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The Visit

Wes Perrin

     “Slow down,” she said, hissing the s sound. “You’re driving way too fast for this road.”
    I grunted, eased back on the accelerator and sighed. I had been thinking about hunting rhinos in Tanganyika. It was something that intrigued me. Except I wasn’t sure that was still the county’s right name. Now it might be one of those “Z” nations: Zambia? Zimbabwe? I curled my trigger finger around the curve of the steering wheel.
    “You must be in one of your moods again,” she said, looking annoyed. “You haven’t said a word for the past half hour.” She was a slender woman, with a pointed nose and a complicated hairdo.
    I didn’t reply. With my left hand I smoothed my graying mustache. I wondered what caliber rifle it would take to bag a rhinoceros. Nothing wimpy. That’s for sure. Maybe like a .50 caliber over and under. A weapon that would coax a smile from Mugumbi, my trusty gunbearer. “Nice gun, bwana,” he would say. “Perfect for trophy.”
    My wife cleared her throat. “I know you are not fond of visiting my mother, but you don’t have to take it out on me. She lives for these visits.”
     “I am not taking it out on you, but I don’t think she even knows who we are any more. She’s on another planet. A dark planet, I would guess”
    She gave me that look. The one that could fry eggs. “Some times I think you are totally dense. Especially when it comes to people. She does too know who we are. And it’s not her fault that the stroke took so much out of her.”
    “Okay. Okay.” I had read somewhere rhinos had incredibly tough hides. It would probably take some kind of armor piercing bullet to bring one down. They were supposed to be surprisingly fast for a 6,000 pound animal. At least for short distances.
    I considered where I would aim. At its head?
    “Your problem,” she said, “is that you really don’t understand what’s in her mind.” She sighed. “She may look incapacitated, but I’m sure she recognizes us, and I know she listens to us. Or, at least to me. And, who’s to say she won’t get better?”
    “Oh, Sure,” I said. “And soon pigs will sing and elephants will skip rope. Dream on.” I remember reading that the front horn of a black rhinoceros can be as long as three and one-half feet. Ground up, it was rumored to be a powerful aphrodisiac. The horn, that’s what the poachers were after. The rest of the carcass would be left to rot. Not by me, though. I’d truck the remains to a taxidermist. “How much to stuff this one?” I would ask. I grinned at the thought.
    “Why are you smiling?” she asked, looking puzzled. “Maybe you’ve had some second thoughts about mother’s condition?”
    “Hardly. Let’s face it. She’s not in the real world.” I shook my head. I wonder where the safari should start. Perhaps Nairobi? That’s what Hemingway would do.
    “Real world, indeed,” she scowled. “Well, who is these days?”
    “Good question,” I answered, and squeezed my trigger finger harder on the steering wheel.

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