Elephant Song - Smith Wilbur (читать книги онлайн бесплатно полностью без .TXT) 📗
Captain Kajo, Taffari ordered.
There is a bottle of champagne in the refrigerator. This calls for a celebration. Kajo went to the bar and busied himself with the bottle.
The cork popped and a little froth gushed on to the carpet. It was Australian rather than French, but none of them complained.
Kajo turned back to the bar, screening the row of glasses on the bar while he poured the wine. He gave Bonny her glass firsttand then served the others in order of their seniority.
Taffari lifted his glass towards Bonny. To you, my dear.
You have saved me and my country from a potentially damaging situation.
Thank you, Mr. President. Bonny took a mouthful of the champagne.
She noticed but did not remark on the slightly bitter aftertaste, for she had learned not to give him the least pretext for offence. And when Kajo refilled her glass, she drank it without question. The unpleasant taste was less noticeable now. I thought we might go for a sunset cruise on the lake, Taffari told her, and Bonny smiled at him but her cheeks felt strangely numb. That would be fun, she tried to say, but it came out slurred and jumbled. Bonny broke off and stared at them. Their faces were receding and there was a ringing sound in her head. It became louder and her vision was darkening. There was only a tiny hole in the centre of the blackness in which she could see Ephrem's face, as though through the reverse end of a telescope, small and remote.
His voice boomed and echoed in her drugged brain. Goodbye, my dear, he said, and her head dropped forward on to the table-top.
There was silence in the cabin for a full minute after Bonny Mahon had collapsed. Then President Taffari gathered his papers and placed them in his briefcase. He stood up and Kajo hurried to open the door for him.
Taffari paused in the doorway and looked back. Ning Cheng Gong was still seated opposite the unconscious girl. He was watching her with a strange pale intensity.
At the head of the gangplank Taffari paused to talk to Captain Kajo.
Make sure the yacht is washed thoroughly before you bring her back to port.
You know how to use the pressure hose? I do, Your Excellency.
Taffari went down the gangplank to his Mercedes and Kajo stood to attention and saluted as he drove away.
The yacht's diesel engine was already running, the exhausts bubbling softly under the stern. Kajo cast off the lines and went to the wheel.
He eased the yacht away from the jetty and turned her bows towards the harbour entrance.
It was a two-hour run out to Lamu Island, and the sun had already set when he dropped anchor in the lee of the uninhabited horseshoe-shaped rock.
We have arrived, Mr. Ning, he said into the voice tube. Help me, please, Captain. Kajo went down into the cabin. Bonny Mahon was lying, still unconscious, on the carpeted deck. Between them they carried her up into the open cockpit and while Kajo held her upright Ning strapped her wrists and ankles to the stainless steel railings.
He spread a nylon sheet under her with the end hanging over the stern, to make it easier to hose down the deck later. I don't need any further assistance, he told Kajo.
Take the rubber dinghy and go ashore on the island. Stay there until I call you. No matter what you may hear you will remain ashore.
Do you understand? Yes, Mr. Ning. Cheng stood by the stern rail and watched Kajo in the stern of the dinghy disappear into the darkness. The little three hp outboard puttered softly, and the beam of Kajo's flashlight threw an erratic beam in the darkness. At last he reached the island and the outboard motor cut out into silence. The flashlight was extinguished.
Cheng turned back to the girl. She sagged against her bonds.
She looked very pale in the cockpit lights and her hair was an untidy copper bush.
Cheng took a few moments longer to savour the moment.
Physically the woman was unattractive to him, and she was much older than he liked, but none the less he felt his excitement mounting. Soon he would, be so absorbed and transported that such small adverse considerations would be of no account.
He looked around him carefully, taking his time, considering the circumstances. Lamu Island was twelve miles from the mainland and the lake crocodiles infested the waters around it.
They would immediately devour any offal that was dropped overboard.
On top of which he was under the protection of President Taffari.
He went back to the girl and adjusted the tourniquet around her upper arm, massaging the veins in the inside of her elbow until they stood out thick and blue in the cockpit lights. He had used the drug on many previous occasions, and he kept the antidote and disposable syringe available at all times.
Only seconds after he injected the antidote, Bonny Mahon opened her eyes and peered at him groggily. Good evening, Miss Mahon.
Cheng's voice was throaty with excitement. You and I are going to have a little fun together.
There had been an almost immediate rapart between Daniel and Sepoo.
It was strange for in every way they were completely different: in size and colour and shape and mentality there was no similarity whatsoever.
It had to be a thing of the spirit, Daniel decided as he followed Sepoo through the forest. They were children of Africa, its pulse beat in both of them, its soul was their soul. They understood and loved this land's beauty and savagery and treasured its bounty. They understood and loved its creatures and counted themselves merely one amongst this multitude of species.
When they camped that night they sat close to each other beside the fire and talked quietly. Sepoo spoke to him of the secrets and the mystery of the forest and the deeply felt beliefs of his people, and Daniel understood. In some measure they were his beliefs too and he accepted the reasons for the customs of these people as Sepoo explained them, and admired the wisdom and virtue of their lore. Sepoo called him Kuokoa, which meant The one I rescued. Daniel accepted the name, even though he knew it was meant as a monument to Sepoo's deed and a reminder of his debt to the old man.
They came to the MOMU track through the forest near SengiSengi in the late afternoon and lay up at the forest edge until it was dark. Then they crossed the open groun in the night.
Sepoo led Daniel to the logging road where he had abandoned the Landrover almost ten days previously but even Sepoo could not lead him directly to the stranded vehicle. It was only the following day that they at last found the Landrover exactly as Daniel had left it behind its screen of dense undergrowth, sunk to its axles in the soft forest floor.
There were no fresh human tracks around it and the video equipment was still in its aluminum carrying cases. Daniel laid it out on the tailboard of the vehicle and checked it quickly.
The camera was not working. Either the batteries were flat after standing so long, or else the moisture had penetrated the mechanism.
Daniel noticed droplets behind the glass of the lens and condensation beaded the casing.
It was a bitter- disappointment, but Danny could only hope that the batteries could still be recharged or that a rudimentary cleaning and drying, once he reached Gondola, would get the camera serviceable again.
He gave Sepoo the case of cassettes to carry while he took for himself the camera, the lens and the spare battery packs, a burden of almost seventy pounds to lug through the steaming forest.
