When the Lion Feeds (49 page)

At carefullY-spaced intervals there was a stage cough from ouma's wagon, a reminder that they were not entirely alone. Sean lit a cheroot and frowned into the fire searching desperately for something intelligent to say, but all his brain could dredge up was, Thank God, Oupa isn't here he sneaked a glance at Katrina: she was staring into the fire as well and she was blushing. Instantly Sean felt his own cheeks starting to heat up. He opened his mouth to talk and made a squawking noise. He shut it again. We can speak in English if you like, meneer. You speak english? Sean's surprise brought his voice back.

I -Practise every night, I read aloud out of my books Sean grinned at her delightedly, it was suddenly very important that she could speak his language. The dam, holding back all the questions that there were to ask and all the things there were to Say, burst and the words came pouring out over each other. Katrina fluttered her hands when she couldn't find the word she wanted and then lapsed back into Afrikaans.

They killed the short taut silences with a simultaneous rush of words, then laughed together in confusion. They sat on the edges of their chairs and watched each other's faces as they talked. The moon came up, a red rain moon, and the fire faded into a puddle of ashes. Katrina, it's long past the time decent people were asleep. I'm sure Meneer courtney is tired. They dropped their voices to a whisper, drawing out the last minutes. In just one minute, girl, I'm coming out to fetch you to bed They walked to her wagon and with each step her skirts brushed against his leg. She stopped with one hand on the wagon step. She wasn't as tall as he'd imagined, the top of her head came to his chin.

The seconds slid by as he hesitated, reluctant to touch, strangely frightened to test the delicate thread they had spun together lest he destroy it before it became strong. Slowly he swayed towards her and something surged up inside him as he saw her chin lift slightly and the lashes fall over her eyes. Goodnight, Meneer Courtney. Ouma's voice again, loud and with an edge to it. Sean started guiltily.

Goodnight, mevrouw. Katrina touched his arm just above the elbow, her fingers were warm.

gGoodn ight, meneer, I shall see you in the morning.

She rustled up the steps and slipped through the opening of the canvas.

Sean scowled at ouma's wagon.

'Thanks very much, and if there is ever anything I can do for you, please don't hesitate to ask. They started moving the wagons early next morning.

There was no time to talk to Katrina in the bustle of inspanning and working the wagons across the corduroy bridge. Sean spent most of the morning in the river-bed and the white sand bounced the heat up at him.

He threw off his shirt and sweated like a wrestler. He trotted beside katrina's wagon when they ran it through the river-bed.

She looked once at his naked chest and arms; her cheeks darkened in the shadow of her bonnet and she dropped her eyes and didn't look at him again. With only the two wagons that were going back to fetch the ivory still on the north bank and the rest safely across, Sean could relax.

He washed in one of the pools, put on his shirt and went across to the south bank looking forward to a long afternoon of Katrina's company.

Ouma met him. Thank you, my bear, the girls have made you a parcel of cold meat and a bottle of coffee to eat on your way. Sean's face went slack. He had forgotten all about that stinking ivory; as far as he was concerned Oupa and Paulus could keep the lot of it.

Don't worry about us any more now, maneer. I know how it is with a man who is a man. When there's work to do everything else comes after.

Katrina put the food in his hands. Sean looked for a sign from her.

one sign and he'd defy even Ouma.

Don't be too long, she whispered. The thought that he might shirk work had obviously not even occurred to her.

Sean was glad he hadn't suggested it.

It was a long ride back to the elephant. You've taken your time, haven't you? Oupa greeted him with sour suspicion. You'd better get to work if you don't want to lose some of your share. Taking out the tusks was a delicate task: a slip of the axe would scar the ivory and halve its value. They worked in the heat with a blue haze of flies around their faces, settling on their lips and crawling into their nostrils and eyes. The carcases had started to rot and the gases ballooned their bellies and escaped in posthumous belches.

They sweated as they worked and the blood caked their arms to the elbows, but each hour the wagons filled higher until on the third day they loaded the last tusk.

Sean reckoned Ins share at twelve hundred pounds, the equivalent of a satisfactory day on the Stock Exchange.

He was in a good mood on the morning that they started back to the camp, but it deteriorated as the day wore on and they struggled with the heavily-loaded wagons. The rain seemed to have made up its mind at Last and now the sky's belly hung down as heavily as that of a pregnant sow.

The clouds trapped the heat beneath them and the men panted and the oxen complained mournfully. At midafternoon they heard the first far thunder.

It will be on us before we pass the river, fretted Oupa. See if you can't get some pace out of those oxen.

They reached Sean's camp an hour after dark and threw his share of the ivory out of the wagons almost without stopping, then they went down to the river and across the bridge to the south bank. My mother will have food ready Jan Paulus called back to Sean. When you have washed come across and eat with us. Sean had supper with the Leroux, but his attempts to get Katrina by herself were neatly countered by Oupa whose suspicions were now confirmed. The old man played his trump card immediately after supper and ordered Katrina to bed. Sean could only shrug helplessly in reply to Katrina's appealing little glance. When she had gone Sean went back to his own camp. He was dizzy, with fatigue and he fell onto his cot without bothering to undress.

The rains opened their annual offensive with a midnight broadside of thunder. It startled Sean to his feet before he was awake. He pulled open the front of the wagon and heard the wind coming. Mbejane, get the cattle into the laager. Make sure all the canvas is secure. It is done already, Nkosi, I have lashed the wagons together so the oxen cannot stampede and I have Then the wind whipped his voice away.

It came out of the east and it frightened the trees so they thrashed their branches in panic; it drummed on the wagon canvas and filled the air with dust and dry leaves.

The oxen turned restlessly within the laager. Then came the rain:

stinging like hail, drowning the wind and turning the air to water. It swamped the sloping ground that could not drain It fast enough, it blinded and it deafened.

Sean went back to his cot and listened to its fury. it made him feel drowsy. He pulled the blankets up to his chin and slept.

In the morning he found his oilskins in the chest at the foot of his cot. They crackled as he pulled them on. He climbed out of the wagon.

The cattle had churned the inside of the laager to calf-deep mud and there was no chance of a fire for breakfast. Although the rain was still falling the noise was out of proportion to its strength.

Sean paused in his inspection of the camp; he thought about it and suddenly he knew that it was the flood voice of the Limpopo that he heard. Sliding in the mud, he ran out of the laager and stood on the bank of the river. He stared at the mad water. It was so thick with mud it looked solid and it raced so fast it appeared to be standing still. It humped up over piles of submerged rock, guRied through the deeps and hissed in static waves through the shallows. The branches and tree trunks in it whisked past so swiftly that they did little to dispel the illusion that the river was frozen in this brown convulsion.

Reluctantly Sean lifted his eyes to the far bank. The Leroux wagons were gone. Katrina, he said with the sadness of the might-have been, then again, Katrina, with the sense of his loss melting in the flame of his anger, and he knew that his wanting: was not just the itch that is easily scratched and forgotten, but that it was the true ache, the one that gets into your hands and your head and your heart as well as your loins. He couldn't let her go. He ran back to his wagon and threw his clothes onto the cot.

I'll marry her, he said and the words startled him. He stood naked, with an awed expression on his face.

I'll marry her! he said again; it was an original thought and it frightened him a little. He took a pair of shorts out of his chest and put his legs into them; he pulled them up and buttoned the fly. I'll marry her! He grinned at his own daring. I'm damned if I won't! He buckled his belt on and tied a pair of veldschoen to it by their laces.

He jumped down into the mud. The rain was cold on his bare back and he shivered briefly.

Then he saw Mbejane coming out of one of the other wagons and he ran.

Nkosi, Nkosi, what are you doing? Sean put his head down and ran faster with Mbejane chasing him out onto the bank of the river. It's madness.

. . let us talk about it first Mbejane shouted. Please, Nkosi, please. Sean slipped in the mud and slithered down the bank. Mbejane jumped down after and caught him at the edge of the water, but the mud had coated Sean's body like grease and Mbejane couldn't hold him. Sean twisted out of his hands and sprang far out. He hit the water flat and swam on his back trying to avoid the undertow. The river swept him away. A wave slapped into his mouth and he doubled up to Tough, immediately the river caught him by the heels and pulled him under the surface. It let him go again, just long enough to snatch air then it stirred him in a whirlpool and sucked him under once more. He came up beating at the water with his arms, then it tumbled him over a cascade and he knew by the pain in his chest that he was drowning. He swooped down a chute of swift water between rocks and it didn't matter anymore.

He was too tired. Something scraped against his chest and he put out his hand to protect himself; his fingers closed round a branch and his head lifted out of the water. He drank air and then he was clinging to the branch, still alive and wanting to live. He started kicking, edging across the current, riding the river with his arms around the log.

One of the eddies beneath the south bank swung the log in, under the branches of a tree. He reached up, caught them and dragged himself out.

He knelt in the mud and water came gushing up out of him, half through his mouth and half through his nose. He had lost his veldschoen. He belched painfully looked at the river. How fast was it moving, how long had he been in the water?

he must be fifteen miles below the wagons. He wiped his face with his hand. It was still raining. He stood shakily and faced upstream.

it took him three hours to reach the spot opposite his wagons. Mbejane and the others waved in wild relief when they saw him, but their shouts could not carry across the river. Sean was cold now and his feet were sore.

The tracks of the Leroux wagons were dissolving in the rain. He followed them and at last the pain in his feet healed as he saw the flash of canvas in the rain mist ahead of him. Name of a name Shouted jan Pall us. How did you cross the river? I flew, how else? said sean. Where's Katrina? Paulus started to laugh, leaning back in the saddle. So that's it then, you haven't come all this way to say goodbye to me. Sean flushed. All right, laughing boy.

That's enough merriment for today . . . Where is she? Oupa came galloping back towards them. He asked his first question when he was fifty yards away and his fifth as he arrived. From experience Sean knew there was no point in trying to answer them. He looked beyond the two leroux and saw her coming. She was running back from the lead wagon, her bonnet hanging from its ribbon around her throat and her hair bouncing loosely with each step. She held her skirts out of the mud, her cheeks flushed darker than the brown of her face and her eyes were very green. Sean ducked under the neck of Oupa's horse and went wet, muddy and eager to meet her.

Then the shyness stopped them and they stood paces apart. Katrina, will you marry me? She went pale. She stared at him then turned away, she was crying and Sean felt the bottom drop out of his stomach.

No, shouted Oupa furiously. She won't marry you.

Leave her alone, you big baboon. You've made her cry.

Get out of here. She's only a baby. Get out of here. He forced his horse between them. You hold your mouth, you old busybody. Ouma came panting back to join the discussion. %, What do you know about it anyway? just because she's crying doesn't mean she doesn't want him. I thought he was going'to let me go, sobbed Katrina, I thought he didn't care Sean whooped and tried to dodge around Oupa's horse. You leave her alone, shouted Oupa desperately, manoeuvring his horse to cut Sean off.

You made her cry. I tell you she's crying. Katrina was-undoubtedly crying. She was also trying to get around Oupa's horse.

Vat haar, shouted Jan Paulus. Get her, man, go and get her!

Ouma caught the horse by the reins and dragged it away: she was a powerful woman. Sean and Katrina collided and held tight. Hey, that's it, man, Jan Paulus jumped off his horse and pounded Sean's back from behind. Unable to protect himself Sean was driven forward a pace with each blow.

Much later Oupa muttered sulkily. She can have two wagons for her dowry. Three! said Katrina.

Four! said Ouma. Very well, four. Take your hands off him, girl.