than you'll ever learn.
He moved away heavily, noisily, and she wanted to strike the insect from
her cheek and run again, but some instinct warned her. She waited five
minutes, and then ten. The insect moved up into her hair.
Akkers spoke again out of the darkness near her. All right, you clever
bitch. We'll get you yet, and she heard him move away. This time she
knew he had gone.
She brushed the insect from her hair, shuddering with horror. Then she
stood up and moved quietly into the forest. Her fingers were stiff and
cold on the fastenings of her slacks, but she loosened them and squatted
to relieve the burning ache in her lower belly.
She stood up again and felt the child move within her body. The feel of
it evoked all her maternal instincts of protection. She must find a
safe place for her child. She thought of the hide by the pools.
How to reach them? For she was now completely lost.
Then she remembered David telling her about the wind, the rain wind out
of the west, now reduced to an occasional light air, and she waited for
the next breath of it on her cheek. It gave her direction. She turned
her back to the next gust and set off steadily through the forest with
hands held out ahead to prevent herself running into one of the trunks.
If only she could reach the pools, she could follow the bank to the
hide.
As the cyclonic winds at the centre of the storm turned upon their axis,
so they swung, changing direction constantly and Debra followed them
faithfully, beginning a wide aimless circle through the forest.
Akkers raged through the brightly lit homestead of Jabulani, jerking
open drawers and kicking in locked cupboard doors.
He found the gun cabinet in David's office, and ransacked the desk
drawers for keys. He found none, and giggled and swore with
frustration.
He crossed the room to the built-in cupboard unit.
There was a sealed-cell electric lantern on the shelf with a dozen
packets of shotgun shells. He took down the lantern eagerly and thumbed
the switch. The beam was bright white, even in the overhead lights, and
he sucked his teeth and chuckled happily.
Once more he ran into the kitchen, pausing to select a long
stainless-steel carving knife from the cutlery drawer before hurrying
across the yard to the gate and along the path.
In the lantern beam, Debra's footprints showed clearly in the soft earth
with his own overlaying them. He followed them to where she had
blundered off the path, and found the mark of her body where she had
lain.
Clever bitch, he chuckled again and followed her tracks through the
forest. She had laid an easy trail to follow, dragging a passage
through the rain-heavy grass and wiping the droplets from the stems. To
the hunter's eye it was a clearly blazed trail.
Every few minutes he paused to throw the beam of the lantern ahead of
him amongst the trees. He was thrilling now to the hunter's lust, the
primeval force which was the mainspring of his existence. His earlier
set-back made the chase sweeter for him.
He went on carefully, following the wandering trail, the aimless
footprints turning haphazardly in a wide circle.
He stopped again and panned the lantern beam across the rain-laden grass
tops, and he saw something move at the extreme range of the lamp,
something pale and round.
He held it in the lantern beam, and saw the woman's pale strained face
as she moved forward slowly and hesitantly. She went like a
sleep-walker, with arms extended ahead of her, and with shuffling
uncertain gait.
She was coming directly towards him, oblivious of the light which held
her captive in its beam. Once she paused to hug her swollen belly and
sob with weariness and fear.
The legs of her trousers were sodden with rain water and her flimsy
shoes were already torn, and as she hobbled closer he saw that her arms
and her lips were blue and shivering with the cold.
Akkers stood quietly watching her coming towards him, like a chicken
drawn to the swaying cobra, Her long dark hair hung in damp ropes down
her shoulders, and dangled in her face. Her thin blouse was wet also
with drops fallen from the trees, and it was plastered over the
thrusting mound of her belly.
He let her come closer, enjoying the fierce thrill of having her in his
power. Drawing out the final consummation of his vengeance, hoarding
each moment of it like a miser.
When she was five paces from him he played the beam full in her face,
and he giggled.
She screamed, her whole face convulsing, and she whirled like a wild
animal and ran blindly. Twenty flying paces before she ran headlong
into the stem of a morula, tree.
She fell back, collapsing to her knees and sobbed aloud, clutching at
her bruised cheek.
Then she scrambled to her feet and stood shivering, turning her head and
cocking it for the next sound.
Silently he moved around her, drawing close and he giggled again, close
behind her.
She screamed again and ran blindly, panic-stricken, witless with terror
until an ant-bear hole caught her foot and flung her down heavily to the
ground, and she lay there sobbing.
Akkers moved leisurely and silently after her, he was enjoying himself
for the first time in two years. Like a cat he did not want to end it,
he wanted it to last a long time.
He stooped over her and whispered a filthy word, and instantly she
rolled to her feet and was up and running again, wildly, sightlessly,
through the trees. He followed her, and in his crazed mind she became a
symbol Of all the thousand animals he had hunted and killed.
David ran barefooted in the soft earth of the road. He ran without
feeling his bruised and torn skin, without feeling the pounding of his
heart nor the protest of his lungs.
As the road rounded the shoulder of the hill and dipped towards the
homestead he stopped abruptly, and stared panting at the lurid glow of
the arc lights that flood lit the grounds and garden of Jabulani. It
made no sense that the floodlights should be burnin& and David felt a
fresh flood of alarm. He sprinted on down the hill.
He ran through the empty, ransacked rooms shouting her name, but the
echoes mocked him.
When he reached the front veranda he saw something moving in the
darkness, beyond the broken screen door.
Zulu! He ran forward. Here, boy! Here, boy! Where is she? The dog
staggered up the steps towards him, his tail wagged a perfunctory
greeting, but he was obviously hurt. A heavy blow along the side of his
head had broken the jaw, or dislocated it, so that it hung lopsided and
grotesque. He was still stunned, and David knelt beside him.
Where is she, Zulu? Where is she? The dog seemed to make an effort to
gather its scattered wits. Where is she, boy? She's not in the house.
Where is she? Find her, boy, find her. He led the labrador out into
the yard, and he followed gamely as David circled the house. At the
back door Zulu picked up the scent on the fresh damp earth. He started
resolutely towards the gate, and David saw the footprints in the
floodlights, Debra's and the big masculine prints which ran after them.
As Zulu crossed the yard, David turned back into his office. The
lantern was missing from its shelf, but there was a five-cell flashlight
near the back. He shoved it into his pocket and grabbed a handful of
shotgun shells.
Then he went quickly to the gun cabinet and unlocked it. He snatched