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advertisement, and the rest would be up to him. In the meantime, she thought, animals and Aristotle lay ahead of her. Smiling, she fell asleep.

CHAPTER
4
    Her alarm awoke Mrs. Pollifax at one, and she jumped out of bed and eagerly approached her suitcase. She opened it lovingly and removed the new bush jacket and the new slacks, reached for a drip-dry blue turtleneck blouse and brought out her comfortable walking shoes. There was a small delay while she fumbled with price tags, but once she was in her safari clothes the effect was dazzling: the old Emily Pollifax, vice-president of the Save-Our-Environment Committee and secretary of the New Brunswick Garden Club had vanished along with the straw hat she’d packed away in her suitcase. She looked—swashbuckling, she thought, admiring herself in the mirror, yes, definitely swashbuckling. Tarzan, she felt, would have approved.
    There was a further delay while she tried on the khakihat, the sun-goggles, the dust veil, and unfurled her parasol, but eventually she was packed and ready to leave. She descended in the elevator, paid her bill at the desk, left her bag with the porter at the front door and, still carrying her umbrella, headed for the Coffee Hut for lunch before her departure for Chunga. She was hesitating at the door when a man’s voice behind her said, “Ha—found you again. Lunching now?”
    Mrs. Pollifax turned and found herself staring into a kelly-green shirt. Lifting her gaze she identified its owner as Cyrus Reed, last seen at the
Times of Zambia.
“As a matter of fact, yes.”
    “Good. Have it with me,” he said, and taking a firm grip on her elbow he piloted her into the patio and seated her efficiently at an umbrella-shaded table. “Don’t give you a chance to refuse,” he said, taking the chair opposite her.
    “No, you didn’t.”
    “Don’t often ask women to lunch,” he said gruffly. “To dinner either, for that matter. Nuisance, that sort of thing. You aren’t, I hope, a real Duchess? Couldn’t help overhearing your classified advertisement in the news office.”
    “He did read it in a loud voice,” she admitted. “Actually I’m Emily Pollifax. Duchess was a—a sort of nickname.”
    He extended an arm across the flowers and they gravely shook hands. He was certainly a large man; big was the only word for him, she decided, looking at him, but it seemed a matter of frame and muscle rather than fat. He moved and spoke slowly, as if stricken by lethargy, but he had whisked her to a table in seconds, and his smile, drowsy as it was, was singularly warm and responsiveand his eyes shrewd. There was something very oriental about his eyes, she thought; it was because they were set into his face on the same plane as his brows, like almonds pressing into a snowman’s face. Those Chinese lids increased his sleepy look and gave him the appearance of a large and slightly rumpled mandarin.
    He said now, observantly, “Eyes had a faraway look when you explained the nickname. Good friend, this Farrell?”
    “A very good friend, yes.”
    “Only kind to have,” he said, nodding. “Imaginative idea, advertising. Cyrus Reed’s my name, by the way. Lawyer, Connecticut. Care for a drink?”
    Mrs. Pollifax smiled at the hovering waiter but shook her head. “I’ve not a great deal of time,” she explained. “I’m being called for at half-past two.”
    “Then we’ll order. I can recommend the chicken because I’ve had it every day since my arrival. Tirelessly, one might say.”
    Mr. Reed, it seemed, had been in Lusaka for four days. “My daughter,” he explained, “is exhausting. Insisted on our stopping in Rome on the way here, and now she’s gone off to Livingstone to see Victoria Falls while I catch my breath. Insisted on renting a car for the trip, said she’d see more of the country.”
    “I expect she will,” said Mrs. Pollifax cheerfully.
    “Already late returning. Due back three hours ago. What brings you here?”
    “I’m