In the vestibule, which, despite the late hour was busy with victims of one kind or another, his harried gaze alighted on a small boy, perched on his mother's lap. He had injured his belly apparently. His shirt, which was too large for him, was stained with blood; his face with tears. The mother did not look up as Locke moved through the throng. The child did however. He raised his head as if knowing that Locke was about to pass by, and smiled radiantly.
There was nobody Locke knew at Tetelman's store; and all the information he could bully from the hired hands, most of whom were drunk to the point of being unable to stand, was that their masters had gone off into the jungle the previous day. Locke chased the most sober of them and persuaded him with threats to accompany him back to the village as translator. He had no real idea of how he would make his peace with the tribe. He was only certain that he had to argue his innocence. After all, he would plead, it hadn't been he who had fired the killing shot. There had been misunderstandings, to be certain, but he had not harmed the people in any way. How could they, in all conscience, conspire to hurt him? If they should require some penance of him he was not above acceding to their demands. Indeed, might there not be some satisfaction in the act? He had seen so much suffering of late. He wanted to be cleansed of it. Anything they asked, within reason, he would comply with; anything to avoid dying like the others. He'd even give back the land.
It was a rough ride, and his morose companion com- plained often and incoherently. Locke turned a deaf ear. There was no time for loitering. Their noisy progress, the jeep engine complaining at every new acrobatic required of it, brought the jungle alive on every side, a repertoire of wails, whoops and screeches. It was an urgent, hungry place, Locke thought: and for the first time since setting foot on this sub-continent he loathed it with all his heart. There was no room here to make sense of events; the best that could be hoped was that one be allowed a niche to breathe awhile between one squalid flowering and the next.
Half an hour before nightfall, exhausted by the journey, they came to the outskirts of the village. The place had altered not at all in the meagre days since he'd last been here, but the ring of huts was clearly deserted. The doors gaped; the communal fires, always alight, were ashes. There was neither child nor pig to turn an eye towards him as he moved across the compound. When he reached the centre of the ring he stood still, looking about him for some clue as to what had happened there. He found none, however. Fatigue irade him foolhardy. Mustering his fractured strength, he shouted into the hush:
'Where are you?'
Two brilliant red macaws, finger-winged, rose screeching from the trees on the far side of the village. A few moments after, a figure emerged from the thicket of balsa and jacaranda. It was not one of the tribe, but Dancy. He paused before stepping fully into sight; then, recognising Locke, a broad smile broke his face, and he advanced into the compound. Behind him, the foliage shook as others made their way through it. Tetelman was there, as were several Norwegians, led by a man called Bj0rnstr0m, whom Locke had encountered briefly at the trading post. His face, beneath a shock of sun-bleached hair, was like cooked lobster.
'My God,' said Tetelman, 'what are you doing here?'
'I might ask you the same question,' Locke replied testily.
Bj0rnstr0m waved down the raised rifles of his three companions and strode forward, bearing a placatory smile.
'Mr Locke,' the Norwegian said, extending a leather-gloved hand. 'It is good we meet.'
Locke looked down at the stained glove with disgust, and Bj0rnstr0m, flashing a self-admonishing look, pulled it off. The hand beneath was pristine.
'My apologies,' he said. 'We've been working.'
'At what?' Locke asked, the acid in his stomach edging its way up into the back of his throat.
Tetelman spat. 'Indians,' he said.
'Where's the tribe?' Locke said.
Again, Tetelman: 'Bj0rnstr0m claims he's got rights to this territory ...'
'The tribe,' Locke insisted. 'Where are they?'
The Norwegian toyed with his glove.
'Did you buy them out, or what?' Locke asked.
'Not exactly,' Bj0rnstr0m replied. His English, like his profile, was impeccable.
'Bring him along,' Dancy suggested with some enthusiasm. 'Let him see for himself.'
Bj0rnstr0m nodded. 'Why not?' he said. 'Don't touch anything, Mr Locke. And tell your carrier to stay where he is.'
Dancy had already about turned, and was heading into the thicket; now Bj0rnstr0m did the same, escorting Locke across the compound towards a corridor hacked through the heavy foliage. Locke could scarcely keep pace; his limbs were more reluctant with every step he took. The ground had been heavily trodden along this track. A litter of leaves and orchid blossoms had been mashed into the sodden soil.
They had dug a pit in a small clearing no more than a hundred yards from the compound. It was not deep, this pit, nor was it very large. The mingled smells of lime and petrol cancelled out any other scent.
Tetelman, who had reached the clearing ahead of Locke, hung back from approaching the lip of the earthworks, but Dancy was not so fastidious. He strode around the far side of the pit and beckoned to Locke to view the contents.
The tribe were putrefying already. They lay where they had been thrown, in a jumble of breasts and buttocks and faces and limbs, their bodies tinged here and there with purple and black. Flies built helter- skelters in the air above them.
'An education,' Dancy commented.
Locke just looked on as Bj0rnstr0m moved around the other side of the pit to join Dancy.
'All of them?' Locke asked.
The Norwegian nodded. 'One fell swoop,' he said, pronouncing each word with unsettling precision.
'Blankets,' said Tetelman, naming the murder weapon.
'But so quickly ...' Locke murmured.
'It's very efficient,' said Dancy. 'And difficult to prove. Even if anybody ever asks.'
'Disease is natural,' Bj0rnstr0m observed. 'Yes? Like the trees.'
Locke slowly shook his head, his eyes pricking.
'I hear good things of you,' Bj0rnstr0m said to him. 'Perhaps we can work together.'
Locke didn't even attempt to reply. Others of the Norwegian party had laid down their rifles and were now getting back to work, moving the few bodies still to be pitched amongst their fellows from the forlorn heap beside the pit. Locke could see a child amongst the tangle, and an old man, whom even now the burial party were picking up. The corpse looked jointless as they swung it over the edge of the hole. It tumbled down the shallow incline and came to rest face up, its arms flung up to either side of its head in a gesture of submission, or expulsion. It was the elder of course, whom Cherrick had faced. His palms were still red. There was a neat bullet-hole in his temple. Disease and hopelessness had not been entirely efficient, apparently.
Locke watched while the next of the bodies was thrown into the mass grave, and a third to follow that.
Bj0rnstr0m, lingering on the far side of the pit, was lighting a cigarette. He caught Locke's eye.
'So it goes,' he said.
From behind Locke, Tetelman spoke.
'We thought you wouldn't come back,' he said, per- haps attempting to excuse his alliance with Bj0rnstr0m.
'Stumpf is dead,' said Locke.
'Well, even less to divide up,' Tetelman said, approaching him and laying a hand on his shoulder. Locke didn't reply; he just stared down amongst the bodies, which were now being covered with lime, only slowly registering the warmth that was running down his body from the spot where Tetelman had touched him. Disgusted, the man had removed his hand, and was staring at the growing bloodstain on Locke's shirt.