Deon Meyer - Blood Safari

Her reaction was not the one I expected.

‘Why is it that you can talk now, Lemmer?’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘For two days you pretend to be this silent, stupid type with nothing to say and no conversation, and now it comes pouring out of you.’

Silent and stupid. I’ll have to suck it up.

‘There I was, crying in front of you last night, and you sat there like a brick wall.’

‘Maybe this isn’t the best time …’

‘A builder? You can tell Wolhuter, but not me?’ Bitterly.

‘Can we talk about this later?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘Thank you.’

She did not react, just stared at the road.

‘There’s a filling station up ahead. We passed it this morning. If I remember correctly, there’s a café too. I’m going to stop at the petrol pumps and we’re going to get out and walk straight into the café. Not too fast, not too slow. Briskly, like people in a bit of a hurry. Right?’

‘OK.’

‘The important thing is that we must not look at the Astra. Not even glance.’

She didn’t respond.

‘Emma?’

‘I won’t look.’

‘You must wait for me in the café. Stay there until I get back. That’s very important.’

‘Why in there?’

‘Because it’s a brick building that will shield you from a bullet. It’s public. There’ll be other people around.’

She nodded. She was tense.

I took my cell phone out of my pocket. ‘Type in your number. Call your phone.’

She took it and typed the number.

‘Press “call”.’

It took a while before her phone rang.

‘You can hang up now.’

I took my phone back and put it in my pocket.

‘I didn’t have your number.’

‘Oh.’

‘Remember the breathing. Remember the cucumber,’ I said. Then I spotted the petrol station and put on the flicker.

She didn’t look for the Astra, despite what I’m certain was a strong temptation to do so. Together, we walked up the stairs to the café and went inside. There were three customers and a short fat woman behind the counter. The place smelled like salt and vinegar.

‘Stay near the back.’ I pointed at the corner where the drink fridges stood. A stopwatch was ticking in my head.

Thirty seconds.

I looked for the back door. A white wood partition allowed access to a small kitchen where a black woman was slicing tomatoes. She looked up in surprise. I put a finger to my lips and walked past her to the wooden door that I hoped led outside. I turned the knob and it swung open.

Outside, there were four or five cars in various stages of decay or repair. Two men stood at the open bonnet of one. They heard my footsteps as I passed them on the way to the edge of the mopane forest beyond.

‘The toilet is that way,’ one of them called.

I stuck a thumb in the air, but kept on without looking back, not rushing but focused. It was oppressively hot in the bright sun.

One minute.

They must not see me from the Astra, which was all that mattered. The garage and café buildings were between us.

I reached the treeline, walked another twenty metres straight on and then looked around for the first time. The bush was dense; I was invisible. I turned ninety degrees to the right and began to run. My foot burned where the glass shard had sliced it the previous night. There wasn’t much time. Hopefully, R4 and his mate had stopped. They would consider the situation and make a decision. The logical one would be to wait a while. Four, five, six minutes, to see whether we came out. That was all the time I had.

I ran far enough that the building would no longer hide the Astra. I turned right again, towards the road. Jogged now, back to the edge of the bush. Had to check where they were.

The Opel was visible through the long grass and trees. It was parked across the road, a hundred and twenty metres from the petrol station. The doors were still shut, but vapour trailed from the exhaust pipe.

Two minutes.

I would have to cross the road behind them. I jogged back deeper into the trees, turned parallel to the road, zigzagging between tree trunks in the dense growth. I counted steps in time with the seconds. Anthills, thick grass, trees.

Do you remember that one we found in the anthill last month? That was Dick this morning, talking about the black mamba. It put a spring in my strides.

Three minutes, seventy metres.

I found a footpath. Cattle spoor. I accelerated. Ninety metres, a hundred, a hundred and ten, hundred and twenty. Heat and damp in my shoe. The cut was bleeding again. I swerved towards the road. Dropped back to a jog, then to a walk. Sweat ran down my face, down my chest, and my back.

The bush opened up suddenly. I stopped. The Astra was thirty metres to the right, its rear facing me. The engine idled. They were watching the filling station.

Momentarily, I hesitated, breathing as deliberately and slowly as possible.

Four minutes. They’d be getting restless.

The sound of a car approached from the left. I could use that. I waited for it and when it was directly in front of me, I bent over and ran across the road behind the vehicle. It was a pick-up with railings and a bored-looking brown cow on the back.

I turned right towards the Astra and ran alongside a fence, hopefully in the occupants’ blind spot. I wiped sweat from my eyes. Twenty metres, ten, five, and then the driver turned his head, a black man, he looked into my eyes, his mouth made an ‘O’, and he said something. The passenger door opened and then I was there and opened it wider. The R4 was swinging around, I grabbed the barrel with my left hand, the sight scraped deep into my palm, blood and sweat made it slippery, I got a grip and jerked violently up and away. I hit the white man on the nose with my right hand as hard as I could. It was a forceful blow, pain shot up my arm and I felt his cartilage break. His grip on the rifle slackened.

It was an R5, the shorter version of the R4.1 got both hands on it and jerked it from his grasp. He made a noise as I hit him above the ear with the folding butt.

I spun the weapon around, cocked it and pressed my thumb against the safety catch. It was on. I clicked it off and pointed the rifle at the driver.

‘Afternoon, kêrels,’ I said.

The white man brought his hand unsteadily up to his bloodied nose, now bent against his left cheek.

14

I called Emma. She answered in an anxious voice. ‘Lemmer?’

‘You can come now. I’m standing at the Astra, about a hundred metres left of the garage,’ I said, and then put the cell back in my pocket.

I saw her leave the café and jog in my direction. The men lay in the grass in front of me, side by side, face down in the dust, hands behind their backs. I kept the R5 pointed at the black man; the white would give us no trouble.

Emma approached. Her eyes widened as she took in the scene, the bloody crooked nose. I held an ID card out to her, the black sergeant’s. ‘They are policemen,’ I told her. ‘Jack Phatudi’s men.’

‘Police?’ She angrily wiped the sweat from her forehead and took the card.

‘You’re in deep shit,’ the white constable said.

‘Watch the language, buddy. You’re now in the presence of a lady,’ I said, and moved closer to him.

‘Why were you following us?’ asked Emma.

‘To protect you,’ said the black sergeant.

‘From what?’ Emma asked.

I had asked the same question – and received the same silence.

‘Get up,’ I said, and took out the R5’s magazine. They got to their feet, the constable with more difficulty than the sergeant. I turned the rifle around and passed it butt first to Crooked Nose. I put the magazine in my pocket. ‘Your pistols are in the car.’