08 Safari Adventure Page 8

  ‘They have a good reason for it,’ said Crosby. ‘If some enemy tries to enter your home, he has to bend far down to get in. He can’t defend himself in that position. He can be knocked on the head or jabbed with a spear before he can get all the way through the door.’

  Other men came stooping out of the mud huts. They smiled when they saw Crosby, who was evidently well known to them and well liked.

  Each man wore a cowhide cape over his shoulders and nothing else. His hair was plastered with red clay and worn in a short braid over the forehead and a long braid behind. His ears had been pierced and stretched so that they hung almost down to his shoulders and the hole that had been bored in the ear-lobe in childhood had been pulled larger and larger so that in a man of middle age it was big enough to carry a good-sized package. Which was lucky, since a man’s cape had no pockets.

  When any man smiled Roger could see that he had two teeth lacking in the lower jaw. He asked Crosby about it.

  ‘These people sometimes get lockjaw. Then the teeth lock together so that they can’t eat or drink. They knock out two teeth so that if they contract this disease they can still get food and drink into the mouth.’

  ‘But lockjaw can be cured. Don’t they call a doctor?’

  ‘They don’t believe in doctors. In fact they don’t believe much in anything that is modern. They stick to their own way of doing things.’

  A fine-looking Masai approached Roger with a smile and spat in his face. Roger wiped his face. He looked so astonished that Crosby had to laugh.

  The Masai waited as if expecting something.

  ‘Spit back,’ said Crosby.

  Roger could not believe his ears.

  ‘Spitting in your face is a sign of friendship,’ the warden told him. ‘Don’t keep him waiting or he’ll be offended. Spit back.’

  Roger summoned up all the saliva he could gather and spat back. The big Masai grinned from ear to ear.

  Women and children began to emerge from the huts. They were too timid to come near. The little brown bodies of the children were bare. The women were dressed in metal - but their armour was not like that of the knights of old. Their arms were buried in metal bracelets, they wore necklaces of metal beads, huge metal earrings several inches wide hung from their ears, metal ornaments circled their waists, and their legs were completely buried from ankle to knee under wire spirals. The wire was the only thing that looked modern.

  ‘Where do they buy the wire?’

  ‘They don’t buy it. They just steal it from the nearest telephone line.’

  Roger could not help noticing that these primitive people were not dirty. ‘For people who live in mud huts they keep themselves remarkably clean. They must bathe twice a day.’

  ‘Hardly.’ Crosby said. ‘They get only two baths in a lifetime - one at birth and the other when they become adults.’

  ‘Then how do they keep clean?’

  ‘Sand. Have you ever tried a sand bath? It will take the skin off you if you’re not used to it. These people are used to it and it just takes off the dirt.’

  Crosby spoke to the Masai in their own language. He pointed at the cheetah and at one of the cattle that strayed among the huts. The men nodded vigorously, and one of them ran into a hut and came out with a bow and arrow.

  ‘We’re going to get some blood for your cheetah,’ Crosby said. ‘But without killing anything. We’ve come to the right place. The Masai are like the cheetah - they live on blood. Blood and milk. Perhaps it’s the strangest diet of any people in the world - although some of the reducing diets in your country are just about as strange.’

  ‘You don’t mean the Masai live on nothing but blood and milk? No meat, vegetables, fruit?’

  ‘A few of the modern ones will take a little meat, perhaps on a holiday. Most of the people won’t touch it And never a vegetable of any sort, or a soup, or a salad, or a bun or biscuit or bread of any kind, or pudding or cake. No cheese, no butter, no eggs, no jam or jelly, nothing sweet, no fruit of any description.’

  ‘Just blood and milk,’ marvelled Roger. ‘How can they live on that? You’d think they’d dry up and blow away. But they look pretty strong.’

  ‘They are strong. And brave. A Masai will wrestle with a lion or a leopard. A young Masai must kill a full-grown lion with nothing but a spear before he can claim to be a man.’

  Roger looked at the cows. That’s where they get the milk. Bat how about the blood?’

  ‘Come. Well show you.’

  The man with the bow and arrow selected a cow. He came to within six feet of it, dropped on one knee, and aimed at the animal’s throat.

  So, thought Roger, that was all guff - about not killing anything. He’s certainly going to kill that cow.

  The cow did not seem to be alarmed. She peacefully chewed her cud. The bowman fired his arrow and it struck home. The cow went on peacefully chewing her cud as if nothing had happened.

  Roger noticed that the arrow had penetrated only a fraction of an inch. A shoulder behind the tip had prevented it from entering farther. The point had evidently been so sharp that the animal had not felt it.

  The bowman pulled out the arrow and blood poured from the jugular vein. Another Masai caught the blood in a large gourd. The cow stood as patiently as if she were merely being milked.

  When the gourd was full a sort of dirty-looking paste was applied to the small hole.

  ‘A mixture of ashes and herbs,’ Crosby said. ‘You see how that stops the flow. It will also prevent infection.’

  The Masai spoke to Crosby and kept glancing at Roger. The warden nodded, and one of the men dived into a hut and brought out a small gourd. From the large gourd they poured about half a cupful of blood into the small container. Then one crouched beside the cow’s udders and filled the small gourd with milk. With his finger he stirred the two liquids together - then offered the gourd to Roger. Roger looked helplessly at the warden.

  ‘Drink it,’ Crosby advised. ‘They’re trying to be nice to you. Don’t let them down. You’ll hurt their feelings.’

  ‘How about my feelings?’ grumbled Roger.

  ‘Never mind your feelings, young man,’ said Crosby rattier sharply. Tn Africa you show respect for the Africans. If you don’t we have unpleasant incidents like the Mau Mau massacres when even our wives have to carry revolvers and no white man’s life is safe.’

  ‘I get you,’ Roger said meekly and raised the gourd to his lips. He drank down the contents without stopping, trying not to taste the stuff. But when he got it down he realized that it had not been unpleasant after all.

  The effect upon the Masai was magical. They chattered and grinned and patted his arm. Now they really accepted him as a friend.

  It was Chee’s turn - but for him, no milk thank you. He eagerly lapped up the fresh blood. In the meantime the Masai insisted upon tapping another cow so that Chee would dine well tomorrow.

  On the way back to the lodge Roger had some questions to ask.

  ‘Do the Masai raise cattle just to get their blood?’

  ‘Oh no, they must have cattle to buy wives. A man must pay three or four cows to the girl’s parents. The more cattle he has the more wives he can buy. A Masai’s wealth is reckoned in cattle, not in money. He may not own one solitary shilling, but if he has a hundred cattle he is a rich man.’

  ‘Because he can sell them and make a lot of money?’

  ‘No. He refuses to sell them. If he sold them, he wouldn’t have them. He would have nothing but money, and he doesn’t care a hang about money. All he cares about is cattle. That’s what makes him such a problem.’

  ‘How so?’

  There are a hundred thousand Masai and they own about a million cattle. These cattle destroy thousands of square miles of land. They eat not only the grass above ground but the roots as well, so grassland becomes desert. Wild animals do not eat the roots, and grassland remains grassland. The Masai don’t need so many cattle, but we do need plenty of food for wild animals if we hope to
keep on bringing tourists here to see the greatest zoo on earth.’

  They stopped at the river to let Chee drink. Chee walked to the water’s edge, looked upstream and down stream and across. He hissed loudly, then drank.

  ‘A wise cat,’ said Crosby. ‘He hisses to scare the crocs away. A lion or a leopard or an antelope would probably just stick his nose into the water and drink. Then a

  croc might grab him by the nose and pull him in. A cheetah is too smart to take that risk.’

  Chee bounced back into the car without being led. He wasn’t satisfied to stay on the floor. He tried to climb up on the seat beside Roger. Roger slid over to the centre to give him room and Chee sat up beside the open window.

  The animal chose to thrust out his head just as the car passed close to a group of tourists. A woman screamed, ‘Look! They’ve got a tiger in that car.’

  The warden grinned and stepped on the accelerator.

  ‘The old story,’ he said. ‘Everybody knows or thinks he knows about the tiger or the leopard or perhaps the jaguar. But not one in a hundred has ever seen the cheetah - the friendliest of all the big cats.’ .

  Chee was sometimes almost too friendly. At night he insisted upon sharing Roger’s bed. And since he was a good seven feet from nose-tip to tail-tip and his long legs reached three feet across the bed there was not much room left for the boy. To make matters more difficult, he purred like a grist mill in Roger’s ear. But it would take more than that to keep a healthy young teenager awake after such a big day.

  Chapter 15

  The trial

  ‘Something on your mind, Hal ?’

  Crosby had noticed that Hal was merely toying with his breakfast, letting his coffee grow cold. He had not joined in the conversation with the warden and Roger -and Chee, who was as usual purring so loudly that the others had to raise their voices to drown him. Hal’s thoughts seemed far away.

  He looked up and smiled. ‘You just caught me dreaming.’

  ‘Anything I can help you about?’

  Hal hesitated. ‘Well - yes. It’s about - your friend, Judge Singh. You think a lot of him, don’t you?’

  ‘I suppose I do,’ admitted Crosby. ‘He goes out of his way to be friendly and helpful. He’s done all sorts of things for me. Even saved my life the day before yesterday - you saw him do that.’

  ‘It wasn’t…’ exploded Roger, then stopped as he saw a warning in Hal’s eyes. He itched to say that it had been Hal who had saved the warden, not Singh. Singh had almost killed him.

  ‘And the judge is my best ally against the poachers,’

  Crosby went on. ‘We could really do nothing without him. We can catch some of them but we can’t punish them. They are punished in his court - he fines them of sends them to prison. The law allows very heavy sentences for the crime of poaching.’

  ‘Does he give them all the law allows?’

  ‘Yes, he says that he does.’

  ‘Have you been down to his court?’

  ‘Oh no. I’m too busy here. I do my job and let him do his.’

  Hal went back to his eggs and bacon. He ate in silence for a few minutes. Then he said, ‘An interesting man, the judge. I ‘d like to see him at work. How about our hopping down there this morning to take a look at the trial?’

  ‘I can’t go,’ said Crosby. ‘But there’s no reason why you shouldn’t Only trouble is - it’s a 250-mile trip to Mombasa and back and the road is pretty bad. But then - what am I thinking of? You’re a pilot You proved that when I went to sleep on the stick. Take the Stork. Wait a minute.’

  He went to his desk and brought out a map.

  ‘Now - here we are - and here’s Mombasa. As you know, it’s on an island connected with the mainland by causeways. Here’s the landing field.’ He made a cross with his pencil. ‘You’ll get a taxi there and go to the court-house - which is here.’ He made another cross.

  On the airstrip, Crosby superintended the fuelling of the Stork, filling both wing tanks, also an emergency tank in the back of the plane. He pointed out the little hand pump that would transfer this petrol, if needed, to the wing tanks.

  He translated the German instructions on the instrument board and explained some of the mechanical mysteries that had baffled Hal.

  ‘Get full steam up before you take off,’ he said. ‘Otherwise you’ll never clear those trees at the end of the strip.’

  Hal climbed aboard. Roger was about to follow but his brother stopped him.

  ‘Stay out of it, kid. I want a little practice first.’

  ‘Can’t you practise with me aboard?’

  ‘Just let me take it up - and come down again. Then Til pick you up.’

  Roger began to object but Crosby cut in.

  ‘Your brother’s right. It’s a touchy take-off.’ Roger looked disappointed and a little angry. If Hal could take this risk, why couldn’t he? The warden smiled. ‘I can’t afford to lose you both, you know.’

  ‘I’ll be back in five minutes.’ Hal said. ‘Sooner than that if I forget which button to push.’

  He looked at the wind-sock. It didn’t give him much encouragement. It ought to be blowing up or down the strip. It was blowing across. On a narrow strip, walled in by trees, this could mean trouble.

  He let down the Perspex hood, thus completely enclosing himself in the transparent bubble. Looks like a dummy in a store window, thought Roger crossly.

  Hal started the ignition. He tested the booster pump and waited for the oil temperature to rise.

  He taxied to the end of the strip and turned about. Down went the throttle. The plane moved, but too slowly, Hal gritted his teeth as if that would help the engine. He wished the strip were asphalt instead of grass. The plane stumbled on, gathering speed.

  Now it was floating on the blades of grass. Now it was in the air.

  Hal set the flaps at fifteen degrees for extra lift. The trees at the end of the strip were coming towards him at an alarming rate.

  He was worried too about the cross-wind that kept pushing him to the right. This was a small plane, as planes go, but still its thirty-nine-foot wing span seemed too much in this narrow trap.

  The end of the right wing was already tickling the leaves of the trees. A small branch, no thicker than a finger, would be enough to send the whole contraption crashing to the ground.

  He cleared the trees by inches. Now he had time to think of the things he might have done - give it a bit more flap, trim back the elevator a little farther, keep the nose closer into the wind - he would remember and do better next time.

  He circled until his nerves settled down, then straightened out towards the strip and prepared to land.

  Full flaps, speed down for the approach, ruddering to fishtail off the height - he skimmed the treetops, sank like a falling leaf and touched the grass. Now he knew where the brakes were, and used them.

  The plane lumbered over the none-too-smooth ground and came to a halt. Hal opened his bubble.

  ‘Good enough,’ said the warden heartily. Even Roger, still a bit sulky, had to admit it wasn’t bad. He climbed into the co-pilot’s seat.

  This time the plane seemed to know its master. It rose as a plane should, levelled off at six thousand feet, and followed the Tsavo River eastwards to the railway station at Tsavo. ,

  Here Hal swung to the right Below him was the red road to Mombasa and beside it the railway.

  This had been the scene of very tragic events. Years ago when the railway was being built, newspapers all over the world were running horror stories about the ‘man-eaters of Tsavo’, lions that had developed a taste for human flesh and were killing and eating railway workers by-the score in spite of all efforts to track them down.

  On the left now was the gleaming ribbon of the Galana River on its way to the Indian Ocean. Northward stretched the wilderness of Tsavo Park for a hundred miles.

  The foaming waters of Lugard’s Falls flashed white in the morning sun. Around the pool at the base of the falls elephants, rhinos, an
d giraffes were stooping to drink.. Animals were clustered around a lake and several water holes. Herds of buffalo, zebra, and wildebeest were mowing the grass in the open meadows. The day-loving lions were out looking for breakfast, but the night-loving leopards had retired into the darkness of the woods.

  A thin spiral of smoke rose from the trees.

  ‘A poacher’s camp,’ Hal guessed.

  ‘And there’s a trap-line,’ exclaimed Roger. ‘Oh boy -what a long one. It must be a good five miles.’

  Hal did some mental arithmetic. “That would come to around twenty-six thousand feet. And if there’s a trap every fifty feet that would come to something more than five hundred traps. Suppose only half of them caught animals.’

  ‘Suppose nothing of the kind,’ said Roger. ‘Yesterday there was an animal in every single trap.’

  ‘All right. And the poachers clear the traps once a week. Five hundred dead animals a week - more than two thousand a month. I can’t believe it. Must be something wrong with my figures.’

  ‘What does it matter?’ Roger said. ‘Even a hundred a month would be a hundred too many. And don’t forget,’ this is just one trap-line. And the warden says there are others two or three times as long. And hundreds of trap-lines all over East Africa.’

  It was easy navigation. All you had to do was to follow the road and railway. Actually the road could not be seen because it was concealed beneath a continuous cloud of red dust stirred up by traffic. The ribbon of red wound down to Mombasa, already visible on its coral island set like a jewel in the blue of the Indian Ocean.

  The plane landed lightly on the broad airfield eight miles from town and the boys took a taxi across the causeway and through the busy streets of the island city to the court-house.

  Hal peered in through the crack between the double doors.

  At the far end of the room behind a desk on a high platform sat Judge Sindar Singh. He did not look so little now. His black robe gave him importance and dignity. Before him stood the poachers, all of them. The rest of the room was full of spectators, also standing. There was no jury, no prosecutor, no defender. Judge Singh was the sole authority. This was not a criminal court - strangely enough, the murder of helpless animals was not considered a criminal offence.