Chapter 33

Over the next few months the crater settled into a routine.

Through their new found friendship with the Maasi, the Gurkhas were able to barter for goats, and soon had a herd of twenty ... goat milk and flesh being a favourite of the Gurkha diet.

Susan along with Martin and Jill visited the Maasi to tend to the sick and to check their cattle.

The Gurkhas’ wives had taken over the husbandry of the dairy herd and fresh milk, buttermilk and cheese became plentiful. Ali’s hens provided eggs and little Tampa had taken over the job of looking after them.

Patar had confirmed that twenty-four of the mares were now in foal, whilst Martin had used the Maasi bull to service three of the Hereford cows. David, with N’debi acting as gun bearer spent days out hunting in the hills and plains of Khana Crater One night camped high in the hills above the crater David asked how N’debi had come here to this land.

N’debi had looked into the fire before replying. “The Matabele were beaten in a war with the White Africans from the south. They came into our land and took it with guns; we tried to fight them but a spear is useless against a gun Bwana.”

David nodded, “But don’t you hate the white man for what he did?” he asked softly.

N’debi shrugged his shoulders, “The white man won, why should I hate him. We won battles with other tribes; it is the way of war. When we lost, we lost everything; our cattle and our homes. We came here to make a new life, and we have started that life with you Bwana.”

“This is a beautiful land with room for everyone N’debi.”

N’debi shook his head. “This is a man’s land, where the strong prevail, but a land has to be won by work and effort,” N’debi murmured, “And it has to be guarded, from slavers and poachers.”

“Do you think the slavers will come back?” David asked him.

“Yes Bwana, they will return for slaves and ivory and the horn of the rhino. It is their way to take everything by force.”

“Then we must dissuade then like we did at the gorge, my friend,” David murmured.

“That was only a small band, Bwana. They come in big canoes and then once on land they break up into bands and go in different directions, returning to the canoes to load the slaves and ivory. Some of the tribes give them ivory to leave them alone.”

“Then we must give them lead and steel to leave our lands alone,” David replied grimly.

With N’debi’s help as translator, he asked the chief of the Maasi if he could give them warning of any slavers entering their country.

The chief had replied that the herd boys communicated with each other from hilltops, giving warnings if lions or other predators were about. In this manner several hundreds of miles could be observed. He would tell them to report if any slavers were seen.

Two weeks later he was in Nairobi to pick up some timber. As it was going to take some time to have it cut to his specifications, he decided to have a drink in the local pub. Inside the bar was a group of men he knew who were professional hunters and ran safaris for wealthy clients. He bought his drink and went over to join them, knowing most of them from past visits to the pub.

They welcomed him as he sat down. Stanley Barr, one of the best hunters was telling of a client who had run, after wounding an elephant, and Stanley had to kill it.

“The poor man had literally shit himself,” he told the audience, to general laughter.

Ron Barlow, another hunter turned to David, “I hear on the grapevine you had a run in with slavers some time back David.”

He nodded and with some urging from them told them the story.

At the end Stanley murmured, “Good riddance, they’re the scum of the earth.”

That started everyone off about slavers. It seemed they affected the safari business when it was known they were present; they had to move rapidly in the opposite direction.

“But surely they wouldn’t attack a safari?” David asked.

Ron replied, “If they thought they had the element of surprise they would, or if there were white women in the safari. White women bring the biggest reward for them.”

Stanley took up the story. “Three years ago John Bishop took a young American couple and their eight year old daughter out on Safari.

They found the bones of them all, after the hyenas had finished with them, but no woman’s or child’s bones. By the time a search party got under way they were long gone.”

“Can’t the government do anything about them?” David asked.

Ron chuckled “The local police commissioner has twelve Askari’s to police an area the size of Wales.”

“Perhaps when we are brought into the Empire things may change, but at the moment it’s up to the individual to fend for himself,” Stanley added.

That night David sat on the stoop with Susan and told her of the conversation with the men in the bar.

“From now on when you and Jill go out of the crater you take a Gurkha escort, and I’ve got you and Jill these to wear,” as he produced two holstered belts from behind the chair he was sitting on. There was a .38 pistol in each holster.

Susan looked shocked. “I’m not wearing that! I’ve never fired a firearm in my life,” she said firmly.