"Do something!" shrieked the minister. "Make it go away!" His bodyguards looked back over their shoulders and, seeing the impasse, regained their courage. They halted, unslung their weapons and began cautiously closing in on the bull and his victim.
"No! Craig yelled over the rattle of loading automatic weapons. "Don't shood" He was certain that his insurance did not cover "death by deliberate rifle-fire', and, quite apart from the fifteen thousand dollars, a volley would sweep the area behind the bull, which included the marquee and its occupants, a scattering of fleeing women and children and Craig himself.
One of the uniformed bodyguards raised his rifle and took aim. His recent exertions and terror did nothing for the steadiness of his hand. The muzzle of his weapon described widening circles in the air.
"No! Craig bellowed again and flung himself face down on the floor of d-te trailer. At that moment a tall, skinny figure stepped between the wavering rifle-muzzle and the great bull.
"Shadrach!" whispered Craig thankfully, as the old man imperiously pushed up the rifle-barrel and then turned to face the bull.
"I see you, Nkunzi Kakhulu! Great bull!" he greeted him courteously.
The bull swung its head to the sound of his voice, and very clearly he saw Shadrach also. He snorted and nodded threateningly.
"Haul Prince of cattle! How beautiful you are! Shadrach advanced a pace towards those vicious pike-sharp horns.
The bull pawed at the earth and then made a warning rush at him. Shadrach stood him down and the bull stopped.
"How noble your head! he crooned. "Your eyes are like dark moons!" The bull hooked his horns towards him, but the swing was less vicious and Shadrach answered with another step forward. The shrieks of terrorstruck women and children died away. Even the most fainthearted stopped running, and looked back at the old man and the red beast.
"Your horns are sharp as the stabbing assegai of great Mzilikazi." Shadrach kept moving forward and the bull blinked uncertainly and squinted at him with red, rimmed eyes.
"How glorious are your testicles," Shadrach murmured soothingly, 'like huge round boulders of granite. Ten thousand cows will feel their weight and majesty." The bull backed up a pace and gave another halfhearted toss of his head.
"Your breath is hot as the north wind, my peerless king of bulls." Shadrach stretched out his hand slowly, and they watched in breathless silence.
"My darling," Shadrach touched the glossy, wet, chocolate-coloured muzzle and the bull jerked away nervously, and' then came back cautiously to snuffle at Shadrach's fingers. "My sweet darling, father of great bulls-" gently Shadrach slipped his forefinger into the heavy bronze nose, ring and held the bull's head. He stooped and placed his mouth over the gaping, pink-lined nostrils and blew his own breath loudly into them. The bull shuddered, and Craig could clearly see the bunched muscle in his shoulders relaxing. Shadrach straightened and, with his finger still through the nose-ring, walked away and placidly the bull waddled after him with his dewlap swinging. A weak little cheer of relief and disbelief went up from his audienc and subsided as Shadrach cast a withering contemptuous eye around him.
"Nkosi!"he called to Craig. "Get these chattering Mashona monkeys off our land. They are upsetting my darling," he ordered, and Craig hoped fervently that none of his highly placed guests understood Sindebele.
Crai marvelled once again at the almost mystical bond that existed between the Nguni peoples and their cattle.
From that age, long obscured by the mists of time, when the first herds had been driven out of Egypt to begin the centuries-long migrations southwards, the destinies of black man and beast had been inexorably linked. This hump-backed strain of cattle had originated in India, their genus has indic us distinct from the European has taurus, but over the ages had become as African as the tribes that cherished and shared their lives with them. It was strange, Craig pondered, that the cattle, herding tribes see me always to have been the most dominant and warlike: people such as the Masai and Bechuana and Zulu had always lorded it over the mere tillers of the earth. Perhaps it was their constant need to search for grazing, to defend it against others and to protect their herds from predators, both human and animal, that made them so bellicose.
Watching Shadrach lead the huge bull away, there was no mistaking that lordly arrogance now, master and beast were noble in their alliance. Not so the minister of education, still clinging, catlike, to his perch in the jacaranda. Craig went to add his entreaties to those of his bodyguards, who were encouraging him to descend to earth once more.
Peter Fungabera was the last of the official party to leave. He accompanied Craig on a tour of the homestead, sniffing appreciatively the sweet odour of the golden thatching grass that already covered half the roof area.
"My grandfather replaced the original thatch with corrugated asbestos during the war," Craig explained. "Your RPG-7 rocket shells were hot little darlings."
"Yes," Peter agreed evenly. "We started many a good bonfire with them."
"To tell the truth, I am grateful for the chance to restore the building. Thatch is cooler and more picturesque, and both the wiring and plumbing needed replacing-"
"I
must congratulate you on what you have ac com pushed in such a short time. You will soon be living in the grand manner that your ancestors have always enjoyed since they first seized this land." Craig looked at him sharply, searching for malice, but Peter's smile was as charming and easy as always.
"All these improvements add vastly to the value of the property," Craig pointed out. "And you own a goodly share of them."