14
Jane stank.
‘Would you like a beer?’ said the sweating Afrikaner sitting next to her in the Toyota Hilux, not for the first time.
It was times like this – not to mention the time the ship she’d been sailing on had been hijacked by pirates – that she wished she wasn’t terrified of flying. ‘No thank you.’
At least six in the evening was a civilised hour for drinking. The three men she was sharing the vehicle with had been taking turns at driving, drinking and snoring throughout the entire gruelling fifteen-hour trip. Jane had offered to drive, partly out of fear for her own safety as whoever was behind the wheel was likely to be fatigued or drunk at any one time, but the South Africans wouldn’t hear of it.
They were all coalminers from Witbank, huge men with huge hands and huge beer
