The Amulet of Power - Mike Resnick [83]
The brakeless safari car was racing downhill toward a herd of elephants that was standing right in the middle of the one-lane road.
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On the right was the mountain; on the left were the treetops, and a dropoff that would surely kill them.
The car continued careening down the hill, and suddenly Lara leaned on the horn.
The sound panicked the elephants, and they broke for cover on the downslope, pushing the youngest to safety first. One matriarch turned to face the car, trumpeting her rage, ears spread, trunk extended, and Lara was sure they were going to collide with the six-ton behemoth, but at the last second the elephant lost her nerve and raced after the others. The car missed her by less than six inches.
But they weren’t out of danger yet, because they still had no brakes and they were still racing down the steep, winding, single-lane mountain road. Every time they came to a curve she leaned on the horn again to warn whatever unseen animals or vehicles might be ahead. Once they almost ran head-first into a bull buffalo, and another time they barely avoided a greater kudu. A pair of baboons were too slow reacting to the horn, and their shattered bodies went flying down the mountain as Lara tried desperately to stay on the road.
Finally she spun onto a turnoff, where the ground leveled out, and a minute later she was able to bring the car to a halt. She sat, tense and motionless, her sweating hands still gripping the steering wheel.
“Where are we?” she asked at last. “Where does this road lead to?”
“We’re a couple of miles from the Ark,” said Oliver. “Just give my heart a minute to stop pounding and we’ll start walking. Once we’re there I’ll send someone back to tow the car.”
“I don’t see any other car tracks,” she noted, staring at the dirt road.
“Cars don’t come to the Ark very often,” replied Oliver. “Usually a bus picks up all the tourists at the Aberdares Country Club and drives them here as a group. This is just a service road; it probably gets used twice a week, tops.” He opened the door. “Come on. If we hurry we’ll make it there before dark.”
“Will the place be full, do you think?” she asked, getting out of the car. She unstrapped her holsters and put it and the pistols into Oliver’s unused backpack, which she then slung over her shoulders.
“The animal spotter on duty tonight is Franz Theibolt,” answered Oliver. “He’s a friend from the old days. If there’s nothing else available, you can have his room.”
“I wasn’t concerned about a room,” she said. “I just wondered how many people we’re going to have to check out before we can relax.”
“We’ll know when we get there,” he replied. “There are maybe fifty-five or sixty rooms, and they usually run close to a full house.”
They began walking along the dirt road. A few baboons stopped to watch them.
“Well, that’s a comfort, anyway,” remarked Oliver.
“The baboons?”
He nodded. “As long as they’re out in the open, it means there aren’t any leopards around.”
A bushbuck loped across the road some twenty yards ahead of them, and then a pair of giant forest hogs appeared, rooting industriously through the high grasses that lined the road. Lara kept waiting for something bigger to come along and claim right-of-way, something like an elephant or a buffalo, but none appeared, and after ten minutes she finally saw the Ark in the distance.
“You know, from here it really does look like Noah’s Ark,” she remarked. “Or at least like I’ve always imagined it.”
“Except that it’s well over a mile above sea level.”
“So’s the real one.”
He stopped and stared at her. “You mean you’ve actually found it?”
Lara laughed. “Sorry, Malcolm. I couldn’t resist teasing you. No, I haven’t found Noah’s Ark. But then again, I haven’t looked for it either. Not yet, anyway.”
They reached the huge structure in another five minutes. A number of people on one of the viewing platforms spotted them and stared curiously as they walked to a door at ground level.
“Hey, fella!” said one of the tourists. “Can’t you read? No one’s allowed to go