sleeping-bap, tucker-box with snacks and a Thermos filled with hot coffee.
Their vigil could last until the dawn, so they were provided with a powerful flashlight that drew power from a twelve-volt car battery; a hand-held two-way radio to communicate with the trackers; and even a china chamberpot with a tasteful floral pattern to allow them to last out the night without discomfort.
When Matatu had set up the furnishing of the hide to his satisfaction, he scrambled down the ladder and he and Shasa had a last brief conference beside the Toyota.
'I think that he will come before dark,' Matatu said in Swahili. 'He is a cheeky devil and he gorges like a pig. I think he will be hungry tonight, and he will not be able to withstand his greed.' 'If he does not come, we will wait through until the dawn. Do not return here until I call for you on the radio. Go in peace now, Matatu.' 'Stay in peace, Bwana. Let us pray that the memsahib kills cleanly. I do not want this spotted devil to feast on my liver.'
3'
The trackers waited until the hunters had climbed into the hide and settled down, before they drove the Toyota away. They would park on the crest of the valley two miles distant, and wait for the sound of gunfire or the call on the two-way radio.
Shasa and Elsa sat side-by-side in the two camp-chairs. Their elbows were almost, but not quite touching. The sleeping-bags were spread over the chair-backs, ready to draw over their shoulders when the temperature began to drop. There were rugs over their laps. Both of them wore leather jackets, some protection not only against the cold, but also against sharp curling claws in an emergency.
Elsa had her long rifle-barrel thrust through the firingaperture, ready to raise the butt to her shoulder with the minimum of movement. It was a 7-millimetre Remington magnum loaded with a 175-grain Nosler bullet that would cover the sixty-five yards to the bait-tree at three thousand feet per second. Shasa had the big eight-bore shotgun as a back-up weapon.
Designed for shooting wild geese at long range, it was a devastating weapon for close work.
As the beat of the Toyota engine faded, the silence of the bushveld descended on the river valley. It was a silence that whispered with tiny intimate sounds: the gentle sigh of the breeze in the leaves above their heads, the stir of a bird in the undergrowth along the river, the far-off booming shout of a bull baboon that echoed faintly along the rocky cliffs at the head of the valley and the tiny ticking sounds of the termite legions gnawing away at the dry mopane poles on which they sat.
Both of them had brought books to while away the hours until dusk, but neither of them opened them. They sat very close to each other, and they were vitally aware of each other's proximity. Shasa felt as comfortable and companionable in her presence as though they were old and trusted friends.
He smiled at the fancy. He turned his head surreptitiously to glance at Elsa, and she had anticipated and was smiling at him already.
She turned the hand that lay on the arm of the chair between them palm uppermost. He took the hand in his own, and was surprised by the smooth warm feel of her skin and by the sharp emotion her touch evoked. He hadn't felt like that for many a long year. They sat side by side holding hands like a pair of teenagers on their first date, and waited for the leopard to come.
Although all his senses were tuned to the subtle sounds and signs of the wilderness, Shasa's mind was free to wander through the junk-room of memory. He thought about many things in those quiet hours as the sun turned across the blue dome of sky and sank towards the jagged line of hills. He thought about the other women he had known. There had been many of those.
He had no way of knowing how many, the passage of time had rendered most of them faceless and nameless. just a very few would remain with him for ever.
The first had been a sly-faced little harlot. When Centaine had caught them at it, she had scrubbed him in a scalding tub of Lysol and carbolic soap that had taken the skin off his most tender parts. He smiled at that far-off memory.
The other that stood out in his memory was Tara, mother of all his children. They had been antagonists from the very beginning. He had always thought of her as the beloved enemy. Then love had wrested the upper hand, and for a time they had been happy together. Finally they had become enemies again, true enemies. Their enmity had been inflamed rather than mitigated by that brief illusory period of happiness.
After Tara there had been fifty or a hundred others - it did not really matter how many. Not one of them had been able to give him what he sought, nor had they been able to alleviate the loneliness.
Recently, in middle age, he had even fallen into the age-old trap of seeking immortality in those young feminine bodies that were themselves in the flower of their youth. Though the flesh was sweet and firm, he had found no contact of the mind, and could no longer match their energy. Sadly he had left them to their booming mindless music and their frenetic search for they knew not what. He had walked on alone.
He thought of loneliness then, as he did so often these days. Over the years, he had learnt that it was the most corrosive and destructive of all man's ills. Most of his life he had been alone. Although there had been a half-brother, he had never known him as a sibling and Centaine had raised Shasa as an only child.
In all the multitude of humankind that had filled his life, the servants and business associates, the acquaintances and sycophants, even his own children, there had been only one person with whom he had been able to share all the triumphs and disasters of his life, one who had been constant in her encouragement and understanding and love.
However, Centaine was seventy-six years old and ageing fast. He was sick to his soul of the loneliness and afraid of the greater loneliness which he knew lay ahead.
At that moment, the woman who sat beside him tightened her grip on his hand as though she empathized' with his despair. When he turned his head and looked into her honey-golden eyes, she was no longer smiling. Her expression was serious, and she held his gaze without shift or embarrassment. The sense of aloneness faded, and he felt calm and at peace as he seldom had in all his fifty-odd years.
Outside their little tree-house, the light mellowed and flared into the soft glow of the African twilight. It was a time of magical stillness, in which the world held its breath and all the forest colours were richer and deeper. The sun sagged like a dying gladiator, and bowed its bloody head below the forest-top. The light went with it, the outlines of the forest trunks and branches faded and softened and receded.
A francolin called in the gloom. Shasa leant forward in his seat and looked through the firing-aperture in the thatch wall. He saw the dark partridge-like bird perched on a dead branch on the far side of the river.
Its bare cheeks were bright scarlet, and it cocked its head and looked down from its perch and made that creaking sound like a rusty hinge which was the special warning: 'Beware! I see a killer cat.' Elsa heard the call and, because she also knew the African wild and understood the meaning of it, she squeezed Shasa's hand briefly and then released it. Slowly she reached forward for the pistol grip of the rifle, and achingly slowly lifted the rifle to her shoulder. The tension in the hide was a palpable charge that held them both in its thrall. The leopard was out there, silent and secretive as a dappled golden shadow.
They were both adepts in the art of the hunter, and neither of them moved except to blink their eyelids and keep their vision clear in the failing light. They drew and released each breath with infinite care, and heard the pulse of their racing hearts beat in their eardrums.
The light was going faster, while the unseen leopard circled the bait-tree.
Shasa could imagine him in his mind's eye, each deliberate stealthy pace, the paw raised and held aloft and then laid down again softly, the yellow eyes endlessly turning and darting, the round black-tipped ears flicking to catch the faintest sound of danger.
The outline of the bait-tree receded, the carcass of the impala hanging on its chain was a dark amorphous blob. The open window of sky above the bare branch dulled and bruised to the shade of tarnished lead, and still the leopard prowled and circled in the dark thicket.
Shooting light was almost gone, night came on apace, and then suddenly the leopard was in the tree. There was no sound or warning. The abruptness of it was a little miracle that stopped both their hearts and then sent them racing away at a mad pace.
The leopard stood on the branch. However, he was only a darker shape in the darkness, and even as Elsa laid her cheek to the polished walnut wood of the butt-stock the darkness was complete and the shape of the leopard was swallowed up by the night.
Shasa felt rather than saw Elsa lower the rifle. He stared through the aperture, but there was nothing to see, and he turned his head and laid his lips against Elsa's ear.
'We must wait until morning,' he breathed, and she touched his cheek in agreement.
Out in the darkness they heard the clink of the chain links. Shasa imagined the leopard lying belly down on the branch, reaching down with one front paw to hook the carcass and draw it up, holding it with both front feet, sniffing the putrefying flesh hungrily, thrusting its head into the belly cavity to reach the lungs and liver and heart.
In the silence they heard the tearing sound of fangs in flesh, the grating and splintering of rib bone, the ripping of wet hide, as the leopard began to feed.
The night
