uselessly through air, his speed plummeting him down into the basin of
the plain.
The old bird caught and broke out of his roll with wings half-cocked,
and streaked down after the other. In one veteran stroke of skill he
had wrested the advantage.
Get him! screamed David. Get him when he turns!
Now!
The young bird was streaking towards the tree-toops and swift death, he
flared his wings to break his fall, turning desperately to avoid the
lethal stoop of his enemy. In that moment he was vulnerable and the old
eagle reached forward with his terrible spiked talons and without
slackening the searing speed of his dive he hit the other bird in the
critical moment of his turn.
The thud of the impact carried clearly to the watchers on the hill and
there was a puff of feathers like the burst of explosives, black from
the wings and white from the breast.
Locked together by the old bird's honed killing claws, they tumbled,
wing over tangled wing, feathers streaming from their straining bodies
and then drifting away like thistledown on the light breeze.
Still joined in mortal combat, they struck the top branches of one of
the leadwood trees, and fell through them to come to rest at last in a
high fork as an untidy bundle of ruffled feathers and trailing wings.
Leading Debra over the rough ground David hurried down the hill and
through the coarse stands of arrow grass to the tree.
Can you see them? Debra asked anxiously, as David focused his
binoculars on the struggling pair.
They are trapped, David told her. The old fellow has his claws buried
to the hilt in the other's back. He will never be able to free them and
they have fallen across the fork, one on either side of the tree. The
screams of rage and agony rang from the hills about them, and the female
eagle sailed anxiously above the leadwood. She added her querulous
screeching to the sound of conflict.
The young bird is dying. David studied him through the lens, watching
the carmine drops ooze from the gaping yellow beak to fall and glisten
upon the snowy breast, like a dying king's rubies.
And the old bird- Debra listened to the clamour with face upturned, her
eyes dark with c oncem.
He will never get those claws loose, they lock automatically as soon as
pressure is applied and he will not be able to lift himself. He will
die also. Can't you do something?
Debra was tugging at his arm. Can't you help him? Gently he tried to
explain to her that the birds were locked together seventy feet above
the earth. The hole of the leadwood was smooth and without branches for
the first fifty feet of its height. It would take days of effort to
reach the birds, and by then it would be too late.
Even if one could reach them, darling, they are two wild creatures,
fierce and dangerous, those beaks and talons could tear the eyes out of
your head or rip you to the bone, nature does not like interference in
her designs. Isn't there anything we can do? she pleaded.
Yes, he answered quietly. Ve can come back in the morning to see if he
has been able to free himself. But we will bring a gun with us, in case
he has not. in the dawn they came together to the leadwood tree.
The young bird was dead, hanging limp and graceless, but the old bird
was still alive, linked by his claws to the carcass of the other, weak
and dying but, with the furious yellow flames still burning in his eyes.
He heard their voices and twisted the shaggy old head and opened his
beak in a last defiant cry.
David loaded the shotgun, snapping the barrels closed and staring up at
the old eagle. Not you alone, old friend, he thought, and he lifted the
gun to his shoulder and hit him with two charges of buckshot. They left
him hanging in tatters with trailing wings and the quick patter of blood
slowing to a dark steady drip. David felt as though he had destroyed a
part of himself in that blast of gunfire, and the shadow of it was cast
over the bright days that followed.
These few days sped past too swiftly for David, and when they were
almost gone he and Debra spent the last of them wandering together
across Jabulani, visiting each of their special places and seeking out
the various herds or individual animals almost as if they were taking
farewell of old friends. In the evening they came to the place amongst
the fever trees beside the pools, and they sat there until the sun had
fallen below the earth in a splendour of purples and muted pinks. Then
the mosquitoes began whining about their heads, and they strolled back
hand in hand and came to the homestead in the dark.
They packed their bags that night and left them on the stoop, ready for
an early start. Then they drank champagne beside the barbecue fire. The
wine lifted their mood and they laughed together in their little island
of firelight in the vast ocean of the African night - but for David
there were echoes from the laughter, and he was aware of a sense of
finality, of an ending of something and a new beginning.
When they took off from the landing-strip in the early morning, David
circled twice over the estate, climbing slowly, and the pools glinted
like gunmetal amongst the hills as the low sun touched them. The land
was lush with the severe unpromising shade of green, so different from
that of the lands of the northern hemisphere, and the servants stood in
the yard of the homestead, shading their eyes and waving up at them,
their shadows lying long and narrow against the ruddy earth.
David came around and steadied on course.
Cape Town, here we come, he said, and Debra smiled and reached across to
lay her hand upon his leg in warm and companionable silence.
They had the suite at the Mount Nelson Hotel, preferring its ancient
elegance and spacious palmy gardens to the modern slabs of glass and
concrete upon the foreshore and the rocks of Sea Point. They stayed in
the suite for the two days, awaiting the Brig's arrival, for David had
grown unaccustomed to humanity in its massed and unlovely multitudes,
and found the quick inquisitive glances and murmurs of pity that
followed him hard to stomach.
on the second day the Brig arrived. He knocked on the door of the suite
and then entered with his aggressive and determined stride. He was lean
and hard and brown, as David remembered, and when he and Debra had
embraced, he turned to David and his hand was dry and leathery, but it
seemed that he looked at David with a new calculation in the fierce
warrior eyes.
While Debra bathed and dressed for the evening, he took David to his own
suite and poured whisky for him without asking his preference. He gave
David the glass and began immediately to discuss the arrangements he had
made.
Friedman will be at the reception. I will introduce him to Debra and
let them talk for a while, then he will be seated next to her at the
dinner-table. This will give us the opportunity to persuade Debra to
undergo an examination later, Before we go any further, sir, David
interrupted, I want your assurance that at no time will it ever be
suggested to her that there is a possibility of Debra regaining her
sight.
Very well.
I mean, at no time whatsoever. Even if Friedman determines that surgery
is necessary, it must be for some other reason than to restore sight, I
don't think that is possible, the Brig snapped angrily. If matters go
that far, then Debra must be told. It would not be fair It was David's
turn for anger, although the frozen mask of his features remained