– as Miguel’s men threw glances at each other. But their faces, in the clear morning light, flashed with extreme confusion. What to do, without Miguel? Without their commander?
Angus yelled: ‘Come any closer he won’t have a head, you fucks. Amy – grab all the car keys. And get the case with the bloods. David – get a gun and get to the car – get in the Land Rover –’
Again the men glanced at each other, confused, angry, and helpless. A few seconds, and Amy was done, brandishing a fistful of car keys in her hand.
‘Angus. I got them! And the bloods.’
‘Go to the car! David!’
Obedient, suppressing his fears, he raced to the car and jumped up and sat at the wheel. His burned, painful hand was poised on the key. Ready to flee the first moment Angus was safe.
The Scotsman was pulling the deadweight of Miguel closer to the Land Rover. Muzzle of the gun still close to his temple. Amy was in the seat next to David, watching. Ready to go. To escape. Ready.
But Miguel was stirring from his torpor, whatever the effect of the euphorbia smoke, it was wearing off – he was fitfully struggling in Angus’s grip; David could see in the headlights – Miguel was trying to wriggle free.
‘Angus!’
The scientist had the muzzle on Miguel’s head, at the temple. David knew what was going to happen. Angus Nairn’s face was set with grim satisfaction.
David watched, appalled, as Angus pulled the trigger: a point-blank execution.
But his grip was unsure: at the last possible moment, Miguel writhed, violently. Again he was the jentilak, the giant of the forest, unkillable, legendary: Angus got off a shot, and blood spat from Miguel’s head, but it was a wound, just a wound in the scalp. The Wolf was alive, and down, and free. And signalling his men.
The first shot of a rifle zinged the morning air. David slammed the gears – then another shot spat against metal, with a chiming crack. The car door swung open and Amy grabbed at Angus – who leapt into the back seat: David floored the pedal, churning the sand, and then at last the wheels got a grip and they lurched forward, picking up speed. Faster. And faster.
The rear window smashed into a hundred shards as a bullet zapped the glass; Angus fired back, through the jagged void, random shots; one and two and three. One man seemed to fall, a squat figure: Enoka. Dead.
Angus screamed: ‘Go!’
Swinging the car, wildly, David shouted: ‘But where –’
‘There!’
They jerked over a hillock at speed, a tongue-chomping vault into the air – then crashed into the sand and raced onwards, rattling everyone and everything: sliding in the gravelly dust, fishtailing. David gripped the wheel as they veered left and right through the dry river plains – slaloming between the camelthorns –
‘David!’
Amy was screaming.
A huge elephant loomed ahead – they were going to crash into the elephant – the slow grey beast was crunching a branch in its mouth; it turned and looked at them, maudlin and pitying –
David tugged the wheel just in time and the car tilted, at speed, and he knew they were going to flip, right over, and pancake. They were going to be crushed, but then the car slammed back onto all four wheels and they raced ahead.
‘The river. Take the river!’
It was an order from Angus. David obeyed.
The car slashed down the mudslide and cracked along the river bed, the wheels churned and the ducks and geese and weaver birds squawked and flailed. David crunched at the gears and accelerated. The big white car was fast and new.
For ten, twenty, thirty, minutes they scythed down the river road. Oryx, drinking placidly from the water, looked up at the noise, and fled. Springboks pronked in fear as the car came splashing over boulders and careering around riverine bends, dangerously fast.
‘This way!’
Angus pointed; David took a fork along a dryer river bed. He grabbed the chance to check behind, once more – and his hopes climaxed: they really were doing it.
They’d escaped.
David felt an urge to sob in horror and scream in triumph at the same time. He did neither. He drove. Silent. The car was silent. They pulled over for a few minutes and Amy found ointment in the car’s first aid box, and she anointed his half-burned hand. As she did he looked at her. She was not crying, but her eyes were clouded, she was subduing her terror. The car started,