Mr. Berg. I am David Morgan. I remember you from when my father owned
Jabulani. I'd like you to meet my wife. Berg's expression wavered.
Naturally he had heard all the rumours about the new owner of Jabulani;
it was a lonely isolated area and it was his job to know about these
things. Yet he was unprepared for this dreadfully mutilated young man,
and his blind but beautiful wife.
With an awkward gallantry Berg doffed his hat, then realized she would
not see the gesture. He murmured a greeting and when David thrust his
hand through the fence he shook it cautiously.
Debra and David were working as a team and they turned their combined
charm upon Berg, who was a simple and direct min. Slowly his defences
softened as they chatted. He admired Zulu, he also kept labradors and
it served as a talking-point while Debra unpacked a Thermos of coffee
and David filled mugs for all of them.
Isn't that Sam? David pointed to the game ranger in the truck who held
Berg's rifle. ja. Berg was guarded. He used to work on Tabulani. He
came to me of his own accord, Berg explained, turning aside any implied
rebuke.
He wouldn't remember me, of course, not the way I look now. But he was
a fine ranger, and the place certainly went to the bad without him to
look after it, David admitted before he went into a frontal assault. The
other thing which has ruined us is this fence of yours. David kicked
one of the uprights.
You don't say? I Berg swished the grounds of his coffee around the mug
and flicked it out.
Why did you do it? For good reason. , MY father had a gentleman's
agreement with the Board, the boundary was open at all times. We have
got water and grazing that you need. With all respects to the late Mr.
Morgan, Conrad Berg spoke heavily, I was never in favour of the open
boundary. Why not? Your daddy was a sportsman. He spat the word out,
as though it were a mouthful of rotten meat. When my lions got to know
him and learned to stay this side of the line, then he used to bring
down a couple of donkeys and parade them along the boundary, to tempt
them out. David opened his mouth to protest, and then closed it slowly.
He felt the seamed scars of his face mottling and staining with a flush
of shame. It was true, he remembered the donkeys and the soft wet lion
skins being pegged out to dry behind the homestead.
He never poached, David defended him. He had an owner's licence and
they were all shot on our land. 'No, he never poached, Berg admitted.
He was too damned clever for that. He knew I would have put a rocket up
him that would have made him the first man on the moon. 'So that's why
you put up the fence. 'No. Why then? Because for fourteen years
Jabulani has been under the care of an absentee landlord who didn't give
a good damn what happened to it. Old Sam here, he motioned at the game
ranger in the truck - did his best, but still it became a poachers
paradise. As fast as the grazing and water you boast of pulled my game
out of the Park, so they were cut down by every sportsman with an itchy
trigger finger. When Sam tried to do something about it, he got badly
beaten up, and when that didn't stop him somebody put fire into his hut
