Assegai полностью

Graf Otto was at the controls of the Butterfly as they took off from the Percy’s Camp airstrip, where they had stopped to refuel after the flight in from Nairobi. He headed southwest towards the manyatta of Massana. Eva sat beside him, Ishmael squatted on the deck with his precious kitchen bundle, while Leon, Gustav and Hennie were bunched at the front of the cockpit.

They had been flying for little more than twenty-five minutes when Leon spotted a feather of smoke on their port quarter, rising straight into the still, breathless heat of midday. ‘Loikot!’ Leon knew it was him, even before he made out the slim figure standing beside the smudge fire. Loikot flapped his shuka to ensure that they had seen him, then pointed with his spear towards the jagged outline of a small kopje not far ahead. He was indicating the whereabouts of the quarry.

Swiftly Leon assessed the changed situation. The gods of the chase had been kind to them. During his absence the lions must have headed in the direction of Massana’s manyatta. They were now many miles closer to it than they had been when they had first spotted them. He looked at the distant escarpment of the Rift to orientate himself, then picked out the ghostly shape of the salt pan where he had left the two Masai only three days ago. It lay almost equidistant between the manyatta and the kopje where the lions were now lying up. Couldn’t be better, he exulted, and moved back quickly to where he could talk to Graf Otto above the engines. ‘Loikot signalled that the lions are lying up among the rocks on that hillock.’

‘Where is the nearest place I can land?’

‘Can you see that salt pan?’ Leon pointed it out. ‘If you put us down there, we’ll be close to the quarry and to the village where the morani are assembling for the hunt.’

Massana’s manyatta was larger than most others in the valley. A hundred or more large huts were laid out in a wide circle around the cattle pen. Graf Otto circled the settlement at low level. A dark mass of humanity had gathered in the central cattle pen. Although Leon could not pick out Manyoro in the press of shuka-clad figures, he had done his job, and prevailed on Massana to assemble his morani for the great hunt. Satisfied that all was in readiness for them, Leon asked Graf Otto to turn the Butterfly towards the salt pan. He landed and taxied to the treeline along its western edge before he shut down the engines.

‘We will be camping here for a while,’ Leon told him, ‘so we can make ourselves comfortable before the morani arrive.’ All the equipment for a fly camp was packed into the cargo hold of the Butterfly. It did not take Leon long to set it up. He sited the tents in the shade beneath the aircraft’s wings. Ishmael built his kitchen and cooking fire at a safe distance from the aircraft and was soon serving coffee and ginger snaps.

Leon drained his mug, then looked up at the sky to judge the time. ‘Loikot will be here any minute now,’ he told Graf Otto, and had barely finished the sentence when Loikot trotted out from among the trees.

Leon left the shade and walked into the sunlight to greet him. He was desperately eager to hear Loikot’s report, but he knew Loikot could not be hurried. The more portentous his tidings, the longer Loikot took to divulge them. First he took a little snuff, standing on one leg and leaning on his spear. Then they agreed that it had been three days since they had last seen each other, a long time, that the weather was hot for this season of the year, and that it would probably rain before sunset, which would be good for the grazing.

‘So, Loikot, mighty hunter and intrepid tracker, what of your lions? Do you still have them in your eye?’

Loikot shook his head lugubriously.

‘You have lost them?’ Leon asked angrily. ‘You have let them escape?’

‘No! It is true that the smallest lion has disappeared but I still have the largest one in my eye. I saw him no more than two hours ago. He is alone, still lying up from the heat on top of the hillock I pointed out to you earlier.’

‘We should not bewail the disappearance of the other,’ Leon consoled him. ‘One lion on his own will be easier to work with. Two together might be one too many.’

‘Where is Manyoro?’ Loikot asked.

‘After we left you we flew over the manyatta of Massana. The morani hunters were gathered there, but they must already be on their way to join us. The manyatta is not far off. They will be here soon.’

‘I will go back to keep watch on my lion,’ Loikot volunteered. ‘When it is dark, he might move a great distance. I will return early tomorrow morning.’

It was still two hours from sunset when they heard singing and saw the people coming through the open forest towards where they were camped on the edge of the pan. Manyoro was leading them, and he was followed by the long file of armed morani decked out in full hunting regalia, carrying shields and assegais.