her knees, she began to sob hysterically.
The sound of it rallied Shasa. Gently he laid Blaine on his back and closed his eyes with his fingertips.
In the doorway Moses groaned and shuddered, and Manfred slammed the telephone back on its cradle and crossed to him. He stood over him, with those huge fists clenched and asked, 'Who is he?' 'Moses Gama.' Shasa stood up, and Manfred grunted.
'So, we have been looking for him for years. What was he doing?' 'I'm not sure.' Shasa went to where Tricia lay and stooped over her. 'But I think he has laid explosives somewhere in the House.
That is the transmitter. We'd better clear the place and have the army bomb disposal --' He didn't have to finish, for at that moment there was the sound of running men in the corridor and three of the security guards burst into the suite.
Manfred took over immediately, snapping orders at them. 'Get the handcuffs on that black bastard.' He pointed at Moses. 'And then I want the building cleared.' Shasa freed Tricia, leaving the gag until last, but the instant her mouth was clear Tricia pointed at Tara where she still knelt sobbing beside Blaine's corpse.
'She --' Shasa did not let her finish. He seized her wrist and jerked Tricia to her feet.
'Quiet!' he snarled at her, and his fury silenced the girl for a moment. He dragged her through into the outer office and closed the door.
'Listen to me, Tricia.' He faced her, still holding both her wrists.
'But she was with him.' Tricia was trembling. 'It was her --' 'Listen to me.' Shasa shook her into silence. 'I know. I know all about it. But I want you to do something for me. Something for which I will always be grateful. Will you do it?' Tricia sobered and stared at him. She saw the blood and the tears on his face and thought her heart might break for him. Shasa took the handkerchief from his top pocket and wiped his face.
'For me, Tricia. Please,' he repeated and she gulped noisily and nodded.
'If I can,' she agreed.
'Don't say anything about my wife's part in this until the police take a formal statement from you. That won't be until much later.
Then you can tell them everything.' 'Why?' she asked.
'For me and for my children. Please Tricia.' Again she nodded and he kissed her forehead. 'You are a good brave girl,' he said and left her.
He went back into the inner office. The security police were grouped around Moses Gama. He was manacled but he lifted his head and stared at Shasa for a moment. It was a smouldering gaze, dark and filled with outrage. Then they led him away.
The office was crowded and noisy. White-uniformed ambulance attendants were bringing a stretcher through the doorway. A doctor, a member of parliament summoned from the chamber, was working over Blaine as he lay on his back, but now he stood up, shook his head and gestured at the stretcher bearers to take Blaine's body. The uniformed guards, supervised by Manfred De La Rey, were already gathering up the pieces of the smashed transmitter and beginning to trace the wire to its source.
Tara was sitting in the chair behind his desk, weeping silently into her halads. Shasa went past her to the wall safe hidden behind one of the paintings.
He tumbled the combination and swung open the steel door, screening it with his own body. Shasa always kept two or three thousand pounds in banknotes against an emergency. He stuffed the wads into his pockets, and then quickly he sorted through the stack of family passports until he found Tara's. He relocked the safe, went to where she sat and pulled her to her feet. 'Shasa, I didn't--' 'Keep quiet,' he hissed at her, and Manfred De La Rey glanced at him across the office.
'She's had a terrible shock,' Shasa said. 'I'm taking her home.' 'Come back here as soon as you can,' Manfred nodded. 'We'll need a statement.' Still gripping her arm, Shasa marched her out of the office and down the corridor. The fire alarm bells were ringing throughout the building and members and visitors and staff were streaming out through the front doors. Shasa joined them, and as soon as they were out in the sunlight he led Tara to the Jaguar.
'Where are we going?' Tara asked, as they drove away. She sat very small and subdued in her corner of the bucket seat.
'If you talk to me again, I may lose control,' he warned her tightly.
'I may not be able to stop myself strangling you.' She did not speak again until they reached Youngsfield Airport, and Shasa pushed her up into the cockpit of the silver and blue Mosquito.
'Where are we going?' she repeated, but he ignored her as he went through the start-up procedures and taxied out to the end of the runway. He did not speak until they had climbed to cruise altitude and were flying straight and level.
'The evening flight for London leaves Johannesburg at seven o'clock. As soon as we are in radio contact, I will reserve your seat,' he told her. 'We will get there with an hour or so to spare.' 'I don't understand,' she whispere into her oxygen mask. 'Are you helping me to escape? I don't understand why.' 'For my mother, firstly. I don't want her to know that you murdered her husband - it would destroy her.' 'Shasa, I didn't --' she was weeping again, but he felt no twinge of compassion.
'Shut up,' he said. 'I don't want want to listen to your blubbering.
You will never know the depths.of my feelings for you. Hatred and contempt are gentle words that do not describe them.' He drew a breath.
Then went on, 'After my mother, I am doing it for my children. I don't want them to live their lives with the knowledge of what their mother truly was. That is too much for a young man or woman to be burdened with.' Then they were both silent, and Shasa allowed the terrible grief of Blaine's death, which up until then he had suppressed, to rise up and engulf him. In the seat beside him Tara was mourning her father also, spasms of weeping shook her shoulders. Her face above the mask was chalky and her eyes were like wounds.
As strong as his grief was Shasa's hatred. After an hour's flying, he spoke again.
