Page 57 of In the Heat of the Jungle

“We don’t have time for more games, Louisa. After we get home, neither of us can conceal our dire straits much longer.”

“We can do it long enough for Chad to get his hands on that fortune. We’ve come too far and done too many wicked things to lose now.”

“What if you help him win Leigh and you’re wrong or exposed?”

“That’s a chance I might have to take. I haven’t decided yet. This information is too fresh. I have to give it more study. For now, we have to quell this romance between Leigh and Jace.” Louisa revealed what she had discovered in Leigh’s tent: the contract with Jace.

Cynthia was shocked. “You mean their wager is a farce? It isn’t for one thousand pounds as Chad thinks? She actually bet one night with him against his plantation? How could any man risk so much to spend a night between her legs? How does she plan to find time to make her payment, especially if he wins more than one night?”

“Obviously little Leigh isn’t as pure and innocent as I imagined. We know she can’t win his plantation. I think she wants to lose to him. That gives her a reason to justify yielding her maidenhead to him. You know how prim virgins are; they have to pretend that surrender isn’t their idea. That’s why she agreed to all those silly rules.” Louisa gave her friend a brief summation of the rules in the contract. “No doubt she’ll find ways to break rules one and two and pay him along the trail, because it won’t be possible to pay him later. We’re sailing as soon as this safari ends. Of course she wouldn’t break rule three because she could never pay off that loss. Chad would never let her out of his sight for a year. She probably wants to enjoy Jace here, then work on Chad back home. The greedy bitch!”

“What if she’s fallen for Jace Elliott and hopes he’ll marry her after she gives him her virginity?”

“She’s not that crazy. Jace is a criminal in exile.”

“If Chad has to win her and can’t, Louisa, we’re all, except for those two, losers.”

“Until I decide what to do, Cynthia, we’ll have to make certain Leigh earns more points than Jace. That should worry and distract our guide.”

“What if you tell Chad about their secret deal? He’ll yank her home so fast her head will spin for weeks.”

“No. I don’t want him to panic and mess up things. If he was really worried about Jace winning, he would be pursuing Leigh more energetically. Part of what Chad said must be true; his little wager was to provoke Jace into working for him. I think he’s after Jace for revenge. If our guide gets killed, Jace isn’t a threat to Chad’s plans for Leigh. It’s clever, get rid of his foe and get the girl.”

“Of course, that must be his plan. He’s so devious and cunning.”

“Not as much as we are, Cynthia. For now, we’ll be very generous and help Chad, without his knowledge naturally. Until we know more, we have to keep Leigh and Jace apart.”

“You want me to have a fight with Reid and move in with her?”

“That’s too obvious and suspicious, Cynthia. We’ll just keep them on edge and in doubt. I’ll work on Jace; you work on Leigh. Maybe Chad will let something slip. I’ll keep a sharp eye and ear on him. If Chad has to win Leigh to become Webster’s heir, I must know soon, as that would change my plan. If not …”

“But what about the other part of Chad’s bet with Jace? The part about winning five thousand dollars each time they sleep with Leigh? Surely one or both men will try to collect on it, many times.”

“I’m surprised Jace Elliott let Chad include such a lowdown term. Obviously Jace isn’t as honest and honorable as we thought.”

Cynthia speculated, “If Leigh’s as hungry and eager as it appears from her secret wager, one of those men could earn a lot of extra money if he’s clever.”

“No man is as cunning and smart as we are. Just wait and see.”

“I hope so, Louisa, I truly hope so.”

Chapter Thirteen

The first sight of the Manyatta, the Masai village, was a surprise. It was surrounded by a fence that looked like a giant circle of tangled thornbushes, and was twelve feet high. Jace explained that it was called an engang and its purpose was to keep out lions and to keep in their cattle.

Once inside, Leigh saw numerous huts with flat tops and made of earth and dung. The dung was thickened and strengthened with straw, and plastered to a round framework of strong branches. The odor was strong but not unbearable. Groups of cattle were everywhere, having been brought inside for the night. Young boys tended the “supreme providers” with great care, even with affection and respect.

The Masai depended on cattle for meat and blood and milk. They halted to watch several men at work with a cow. A leather thong was tied around its neck, and it was held motionless. One man knelt and fired a blocked arrow into the animal’s jugular vein. Blood was caught in a gourd. Some of the men drank the red liquid hot from the task. Others mixed it with milk, then consumed it. Leigh noticed how the bleeding halted immediately. The cow seemed unhurt, and not the least troubled by the deed, but she felt a little nauseated.

Jace had told them many things about this nomadic tribe of lion-killing spearmen. They settled in an area as long as the grazing was good, then moved on when it wasn’t. They never camped near waterholes, because the earth was trampled and barren, and predators were a threat. Water was hauled by women to camp, and none was wasted, not even for bathing and drinking. That was done at rivers.

Flies were many and busy inside the enclosure. But Masai did not kill them or even shoo them away, believing spirits of ancestors could inhabit all living things. Their god was called Enkai, and the lives of these drinkers of blood were filled with rituals and customs.

Until his middle teens, a Masai boy tends the herd, while the girls milk cows and serve as the warrior’s concubines. Between sixteen and twenty, a boy is circumcised in a grand ceremony. During this training period he is given warrior raiment and weapons, and his head is shaved. A few years later, he becomes a full warrior. Only then can he marry and grow hair to be braided into a certain style.

The Masai warriors—moran—were very tall and slender, a handsome race with sharp and bold features. The garb of some consisted of animal skins draped toga-style; others wore a cloth wrapped around their hips. Their hair was plaited in an elaborate style, its top held against the forehead with a cord beneath the chin. The black hair was heavily greased with animal fat and dusted with red ochre. Their stork-like legs were decorated with designs running from groin to ankle by scratched mud. Most of them had simple beaded bands around their necks, wrists, and ankles. Their bodies displayed a reddish-orange cast from the ochre mud smeared and dried there. Most had large loops in earlobes stretched to an amazing size.

The girls who served the warriors did so before the age they could conceive, a fact Leigh found distressing. When puberty ended, the young girls were circumcised, too, and declared ready for marriage.

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