‘Go forward.’ Graf Otto gestured. ‘Go forward to where you can see ahead to guide me.’ Leon edged gingerly to the front of the cockpit. Without a glance in his direction Eva moved aside to make room for him and he took up his position beside her and fastened his safety belt to the ring bolt. They braced themselves with both hands on the rail. They were so very close that he fancied, despite the wind, that he could smell a trace of her special perfume. Facing forward, he glanced at her from the corner of his eye. The slipstream flattened the blouse and long skirt against her body and limbs so that every curve and contour was accentuated. For the first time he was able to make out the shape of her legs, long and slender, and then he looked to the twin mounds of her bosom under the velveteen jacket. He saw at once that her breasts were larger than they had seemed, rounder and fuller than Verity O’Hearne’s had been. He forced himself to tear his eyes away and look ahead.
Already they were approaching the rim of the Great Rift Valley. He picked out the glint of the steel tracks where the railway began its descent of the escarpment to the volcanic steppe of the valley floor. He looked back at Graf Otto and gave him a hand signal to turn ninety degrees southwards. The German nodded and the Butterfly dropped one wing and went into a lazy left-hand turn. Centrifugal force pushed Eva lightly against him, and for a long, exquisite moment Leon felt the outside of her warm thigh press against his. She seemed oblivious to this for she made no move to pull away. Then Graf Otto lifted the port wing and the Butterfly came back on to even keel again. The contact was broken.
The Great Rift Valley opened before them. From this altitude it was a vista that belonged not to petty mankind but to God and his angels. Now Leon could truly appreciate the immensity of the land: the seared and rocky hills, the lion-coloured plains blotched with dark expanses of forest, and the blue palisades of hills and mountains stretching away into infinite distances.
Suddenly the deck canted under their feet as Graf Otto lowered the Butterfly’s nose and she dropped into the airy void. The cliffs of the escarpment rushed under them, so close that it seemed her wheels must bounce off the rocks. The valley floor loomed up to meet them. Leon saw Eva’s fists tighten into balls on the handrail. He could see that the tension in her body was arching her back. To pay her back for her earlier sauciness he released his own grip on the rail, and placed his hands on his hips, leaning easily into the dive as the aircraft dropped. This time she could not ignore him, and shot him a quick glance as he balanced against the disparate forces that dragged at his body. Then she looked ahead, but lifted one hand from the rail and turned it palm upwards in a gesture of resignation.
Graf Otto pulled the Butterfly’s nose up out of her dive down the valley wall. Leon’s knees buckled under the force of gravity and Eva was pushed against him once more. She swayed away as the Butterfly came back again on to even keel. They barrelled along the escarpment with the wall flashing past on the port side, so close that it seemed the wing-tip might touch it at any moment.
Suddenly Leon saw what appeared to be a swarm of large black scarab beetles crawling along a mile or so ahead. It was only when the Butterfly raced down on them that he saw it was a large herd of buffalo charging away in panic from their approach. He made another hand signal to Graf Otto, and the Butterfly banked steeply towards the fleeing herd. Once again Eva was pressed against him, but this time she gave him a deliberate bump with her hip. With a surge like electricity through his loins, he understood she was letting him know that she was just as aware of these physical contacts as he was.
They flashed over the heaving backs of the buffalo, so close that Leon could see each pellet of dried mud sticking to their hair, and clearly discern the parallel pattern of scars across the shoulders of the leading bull, left by the raking claws of a marauding lion.
They flew on until Eva waved excitedly and pointed out on her side of the fuselage. Graf Otto banked in the direction she was pointing. Then the Butterfly was straight and lined up on five huge elephant bulls, wading through the dense thorny undergrowth a short distance ahead. Although she no longer had the excuse of gravity, Eva gave him another cheeky little bump with her hip. It was a titillating but dangerous game they were playing, right under Graf Otto von Meerbach’s nose. Leon laughed into the wind and, without moving her head, Eva peeped at him through lowered lashes and smiled secretly.
