An Elephant in My Kitchen: What the Herd Taught Me About Love, Courage, and Survival Read online

  The first night, Thabo and Elaine were so exhausted that they fell asleep instantly. It was a good sign, and from that night, as long as Elaine was close by, he was a happy little camper. She knew from experience that he always woke up at 5 a.m., and he was so reliable that she never set an alarm. If she didn’t wake up, he squealed and squealed until she did. If she pretended to be asleep, he nudged her with his snout, and if that didn’t work, he balanced his front legs on the bed and rested his head on her stomach.

  ‘Nothing like a heavy rhino head to force me out of bed,’ she grinned. ‘And he knows it’ll get me up.’

  On a particularly chilly morning, Elaine was still buried under her duvet and Thabo decided enough was enough. His mum was right there, so why wasn’t he getting a cuddle? He heaved himself up on the bed with her. Elaine woke with a jolt on a broken bed with a very happy rhino calf snuffling his face into hers. He curled up next to her and, for once, allowed her an extra long lie-in.

  Elaine never bothered with the bed again and slept on the mattress on the ground, even though she knew that uninterrupted sleep would become a thing of the past. They fought for bed space and blankets most nights and I eventually replaced her white cotton sheets with ones that didn’t show the dirt quite as easily.

  Looking after Thabo was better than a gym workout. He hated anything to move while he was being fed, not even a twitching toe, and Elaine quickly perfected the leap-on-table manoeuvre to get out of his way. Two hundred kilos of irritable rhino calf packs a punch. The only way to get rid of some of his exuberant toddler energy was to take him for a run. He gambolled after her like a puppy, and whenever they passed a cluster of trees he hurtled towards the closest one and hid behind it. I can’t see you so you can’t see me. Of course, she ignored the huge rump sticking out from behind the tree and played along.

  His favourite place in the world – after her bed – was his wallow pool.

  One minute he would be grazing quietly, the next he would zoom across the enclosure and throw himself into the mud, back legs kicking to churn up the sludge. The muckier the better. Up he scrambled and over he keeled, splashing and cavorting and peering at us through happy mud-caked eyes. You didn’t have to be an animal expert to know that rhino boy loved his mud – something we encouraged because mud is crucial for a rhino’s health. It’s a natural sunblock, stops them from overheating and helps prevent insect bites.

  Like human kids, Thabo did the opposite of what Elaine wanted him to do, and going up onto the lodge deck to say hello to guests eating breakfast was one of her big no-nos. One bump of his clumsy rump and a table would be on its side, scattering scrambled eggs and toast everywhere.

  Most mornings, the two of them walked past the veranda without a hitch, but if his ears perked up and there was a spring in his step, Elaine knew trouble was brewing in Thaboland.

  ‘Don’t even think about it,’ she warned.

  He pretended to be on his best behaviour and ignored the deck steps but she spotted his ears turning into mini satellite dishes and jumped in front of him to distract him. He flew into a U-turn and bolted up the steps. It was too late for her to stop him. You can’t negotiate with a determined little rhino in full flight.

  The last time he ducked behind her and up the deck steps, he tried to headbutt his reflection in the glass doors and shattered them into a million pieces. Broken chairs and tables are one thing, but broken glass was too dangerous, and from that day a gate went up and ended his escapades on the deck.

  ‘I think he’s bored,’ Elaine said. ‘He needs a buddy.’

  Bush play dates aren’t a phone call away, so we were thrilled when Moholoholo Rehabilitation Centre said they had a female orphan ready to be rehomed.

  ‘They’re about the same age so it should be easy to introduce them to each other. She’s not quite ready for release yet, but if all goes well, we can relocate her by the end of the year,’ promised the manager.

  My French romantic streak went into overdrive. I saw Thabo falling in love. I saw babies. I was going to be a rhino granny!

  Christmas 2012, Thabo received the best present of his life – little Ntombi. Alyson, her main caregiver, had no intention of letting her young charge leave without her, so she packed her bags and came along too. Not only did Thabo get a new friend for Christmas, he also got a new mum to take over from Elaine, who had returned to England.

  Ntombi had been a victim of poaching when she was only five months old. Her mother was butchered in the Kruger National Park and the poor little thing saw everything. I hate to think of the horrific memories she carried with her. When she first arrived at Moholoholo she was petrified of the humans who were trying to save her life and charged everyone who came close. She was so aggressive that she had to be fed through gaps in the fence, but with love and patience she slowly learned to trust her new two-legged family.

  This is why rehabilitation centres are so important. They are safe havens where distressed and injured orphans can overcome their poaching trauma and grow into well-balanced rhinos.

  The day Ntombi came to Thula Thula, we put her into the enclosure next to Thabo, with only a strong picket fence between them. I held my breath to see what he would do. He ignored her! Monsieur grazed, wallowed and snoozed, and completely ignored the young demoiselle next door. My matchmaking dream had failed.

  But he didn’t play hard to get for very long, or maybe curiosity got the better of him, because he sidled up to her boma and studied her with great interest.

  ‘Go, my boy,’ I urged. ‘Start with a little hello.’

  Ntombi eyed him for a few seconds then turned her back on him, clearly giving him the cold shoulder. Intrigued, Thabo trotted along the fence and rested his face against it. Ntombi looked at him over her shoulder and kept eating. After a few coquettish glances, she relented and scampered towards him. He pushed his nose between the poles. She walked right up to him and snuffled his snout.

  ‘They’re kissing!’ I laughed triumphantly.

  3

  Poaching is war

  Thabo and Ntombi became an inseparable couple over the years, so it didn’t surprise me in the least when Promise radioed that Ntombi wasn’t allowing anyone near Thabo. She knew he was injured and she was keeping him safe.

  ‘How will the vet treat his gunshot wounds if she’s chasing everyone away from him?’ I asked Alyson and Promise.

  ‘He may have to dart both of them,’ Alyson replied. ‘You’ll have to decide with Mike when he gets here.’

  Lawrence had always handled animal emergencies and I had no clue what to do. I glanced at my phone. Still no call from Mike. In a couple of hours it would be dark and too late to attempt treatment. I was shocked that the poachers had the gall to breach our electric fence in broad daylight. They hadn’t even bothered to use silencers. Ever since Thabo and Ntombi were old enough to leave the safety of the orphanage to be free rhinos in the reserve, they had been protected by armed guards. Perhaps the poachers knew that Lawrence had just died and assumed that security would have dropped? I felt helpless and completely out of my depth.

  ‘Please take me to see Thabo,’ I said to Promise.

  ‘Not a good idea, Françoise. Ntombi’s too stressed and another vehicle will make it worse,’ he warned. ‘Alyson’s doing her best to calm her from the safety of the 4×4.’

  ‘How is he? Can you see how badly hurt he is?’

  ‘There’s a lot of blood but Ntombi still won’t let us close, not even with Alyson here. The problem is that the damn hyenas have smelled blood and are pestering him. Here, speak to Alyson,’ he said, passing the phone to her.

  She was in a state. ‘I shouldn’t have left them.’

  ‘Protecting them isn’t your job, and anyway, you can’t be with them all the time,’ I said firmly. ‘Poachers don’t give a damn, and if they weren’t put off by the guards, you being there would have made no difference.’

  ‘I should have been more alert,’ she agonized. ‘Just before I left, they b
oth stopped eating and looked out into the distance as if they’d heard something. I bet those bastards were already there, watching us. How could I have missed that?’

  ‘There were two armed men looking after them,’ I repeated. ‘If they couldn’t stop the attack, you couldn’t have either. How is he?’

  Her voice broke. ‘Just standing there, not moving. Spooked and in shock.’

  ‘Let me get off the phone in case Mike’s trying to get through. I’ll call you as soon as I hear from him.’

  I sank back into my chair in despair. Thabo and Ntombi had been doing so well on their own. About a year ago, Alyson and the rangers had started the long process of familiarizing them with the bush. They took them out on daytime walks to teach them where the watering holes were and to help them discover bush smells, vegetation and animals that they would encounter. Every night they were brought back to the safety of the boma, until one evening they didn’t want to return. Nerve-wracking for us, but we knew it was a healthy sign and time to let them roam free. Alyson still spent a lot of time with them in the bush to make sure they were okay, and I shuddered at the danger she had been in.

  I paced about the room. How would I pay the vet fees? What if Thabo died? First Lawrence, now Thabo. I’m usually good in a crisis, but I couldn’t get my thoughts straight and still couldn’t get my head around the fact that armed men had come into the reserve to kill Thabo and Ntombi. I only realized much later how naive that was. You can’t patrol forty-five kilometres of fencing every minute of the day and night. When Lawrence was alive, security took up a huge chunk of his time. He had been closely involved with patrols, snare and fence monitoring, and dealing with all the poach-ing incidents. Connie, my security manager at the time, was a retired policeman who had been excellent at following instructions from Lawrence but who crumbled under the pressure of coordinating security on his own.

  I’ve never felt more insecure and uncertain in my life. I didn’t know where to start or even how to direct Connie and his security team on what to do.

  Gypsy, my tiny poodle, was at my feet, panting in the heat. I felt her big black eyes on me and stroked her absent-mindedly, checking my phone. Still nothing from Mike. Gypsy didn’t give up. She has a way of staring at me without making a sound that always reaches me. I looked up, gazed into her eyes. Her love touched my soul. My girl knew something was wrong.

  ‘Ah, my Gypsy,’ I sighed. ‘What are we going to do?’

  She had taken over as lodge princess after Bijou died of old age in 2010, but she was a gentler and humbler little poodle, a real people’s princess. I had fallen in love with her when she was nothing more than a tiny ball of fur with huge black eyes that followed me around as I walked amongst the cages of our local SPCA. She shows me her gratitude every single day for having chosen her over her brothers and sisters.

  I picked her up and held her against me. She licked my face to tell me I wasn’t alone and that she was there for me. I buried my face in her fur, fighting back tears. She snuggled deeper into my neck. I felt her warm breath on my skin and wished I could stay in her sweet embrace forever.

  But I couldn’t. I had an animal in trouble and I couldn’t sit back and do nothing.

  ‘Let’s get to work,’ I whispered and carried her with me to the office.

  She sat on the chair at the other side of my desk and kept a watchful eye on me while I drowned my anguish about Thabo in being busy.

  Top priority was bolstering security in case the poachers returned. I couldn’t run the risk of pulling our existing guards away from their patrol areas, so I phoned the security company Lawrence used for emergencies and they promised to dispatch two extra armed men in the morning. We weren’t off the hook by a long shot because I had only enough money for them to stay for one month, but it was a start. I would protect Thabo and Ntombi even if it bankrupted me. They would not be killed on my watch.

  Mike Toft called at last with the bad news that he was in the middle of another poaching crisis and wouldn’t get to us that day. I told him the rangers had seen Thabo take a few steps.

  ‘That’s good news. If he’s walking and not in obvious pain then the bullet probably didn’t damage any bones,’ he said. ‘He won’t be comfortable but it doesn’t sound life-threatening. I’ll be there first thing in the morning. Keep him safe until then.’

  Our rangers aren’t usually involved in security operations, which is why we employ guards who are specifically trained for this dangerous work, but they refused to leave Thabo and Ntombi and wanted to be part of their protection team.

  ‘The guards need our help,’ Vusi insisted.

  Alyson was desperate to join them too, but I was worried about her safety and talked her out of it. The poachers hadn’t managed to get the horns they had come for and I was terrified they would return. No one slept a wink that night. Thabo and Ntombi were skittish and didn’t want the rangers close to them, so the men tried hard to give them space while still keeping them safely within eyeshot. Thabo eventually lay down but Ntombi stayed vigilant and spent most of her time chasing off hyenas. Rhinos have terrible eyesight but a superb sense of smell, so Ntombi knew these small but dangerous predators had arrived long before the rangers did, and became so distraught, snorting and stress-shrieking, that the men stepped in and helped her chase them off. By 6 a.m., two ex-military men arrived to reinforce our security. They walked bolt upright and their restless eyes constantly scanned their surroundings. What a relief. An hour later, Dr Mike Toft arrived. He immediately darted Thabo while Alyson and the rangers kept Ntombi at a safe distance.

  ‘It’s a flesh wound,’ he announced.

  Alyson radioed the news to me. ‘The bullet missed the bone by millimetres.’

  I will always be grateful that those poachers were such useless marksmen.

  Good came out of this terrible attack, because it spurred me on to launch our own rhino fund. I realized that without money, my animals weren’t safe and that having our own fundraising organization was the only way I could be sure always to have emergency cash on hand. Money flowed in, enough to pay the extra guards for more than a month and to buy extra weapons and security equipment. I hate guns, but poaching is a war and the only way to fight it is by being prepared for the worst – and that means being armed.

  I will never forget those ghastly twenty-four hours after Thabo was shot, but they helped me to define the purpose of my life without Lawrence and I understood with such clarity that the mantle of protecting Thula Thula’s wildlife had become mine, and mine alone.

  4

  Magic money tree

  I often gaze out into the bush and can’t believe how much meeting Lawrence changed my life. I was thirty-three and in London for a trade show. It was a freezing Friday in January and I was standing in the taxi queue outside the Cumberland Hotel, running out of time to get to my ten o’clock appointment at the Earls Court Arena. I rearranged my scarf against the wind, buried my hands in my coat pockets and hoped for a taxi miracle.

  The hotel porter tapped me on the shoulder.

  ‘Excuse me, ma’am. Would you mind sharing a cab with a guest going to Earls Court?’ he asked, pointing to the back of the queue.

  I saw a big man with red hair dressed in white summer trousers and a blue plastic windbreaker. I leant forward to have a better look and shook my head. I wasn’t in the mood for tourists.

  The porter was startled by my un-British manners but continued valiantly to search for someone more gracious. My rudeness didn’t go unpunished, because half an hour later I was still standing there. Eventually I gave up and went back into the hotel to warm up, cursing my luck at being in London during its worst winter in fifty years. Who should be crossing the lobby at the same time? The tourist. He looked at me in amusement. I was mortified and said the first thing that came into my head.

  ‘You look like a foreigner in need of help. I’ll show you how to take the tube to Earls Court if you like. It’ll be the quickest way to get there in this weather.
’

  If he thought it was funny being called a foreigner by someone speaking in a French accent, he hid it well.

  ‘Sure,’ he said. ‘I just need to make a quick phone call.’

  A bit of a cheek but I had been rude enough, so I kept quiet and surprised myself by agreeing to wait. We eventually headed for Marble Arch tube station and fought our way down the steps with everyone else caught out by the weather. I was worried I would lose him in the crowd but his bright-blue jacket turned out to be a useful beacon. His South African shoulders were just as useful and he easily jostled us to the right platform. We even managed to find seats. I discovered that he was in London on business and that the only touristy thing about him was that he had flown in from Florida the day before.

  ‘Bad timing to arrive in this weather,’ I bantered.

  ‘You can say that again. I can’t stand it. Where I come from, it never drops below fifteen degrees, not even in winter.’

  He explained that he was meeting an exhibitor about a revolutionary product called Aquaboy, designed by a surfer to save people from drowning. It was worn on the wrist like a watch and, as long as you had the presence of mind to yank it while a ten-foot wave tossed you about like a rag doll, it would open like an underwater parachute and pull you to the surface.

  I thought it was brilliant and it was my first glimpse of the passionate visionary he was. Only a mad South African could come to snowbound London to market a surfing gadget.

  He fell silent and I realized he looked really ill. I won-dered what was wrong but didn’t want to ask. So there I was, sitting next to a strangely dressed man who looked seasick. He explained afterwards that he’d had a nasty hangover after being badly roasted by a nightclub comedian because he was South African. In 1987, apartheid still existed and white South Africans weren’t very welcome abroad. Afterwards, he had almost frozen to death trying to find a cab back to the hotel. No wonder he looked queasy.