Hey, Mr. Morgan, Akkers giggled, don't forget your nails!
David swung round to face him, his face felt tight and hot, the
cicatrice that covered his cheeks and forehead were inflamed and the
dark blue eyes blazed with a terrible anger. He started up the steps.
His mouth was a pale hard slit, and his fists were clenched at his
sides.
Akkers stepped backwards swiftly and reached behind the shop counter. He
lifted out an old double-barrelled shotgun, and cocked both hammers with
a sweep of his thick bony thumb.
Self defence, Mr. Morgan, with witnesses, he giggled with sadistic
relish. Come one step closer and we will get a look at your guts also.
David paused at the top of the steps, and the gun held in one huge fist,
pointed at his belly.
David, hurry, oh, please hurry, Debra called anxiously from the
Land-Rover, with the weak squirming body of the pup in her lap.
We'll meet again, David's anger had thickened his tongue.
That will be fun, said Akkers, and David turned away and ran down the
steps.
Akkers watched the Land-Rover pull away and swing into the road in a
cloud of dust, before he set the shotgun aside. He went out into the
sunlight, and the baboon scrambled down from its pole and rushed to meet
him.
It jumped up on to his hip and clung to him like a child.
Akkers took a boiled sweet from his pocket and placed it tenderly
between the terrible yellow fangs.
You lovely old thing, he chuckled, scratching the high cranium with its
thick cap of grey fur and the baboon squinted up at his face with narrow
brown eyes, chattering softly.
Despite the rough surface, David covered the thirty miles back to
Jabulani in twenty-five minutes. He skidded the vehicle to a halt
beside the hangar, and ran with the pup in his arms to the aircraft.
During the flight Debra nursed him gently in her lap, and her skirts
were sodden with his dark blood. The pup had quieted, and except for an
occasional whimper now lay still. Over the W T David arranged for a car
to meet them at Nelspruit airfield and forty-five minutes after take-off
they had Zulu on the theatre table in the veterinary surgeon's clinic.
The veterinary surgeon worked with complete concentration for over two
hours at repairing the torn entrails and suturing the layers of
abdominal muscle.
The pup was so critically injured, and infection was such a real danger,
that they dared not return to Jabulani until it had passed. Five days
later when they flew home with Zulu still weak and heavily strapped but
out of danger, David altered his flight path to bring them in over the
trading store at Bandolier Hill.
The iron roof shone like a mirror in the sun, and David felt his anger
very cold and hard and determined.
The man is a threat to us, he said aloud. A real threat to each of us,
and to what we are trying to build at Jabulani. Debra nodded her
agreement, stroking the pup's head and not trusting herself to speak.
Her own anger was as fierce as David's. I'm going to get him, he said
