Far In The Wilds (2 page)

And for the moment, Anthony Wickenden seemed like that man. Ryder felt a rush of affection for Helen. She had taken his rejection with better humor than he’d expected, and although he had used the friends line on almost every woman he’d refused, he was rather surprised to find he actually meant it with Helen.

He dropped a kiss to her startled cheek.

“Whatever was that for?”

“You might just be a good egg, Helen. Would you like to dance?”

She threw back her head in a theatrical gesture. “Would I? Just try and stop me.”

Chapter Two

After a lavish buffet supper, the dancing resumed. It was hectic and unbridled as any found in a Parisian nightclub, the dancing of people determined to enjoy themselves after the rigors of war. They drank and danced and fondled one another with deliberation, exchanging news and kisses as they found neighbors they had not seen for months and groped towards new friendships in the soft glow of the lowered lights.

Ryder had just returned his last partner—a besotted girl of eighteen he had no intention of partnering again—to her friends when Helen appeared at his side, towing with her a pair of newcomers.

“Ryder, I don’t believe you know the prince. Your Highness, may I present Julian Ryder White, one of our most distinguished settlers. Mademoiselle Gautier, Mr. White. Ryder, His Highness, Prince Frederick-Christian, seventeenth in the Danish line of succession, and his companion, Mademoiselle Liane Gautier of Paris.”

If not for the introduction, Ryder would have though Mademoiselle was the Dane and her friend French. He was small and dark and wiry, with a cruelly thin moustache and evening clothes so rigidly tailored he might have been wearing armor. She was a tall blonde, wearing a cool, Nordic sort of detachment that told him she thought she was above this sort of provincial entertainment. Then Ryder saw the assessment in her eyes as she flicked them over his body. She was French alright.

“Your Highness,” he said cordially. He didn’t bother to bow.

The prince gave him a thin smile. “I see like all Africans you are casual in your manners.” He attempted a chuckle to take the sting out of it, but Ryder knew he was piqued.

Ryder shrugged. “I am Canadian by birth and African by choice, and in neither of those places did I learn to bow and scrape.”

The woman put out her hand and with it the promise of a smile. “Monsieur.”

Ryder took it and bowed, flicking the prince a mischievous look. “I make exceptions for nature’s aristocrats.”

At this the woman laughed aloud, but the prince looked frankly astonished. “You think beauty matters more than lineage?”

“Why not? They’re both accidents of birth.”

Helen cleared her throat. “I’m afraid I am engaged for the next dance with Kit Parrymore. You must meet him, Your Highness. He’s a desperately talented artist.”

“Later,” he said with a wave of his hand. “I find Mr. White’s conversation most diverting.”

“As you wish,” Helen said, throwing out a bright smile. As she passed Ryder, she squeezed his arm. “Behave, pet. We don’t want an international incident on our hands.”

She slid through the crowd and Ryder turned back to the pair. “What brings you to Africa?”

Mademoiselle Gautier moved fractionally closer to her prince. “The press. They are ruthless in Europe and not very understanding of our friendship.”

“I see.” Ryder’s voice was deliberately neutral, but the prince bristled.

“My wife is unwell, and the press blame her poor health on my friendship with Mademoiselle. It is nonsense, of course.”

Mademoiselle flicked Ryder a quick glance, conspiratorial, as if to confirm that they both saw through the prince’s desperate attempts to convince himself if no one else that his infidelity had no victims.

She turned to her companion. “Freddie, I should like some properly chilled champagne. What the waiters are serving is far too warm. Is it possible to teach them how it ought to be done?”

The prince inclined his head. “Yes, of course.” He gave Ryder an appraising look and hurried off on his mission.

Ryder turned back to Mademoiselle. “I’m impressed. That was very neatly done.”

She favored him with a modest smile. “Freddie is not difficult to manage. He likes to instruct. If I can set him a task where he is above others, teaching them, he is happy. And it leaves me free to pursue my own interests.”

Ryder shook his head. “That’s my cue to ask ‘what interests?’ Not going to happen, Mademoiselle.”

She moved an inch closer. “Why? Don’t you want to flirt with me?”

“To what end?”

She lifted one shapely shoulder in a shrug. “Why must there be an end? You think like all Anglo-Saxons, Mr. White. Sometimes it is simply good to flirt for its own sake. It is pleasant to talk to someone attractive, is it not?”

“It is.”

“And I am attractive, am I not?”

Ryder gave her a lopsided grin. “There you go again, tossing bait in my direction. I’m not biting.”

“I am very naughty,” she admitted. “But I intrigue you, I think. No, do not answer. I do not wish to get you into trouble.” She tipped her head, running her gaze from his eyes to his earring. She put out one fingertip to touch it. “This must have hurt.”

“Like pleasure, pain is relative.”

Her eyes widened. “I was wrong about you, Mr. White. I think there may be something of the Frenchman about you after all.”

They were still smiling at each other when the prince arrived followed closely by a waiter with a bucket of icy cold champagne. “I claim victory,” the prince announced. He handed a glass to Mademoiselle and another to Ryder. “Come, let us toast my triumph.”

“
Toujours
,” Mademoiselle said. She sampled her champagne and praised him lavishly for his cleverness. The little prince preened.

“Tell me, Mr. White, what does a hunter do with his time besides kill things?” Mademoiselle asked.

Ryder, relaxing into the champagne, gave her a pointed look. “I have hobbies.”

“I wager you do,” she murmured.

The prince cut in sharply. “I do not think you are as successful as Mrs. Farraday says. I inquired about guides for our safari and your name did not arise in the conversation.”

“Probably because I don’t guide.” Ryder helped himself to another glass of the cold champagne. He glanced to where Jude was dancing with Anthony Wickenden. The band was playing something soft and coaxing and the veranda doors had been thrown open to the warm night, the perfume of it thick with flowers and spice and smoke and the red earth of Africa itself. Outside the stars were shedding their light on the club gardens, glittering like so much broken glass on the velvet of the night sky. It was a night for falling in love, and it looked to Ryder as if Anthony was halfway there.

He realized the prince was speaking. “But how is it that you do not guide? All of the hunters do.”

“I do what I like. And I don’t usually like to guide. I’d rather hunt for meat or to take out a maneater than kill for sport.”

The prince made a noise of derision. “I thought you appreciated beauty for its own sake. Is preserving the beauty of an animal forever not reason enough?”

Ryder sighed. The strange little man and his cryptic conversation were tiring. Mademoiselle was a lovely distraction but not quite enough compensation for putting up with him. “Trophies are not beautiful,” he said flatly. “Not to me.”

To his surprise, Mademoiselle flushed deeply. The barb hadn’t been directed at her, but she had taken it to heart, and he saw a flash of pure anger that she worked hard to smother.

The prince spoke again. “I think you exaggerate your talents, Mr. White. Like all colonials, you are a teller of tales, are you not? Come, confess to me that you are not all that you seem. What are you really?”

Ryder was well and truly bored and knew the fastest way to get rid of the prince was to tell him the truth. “I’m a farmer and tradesman. I have a sisal plantation on the coast, and I have a string of small shops called
dukas
in the bush. I sell rice and fabric and motor oil, Your Highness. Now, if you will excuse me—” He didn’t wait for permission to leave. He flicked a brisk nod towards Mademoiselle and turned on his heel, the prince spluttering behind him.

Out of the tail of his eye, Ryder saw a commotion at the door. Rex Farraday was in heated conversation with the club porter while Helen was clutching her necklace with one slim hand, her face drained of color. Suddenly, a small crowd of native Africans shoved into the doorway, eyes rolling in terror, the women sobbing and the men shouting. In their midst they carried an unconscious man, blood dripping red onto the polished floor. Rex did his best to calm them, but Ryder caught one word repeated over and over again.
Simba
.

It wasn’t possible, Ryder thought. A lion in the middle of Nairobi? But the Africans were insistent, and the porter added his voice to the fray. Ryder slid through the crowd until he was at the man’s side. He was about to question the porter when he saw the injured man’s wounds. There was no mistaking a lion’s bite, and the rest of the party knew it. The word
simba
flowed over and through them, sparking excitement and in some cases outright hysteria. The band stopped playing and the crowd shoved its way to the windows, exclaiming loudly as they caught sight of the creature.

“Oh, that poor little monkey,” Ryder heard Jude say. Wickenden had his arm firmly around Jude, and Ryder turned away, his one responsibility attended to. Helen had kept her feet, but two other women had already swooned, men were shouting about forming a hunting party, and Ryder saw that things were quickly spiraling out of control. Rex was attempting to bring order to the situation, but few were listening and most were just drunk enough to be dangerous. It was only a matter of minutes before someone did something stupid.

As he had done earlier in the day, Ryder vaulted over the bar, this time to grab the rifle that was hung on the back wall. He opened it and found it was empty.

“
Sahib
,” the Indian barman called softly. Ryder looked down to find the man sitting comfortably on the floor tucked out of harm’s way. He handed up a box of ammunition. Ryder took up four rounds, loading two and slipping the others into his pocket before passing back the box.

“Do you not want more,
sahib
?”

Ryder shrugged. “I won’t have time to reload more than once.” He hefted himself over the bar again, landing lightly on his feet. At the door, Rex was still trying to restore calm. He caught sight of Ryder and waved him over with an air of relief. Helen shrieked when she saw the rifle in his hand.

“Ryder—” She never finished the sentence, but there was no need.

“Yes, Helen. I have to.” He gave her a lazy grin, and just then Jude appeared at his side.

“Need a second gun?”

“No, but you can hold my coat,” he told her, shrugging out of the tight evening coat.

“Ass,” she said, but her usual easy tone was brittle. She was afraid for him, and he felt a quick chill brush his spine. Jude wasn’t afraid of anything. But life turned on a dime in Africa. A man could be hale and hearty at breakfast and dead by lunch, taken out by a bullet or an animal bite or a fever so savage it could turn a man’s organs to liquid. It didn’t matter how often you said your prayers or how many good luck charms filled your pockets. Dead was dead, and Africa could get you there quicker than anyplace else.

He held her gaze a moment as he handed over his coat. He looked over her head to Wickenden whose eyes were round with fear and excitement. He gave Wickenden a brisk nod. He didn’t dare tell the fellow to take care of Jude, but they both knew what Ryder expected of him. Wickenden’s hands tightened on her shoulders and Ryder turned sharply on his heel.

He strode through the crowd and it parted before him like the Red Sea, falling away as he walked. He knew there was a buzz of conversation and even a few muted shouts or sobs, he couldn’t quite tell which. The rifle felt good in his hand, solid and heavy, a large-bore with a bullet capable of shattering bone at a hundred yards. It was security, but security was an illusion. A cat was unpredictable as the wind and twice as changeable. In their own environment they fell into patterns, and if you watched one long enough, you might get to know him, might even get lulled into believing you understood him. But you never did. Like most everything else in Africa, lions kept their secrets. They could often be spotted near Nairobi, but it was rare to see one in the centre of town, and the fact that this one had ventured in meant that it was starving or ill or mean as hell, none of which inspired any confidence in Ryder.

He moved out onto the veranda of the club, conscious of the crowd pressing in behind him. But Rex had regained control and they came no further than the doorway. Dozens more huddled at the windows, and as he stepped into the street, he realized it wasn’t just the club members watching. Every window on the street had been thrown open, the occupants hanging halfway out to see the fun. Ryder ignored them all. He stood in the center of the street, feeling the weight of the wide dark sky pressing down on him. The fragrance of Africa clung to his skin, cooking fires and ripe fruits mingling with the red dirt under his feet, with the odour of spices and green leaves and the peculiar sharp smell of the lion itself. The moon was dark, but the starlight was softly silver, and Ryder decided it would be as good a night as any to die.

He cocked the rifle and began to walk. The lion was some distance ahead in the shadows. He caught the smell of it again, rising on the breeze. He remembered a disastrous term at school in England when he was twelve. His father, bowing to family pressures, had sent him home to be educated as a gentleman. But there was no civilizing Ryder. He had fought and scrapped his way into being sent down, and no one had been happier than he at being forced to leave. But he remembered one of the boys, a thin weedy child who later became a leading barrister in London. He had asked Ryder what lions smelled like, and Ryder had barely thought before blurting out, “Cat piss.” The other boy was disappointed, but it had been the truth. Big cats, like domestic tabbies, smelled strongly of urine. They marked as they walked, kings of creation, claiming whatever they saw for themselves, and this lion was no different. It had sprayed the fruit cart and the curb stone and the side of the Norfolk Hotel as it walked, the scent rising pungently behind him. Under it all, Ryder caught the sharply metallic smell of the monkey’s blood. The little carcass had been tossed aside, bones crushed in the massive jaws of the cat. He hadn’t been intended for dinner, Ryder realized. The lion had been making a point that the monkeys were to stay out of his way. He had seen such things occasionally in the bush. A lion might kill a cheetah cub or a hyena, not to eat, but as a warning. The monkeys had certainly taken it to heart. They had scrambled up the nearest acacia tree and were shrieking and shaking as Ryder passed underneath.