Frank was born in the bush and had lived all his life in the bush. Maybe because he had had little exposure to the conventional world, he had his own set of rules and views on what was right and what was wrong, and he was generally a poor listener when dealing with opinions that ran counter to his own. He was a bit of a loner but instantly likable because he was so obviously his own man. Tall, muscular, and finely featured, he was attractive to women largely because he cared not a damn. Personal appearance was of no consequence to him, and he presented himself consistently disheveled, disorganized, and often disorderly. Shaving was an unnecessary hardship. A dark beard and dark eyes sent a dangerous signal to the unmet. As a professional hunter he was talented but careless and fearless. That is a life-threatening combination in Africa, and so it should come as no surprise that Frank, in the course of sailing too close to the wind, would on occasion risk foundering.
Frank’s smile was marred by a missing front tooth. Walking into his workshop one morning he had been confronted by a stray dog. Not only was it early in the day but, in addition, he was sporting a serious hangover. He did not like these “tick taxis.” They brought with them disease and bad breeding and had no place in a white man’s home. The mongrel, however, instead of fleeing, added insult to injury by baring its teeth and growling at him.
Immediately enraged, Frank reached for a steel tyre iron that was lying on the floor. Grabbing it, he hurled it at the dog with great vigor and purpose, then eagerly awaited impact. He watched the steel fly through the air, but instead of striking dog flesh as intended it missed, landing on a tyre. As fortune would have it, the blunt head of the iron hit the tyre at a perfect right angle and bounced back at him, seemingly with increased velocity. It belted him in the mouth, sending him to the floor without one of his front teeth.
With a mouthful of blood, in plenty of pain, and with the remnants of his tooth in his hand, he went and fetched a rifle. What followed was a dog pogrom that saw the end of the stray dogs in his area. But he was destined to live on short one tooth and possessed of an abiding hatred of tick taxis.
* * * * *
Frank was a fine tracker and preferred not to rely on his African staff when he could do it himself; he was a loner and an individualist who preferred always to be in control. He was indeed good, but when following wounded leopard he had to learn the hard way that it is sometimes prudent to delegate.
Upon a time, he was sitting in a leopard blind with his client when, just as they were about to abandon their vigil, a leopard suddenly appeared on the bait. That was good and bad—good because his client had a chance of a shot, but bad because the light had faded and visibility was poor. To the trained eye the profile and position of the cat was clear, but in all the excitement Frank had difficulty explaining the point of aim to his man.
Intent on seizing the opportunity, the shooter hunkered down behind his scope and tried to draw a bead. But it was obvious to the PH that he was imprecise in his point of aim, because the rifle kept moving as he swept the area to find his target. No sooner had Frank spoken the words telling him to hold fire than a shot blasted into the night.
“Did you see what you were shooting at?” he asked.
“I think so,” was the subdued reply.
There was little doubt in Frank’s mind that he had a problem on his hands. Yes, at the bait there was nothing to be found. Clearly the only option was to return to camp and await the dawn. With a disappointed hunter in tow, they duly returned home.
At first light they were at the scene and looking for tracks. Initially there was no indication of a strike, but then, after some painstaking investigation, they found a speck of dark blood and then more. But the drops were intermittent, and it was clear that the shot had almost certainly missed the vital organs. There was an excellent chance it had been a gut shot, so he could rest assured that there was an angry predator lurking somewhere about. A long walk and a longer day beckoned.
Laboriously they followed the tracks. Progress was maddeningly slow as they scrutinized grass, leaves, and sand for specks of leopard blood. Six hours later they were all tired, thirsty, hot, and frustrated. Frank could see that the trackers were losing interest and that the client had had his fill of shuffling after wounded game. The visitor was dispatched to the road with a gunbearer and told to wait there to be picked up. In the noble tradition, Frank was determined to keep going until he found the leopard or well and truly lost the tracks. The two trackers followed his instructions with great reluctance, and that brought forth a scolding.
“I’m in charge, and we follow this spoor until we find him!”
The trackers listened without enthusiasm and resigned themselves to continuing the hunt.
It was not long before the going became even more difficult and dangerous as they entered a large Combretum thicket, and the trackers became even more lackluster in their endeavors. That did nothing for Frank’s mood. Frustration caused by his failure to find the elusive leopard, the heat, and thickets riddled with thorn combined with fury at the lack of commitment from his trackers was driving him to the point where his temper was slipping away.
“You bastards are bloody useless,” he hissed. “Get the hell out of here or get involved.”
They stared back at him with dark, dead eyes.
“We will never find this thing,” said one.
“That is for me to decide. We still have tracks. Now open your eyes and help me or take off for the car.” He pointed in the direction they had come and fumed.
After another withering look he turned and returned to the business of tracking, but his anger was starting to cloud his judgment. The sound of feet dragging behind reminded him that his assistants remained sullen and dissolute. His head started to hurt as his frustration grew under a boiling sun. He tore his way through thicket that clawed at him relentlessly. Sweat poured forth and blood marked the scratches. Mopane flies whirred in and out of his eyes, ears, and mouth.
In a little clearing an ant bear hole of unusual size appeared immediately ahead, and without thinking the frustrated hunter approached it and out of absentminded curiosity brought himself to his knees to peer inside. Seeing nothing untoward he leaned further into the excavation to probe further. What the trackers saw from a short distance off was Frank’s rump prominent and his head angling down into the burrow. The two tired men looked on with little more than passing interest, but the next moment they saw the rear of their leader surge rapidly forward and down as it followed his head. There was a puff of dust, a muffled cry, and then they noticed that connected to the bwana’s head was a paw with spots on it. Then they heard the bwana scream out very loudly indeed.
In an act of breathtaking idiocy Frank had put his head at the hidden predator’s disposal, and it had taken full advantage of the surprise offer. His screams for help triggered a restrained response, however, inasmuch as the trackers were reluctant to get in too close. Neither was armed, and the bwana’s weapon was in the hole with his head.
With his face crushed into the sand wall of the ant bear’s dwelling, Frank felt another claw rake the nape of his neck. Blinded and struggling to breathe without inhaling dust and sand, he managed to jam the rifle into something soft and tried to get it into a firing position with one hand, but it proved impossible.
The trackers helpfully shouted words of discouragement at the attacker, but from a safe distance and with questionable zeal. After all, their relationship with their boss had been placed under considerable strain.
With the strength generated by panic Frank hauled himself out the hole, with the leopard still firmly attached, and with all the strength at his disposal he wrenched himself to his feet. Fortunately the leopard was a female and relatively light, but it clung on tenaciously. He felt and heard the back of his head tear as the cat continued the attack before suddenly letting go and scampering off into the thicket.
To his dismay Frank noticed that his vision had become impaired, and then he realized that it was because his scalp was now hanging forward, over his eyes. The trackers expressed their condolences. He was not sure whether the physical pain or the pain of embarrassment was greater, but he accepted their sympathies with absolutely no grace. He brushed the back of his head out of his eyes and went to get help.
* * * * *
In addition to his other talents, Frank was a determined and irresponsible womanizer who was deeply disrespectful of the institution of marriage. To his way of thinking it was an irritating irrelevancy that should not be allowed to stifle his natural desires. So it was that when an elderly and rather portly client arrived with his youthful and beautiful new wife, Frank was quickly galvanized into action.
Money appeared to have been a motivating factor in bringing this particular union to consummation. True love was clearly absent from the relationship, and the young wife responded quickly and positively to Frank’s innuendo-laced entreaties. The prospective adulterer decided that it would help his cause if he hunted the Old Man hard and fast early in the safari, in the hope that if they were off to a productive but hectic start it would induce fatigue mixed with joy, encourage him to relax, and maybe—just maybe—drop his guard.
The plan went according to the script, but the soon-to-be cuckolded old gentleman was emphatic that his wife accompany him at all times and in all situations. Whether or not he sensed that mischief was in the air was unclear, but Frank’s frustration grew as the signals from the wife flashed with increasing brightness. His long celibate days in the savannas were pushing desire to the breaking point. But it was looking increasingly unlikely that the right situation was going to fall into his lap, and soon time was of the essence. Frank decided to resort to cunning and deception, and a more proactive modus operandi.
Thus it was that he and the old gent’s wife hatched a plot that the wife would fall ill at a mutually agreed time. Frank would then insist that he depart for the local mission hospital to seek assistance, and the husband would go out hunting with one of the waiters. The man had just returned to camp from leave, and it would be his job to masquerade as a professional hunter. Frank would encourage the husband to accept the waiter as a temporary substitute so as not to lose hunting time.
Thus the plan would see him safely out the way for the afternoon, and Frank would be free to return to camp and indulge in gleeful adultery. If things went well, it would enable him to rid himself of the pain in the nether regions that was troubling him so terribly. Frank knew that it was a daring, almost foolhardy ploy, but his insistent discomfort made thinking clearly difficult.
Joe the waiter was duly summoned to have the plan explained to him, but in the course of the conversation Frank realized how fraught with risk this all was. The accomplice he had selected was not famous for reliability or honesty, and there seemed a very significant threat that something might go wrong. The husband was nobody’s fool, and he might well pursue a line of inquiry with Joe that would confuse the less sophisticated stooge. Frank decided to instruct the waiter to pretend he could not speak English—another lie. That would keep it simple and reduce the margin of error.
“I will tell the client that you speak no English. All you can say is ‘shoot’ or ‘do not shoot’ and the names of the animals. Do you understand me properly?”
“Yes, bwana.”
“If he asks you any questions, you say you do not understand.”
“Yes, bwana.”
“Are you sure, Joe?”
“Yes, I am sure, bwana.”
“And you stay in the bush until dark. You don’t come back to camp before the sun goes.”
“Yes, bwana.”
He looked him earnestly in the eyes. “Joe, don’t screw this up. If you do there is going to be big trouble, and if I get into trouble so do you.”
“Yes, I understand, bwana.”
Joe then dressed in khaki and received a few sundry accoutrements and was told to concentrate on being a hunter until further notice. Even Frank, with a brain temporarily unbalanced by sexual desire, knew that he was playing with fire, but he put hope in the fact that the waiter was bright enough, knew a bit about game, had done a little shooting, and was a fairly competent driver. The waiter received an assurance that a useful payment would be forthcoming if the deception were carried out successfully.
The wife then duly reported sick before lunch, said she had lost her appetite, and insisted she wished to repair to her tent to rest. She explained that she felt very weak but did not wish to interfere with her husband’s plans for the afternoon. Frank gave a very authoritative clinical diagnosis that he had been rehearsing and explained there was no need for alarm; the ailment was almost certainly the result of an allergic reaction to tsetse fly bites and treatable, but it would necessitate his journeying to the mission hospital to acquire the requisite drugs. He emphasized that his client should continue to hunt, with Joe, who had so conveniently just arrived. He assured him that Joe was perfectly competent, despite his inability to grasp the English language. The client was a little circumspect at first, but upon hearing that he would be traveling to an area where an exceptional sable bull had recently been sighted, he accepted the offer. Frank hastened the hunting party together and saw them off on the road.
Barely able to control his breathing, Frank sat himself down to give them a little time to travel and ensure that there would be no unforeseen return. When secure in the knowledge that they were indeed gone, he made his way to the tent, where the object of his craving awaited. He walked in to discover her in a state of utterly splendid nakedness. Her long blonde hair was fluffed out languorously on the pillow, and a slither of white sheet lay teasingly between smooth and slender thighs. A lovely white smile invited him closer. His blood surged at this heavenly sight, and, overcome with a feeling of light-headedness induced by delicious anticipation, he disrobed and lay beside her. Gently they began to kiss, and her warm soft mouth pressed upon his, while silken skin wrapped itself around him.
In the field the hunting party was on track to the appointed area as per plan when fate intervened. A colleague of Frank’s just happened to be passing through the area and had decided to pay his old friend an impromptu social call. Recognizing Frank’s vehicle, he waved to the hunting party and signaled them to halt. Joe brought the vehicle to a standstill.
Unfortunately, Frank’s friend recognized Joe immediately and was struck by the unusual sight of him positioned in a vehicle, dressed in hunting garb, with a client in tow. He well knew that Frank seldom let anyone drive his vehicles, least of all one of his waiters. He was greatly puzzled.
“Jambo, Joe. What the hell are you doing?”
Joe was a little overcome with surprise at the unexpected meeting and promptly forgot his orders.
“I’m hunting,” he said with a smirk.
Frank’s friend laughed at the sight of the waiter grinning with amused self-importance. Joe found himself unable to hide his pride at being seen by one of the hunters in his new and unexpected position of responsibility and importance. After all, come to think of it, in a short time he had come a long way up the world.
“What the hell are you doing hunting, Joe?” The visitor shook his head incredulously.
The client had been struck immediately by Joe’s sudden bilingualism but reserved judgment. After all, Joe had used only two words of the language. But not for long. There was more to come.
“The bwana sent me. He is in the camp.”
On hearing irrevocable proof that he had been lied to about the Joe’s language abilities, the client went puce and he felt pressure rise on his brain.
“What did you say?” he screamed.
Both Joe and Frank’s friend were shocked by the outburst. There was a brief but deathly silence. Joe felt the blackness drain out of his cheeks as his blunder registered with him, and he turned slowly to face his enraged interrogator. He simply sat dumbfounded and speechless and awaited the next outburst.
“What do you mean he is in camp? I thought you couldn’t speak English! I thought he was going to the mission!”
The sound of the bellowing shocked Joe into further silence. He felt spittle on his face and turned away to look blankly straight ahead. He had not a clue what to do. Frank’s friend looked on, lost for words, before realizing that an incident had been triggered that was probably going to lead to violence. Determining discretion to be the better part of valor, he engaged gear and sped away, leaving the poor waiter to fend for himself.
Realizing that he had been the victim of a terrible deceit and that an outrage was almost certainly in progress back at the camp, the client gave another earsplitting roar.
“Get me back to camp—now!”
Joe’s knees were shaking so badly that he had to struggle to find the clutch. The client continued to glare at him from up close, and Joe knew that his life was endangered. Barely able to hold the wheel steady, he turned and drove nervously back to camp.
“Faster, faster!” the dupe screamed.
Joe put his foot down flat. It mattered little now. He could die in a car accident or the client could kill him. If he survived both those possibilities the bwana would certainly finish the job, so he hurtled down the road at tremendous speed.
Frank, in camp, was at that wonderful point in life at which he felt he held proprietary rights of the most intimate nature over the most wonderful object known to the male of the species. Being at a very advanced stage in the process of fornication, he was finding the experience too exquisite to terminate and so concentrated on prolonging the perfect moment for as long as possible, while whispering a series of polished pleasantries into his lady’s delicious ear. The smell and soft feel of the woman he embraced, and the warmth from her moist loins, brought him as close to heaven as he felt certain he would ever get.
Such was Frank’s sexually induced delirium that he was uncharacteristically tuned out to the approach of danger. The first he knew of matters untoward was when the sublime mood was broken by a sound akin to a low-flying fighter jet screaming past his tent and into camp. The roar of a high-revving engine was closely followed by a thunderous crash caused by metal on wood as his Land Cruiser collided with a tree. Then there was a momentary but perfect silence. Joe jumped out and ran for all he was worth through the bush, heading for the horizon. The client was more interested in human contact.
For Frank, it had taken less than the time needed to say his name for his status to be transformed from sexual predator in a sensual paradise to hunted prey. The next sound he heard was sonorous and charged with malicious intent.
“Where are you, you bastard!?”
Frank did not want to answer that or any other question. As he leaped from the place of passion into his pants, he looked down at himself and found it hard to understand that what he was seeing might well prove the reason for his early death. He glanced out the tent window and was stunned by the speed at which the husband was approaching, despite his bulk and his age. The Weatherby in his hand, which he had wielded with such precision and competence in the field, posed an added problem.
The hunter was now very much the hunted. He bolted out the other side of the tent and fled into the long grass at incredible speed and kept running for a long time before finding a place to hide and catch his breath. Then he heard a voice and saw Joe, who was obviously also on the run. Enraged, embarrassed, and unfulfilled, he assaulted him. Then he lay up until nightfall, whereupon he stole into the camp under cover of darkness, retrieved a vehicle, and went off to report his early departure from the safari.
It was some months later when, much to Frank’s consternation, an African gentleman rode into his camp on a bicycle. Dressed in a tatty official-looking khaki uniform he bore a letter that carried a stamp indicating that it was “On Government Service.”
“Are you Mister Frank Cooper?” the official asked.
“Yes,” he replied.
“Ah, I have a summons for you.” He proffered the brown envelope.
It appeared that his presence was required. He read the contents:
“This is to certify that Mr. Frank Cooper is hereby summoned to appear at the District Court to answer to the charge of Assault with Intent to Do Grievous Bodily Harm in the matter of one Joe. . . . ”
This came as a shock. Frank had been hunting the area for years and had no knowledge of any court anywhere in the vicinity—and this was not the first time he had given a member of his staff a “clap.” On investigation he discovered that, indeed, twice a year a magistrate traveled from the capital to the boma in the little village and convened a court to hear criminal and civil complaints.
Never in his wildest dreams had he envisaged appearing in court in these remote reaches, but there it was. He would have to go on the appointed day or face a warrant for his immediate arrest. Furthermore, he was ordered to present himself in suitable attire. That was particularly irksome, for he owned neither suit nor tie.
On the appointed day, with a tie and ragged jacket borrowed from his cook, “the accused” made his way to court. Word had obviously spread that a white man was going to be tried, and the idea created enormous popular interest. On driving into the parking area outside the boma he noted with resignation the excited buzz emanating from the crowd. This boma was a bedraggled, official-looking building, a relic from colonial times that had almost certainly seen no paint since the British had departed. There was much finger pointing, whistling, and clapping from the large crowd, for whom this trial provided a spectacle seldom if ever witnessed. He suddenly knew how one feels on the scaffold.
Frank walked to the door and entered the room, closely followed by the noisy throng of people who were jostling for seats inside. A clerk of court and an orderly started remonstrating above the din to control the crowd and restore some semblance of control. Finally, when the public seating was fully subscribed, those still trying to enter were subjected to a quick baton charge and forcefully evicted.
When all was quiet, Frank was motioned off his seat toward a derelict looking podium with a box on top, inside of which was a three-legged wooden stool. When seated, he found it barely possible to see over the sides. He stared out over the top at his audience and felt a little frightened, quite angry, and extremely stupid—like a rabbit caught in the headlights. Then he reminded himself that this all had come about as a result of the power of the female to induce men into extraordinarily inane conduct. He looked down at his dirty shoes and the dirty floor as he pondered this anomaly of nature.
After what seemed like an age a policeman appeared through the door, carrying what was obviously a docket containing the evidence that would prove Frank’s criminality. The man seated himself at a desk in the opposite corner of the court and gave Frank a meaningful and vindictive stare. Frank stared back at him and thought how much he would like to flatten his nose a little more.
Suddenly the hum from the crowd subsided as the orderly warned the assemblage of the approach of the presiding officer.
“Stand up! Stand up!” he ordered.
With theatrical mien the magistrate swept into court, clearly aware that this was showtime. Before him was an audience of a size never before seen in the districts. White men were rare here, and having one on trial before him, to be placed on the rickety scales of rural African justice, was a rather pleasurable novelty. For this occasion the presiding officer had taken special care before making his entrance to dust and adjust his robes of office, in order to maximize their decorative effect. There was a reverential silence as all stood gaping. His Worship strode to the raised bench at the head of the room and took his seat behind an old desk. After shuffling papers he nodded to the court orderly, and the order to sit was given.
“Be seated.”
“Eef eet pleeeses Yo Wushup, thee Stet weeshes to present the mutter in wheech Meester Frunk Cooper is chuched with arsault weethe eentention too doo greevos bodily hum to Meester Joe Banda. Thee Stet alleges thet on thee day in question Meester Frunk deed arsault Meester Banda weeth a weepon eentending to do heem greevous bodily hum.”
The magistrate had his face inches from his desk as he diligently took note of the prosecutor’s words. His writing hand moved rapidly across the pages, and Frank could hear a scratching sound. The prosecutor waited for the nod from the magistrate to continue, but nothing happened. There was an embarrassed silence. Then came a voice from the bench.
“My pen. Eet ees broken,” His Worship announced. He held up an empty ballpoint and simpered. There was more silence while all the assembled looked to see how a problem like this might be tackled. More through impatience than kindness Frank reached into his pocket and produced a pen. Thrilled that the spectacle would now recommence, the audience cheered.
“Thunk you, Accused,” he said to Frank, then nodded to the policeman to continue.
The prosecutor announced that he was calling his first state witness.
“Thee Stet weeshes too call Meester Banda.”
With that Joe the waiter appeared, and the crowd stirred. Here before their very eyes was the victim of the white man’s brutality.
“Silence, silence!” the orderly barked.
Frank watched Joe through slit eyes as the waiter savored his moment of fame. He was dressed in his Sunday finery, but to add to his getup he was also wearing sunglasses, despite the prevailing gloom in a courtroom without lights. The magistrate ordered him to remove them. A Bible was produced from under the policeman’s desk, and the complainant was sworn in. The policeman then began his questioning.
“Meester Banda, cun you tell the court whatee huppened too you?”
“Yas, Your Weship. On thut day Meester Frunk, he wunted to fock thee, thee, thee client’s wife.” Joe stammered a little in the glow of all the attention. There was total silence in the courtroom as all hung on every word. “So he told me, ‘Joe you must be the hunter so I can stay in the camp and fock the client’s wife.’ Hee sayed to me, ‘I tell the client you cunt speak Eenglish,’ so I must not talk to the client. We go in the bush, then I see on the rod the friend of Meester Frunk.”
Frank noted the magistrate shaking his head in solemn but silent outrage at the revelation that the hunter in the dock had been engaged in adultery.
“He speeks to me, and I am forgetting what the bwana has sayed and I speek to heem in Eenglish. Then the client, he goes compleetely mud, and I theenk hee is going to keel me. He shouts to me to go back to cump fust. We go very fust, and then in the cump I huv uccident into the tree. But the client is compeetely mud, so I run into the bush to hide. Then I see Meester Frunk running very fust into the bush holding his pants, and I call heem. He is mud too, and he beats me to hell with a big stick and all the time he is calling me a stupid bloody bastard. I thought I’m going to die.”
The magistrate continued his solemn head shaking at this news.
The stick came as a surprise to Frank, but, obviously, in the great African tradition, Joe had decided to touch up the story a little.
The magistrate then turned his attention to Frank.
“Stand up!” shouted the orderly at the villain.
Frank stood in the knowledge that all eyes were on him as they savored the white man getting his very well deserved, albeit belated, deserts.
“Why were you huvving sex with thee client’s wife? Shee ees not your wifee but the wifee of your veeseetor. This is very, very bud,” he solemnly announced.
The audience nodded in agreement. The magistrate shook his head woefully for what seemed a long time.
“Where ees your wife, Meester Frunk?”
“I do not have one, Your Worship.”
“Ah, ah, ah, shem,” he shook his head woefully again. It was a show of sympathy partly for a man with no wife and partly for what he was about to do to him.
“So whyee did you do this bud theeng. Eet is very bud. I am very upset. You are a white mun; you should know ho to beehev.”
“She wanted me to do this, Your Worship.”
“But eet is very bud to huv sex with the wife of your client. Eeven eef she wunts eet you must just say no. You must just say no. No I cunt!” He thumped the old desk to emphasize his point, and there was a loud crack. The magistrate looked down to see what had broken.
“Yes, Your Worship, I’m very sorry for this. I will never do it again.”
“So why deed you beat Meester Banda with a stick and all the time calling heem a ‘bloody bastard’? This is also very bud.”
“I’m sorry for this, your worship, but I was very angry and I lost my temper. But I did not beat him with a stick. I hit him with my fist.”
“Thut ees a lie, Your Weship!” shouted the prosecutor.
Frank saw Joe sitting with a finger up one enlarged nostril, thoroughly enjoying the spectacle he was so much a part of.
“He is the liar.” Frank pointed an accusing finger at the head with a finger inside it.
“You are a liar!” Both the policeman and Joe and some of the audience joined the chorus, and the orderly and the magistrate started calling for quiet above the din.
This, Frank felt, was pure theater that all but he were happy to see drawn out as long as possible.
Finally, when order returned, the magistrate realized that he needed to regain control of his court. He admonished the ill-disciplined spectators and returned to the bone of contention. He looked at Frank.
“Butee hee sayes you heet heem weeth a beeg stick.”
“No, I did not,Your Worship. Can I show you what I did, please?”
Exasperated and angry, Frank had decided to bring some closure to the proceedings.
“Yes,” said the magistrate, somewhat absentmindedly.
With that Frank emerged from his box and walked toward the corner where his accusers were seated. There was a rapt silence as they watched the white hunter stride toward the complainant.
“Stand up, Joe.” He looked at his man, who was now visibly taken aback. The room remained silent as Joe looked about him for guidance. No intervention was forthcoming, so he came to his feet—but not for long. Frank saw Joe’s eyes widen as he realized what was coming at him. A hard fist crashed into his nose. Down he went.
There was a stunned silence. Frank addressed the bench.
“That is what I did, Your Worship.”
The crowd went uncontrollably wild—whistling, clapping, shouting, cheering, jeering. Then a fight started that turned into a fracas that turned into a riot. The orderly entered the melee to restrain the belligerents. He disappeared for a while and then reemerged to be seen fleeing, holding his bloodied nose. The magistrate, realizing that things had spun out of control, also decided to exit, doing so unglamorously through a small window. Frank seemed to have become superfluous, as events had now gathered a momentum all of their own. He was hardly noticed as he walked to his vehicle and drove back to camp.
The next day he returned to the scene of the crime and offered to pay reparations. The offer was accepted gladly. The magistrate fined him twice—once for hitting Joe in the bush, and once for hitting him in the court. It was not justice in the classical sense, but of the African kind.
