Free Home is Goodbye by Isobel Chace

steppe lay beneath her, Africa as she had always been, vast and untamed, with few signs that man had ever crossed her dangerous territory. A herd of zebra, showing up only because they had moved away from the protection of the trees in a moment of safety. Elephants, enormous and yet nimble for their colossal size, moving in families; the only animal sure of his own life, and able to ignore the panics of the lesser breeds all around him. A pride of lions, replete and sleeping in the hot sun. Buck, wildebeeste, rhino, almost any animal that she could put a name to, came into sight at least once as they flew overhead.
    ‘You can’t see them well from up here,’ Matt said at last, having watched her out of the corner of his eye for some time. ‘One day I’ll take you to one of the national parks and do the thing properly!’
    His eyebrows quirked with amusement as he waited to see if Sara was going to stay in a huff with him. She knew it, but could not resist the offer he held out to her.
    ‘Would you really?’ she demanded.
    ‘I don’t see why not. We could make up a party one week-end. The best one is Ngorogora crater. You ought to see that! We might easily go there one day. Would that suit you?’
    ‘Oh yes, anywhere at all! Oh, look, there’s a giraffe! They’re so much more brightly coloured in real life — at least, I mean than they are in the zoos at home. Do you suppose they fade in the cold weather?’ She cast him an anxious glance and was rather annoyed when he laughed at this ingenious theory.
    ‘Just because you’ve been brought up with them, there’s no need to be superior,’ she told him with a quaint dignity. ‘Why don’t you impart some of your stores of knowledge?’
    Matt grinned. He needed no second invitation to talk about the land that was so dear to him. Animals, he told her, were societies of people, each with their own customs and patterns of behaviour. Learn the customs and you were reasonably safe with them, ignore them and you were heading for trouble. He told her stories of the truly pioneer days of Africa and of the men who had opened up the country.
    He got so carried away with his own delight in the legends that it was she who first heard the grinding noise in the engine.
    ‘Matt!’ she exclaimed. ‘ C an you hear that noise?’
    He listened intently and his lips tightened as the joystick began to pull against his hand.
    ‘What’s wrong?’ she asked. ‘Is it anything serious?’
    He shook his head.
    ‘No, nothing serious, but, Sara, I’m going to take her down. We shall be quite all right. When they don’t hear from us at the next checkpoint, they’ll send someone out to look for us—’
    Her eyes searched his for reassurance.
    ‘Very well, Matt,’ she said at last, and he smiled at her, a warm, intimate smile that brought the colour to her cheeks and made her look away.
    ‘Right, we’re going down — now!’ Matt warned her, and they swooped earthwards with the sudden violence of a fast lift. Sara shut her eyes and held on to her seat.
    We’re going to crash, she thought, and was surprised that she wasn’t more afraid. Then she felt the wheels hit the ground and they had landed. The engine gave a final cough and died and she heard Matt breathing heavily beside her. The little Auster slewed round and jolted to a stop, throwing Sara forward so hard that her safety-belt cut into her.
    She felt Matt’s hands lifting her down to safety and then they stood hand in hand gazing at the little plane.
    ‘I thought we were going to crash,’ she said in a small, weak voice.
    He held her close.
    ‘We damned nearly did!’ he said.

 
    CHAPTER FIVE
     
    It was Sara who first pulled away from his encircling arm. She had a sudden vision of her Aunt Laura nodding approvingly as she lay on her sofa at Kwaheri and smiled inwardly to herself. How very misleading looks could be, for she was well aware that there was nothing in the least romantic in the way Matt had held her,