Red Earth (6 page)

The gunman appeared to order the girl and boy into the front of the Toyota while he took the cleared seat in the rear, and the doors slammed.

At the same time, someone inside the minibus taxi had taken the driver's seat and the bus was backing down the red earth road at high speed, jinking left and right as the driver fought to keep control.

Nia flicked the radio to the police emergency frequency again and broadcast what she had seen, and the fact that she had been shot at. As she did so, she thought that even if the police couldn't respond immediately at least members of the news media, who monitored the police channel, might pick up the story and this would put pressure on the police to devote some resources to saving the kids. To her it seemed that the gunman had taken the schoolgirl as his hostage as he had kept the gun on her and not on the boy, who was armed with an AK-47. He could have been threatening the boy in some other way, but something about the way they had interacted made Nia think the two young men knew each other. Her phone rang.

‘Five minutes away,' the vulture man said.

‘Hurry, but be careful. Sheesh, I don't know. Maybe don't come at all, there are people killing each other down there!'

‘OK, keep the phone line open
.
'

The passenger behind the wheel of the taxi had turned the bus around and it was disappearing back towards Mtubatuba. Nia saw the Fortuner start to move. She followed it, bringing the R44 down low, closer than she had ever come to a moving vehicle. Slowly, she pulled ahead of the Toyota. The boy at the wheel accelerated to ninety kilometres an hour.

She thought of the boy and wondered how skilled he was at driving. He hadn't looked more than sixteen or seventeen. Nia thought she might be able to slow him down, but she was acutely aware of the girl and the baby in the car. The last thing she wanted was for the guy to crash and injure the innocents on board.

Nia was terrified of engine failure, but she had to try something. She eased sideways with the pedal, trying to keep the aircraft level to avoid sloshing the fuel. She was as low as she dared, her skids at windscreen height as she tracked right just ahead of the stolen car. The driver braked, but rather than giving up, as Nia had hoped, he turned off the narrow gravel road and into the veldt.

‘I see you on the horizon. Nearly there. What's the status?' asked the vulture man.

Nia spoke into the headset. ‘The status is, this is fucked. I'm in pursuit, but I have to land ASAP, I'm nearly out of fuel. The kid driving has just gone into the veldt
.
That's slowed him down. If you hurry you might be able to catch him.'

‘All right. I'm just coming to the
kraal
. I see the two men down. I called the ambulance like you asked but it looks as if it's too late and … wait a minute.'

Hurry up
, Nia urged the man silently.

‘One of these guys is still alive. I have to stop and help him.'

Nia exhaled, puffing her cheeks. This was crazy. ‘There's a baby and a kidnapped schoolgirl in the car ahead of me.' Nia waited for a reply, then tried again. Nothing. She wheeled the helicopter in a wide climbing turn, keeping the bank angle as shallow as possible to keep the remaining fuel in her tanks steady. She looked down helplessly at the vehicle ploughing through the grass. The boy was driving fast, competently, heading for the trees. She saw what he was doing now. He was going to drive amid the thorny acacias, where he would know she couldn't land to block him, and then cut back out onto the road on the other side of the hill.

The low-fuel light glared solid now, demanding that she put down. Reluctantly she turned back to the
kraal.
Running on vapours, she set down about five metres from the side of the road, near a Land Rover Defender with pictures of vultures on the doors. A man was kneeling over one of the shooting victims, covering the wounded man with his body to protect him from Nia's rotor wash. Nia closed her eyes and permitted herself a short sigh. She had been closer than she'd ever come in her flying career to having to make a forced landing. She tugged on the rotor brake handle, attached to a short chain hanging from the cockpit ceiling, unbuckled, took off her headset, unplugged her phone and jumped down.

Her phone chirped and she accepted the call, too frazzled to even check the screen. ‘It's Nia.'

‘Babe, it's me.'

Nia slumped against the helicopter. ‘Sheesh, Banger, it's good to hear your voice.' Her relief turned quickly to anger. ‘Where the hell have you been?'

‘I got a missed call from you but couldn't get through. Damned network's been clogged because of the bomb in Durbs. I finally got hold of Virginia and John told me where you're at. Give me your exact position.'

She'd been worried about him, but at least he was safe. She described where she'd landed. ‘Hey, if you can get through to John, can you tell him I need fuel?'

‘OK, I can pass on the message, but I
am
close. You're between Mtubes and iMfolozi, correct?'

‘Yes, that's right. I wish I could have got through to you earlier. There was this hijacking, but they took a baby, and there was shooting, and …' Nia fought back a rising tide of tears.

‘Sheesh, babes. Stay right there, I'm coming. Just tell me your GPS coordinates, or if you need a minute, SMS them to me. I picked up your earlier locstat from John. See you soon, OK?'

Nia sniffed. The reality of what she had just been through was only just starting to hit her.

Chapter 7

Mike had seen a few gunshot wounds in his life; this one was bad.

The man he was working on was a police officer. Vusi had been able to tell him his name and his rank. Mike had ripped open the warrant officer's shirt to find a hole in his belly from which blood was welling and pouring out over the man's side. Mike took off his own shirt, balled it and had Vusi hold it against the wound while he unzipped the first aid kit he always carried with him.

‘Shit. How is he?'

Mike looked up, into the sun, and saw the silhouetted face of a woman. It was hard to make out her features, beyond the initial impression that she was attractive, and angry.

‘Not good. Who knows how long it will take the ambulance to get here.' Mike lowered his voice. ‘He would have bled out if I hadn't stopped.'

The woman ran a hand through her untidy hair. ‘This is a mess.'

‘Want to pass me that bottle of saline from the first aid kit?' he said.

She dropped to her knees and passed him the small plastic one-use container. ‘Sorry. I'm Nia.'

‘Mike. Help me.' As Mike removed his shirt from Vusi's wound blood pumped out. He bit the end off the saline bottle and squirted the liquid all over and around the bullet hole, then pressed the pad of a wound dressing over it. ‘We need to roll him.'

‘No exit wound,' Nia said.

He nodded. She seemed to have some idea of what was going on, and with her help they turned Vusi, passed the tapes of the dressing around his back and tied it tightly. ‘He's lost a lot of blood. If that ambulance doesn't get here soon, can you fly him to Durbs?'

Nia shook her head. ‘That was the last of my fuel. I'm stuck here until my guys can bring me a resupply.' She took the policeman's hand and looked into his eyes. ‘You hang in there, man, we're going to get you help. You'll be fine.'

Mike wasn't so sure, but Nia had dropped her surly attitude and was reassuring the patient, which was sometimes all you could do in this kind of situation. ‘Thanks. The car you were chasing; tell me what you saw.'

Nia took a breath and ran through the shooting of the taxi driver and the policeman, the schoolboy seeming to help the car thief and the girl being forced into the Fortuner. She put a hand to her head. ‘I think I screwed things up, though.'

‘How?' She really was very pretty, he decided, now that he could see her properly. Her black hair was cut in a short, practical bob and her skin had an even, mellow, Mediterranean colouring. Her fingers had left a smudge of Vusi's blood on her forehead.

‘The hijacker hadn't seen me until that point; I was standing off and he was too busy. I went in closer and he panicked. He shot at me and that's when things started kicking off. Vusi was shot; the taxi driver was killed. The gunman decided to take a hostage – another one – a schoolgirl in addition to the baby. Shit.' She looked to the driver, whose body lay motionless in the grass.

‘Don't blame yourself, blame the shooter,' Mike said. ‘I don't think me getting here sooner would have helped you. I've got guns, but by the sound of it, this gunfight was all over in seconds.'

She blinked a few times and Mike had the feeling she was fighting back tears, though something about her no-nonsense manner told him that she was not the sort to show weakness.

‘You might have been able to stop them,' she said.

Mike shrugged. ‘They were already mobile; if I'd opened up on the Toyota I might have hit the baby, or the girl. I'm an OK shot, but to take out the shooter from another moving vehicle with a rifle is just about impossible.'

‘Yes, yes, yes. I know about guns.' She waved her free hand dismissively, then looked at him. ‘You said on the radio you know this area.'

He nodded.

Nia gestured with her thumb past her helicopter, in the direction in which the Fortuner had disappeared. ‘Where does that road lead?'

‘Either back to the N2 or, eventually, to Hluhluwe–iMfolozi.'

Nia looked up the road, then back at him. ‘So if we can get a police roadblock on the motorway on ramp then we can bottle them up.'

‘Good luck finding a policeman today,' Mike said. ‘You heard about the bomb?'

‘Yes. Are there any other villages between here and the national park?'

‘A few small
kraals.
Your hijacker had to know someone out here. It's not the sort of place he could easily disappear into.'

Nia looked around them. ‘Why would he stop here, of all places?'

‘Funny,' Mike said, following her gaze.

‘What's funny, I need a laugh.' Nia tended to Vusi, mopping his brow with Mike's bloodied shirt.

‘I know a young guy who lives around here.'

‘I didn't see anyone in the
kraal
, just a few goats.'

Mike could feel the sun stinging his bare back, but he didn't relish the idea of asking Nia for his shirt back and feeling Vusi's blood stick to his skin. He had an old one in the back of the Land Rover which he used when he had to get under the old bus and see to something. He would get it once the ambulance arrived –
if
it arrived. ‘You've heard of child-headed households?'

Nia nodded. ‘Mom and Dad die of AIDS and the eldest kid is left to run the family.'

‘Well, the kid who lives in that rondavel over there,' Mike pointed to a mud-brick circular hut with a thatched roof, ‘
is
the family. His parents are dead, his one older brother got the virus as well and is gone, and his younger sister was raped by their uncle, their only surviving close relative. The little girl's in care, in a foster home.'

‘Sheesh,' Nia said. ‘They didn't take the boy into care as well?'

Mike shook his head. ‘He went into juvenile detention; he got busted stealing a car with his cousin, the uncle's son. He was going to sell it to make money for their school fees and food. While he was inside he left his sister with the uncle.'

Nia looked heavenwards, then back to Mike. ‘And the uncle?'

‘Dead. Shot out the back of a local shebeen.'

‘Good riddance. Is the kid out of detention now?'

‘Yes,' Mike said.

‘You think there might be a connection between today's hijacking and the kid? Think maybe it was him who stole the Fortuner? The guy who shot at me wasn't old; maybe early twenties.'

Mike looked out over the rolling hills to the line that marked the division between marginal farmland and the wild bush; Hluhluwe–iMfolozi was as close as it got to heaven on earth. It was a place of sanctuary, and, perhaps by extension, a place of refuge for a troubled soul. ‘I hope to God it wasn't.'

*

Themba drove like he hadn't driven in two years. It was scary, not only because Joseph kept waving his pistol around, and now had the AK-47 resting across his lap, and not only because Lerato had been crying. It was scary because Themba had almost forgotten what a rush it was to drive fast with someone in pursuit.

Themba had found the AK in the Fortuner and had considered shooting his cousin, but he couldn't do it. Joseph had ripped the rifle from his hands then ordered him to drive. Mostly, he felt shame. There was a baby in the back of this stolen car and that, even to Themba, who had experience in driving stolen cars, was just not right.

‘What are you thinking, cousin?' Joseph mocked him from the back seat.

Themba glanced in the rear view mirror and saw that Joseph's face was going grey. He had picked a piece of clothing from the pile in the back of the vehicle and balled it and tied it, with a belt, around his injured shoulder. The clumsy bandage had slowed the flow of blood, but Joseph's heavy lids belied his crazy grin.

‘I asked what's on your mind?'

‘Why did you have to involve me in this, Joseph? That is what I am thinking. And what are you doing with a baby in this car? Are you crazy?'

‘Turn around, bitch, don't look back at me,' Joseph said to Lerato, who wiped her eyes and looked ahead again.

‘Leave her alone, Joseph,' Themba said, looking in the mirror. ‘And please answer my question. Why?'

‘I wasn't planning on coming to you, all right? I had … problems. I needed help.'

Themba knew that stealing a car these days was not a one-man job. Too much could go wrong. Joseph would have had a partner, someone to drive while he searched for the tracking device, or vice versa. ‘Why are you working solo?'

Joseph stared out the window for two seconds, then snapped his head back around. ‘None of your damn business. Just drive. We need to find somewhere to hide up while I contact the buyer. I'll get him to come to us.'

Themba shook his head. ‘You know the buyer won't do that. Too risky, man. I've got a better idea. Why don't I take you to the nearest clinic, drop you out the front and the baby nearby where someone will find it, and then I'll go burn this ride. No one will be any the wiser. You just tell the doctors you got caught up in a robbery.'

‘No. I'm not letting you or your little girlfriend here out of my sight until I've got my money for this piece of shit white man's car. Who is she, anyway?'

Themba looked to Lerato then glanced back at his cousin. ‘No one, she was just on the bus. We should let her go, Joseph.'

‘You shouldn't have used my name, now she knows it. What's your name, sexy?'

Lerato folded her arms and stared resolutely out of the windscreen. Joseph leaned forward between the seats and pressed the end of the barrel of his pistol against her temple.

‘I said, what's your name, sweet girl?'

‘Joseph, leave her alone!'

She swallowed hard. ‘Lerato.'

‘
Le-ra-to
, nice name. Rolls off the
tongue
nicely. You and me going to be friends, Lerato?' He pressed the pistol harder.

‘Please don't hurt me. Can't you just let me and Themba go?'

‘Aha,' said Joseph. ‘So you and my cousin
do
know each other. It figures, same school uniform and all.'

‘My father,' Lerato breathed, ‘he's a big man, wealthy, with connections to the government. You don't want to upset him. Please, just let me go and I'll say nothing.'

Joseph grinned. ‘
Wealthy
, you say? Well then maybe he'll pay me to get you back,
Le-ra-to.
What do you think, cousin, will Lerato's daddy shell out some coin to get his baby girl back in one piece?'

Themba glared at his cousin. ‘You
do not
involve her in this, Joseph. I'm going to stop and let her out as soon as I find somewhere safe.'

Joseph tapped the barrel of the pistol against Themba's head. ‘You
do not
give me orders, cousin; you know that's not how it works. While I've got the guns, I'm the one in charge here.'

Themba drove on, regularly checking the rear view mirror in search of someone following them. He wondered why the helicopter had given up on them. He also kept an eye on the baby which, surprisingly, had drifted off to sleep. He tried easing off the accelerator, but Joseph jabbed him again in the back of the neck and told him to speed up. He was a little scared, but mostly he was angry at his cousin. Joseph had never pointed a gun at him, let alone stuck one to his head. Also, he didn't like the way Joseph kept leering at Lerato. ‘Joseph, please, you don't need us. You know I won't tell the cops anything and I'll make sure Lerato doesn't, either. Right?'

She looked back at him, her beautiful big eyes now all red-rimmed and misty. She sniffed. ‘Yes, right. I won't say a thing.'

Joseph laughed from the back seat, then winced. Themba looked at his cousin again in the mirror and saw Joseph's lids slowly dropping. The wound must be worse than he was letting on, Themba thought. He didn't want to think of his cousin dying, but after the way he'd been acting today it was hard to feel pity for him.

‘Don't slow down again.' Joseph lifted his head up and opened his eyes. ‘We have to find somewhere to stop so you can strip this car. In fact, pull over now.'

Themba frowned. He considered telling Joseph to go to hell, but then his cousin leaned across to Lerato. She screamed as he put the gun to her head.

‘OK, OK.' Themba pulled over and stopped the car.

‘Get out.' Joseph motioned to Lerato. Joseph slung the AK-47 over his good shoulder. ‘Over here, get on your knees.'

Themba got out, holding his arms loosely at his sides, clenching and unclenching his fists.

‘Don't look at me like that, cousin.' Lerato knelt in front of Joseph, who kept the gun pointed at her. ‘If you don't find it in ten minutes I'm going to see how good this little playmate of yours is with her mouth.'

‘Don't even think of it.'

‘OK, I'll just kill her now, then. You're right, I don't need either of you as hostages, and she knows too much about me, about you, now.' He straightened his arm and touched the barrel between Lerato's eyes. ‘On three. One, two …'

Themba threw up his hands. ‘All right, all right. Enough. I'm doing it.'

Themba set to work, checking under the seat and carpets. He opened boot and started dragging out more household goods.

‘Faster, Themba, I'm getting bored here,' Joseph wheezed.

‘I need tools. Where are they?'

Joseph shrugged. ‘How should I know? Maybe with the spare?'

Themba cursed and tossed out a DVD player and a plastic bin bag that split and disgorged half a dozen pairs of women's shoes onto the grass. He saw a red metal box. He grabbed the handle and it was reassuringly heavy. He opened the cantilevered lid. ‘Tools.'

‘Get on with it,' Joseph snapped.

The tool box was comprehensive. There was a good deal of electrical gear – a soldering iron, solder, different grades of insulated wires, a multimeter – but Themba dug deeper until he found a cordless drill. He pulled the trigger; it was charged. Finding a pack of drill bits and screwdriver tips he fitted one and pocketed another couple. Themba went to the front of the Fortuner and started stripping out the door trim panels.