71. Uncertainties
Chloe is walking over to the field clinic over loose gravel and nears it carefully like a chameleon. The clinic is an army truck that opens at one side with a tent attached. They chose an ideal location under a big tree that protects them from the murderous Africa sun.
She sneaks up on Isaac stealthily where he is standing under the tent with his back to her and talking. She hugs him tightly so that he stop talking and smiles at Khaya.
“Sorry, my mate!” He turns around in her embrace and pecks her softly on her lovely, full lips: “Are you not going to greet our friend, darling! Where are your manners?”
Chloe shrewdly looks at Khaya and naughtily smiles: “Sorry, Doctor. How are you this morning? Wait, let me guess. You are complaining to each other, I must listen to his story every evening that nothing is going on and I have to remind him that it is better this way. We don’t need a medical emergency, not so?”
Khaya smiles: “Yes, it’s true, but that was not what we were discussing. Isaac enquired about Rene Bosch who probably will join us soon and we wondered whether the helicopter shouldn’t have arrived already? Chloe, it should have picked up our friends this morning at 10:30 in Port Elizabeth and flew straight here, not so? It is five o'clock already! It couldn’t have taken them this long?”
Isaac hugs Chloe very tightly. “Khaya has a special soft spot for Rene en I detect he becomes all the more worried as time goes by. You see the colonel regularly. Do you know something, dearie?”
From behind them Nonkosi’s voice comes suddenly: “Yes, do you know anything? I am also worried sick.” They look around and see Nonkosi and Anton at the entrance of the tent.
Khaya explains: “Nonkosi also very much look forward to the time Rene joins us. We three in the past have serviced clinics and old age homes together and she is a delightful lady.”
Nonkosi frowns. “Chloe, won’t you go and find out from the colonel what is going on. I’m sure they should already have landed.”
Anton nods earnestly: “Yes, by all means! She is getting on my nerves. She can’t sit still or stop to harass me. ‘Where is my pal?’ ‘When are they coming?’ ‘I hope they haven’t got into trouble.’ Please, Chloe, relieve me of this evil!”
Annoyed Nonkosi looks at Anton and pulls a face as if to warn him that he is now crossing the line about their personal details. He looks like a naughty schoolboy caught out on mischief but it is too late to rectify anything.
Chloe laughs out loudly for his despairing demeanor. The pair of them has been fascinating her from the day they have arrived on the farm. Anton is a millwright and in the meantime befriended Ronnie and took over the mechanical maintenance of the farm. Captain Dexter told her and Jane one day how Anton followed a SAMIL 100 that exhausted black smoke and showed Morrison’s technical guys the air filter was blocked. He knows army vehicles like the back of his hand because he was a serviceman in the army during the bush war. He also now helps out at the technical service corps of the colonel. Chloe wants to, when she gets the chance, take Nonkosi aside and finds out how she became entangled with Anton van Loggerenberg and when. Was it recently, or had they have to walk a long path during the difficult apartheid years?
Chloe breaks her hug eventually and throws her hands in the air.
“Okay, why don’t we all go to the colonel and hear what is going on, or are you afraid of him? Jane and I are worried as well and especially about Captain Dexter because we work well together. And Jane simply can’t wait to cuddle her Frenchman again. And I remember how the lovely Kadin, Rene’s beautiful daughter, embraced me before she climbed into the kombi when they departed. We all want them safe and sound here with us.”
Chloe realizes, looking at their demeanors, there is no interest in joining her and Anton sums up their feelings: “No, Chloe, if I have to be in that arrogant man’s presence for too long, I shall do something irresponsible. We all feel like this. You just have the way to turn him around your little finger. Everyone can see the pest likes you no matter what you do.”
Khaya laughs heartily: “Who doesn’t like Chloe? She can turn every situation upside-down en spin it like a top.”
They are all splitting their sides and Chloe gives in: “Okay, I shall walk over quickly and see what I can find out. All of you just wait here for me then I can inform you all, toodle-oo …”
Chloe quickly walks over to the mobile headquarters where she hopes she will find Morrison and his task team. She sees Jane coming from the kennels.
“Hey, Chloe, wait for me. Are you on your way to the colonel?”
“Yes, Jane. Khaya, Anton, and Nonkosi are with my husband in the field clinic and they are all very worried like us but they are not eager to face the colonel. They asked me to find out.”
Quickly they ascend the stairs. No one is behind the desk of Heinrich’s office and they pass it and peep into the colonel’s empty office next door. They also pass his office and find the task team with the colonel in the lecture room deliberating.
Amazed the colonel looked up when the two burst in uninvited: “And now, ladies, what is chasing you?”
Chloe explains quickly: “Quite a group of us are very worried, Colonel. Shouldn’t the helicopter have arrived a long time ago? They sent me to enquire what really is going on.”
Morrison answers concisely: “We are exactly here to discuss the problem. Something must have gone wrong. You are correct, but we know as much as you do. The question now is: what do we do about it? There is no way in which we can communicate with Captain Dexter and his men. They are on their own.”
Worried Jane asks: “Colonel, do you have a plan of action?”
Morrison nods. “If they don’t turn up before tomorrow morning, we will have to use the private chopper to go and have a look. It is too late now and too dangerous to fly because the normal lights that guide aircraft against obstacles like cables and high voltage wires are probably not working and it is only safe to fly in daylight.”
This doesn’t satisfy Jane: “But what if they were attacked and are in danger at this stage, Colonel? Don’t you think we should send in backup? What if the Puma is out of order? They flew to that place and they have no vehicles. What if they had to get to vehicles by foot and were attacked by cannibals and robbers?”
Morrison shakes his head: “We have no way to contact any part of our army over this distance. What if we already have lost the Puma, Dexter, and his men, and we lose also the contingent we send after them? The army that protects our base here then becomes only weaker. The safest option is to send out Haasbroek and two of our best operational soldiers at first light tomorrow morning. They will only land there if Dexter can assure them of a safe landing, or else they must do surveillance of the situation from the air, fly back and report. We then can make a more informed decision.”
Suddenly the two-way radio in front of Morrison crackles: “Main Gate, here! Colonel, please come in, over.”
Morrison takes the call: “I’m listening, Main Gate, over.”
“Colonel, Major Hunter is here at the main gate. He wants to see you urgently. He has very important information.”
Chloe’s heart jumps inside her and she and Jane look at each other with big eyes. Last week they harassed Dexter to convince the colonel that they go into town for supplies, but he bluntly refused. Their real plan was to convince Dexter on their way to town to visit Hunter quickly on the smallholding to see if he is coping.
Now their friend is at the main gate with crucial information for the colonel. What on earth can it be? Does it have anything to do with their current situation?