Free Born Wild by Tony Fitzjohn Page B

arrived home in triumph, eleven bone-shuddering hours later. George harrumphed his approval; Terence harrumphed his dismay. And we settled back into our routine as if nothing had happened.
    In Nairobi I had bought food and drink to last us a few weeks and was intent on getting better at tracking the lions. These were the days before radio collars and it was no easy task keeping tabs on them, even when we only had three – they could comfortably travel eight or nine miles between dusk and dawn. The key thing was getting up before the sun: the shadows in the early morning and evening help you to see faint impressions that you miss when the sun is overhead, and the slightest breeze, as the heat of the day starts to move the air, can rub out even the most distinct tracks. Once I was up it was just a matter of watching George. He never actually said anything but he would point at some bent grass or a patch of urine or gesture at his nose, encouraging me to smell.
    After a lifetime spent in the bush, George had the most extraordinary knowledge of animal behaviour. It was almost as if he knew what they would do before they knew it themselves. A great many ill-informed words are spoken by people who ‘ know it’s a mock charge because the elephant’s ears are waving’ orbecause the lion isn’t swishing its tail vigorously enough – words that are often wryly recalled at their hospital bedsides, or over the mahogany by friends at their funerals. George didn’t talk about it and he didn’t have any tried and tested rules but he knew. Always armed, he never had to shoot a charging animal in the entire time I knew him. And we were charged a lot. By the time I met George he always avoided killing animals: memories of shooting game by the thousand to feed the British Army during the Second World War haunted him. But it wasn’t just repugnance that put him off shooting charging beasts. He seemed to know what was going to happen and reacted accordingly. He seldom got it wrong.
    In my early years at Kora there were still a great many rhino and they charged us regularly. It’s quite easy to avoid rhinos if you keep your cool and you’re not hemmed in, not because it’s a mock charge but because they have lousy eyesight. George was a master at avoiding them with minimum effort but even he needed to see them first. When Christian’s playmates, Lisa and Juma, were out hunting and I was still very green, we were once out looking for them in thick bush when George held a finger to his mouth to hush me. He came back to me very quietly, then moved to one side and I stepped forward. I had a rifle but I didn’t have a bullet up the spout as it’s too dangerous when you’re walking in thick nyika bush behind a friend. We could hear a crunching sound so we thought Lisa and Juma had made a kill and were enjoying the spoils. We stopped and listened again because it’s always dangerous being around lions and their food, then I moved up once more. I came face to face with a two-ton rhino just six foot away from me. It snorted in shock. I snorted back, then turned and ran, holding the gun above my head to load it without snagging it on the ground. I turned to fire and, as I did, the rhino veered away from me and went straight for George. Everything happened very slowly and clearly as theadrenalin kicked in. Christ! I’ve killed the Old Man, I thought, as I watched the rhino thunder down upon him. I couldn’t shoot because the rhino was between George and me. I was utterly powerless. Horrified, I watched as George lowered his rifle, held it across his chest like a guardsman and jumped sideways two feet over a small bush. The rhino roared past him, followed at pace by a calf, and smashed away through the undergrowth. George looked up with a smile. ‘ Nice calf,’ he said, and carried on tracking the girls.
    Another time Christian, George and I were walking down a sand lugga