Wilbur Smith - Assegai

‘I want our partnership contract backdated to the first day of the Roosevelt safari.’

‘Ouch, and shiver my timbers! You really are rubbing my nose in it! You want me to pay you full commission for your hunt with Kermit Roosevelt!’ Percy pantomimed disbelief and deep distress.

‘Stop it, Percy, you’re breaking my heart.’ Leon smiled.

‘Be reasonable, Leon. That’ll amount to almost two hundred pounds!’

‘Two hundred and fifteen, to be precise.’

‘You’re taking advantage of a sick old man.’

‘You look hale and hearty to me. Are we in agreement?’

‘I suppose I have no other option, you heartless boy.’

‘May I take that as yes?’

Percy nodded reluctantly, then smiled and held out his hand. They shook and Percy grinned triumphantly. ‘I would have gone up to thirty per cent on your commission if you’d pressed me, rather than the piddling twenty-five you settled on.’

‘And I would have agreed to twenty if you’d held out a little longer.’ Leon’s smile was equally smug.

‘Welcome aboard, partner. I think we’re going to get along together rather well. I suppose you want your two hundred and fifteen pounds right this minute? You don’t want to wait until the end of the month, by any chance, do you?’

‘You suppose right. I want it now and would rather not wait till the end of the month. One other thing. It’s almost a year since I had a moment to myself. I’m taking some time off, and I’ll be needing a motor. I have business to attend to in Nairobi, and possibly even further afield.’

‘Give the lady, whoever she may be, my fond greetings.’

‘Percy, I should warn you that your fly buttons are undone and your mind is hanging out.’

Leon’s first stop in Nairobi was at the headquarters of the Greater Lake Victoria Trading Company in the main street. The Vauxhall’s engine was still stuttering and backfiring in preparation for final shutdown when Mr Goolam Vilabjhi Esquire rushed out of his emporium to greet him. He was followed closely by Mrs Vilabjhi and a horde of small caramel-hued cherubs with raven hair and enormous liquid dark eyes, all clad in brilliant saris and chittering like starlings.

Mr Vilabjhi seized Leon’s hand before he had alighted from the truck and shook it vigorously. ‘You are a thousand and one times welcome, honoured Sahib. Since your last visit to us, my eyes have alighted on no finer vista than that afforded by your pleasing visage.’ He led Leon into the store without releasing his grip on his right hand. With the other he swatted at the circling swarm of children. ‘Away with you! Be gone! Bad children. Wicked and uncivilized female personages!’ he cried, and they took not the least notice, except to keep just out of range. ‘Please forgive and forget them, Sahib. Alas and alack! Mrs Vilabjhi produces only female personages despite my most dedicated endeavours to the contrary.’

‘They are all extremely pretty,’ said Leon gallantly. This encouraged the smallest cherub to sidle in under her father’s ineffectually swinging hand and reach up on tiptoe to take Leon’s. She helped her father to lead him into the building.

‘Enter! Enter! I beg of you, Sahib. You are ten thousand times welcome.’ Mr Vilabjhi and the cherub led him to the back wall of the store. The colourful religious icons of the green-faced, multiarmed goddess Kali and the elephant-headed god Ganesh had been moved to the far ends of the wall to make way for the most recent addition to the gallery. This was a large gold picture frame with a wooden plaque, ornately carved and painted with gold leaf. It bore the legend,

Respectfully dedicated to Sahib Leon Courtney Esquire.

World-renowned polo player and shikari.

Esteemed and deeply beloved friend and boon companion of

Colonel Theodore Roosevelt, President of the United States of America

and of

Mr Goolam Vilabjhi Esquire.

Behind the glass of the frame were pasted a number of the Englishlanguage newspaper clippings originating from American Associated Press.

‘My family and I are very much hoping and praying that you will sign one of these splendid publications to be the jewel in the crown of my collection of cherished memorabilia of our friendship.’

‘Nothing would give me greater pleasure, Mr Vilabjhi.’ Despite himself Leon was deeply touched. The Vilabjhi girls crowded around him as he signed a photograph of himself: ‘ To my good friend and benefactor, Mr Goolam Vilabjhi Esq. Sincerely, Leon Courtney. ’

Blowing on the damp ink, Mr Vilabjhi assured him, ‘I will treasure this personally handwritten autograph for the rest of my days and as long as I shall live.’ Then he sighed. ‘I suppose that now you wish to speak about redeeming your genuine elephant ivory tusk, which I still have in my possession.’

When Manyoro and Loikot carried the tusk out to the truck Leon followed them with small girls hanging from both his hands and others firmly clutching the legs of his khaki trousers. Only with difficulty was he able to dislodge them and climb into the driver’s seat. He drove on to the new Muthaiga Country Club, whose pinkpainted brick and plaster walls had replaced the old Settlers’ Club’s whitewashed mud-daub on a site far beyond the teeming bustle of Main Street.

His uncle Penrod was waiting for him in the members’ bar. The first thing Leon noticed as the colonel rose to greet him was that he had put on a bit more flesh, especially around the belt. Since their last meeting more than a year ago Penrod had moved up from the category of well covered to distinctly portly. There was also a little more grey in his moustache. As soon as they had shaken hands Penrod suggested, ‘Shall we go to lunch? Today Chefie’s serving steak and kidney pie. It’s one of my favourites. I don’t want the riffraff to get at it ahead of me. We can talk as we eat.’ He led Leon to a table on the terrace under the pergola of purple bougainvillaea, set discreetly out of earshot of other diners. As he tucked the white napkin into the front of his collar Penrod asked, ‘I suppose Percy’s shown you the articles written by that Yankee Andrew Fagan, and the letters from prominent people that they have evoked?’

‘Yes, I have them, sir,’ Leon replied. ‘As a matter of fact, I found them rather embarrassing. People seem to be making such an awful fuss. I’m certainly not the greatest hunter in Africa. That was Kermit Roosevelt’s idea of a joke, which Fagan took seriously. Actually I’m still a greenhorn.’

‘Never admit it, Leon. Let them think what they want to. Anyway, from what I hear, you’re learning fast.’ Penrod smiled comfortably. ‘As a matter of fact, I had a small hand in the whole subterfuge. Rather neat, I thought, little stroke of genius.’

‘How are you involved, Uncle?’ Leon was startled.

‘I was in London when the first articles appeared. They gave me a bit of a brainwave. I cabled the military attaché at our embassy in Berlin and asked him to tout the articles to the German press, especially the sporting and hunting publications that are read by the upper crust. It’s a stereotype that most of that type of German, like their English counterparts, are enthusiastic sportsmen and have their own hunting estates. My plan was to lure the notables among them here to go on safari with you. This will give you the opportunity to gather all kinds of intelligence, which will certainly prove invaluable when the time comes that we have to fight them.’

‘Why would they want to confide in me, Uncle?’

‘Leon, my lad, I cannot believe you’re completely unaware of your winning ways. People seem to like you, especially the Fräuleins and the mademoiselles. Safari life, being close to Mother Nature and her creatures, has a way of inducing even the most reticent to relax, lower their guard and speak more freely. Not to mention the way it also loosens the strings of female corsets and drawers. And why would a senior figure in the Kaiser’s Germany, a major arms manufacturer or one of their consorts, suspect a fresh-faced innocent like you of being a nefarious secret agent?’ Penrod lifted a finger in the direction of the head waiter, who hovered nearby in his flowing white ankle-length kanza , scarlet sash and tasselled fez. ‘Malonzi! Please bring us a bottle of the 1879 Château Margaux from my private bin.’