutes the Land Rover made steady progress over relatively flat, open terrain. From time to time they came across game: a giraffe, some warthogs, even a female rhino and her calf. All made way for the car, disappearing into the bush at the sound of its engine and the smell of its exhaust. Carver was driving without lights so as not to give away his position, a skill he’d first been taught in the SBS. But for all his training, even the most docile bush country was still littered with hazards: potholes, boulders, tree-roots and thickets of tangled, thorn-bearing undergrowth. It was far better to temper his impatience, keep his speed down and stay out of trouble than risk going too fast and suffer an accident. Yet he knew it was just a matter of time before some kind of pursuit came after them and it took every ounce of self-control he possessed to resist the temptation to press the pedal to the floor.

Three miles from the border, the land began to rise towards a low range of hills. Now the going became rougher. The soil was thinner with many more boulders to be avoided. The Land Rover’s four-wheel-drive and low gearbox ratio came into their own as Carver let it roll down the precipitous bank of a dried-up river-bed and then up the other side. His pace slowed still further as the car made its way through tight gullies, the tyres fighting for purchase on narrow trails that fell away into ditches and ravines. What had been a straight line across country became a twisting course around blind corners and over humps in the landscape that gave no clue as to what lay on the other side.

Justus did his best to recall what lay in store for them, as did Zalika. But a long time had gone by since either of them had lived or worked on the Stratten Reserve, and their task was made no easier by the night, even if a three-quarter moon shone from the cloudless sky and the stars burned in the heavens as bright pinpricks of billion-year-old light.

From time to time, Carver stopped the car and they listened for any sound of pursuit. Then, clutching his own rifle for security, Justus got out and tentatively walked on ahead, scouting out the way before returning to report his findings to Carver. As he stood outside the Land Rover, talking in a low, barely audible voice to Carver in the driver’s seat, his reports were always calm and measured, expert assessments of the challenges they faced.

They were so close to the border now, just another few minutes’ drive. The tension was still acute, the fear of capture ever-present. Now, though, for the first time, there was real hope, too. Carver had let himself imagine the beer that Parkes had waiting for him. Justus could almost feel the joy that would come when he held his children in his arms again.

But then, on his fifth sortie, when they were traversing a hillside along a narrow ledge, a rockface rising to the left of them, the slope falling steeply away to the right, Justus returned at a sprint, looking behind him as he ran. In his haste, he did not see the small hole in the trail ahead of him. His foot turned on the side of the hole, twisting his ankle and sending Justus crashing to the ground. In an instant he was up again, grimacing as he got to his feet and hobbling the last few steps to the car. He pulled open the passenger door, leapt up into his seat, the effort making him cry out in pain, and slammed it shut again before gasping a single, breathless word: ‘Lion!’

‘Where?’ Carver asked.

‘Just around the corner, in the middle of the path. He is asleep. I don’t think I woke him.’

‘Then we’d better do it.’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Don’t be daft. He’ll soon wake up and get the hell out of there when he sees a bloody great lump of metal lumbering towards him.’

‘I wouldn’t be so sure,’ said Zalika. ‘Lions aren’t like other animals. They don’t move just because they see us coming.’

‘We’ll just have to make him move, then, won’t we?’

The mutters of protest from the other two were drowned out as Carver started up the engine and moved the Land Rover forward. Its tyres crunched over dust and pebbles as it slowly drove round the corner. And there, exactly as Justus had promised, lay a very large, very sleepy lion.

Lobengula had encountered his first truck when he was still a cub. Over the years he had become accustomed to these loud, smelly objects and had learned that they offered neither a threat to him nor a meal. He was, therefore, entirely indifferent to their presence. So now, when the noise of the Land Rover’s engine woke him, he reluctantly opened his eyes, glowered at the vehicle approaching him, then rested his head back down on his huge paws.

The metal machine came closer to him, so close that he could almost reach out his claws and strike it. This time when he raised his head, Lobengula’s stare was a lot angrier and he gave a low, grumbling growl of disapproval. Then, determined not to budge, he lowered his head again.

‘Why don’t you give it a blast of the horn?’ asked Zalika.

Carver almost thought he could hear a teasing tone in her voice, a return to her old, combative spirit. But then he recalled all the times during the drive when she had turned in her seat, looking anxiously out of the rear window to see if anyone was on her trail. Whatever front she might put on, Zalika was all too aware of the danger they were still in.

‘Can’t risk it,’ he said. ‘If there’s anyone out there, they’d hear it. Maybe we could shoot it.’

‘You should only shoot a lion if you can kill it there and then,’ said Justus. ‘And if you kill this lion right here, you will then have to move its body.’

‘That means getting a chain round it, using the winch – we haven’t got time for all that,’ Carver said. ‘The hell with this.’

He revved the engine then slowly inched the car forward. Surely the lion would move once it felt the press of steel on its body.

Lobengula moved. He scrabbled backwards, got to his feet, gave an irritable shake of his mane and then, standing four square in the Land Rover’s path, he growled again, a shorter, more clipped sound, almost a bark. It was his equivalent of a warning shot across the bows. The next time he’d really roar. And if that didn’t remove this nuisance from his life, he’d have to start fighting.

Carver rolled his eyes and looked up at the roof of the car. ‘Jesus wept.’

‘There was another path, a couple of hundred metres back, pointing down the hill. Maybe we could try that,’ Zalika suggested.

‘Anything’s better than pissing about here,’ said Carver, pulling at his seat-belt. ‘Strap in tight.’

The lion wasn’t the only male losing his temper. The tension and impatience Carver had suppressed so efficiently for the past forty minutes burst through his tightly stretched composure. He wrenched the gear-stick into reverse, turned in his seat to look through the rear window and kicked the accelerator hard.

The Land Rover shot backwards. Carver turned the steering wheel hard to get back round the corner. Too hard: the rear corner of the car collided with the sheer rock on the upward side of the hill. Carver overcompensated as he pulled the wheel the other way.

‘Watch out!’ Zalika yelled.

But it was too late. One of the rear tyres had lost its footing on the edge of the road. Carver slammed on the brakes, but the Land Rover was out of control, skidding sideways and backwards over the edge, crashing on to its side and sliding twenty feet down the hill until it collided roof-first with the base of a tree and came to a crashing halt.