or lettering that might have been incorporated in the design.
Hoping to devise some way of climbing closer, he tried to use the stone
niches as aids. With a great deal of effort, usin them as foot- and
hand-holds, he managed to lift himself out of the water. But the
distances between holds were too great and he fell back with a splash,
swallowing more water.
"Take it easy, my lad - you still have to swim out of here. No profit in
exhausting yourself. You will just have to come back another day to get
a closer look at whatever it is up there."
Only then did he realize how close he was to total exhaustion. This
water coming down from the Choke mountains was still cold with the
memories of the high snows. He was shivering until his teeth chattered.
"Not far from hypothermia. Have to get out of here now, while you still
have the strength."
Reluctantly he pushed himself away from the wall of rock and paddled
towards the narrow opening through which the Dandera river resumed the
headlong rush to join her mother Nile. He felt the current pick him up
and bear him forward, and he stopped swimming and let it take him.
"The Devil's roller-coaster!" he told himself. "Down and down she goes,
and where she stops nobody knows."
The first set of rapids battered him. They seemed endless, but at last
he was spewed out into the run of slower water below them. He floated on
his back, taking full advantage of this respite, and looked upwards.
There was very little light showing above him, for the rock almost met
overhead. The air was dank and dark and stank of bats. However, there
was little time to examine his surroundings, for once again the river
began to roar ahead of him. He braced himself rilentally for the assault
of turbulent waters, and went cascading down the next steep slide.
After a while he lost track of how far he had been carried, and how many
cataracts he had survived. It was a constant battle against the cold and
the pain of sodden lungs and strained muscle and overtaxed sinew. The
river mauled him.
Suddenly the light changed. After the gloom at the bottom of the high
cliffs it was as though a searchlight had been shone directly into his
eyes, and he felt the force and ferocity of the river abating. He
squinted up into bright sunlight, and then looked back and saw that he
had passed out below the archway of pink rock into that familiar part of
the river which he had explored with Royan. Coming up ahead of him was
the rope suspension bridge, and he had just sufficient strength
remaining to paddle feebly towards the small beach of white sand below
it.
One of the hairy tattered ropes dangled to the surface of the water, and
he managed to catch hold of it as he drifted past and swing himself in
towards the beach. He tried to crawl fully ashore, but he collapsed with
his face in the sand and vomited out the water he had swallowed. It felt
so good just to be able to lie without effort and rest.
His lower body still hung into the river, but he had neither the
strength nor the inclination to drag himself fully ashore.
"I am alive," he marvelled, and fell into a state halfway between sleep
and unconsciousness.
never knew how long he had been lying like that, but when he felt a
hand shaking his shoulder, and a voice calling softly to him, he was
annoyed that his rest had been disturbed.
"Effendi, wake up! They seek you. The beautiful Woizero seeks you."
With a huge effort Nicholas roused himself and sat up slowly. Tamre
knelt over him, grinning and waggling his head.
(Please, effendi, come with me. The Woizero is searching the river bank
on the far side. She is weeping and calling your name,' Tamre told him.
He was the only person Nicholas had ever met who contrived to look
worried and to grin at the same time. Nicholas looked beyond him and saw
that it must be late afternoon, for the sun sat fat and red on the lip
of the escarpment.
While still sitting in the sand Nicholas checked his body, making an
inventory of his injuries. He ached in every muscle, and his legs and
arms were scraped and bruised, but he could detect no broken bones. And
although there was a tender lump on'the side of his he ad where he had
glanced off a rock, his mind was clear.
"Help me upP he ordered Tamre. The boy put his shoulder under Nicholas's
armpit, where the. rope had burnt him, and hoisted him to his feet. The
two of them struggled up to the bank and on to the path, and then.
hobbled slowly across the swinging bridge.
He had hardly reached the other bank when there was a joyous shout from
close at hand.
"Nicky! Oh, dear God! You are safe." Royan ran down the path and threw
her arms around him. "I have been frantic. I thought that-' she broke
off, and held him at arms length to look at him. "Are you all right? I
was expecting to find your broken bodym---'
"You know me," he grinned at her and tried not to i limp. "Ten'feet tall
and-bullet-proof You don't get rid of Me that easily. I only did it just
to get a hug from you."
She released him hurriedly. "Don't read anything into that. I am kind to
all beaten puppies, and other dumb animals." But her smile belied the
words. "Nevertheless, it's good to have you back in one piece, Nicky."
"Where is Boris?"he asked.
"He and the trackers are searching the banks lower down the river. I
think he is looking forward to finding your corpse."
"What has he done with my dik-dik?"
ainly nothing too much the matter with
"There is cert you if you can worry about that. The skinners have taken
it down to the camp."
"Damn it to hell! I must supervise the skinning and tion of the trophy
myself. They will ruin id' He put prepara his arm around Tamre's
shoulder. "Come on, my lad! Let's see if I can break into a trot."
las knew that in this heat the carcass of icho the little antelope would
decompose swiftly, and the hair would slough from the hide if it were
not treated immediately. It was imperative to skin it out immediately.
Already it had been left too long, and the preparation of a hide for a
full body mount was a skilled and painstaking procedure.
it was already dark as they limped into the camp.
Nicholas shouted for the skinners in Arabic.
"Ya, Kif! Ya, SalinP and when they came running from living huts he
asked anxiously, "Have you begun?" their
"Not yet, effendi. We were having our dinner first."
"For once gluttony is a virtue. Do not touch the creature until I come.
While you are waiting for me, fetch one of the gas lights!" He limped to
his own hut as fast as his aches would allow. There he stripped and
anointed all his visible scrapes and abrasions with Mercurochrome, flung
on fresh dry clothes, rummaged in his bag until he found the canvas roll
which contained his knives, and hurried down to the skinning hut.
By the brilliant white glare of the butane gas lantern he had only just
completed the initial skin incisions down the inside of the dik-dik's
legs and belly when Boris pushed open the door of the hut.
"Did you have a good swim, English?"
"Bracing, thank you." Nicholas smiled. "I don't expect you want to eat
your words about my striped dik-dik, do you?" he asked mildly. "No such
bloody animal, I think you said., "It is like a rat. A true hunter would
not bother himself with such rubbish," Boris replied haughtily. "Now
that you have your rat, perhaps we can go back to Addis, English?"
"I paid you for three weeks. It is my safari. We go when I say
so,'Nicholas told him. Boris grunted and backed out of the hut.