in the tones of an enthusiastic tour guide, described the event that had brought them into being. Adid, baffled by the digression, grimaced at the desolation and asked, “Does this bear on what we were talking about?”
“It does in a way.” Fitzhugh got back behind the wheel and drove on, past jagged escarpments honeycombed with caves. “If you listen to my proposal, you will be rid of that fool and spare yourself a lot of trouble.”
“What trouble?”
“The trouble I will cause if you don’t listen to it.”
“You have a great deal of nerve speaking to me in that manner. You sound like an extortionist.”
“I admit it, that is what I am,” Fitzhugh said, stopping again. “Hassan, you are the president of a company that is profiting from gunrunning. Money from gunrunning is being funneled to a Swiss bank account that I am sure has your name on it.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Yes, I would. I was visited by a CNN correspondent not long ago, Phyllis’s replacement. He has seen the videotapes, the photographs, the notes she left behind. It’s only a matter of time before he adds things up and comes to the same conclusion you and I have. Do I need to tell you the trouble that will cause you? And what if he finds out about that Swiss account and the source of its funds? What if he finds out—I know this, Hassan—that you and your father once were suspected of sabotaging Richard Leakey’s plane? Yes, I can accelerate things by going to him with everything I know, and that I will do unless you listen to me.”
The twin black holes in Adid’s head turned toward Fitzhugh.
“Hassan, I am aware how easy it would be for you to see that I meet with an accident. You had better make the arrangements immediately, because I will be there tomorrow.”
“What is in this for you? Who is paying you?”
“What is in it for me?” Fitzhugh pointed to a crude ladder, leaning against an outcrop under the mouth of a shallow cave. “Do you see that? The Taita who live here climb it to leave food offerings for those who were buried under all that lava. It is said that their souls cry out on certain nights, and that they must be appeased or they will bring down on the living the evil that befell them. What made this? A wrathful god or a destructive demon? Both. This Shetani is a place of evil, yet it is sacred also. It is feared and revered. It is a kind of church where the God who is Devil and the Devil who is God is worshipped.”
“I have no patience for this nonsense,” Adid muttered.
“Souls cry out to me,” Fitzhugh said. “The souls of those six dead people. They won’t let me sleep at night until they are appeased. That is what’s in it for me—nothing more than a decent night’s sleep.”
“I am not going to listen to this anymore. Turn around.”
Fitzhugh released the parking brake but did not turn around; he continued on, climbing the road to the crest of a pass from which they could see, far across the oceanic sweep of the Serengeti plains, the stupendous mass of Kilimanjaro. The clouds that normally veiled its peak had lifted, and the snow and ice mantling the great mountain glared in the sun.
“Look!” Fitzhugh said, braking to another stop. “Ice on the equator! Ice in the heart of Africa! A rare thing—like justice.”
Adid looked as if he were about to jump out and go back on foot. A Cape Buffalo bull, staring balefully from under its massive horns, gave him second thoughts.
“The souls cry out to me for justice,” Fitzhugh carried on. “That’s how I can appease them. Not a perfect justice, which would be to see Douglas hang. A partial justice. An African justice. They will settle for half a loaf, and so will I.”
“You have gone mad, have you not?” Adid said. “But I will humor the madman.”
“Yes! You are something of a devil, Hassan, but a minor devil compared with our American friend. And I seek your help in delivering justice. Do your old friend the Ambler a service. Help him to sleep at night.”
“But I cannot humor the madman for much longer.”
“You said you do business in Khartoum. Do you know people in the government?”
“You cannot do business in Khartoum without knowing people in the government,” Adid said, speaking as he would to a child.