time. It was probably built into the original construction. That made sense. If this area had been the dungeons and the crazy German aristocrat knew there were crocodiles down here, then having a huge caged floor built into the rocks would serve as a threat to anyone dragged down here. Not that the history of the place mattered now, as Max hooked an arm through the grid and pulled himself up.
The area he stood in was quite bare. There was a stainless-steel door to one side, and another in the opposite wall. He could hear the steady hum of machinery, muted by the thick walls, so he guessed that all the fort’s power and utilities were located down here. He had visited a German castle in Bavaria on a school trip and wished he could remember more of the layout. That would have helped him get a clearer picture in his mind of where he was within the fort’s structure. Wherever it was, he was at the bottom, so the only way out was up. But how? Air ducts were fastened to the walls and the roof, more piping, but no way out. What was it he had seen and heard when he whirled through that darkness? Max ran his hands over the door’s dull sheen. Next to it, on a slender column of the same brushed steel, was a square of glass, the outline of a spread hand etched into it. Max hesitated, his hand hovering over the lines. Obviously it was a coded access, a palm-print recognition terminal, but would it set off every alarm bell in the castle if he tried it, or would it simply deny access?
He looked above the door. Between the wall and ceiling was a glass panel, running the whole length of the room. Below it a smallish pipe ran, suspended from sturdy-looking brackets. He could reach that. One good jump and he’d get a grip, then he could see what lay on the other side of the wall. He flexed his knees, feeling the strain on his thigh muscles. Forcing his legs upwards from a squat position, he threw his arms as high as he could. He grasped the pipe, but his hands were sweating and he didn’t have a strong enough purchase-the pipe was just that bit too wide. Focusing all his attention on the strength in his wrists, he curved his hands as tightly as he could. Shaking with effort, he pulled the weight of his body up, feeling his biceps bite, but he was losing his grip.
No sooner had he tried to lift his knees to swing a leg onto the pipe than the door hissed open. “Johnson Mkebe has entered the hydroelectric area,” a woman’s voice murmured gently.
A slightly built African, wearing a baseball cap and blue overalls with MAINTENANCE printed across the back, stepped through the doorway. Three things happened in quick succession: the door closed, Max fell, and Johnson Mkebe was knocked unconscious as Max crunched on top of him. Max rolled free, immediately alert for the sound of running feet. He held his breath, heart thumping, muscles tense. There was nowhere to escape except back into the overspill tank. And that was not an option. He would barge into anyone who came through that door and take his chances with whatever lay on the other side of the wall. But nothing happened. Max waited another few seconds, and still no one came to investigate. Max heaved the man over, unzipped his overalls and yanked them down over his legs, then climbed into the one-piece boiler suit. With a couple of turns on the sleeves and ankles, it fit. Jamming the cap on his head, he turned for the door but realized that there was only one way to get out of the room. Dragging the unconscious man’s dead weight as close to the security palm-reader as he could, he stretched one of his arms out until it rested on the glass plate. “Johnson Mkebe has left the hydroelectric area,” the voice told him.
As the sliding door swished closed behind him, he moved into an area that was as boxed as the room he had just left. An open steel structure rose upwards to the right; it was the lift shaft. Ahead of him was another closed, brushed-steel door. What next? No choice really. Press the button, get into the lift, find a floor where he could hide until he could see the lie of the land and then he would look for …
The door ahead of him slid open. Along the corridor, a man in a wheelchair, his shoulders drooped, his face unshaven, eyes gazing down at the floor, drugged into semi-consciousness.
“Dad!” Max yelled. But Tom Gordon did not even raise his eyes.
At the sound of Max’s voice, a malevolent-looking man in a white coat stepped into the corridor, shock registering on his face at the unexpected intruder. He lunged for the fist-sized red alarm button on the wall. In a second, wailing sirens would bring armed men storming in. Max had to stop him.
But he knew he would never reach him in time.
19
Max’s words stayed like a mantra in!Koga’s head, and he did run. Faster and further than ever before. The sky changed color, the land grew cooler and the animals hunted, but!Koga stopped only to sip water. He ignored the growling challenge of the lions as they feasted on a buck, he scattered the herd of springbok and irritated the elephants who trumpeted his arrival and departure.
Finally, as the sun’s rays brought their nourishing warmth,!Koga stopped. He smelled the woodsmoke before he saw it curling from the police outpost’s chimney. A square, two-room bungalow with a red tin roof and dust- stained walls sat perfectly in the center of the arid area designated as its domain. A chain-link fence boxed it in and a flagpole stood rigidly to attention with a limp Namibian flag hanging like a scarf from its neck.
He waited for an hour, until he saw movement and identified the two policemen as they woke to start their daily routine. A needle of steel pointed to the sky, a radio antenna that would summon help.
He moved cautiously towards the policemen, smelled the coffee being brewed and the meat being cooked. A growl from his stomach reminded him how little he had eaten in these past few days. The police would probably be from the Herero tribe, but he would speak to them in Afrikaans, the common language of the once-oppressed people of Namibia. A cop wearing a vest and boxer shorts was cooking on a gas-bottle stove outside the bungalow and he saw!Koga before he could say anything.!Koga stopped in his tracks. This might be a hostile reception. The authorities weren’t always friendly towards the Bushmen.
Like a man enticing an animal to approach closer, the man gestured with the frying pan.
“You all right, boy?” the shaven man called. Neither of the cops seemed too concerned;!Koga stepped closer. Lifting his wrist, he showed them the watch.
“The white man who is missing, I have been with his son. He sent me to you. For help,” he added.
The men became more alert. “We know about the missing man and his son, headquarters have been looking for him,” said the cooking man.
“My people have died; many of them. And this boy. His name is Max and he is my friend, he is also dead.”
!Koga undid the watch and threw it to them. “This is his father’s watch, to prove I have been with his son. His name is on the back.”
The cook caught the watch, checked the inscription and handed it to his partner.
!Koga held the hydrology map in his other hand. “I must speak to Kallie van Reenen. She is at the farm called Brandt’s Wilderness. Only she can help now. This is a paper which shows where the people died.”
The two cops muttered something to each other, then nodded.
“Where’s the boy’s body?”
“He fell into the monster and was swallowed. The monster took him beneath the earth.”
!Koga was more tired than he had ever been before. The food and coffee made his mouth water. Now the cops smiled and the cook hooked the steak from the pan with a fork.
“Come on, son, we’ll deal with this now. You need some food,
Yes,!Koga needed food and sleep, though the grief he felt for Max still sat on him like a heavy rock. He stepped forward; he had done what Max had asked, perhaps now there was a chance to save Max’s father. He squatted in front of the men as they placed the steak on a plate in front of him.
“You’d better give me the paper for this van Reenen person, then I can tell my people to find her.”
“I can’t do that, I have to give it to her, that’s what Max told me.” He reached for the plate of food but the cook grabbed his wrist.
