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him.’
    ‘Don’t you think poachers might have done it?’
    Hal stood up. ‘Look. There are the bandas in full view. The warden thinks the poachers wouldn’t dare come so close to the lodge.’
    Crosby was studying the animal’s head. That’s what I thought,’ he said. ‘But I was mistaken. Both horns are gone. No animal would chew them off - they’re not good to eat. Poachers took them. And the animal didn’t die a natural death.’ He pointed to a ragged wound in the throat. ‘A spear did that! Now you get some idea of how bold these fellows can be. But you haven’t seen the worst yet. Jump into the car and I’ll show you something that beats all this hollow.’
    After only a few minutes’ drive, the car stopped. This is the Tsavo River,’ Crosby said.
    The boys could see no river. There was nothing but a stretch of rough black rock.
    ‘Have you ever walked on a river?’ said the warden. ‘Now’s your chance.’
    He led the way out on to the bare black area. He stamped on the rock. It gave out a hollow sound. Hal studied the rock.
    ‘It looks like lava,’ he said.
    ‘It is lava. Some time or other it came down from Mount Kilimanjaro and covered the river. The river is still there - under your feet. Now let’s walk downstream.’
    As they walked they heard a rushing sound which steadily grew louder. They rounded a corner and then saw the river, gushing out in great volume and thunder from under the roof of lava. They could feel the roof tremble from the violence of the current. Released from its prison, the stream broadened here to form a large pool or small lake.
    This is call Mzima Springs. The water is usually as clear as glass.’
    It was not clear now. It was reddish brown, and it stank.
    ‘You’ve walked on top of the river,’ the warden said.
    ‘Now I’ll take you under it.’
    He brushed aside the bushes and revealed a slanting hole in the ground. They descended the steep slope in the half darkness and came out into an underwater room.
    This must be the underwater observatory the warden had mentioned. Through windows they could look out into the heart of the river and up to its shimmering sunlit surface.
    They eagerly pressed their noses against the glass. What they saw made them sick. Hippos - but they were not walking on the bottom grazing on the river weeds, they were dead and their carcasses lay in great heaps pressed down by more carcasses on top. Some, inflated by gases, had floated to the surface. Blood still trickled from the deadly wounds made by the poachers. Tails had been cut off, strips of hide had been removed, canine teeth of solid ivory, more valuable for some purposes than elephants’ tusks, had been torn out, in many cases the entire head had been chopped off.
    A few baby hippos, still alive, but nearly dead from starvation, prodded their senseless mothers who could no longer feed them.
    The babies themselves were food for the crocodiles which glided after them, their great jaws wide open. These tender young bodies made a delicious breakfast for the great reptiles. The crocs churned the water with their powerful tails and even fought among themselves for the choicest bits. Hundreds of fish gobbled up fragments of hippo flesh.
    The boys were sober as they climbed out of the observatory. They had been told that such things were happening - but they had to see it to believe it. They had been eager before to help stop the killing of animals by poachers. Now they were determined.
    They returned to the lodge at nine and had breakfast They had seen so much - it hardly seemed possible that they had been out only three hours. Now they must impatiently wait another three hours before their men would arrive and they could make their first expedition against the killers.

Chapter 7
Blackbeard appears
    At midday the fourteen lorries, trucks, jeeps, and Land-Rovers of Hal’s safari rolled in.
    Hal’s thirty black safari men, with smiling faces behind a red film of road dust, climbed