panties and tore them off her, then he pusher her down on top of the hot and bleeding carcass of the buffalo. She fell with her legs sprawled open and the muscles of the dead anima were still twitching and contracting from the brain shot, and the sweet coppery smell of blood mingled with the rank wild stink of game and dust.
Sean stood over her and tore open the front of his breeches and she looked up at him with the terror still clouding her eyes.
'Oh you bastard,' she sobbed. 'You filthy rotten bastard.' Sean dropped on his knees between her long loose limbs and cupped his hands under her hard little buttocks. As he lifted her lower body he saw that her fluffy blond mount was already as sodden as the fur of a drowned kitten.
They drove back to camp with the body of the dead bull crammed into the back of the Land-Rover, the great horned head dangling over the side, and Matatu and the gunbearer perched upon it, singing the hunter's song.
Lana never said a word all the way back. Ed Liner was waiting for them under the dining tent, but his welcoming grin faded as Lana threw her torn panties on the table in front of him and piped in her little-girl voice, 'You know what, naughty old Sean did, Daddy Eddie?
He raped your little girl, that's what he did - he held her down and stuck his big dirty thing into her.' Sean saw the fury and the hatred in the old man's faded eyes, and he groaned inwardly. 'The bitch,' he thought. 'The sneaky little bitch.
You loved it. You screamed for more.' Half an hour later Lana and Ed were in the red and silver Beechcraft Baron when it took off from the narrow bush strip. As it banked away on course for Nairobi, Sean glanced down at his own trouser front.
'Well okay, King Kong,' he murmured. 'I hope you are satisfied, that just cost us fifty thousand dollars an inch.' He turned back to the Land-Rover still shaking his head sadly as he picked up the bundle of mail that the pilot of the Beechcraft had brought down from the office in Nairobi. There was a yellow cable envelope on top of the pile and he opened it first.
'I am marrying Holly Carmichael on 5th August. Please be my best man. Love. Garry.' Sean read it through twice, and Lana and Ed Liner were forgotten.
'I'd love to see what kind of bag would marry Garry,' he chuckled.
'Pity I can't go home --' he broke off and thought about it. 'But why not! Why the hell not! Living dangerously is half the fun.' Shasa Courtney sat at his desk in the st_udy at Weltevreden, studying the Turner on the opposite wall as he composed the next paragraph in his mind.
He was drafting his Chairman's Report for the cabinet select committee of Armscor. The armaments company had been set up by special act of parliament, and the strict secrecy of its operations was ensured by that act.
When President Eisenhower had initiated the arms embargo against South Africa as a punitive reaction to the Sharpeville massacre and the racial policies of the Verwoerd government, the country's annual expenditure on weapons manufacture had been a mere ?300,000. Four years later they had an annual budget of half a billion.
'Dear old Ike did us a big favour.' Shasa smiled now. 'The law of unforeseen consequences in action again, sanctions always backfire.
Now our biggest worry is to find a testing ground for our own atomic bomb.' He addressed himself once more to that section of his report, and wrote: Taking into consideration the foregoing, I am of the opinion that we should adopt the third option, i.e. underground testing. With this in view, the corporation has already conducted investigations to determine the most suitable geological areas. (See attached geological survey reports.) The shot holes will be drilled by a commercial diamond drilling company to a depth of four thousand feet to obviate contamination of the underground water supplies.
There was a knock on the door and Shasa looked up in angry disbelief. The entire household knew that he was not to be disturbed, and there was no reason nor excuse for this intrusion.
'Who is it?' he barked, and the door was opened without his permission.
For a moment he did not recognize the person who stepped into the study. The long hair and deep tan, the flamboyant costume - the gilet of kudu skin, and the bright silk scarf knotted at the throat, the mosquito boots and cartridge belt were all unfamiliar. Shasa stood up uncertainly.
'Sean?' he asked. 'No, I don't believe this is happening.' He wanted to be angry and outraged. 'Damn it, Sean, I warned you never--' but he could_not go on, his joy was too ' - u intense ana his voice petere--& out.
'Hello Dad.' Sean came striding towards him, and he was taller and more handsome and self-assured than Shasa remembered. Shasa abhorred all manner of theatrics and affectation of dress, but Sean wore his costume with such panache that it appeared natural and correct.
'What the hell are you doing here?' Shasa found his voice at last, but there was no rancour in his question.
'I came as soon as I got Garry's cable.' 'Garry cabled you?' 'Best man - he wanted me to be his best man, and I didn't even have a chance to change.' He stopped in front of Shasa, and for a moment they studied each other.
'You are looking good, Pater,' Sean smiled, and his teeth were white as bone against the tan.
'Sean, my boy.' Shasa lifted his hands, and Sean seized him in a bear hug.
'I thought about you every single day--' Sean's voice was tight and his cheek was pressed to Shasa's cheek. 'God, how I missed you, Dad.' Shasa knew instinctively that it was a lie, but he was delighted that Sean had bothered to tell the lie.
'I've missed you, too, my boy,' he whispered. 'Not every day, but often enough to hurt like hell. Welcome back to Weltevreden.' And Sean kissed him. They had not lissed since Sean was a child, that sort of sentimental display was not Shasa's usual style, but now the pleasure of it was almost unbearable.
Sean sat t Centame s right hand at dinner that evening. His dinner a ' ' jacket was a little tight around the chest and smelled of moth balls, but the servants, overjoyed to have him home, had pressed razor edges into the crease of his trousers and steamed out the silk lapels. He had shampooed his hair, and oddly the thick glossy locks seemed to enhance rather than detract from his over-powering masculinity.
Isabella, taken by surprise like everybody else, had come drifting downstairs, dressed for dinner with her shoulders and back bare, but her cool and distant poise had evaporated as she saw Sean. She squealed and rushed at him.
