Of course I felt stupid doing it, but I was beginning to wonder if I had stirred up some kind of hornet’s nest. Though I couldn’t quite see how. I was being followed, inevitably. There was a lot of traffic, and first I had a taxi on my back bumper, then an old red bakkie, and finally a black BMW, though he soon snarled past me in a flash of darkened glass. I tried telling myself not to be ridiculous and to keep my mind on the traffic, Mike’s return and the beauty of the day. The rain during the week had freshened the landscape, postponing the onset of autumn’s sepia dryness, and there were enough high clouds to break the unrelieved blue of the sky and make interesting shapes. Maybe they presaged another storm later, but for now, they were welcome. Where the road ran through open country, cloud shadows raced across the grass, darkening the ground in crazy patterns. The aloes that stood sentry on the embankments were just beginning to spike, still green though with a promise of the flames of winter that would flank the black tarmac.
