White Dog Fell from the Sky - By Eleanor Morse Page 0,55
I had to get away from that prick.”
“My boss?”
“Why, do you like him?”
“I don’t dislike him.”
“He’s a conventionally minded little man. He ought to be adding columns of figures instead of the job he’s doing. Why shouldn’t people believe what they want to believe about the moon?”
He peered at her in the darkness. “Are you happy?”
“Why do you ask?”
He pulled her toward him and kissed her. His mouth was soft and tasted of wine. Something in her head said, This man is a rapscallion.
She expected he’d ask to come to her tent. She had no answer for him, but she knew there was no will left in her. As though hearing this, he said, “We don’t have to hurry. We have all the time in the world.”
Do we? she wanted to ask.
“Don’t you feel that?” he asked.
“No.” She felt hot now, feverish. She took off the light jacket she was wearing and threw it over her arm. She began to cry softly.
“Shall I come to you tonight then?”
She began to shake. “No.” Something had grown too full in her to be held. She could love this man, given half a chance, and it scared her silly and shattered her with happiness. She could hardly see him in that light. He moved closer and drew her body to his. She cried harder.
“What?”
“Don’t worry,” she said.
“What?”
“I’ve been pent up.” She stopped abruptly and wiped her nose on her sleeve like a child. She hated to cry.
“You’ve been living like a Hartford housewife.”
“It wasn’t his fault.”
“I didn’t say it was. But it wasn’t in your nature.”
She squeezed his arm with both hands.
“I’m too old for you,” he said.
“What difference does it make?”
“It makes a difference. Think about it.”
“I have.”
“You don’t know who I am.”
“I know enough.”
“What do you know?”
“You’re uncivilized.”
“How do you know that?”
“I’ve been watching you.”
“And I you.”
“And what have you seen?”
He paused. “You’re bright and brave, and you’ve been hurt. Your best time is early morning.”
She laughed. “Your best time is when the moon rises.”
They stood side by side, her head against the top of his arm.
“Well good night then,” she said.
“You’re going?”
“Yes.” But then she didn’t. They went back to the campfire and found no one there. Ian kicked up the ashes with his boot and threw on a couple of hunks of wood. A shooting star flared across the edge of her vision, and then she wasn’t sure whether it was a star or a spark from the fire rising into the darkness. And there was the moon over the top of the low trees, shining with all its distant mountains and valleys. She looked at him out of the corner of her eye and saw a shaggy head, dark against the light of the fire.
“What are you thinking?” he asked.
“That you look like a beast in this light.”
“Friendly or savage?”
“Midway.”
The fire hit a pocket of air inside a log and exploded.
Over the following two days the group met with Bushmen leaders outside of Maun, and with a group of ranchers, all of whom managed large herds of cattle. One of Alice’s jobs was documenting conversations with groups whose positions felt irreconcilable. Arthur Haddock was immovable. He’d return to Gaborone and talk with his wife of forty-five years about the primitive men he’d met who were still running after wild animals with bows and arrows.
The roads were very bad: deep sand, deeper ruts, rocks jutting up unpredictably here and there. One or another vehicle got stuck and had to be dug out. On the way to Sehitwa, the truck had a flat, then a shock absorber on one of the Land Rovers went. The temperature gauge on the second Land Rover began climbing, and after changing the tire on the truck, it spiked up to the danger zone. The three vehicles stopped. “The gauge is bad,” said Shakespeare optimistically. He put his hand companionably on the hood. He filled up the radiator, and they started out again. The gauge stayed in the red zone. They stopped again. “Could be a leak somewhere,” said Will.
“I say we turn around,” said Haddock.
“We’ve got two more vehicles,” Alice said. “Why would we turn around?”
Will lay down in the sand and wriggled underneath the Land Rover. He came back out. “The radiator’s taken one too many rocks.” He had a short conference with Shakespeare and Sam, who rummaged around in a tin box and brought out a container of pepper. They let the radiator cool down, then Shakespeare removed the radiator cap, measured