For a marksman of Michael's calibre, it was simple shooting. He waited until two birds overlapped each other, and took them both with his first shot. They crumpled in midair and as the rest of the flock flared up and scattered, he knocked down a third pigeon in a burst of feathers with his second barrel.
The two women raced out into the open field to bring in the birds.
Three with two shots. Centaine came back and stood close beside him, stroking the soft warm body of the dead pigeon and looking up at Michael.
It was a fluke, said Anna gruffly. Nobody shoots two A pigeons by intention, not if they are flying. The next flock was a larger one, and the birds were bunched. Michael took three of them with his first barrel and a fourth bird with his second, and Centaine turned triumphantly to Anna.
Another fluke, she gloated. What luck the captain is having today. Two more flocks came within range in the next half hour, and Centaine asked seriously, Do you never miss, Mijnheer? Up there, Michael looked into the sky, if you miss, you are dead. So far I have never missed. Centaine shivered. Death, that word again. Death was all around them, on the ridges over there were for the moment the sound of the guns was just a low rumble, death in the sky above them. She looked at Michael and thought, I don't want him to die, never! Never! Then she shook herself, driving away the gloom, and she smiled and said, Teach me to shoot. The request was inspired. It allowed Michael to touch her, even under Anna's jealous gaze. He stood her in front of him, and coached her into the classic stance, with her left foot leading.
This shoulder a little lower. They were both electrically aware of each contact. Just turn your hips this way slightly. He placed his hands upon them and Michael's voice sounded as though he were choking as she pushed back with her buttocks against him, an untutored but devastating pressure.
Centaine's first shot drove her back against his chest, and he clasped her protectively while the pigeons headed untouched for the horizon.
You are looking at the muzzle of the gun, not the bird, Michael explained, still holding her. Look at the bird, and the gun will follow of its own At her next shot a fat pigeon tumbled out of the sky, amid shrieks of excitement from both women, but when Anna ran out to pick it up, the rain that had been holding off until that moment fell upon them in a silver curtain.
The barn! cried Centaine, and led them scampering down the lane. The rain slashed the tree-tops and exploded in miniature shell bursts on their skin so that they gasped at its icy sting. Centaine reached the barn first, and her blouse was sticking to her skin, so that Michael could see the exact shape of her breasts. Strands of her dark hair were plastered against her forehead, and she shook the drops off her skirts and laughed at him, making no attempt to avoid his gaze.
The barn fronted on to the lane. It was built of squared attered yellow stone blocks and the thatched roof was t and worn as an old carpet. it was half-filled with bales of straw that rose in tiers to the roof ,This will set in, Anna groused darkly, staring out at the streaming rain and shaking the rain off herself like a water buffalo emerging from the swamp. We will be stuck here. Come, Anna, let's clean the birds. They found comfortable perches on the straw bales, Centaine and Michael with their shoulders almost touching, they chatted.
and while they plucked the pigeons Tell me about Africa, Centaine demanded. is it really so dark? It's the sunniest land in the world, too much sun, even, Michael told her.
hate the I love the sun, Centaine shook her head cold and the wet. There could never be too much sun for me. He told her about the deserts where it never rained. Not as much in a year as it does here in a single day.'I thought there were only black savages in Africa.'No, he laughed. There are plenty of white savages too - and black gentlemen, and he told her about the tiny yellow pygmies of the Ituri forests, tall as a man's waist, and the giant Watusi who considered any man under two metres tall to be a pygmy, and those noble warriors of Zulu who called themselves children of heaven.
You talk as though you love them, she accused.
The Zulu? he asked, and then nodded. Yes, I suppose I do. Some of them, anyway. Mbejane- Mbejane? She did not pronounce the name right.
A Zulu, he has been with my Uncle Sean since they were lads together. He used the Zulu word Umfaan and had to translate for her.
Tell me about the animals. Centaine did not want him to stop talking. She could listen to his voice and his stories for ever. Tell me about the lions and the tigers. No tigers, he smiled at her, but plenty of lions. And Even Anna's hands, busy with plucking the birds, stilled as she listened while Michael described a camp on the hunting veld where he and his Uncle Sean had been besieged by a pride of lions, and had had to stand by the horses heads all night, protecting and soothing them, while the great pale cats prowled back and forth at the edge of the firelight, roaring and grunting, trying to drive the horses into the darkness where they would have been easy prey.
Tell us about the elephants. And he told her about those sagacious beasts. He described how they moved with that slow somnambulistic gait, huge ears flapping to cool their blood, picking up dirt to dash it over their heads for a dust bath.
He told them about the intricate social structures of the elephant herds, how the old bulls avoided the uproar of breeding herds. Just like your father, said Anna. And how the barren old queens took upon themselves the duties of nanny and midwife: how the great grey beasts formed relationships with each other, almost like human friendships, that lasted their lifetimes; and about their strange preoccupation with death, how if they killed a hunter who had plagued and wounded them they would often cover his body with green leaves, almost as though they were trying to make atonement. He explained how when one of the members of the herd was stricken, the others would try to succour it, holding it on its feet with their trunks, supporting it from each side with their bulks, and when it fell at last, if it was a cow, the herd bull would mount her, as though trying to frustrate death with the act of generation.
This last tale roused Anna from her listening trance and reminded her of her role of chaperone; she glanced sharply at Centaine.
It has stopped raining, she announced primly, and she began to gather up the naked caracasses of the pigeons.
Centaine still watched Michael with huge shining dark eyes.
One day I will go to Africa, she said softly, and he returned her gaze steadily and nodded. Yes, he said. One day. It was as though they had exchanged a vow. It was a thing between them, firm and understood. In that moment she became his woman and he her man.
Come, Anna insisted at the door of the barn. Come on, before it rains again, and it took a vast effort from both
