He studied the map and the strange names through a magnifying glass. Lots that began with ‘M’ – Mahajanga, Maintirano, Miandrivazo and Morondava. And plenty that began with
‘A’ – Antsiranana, Ambatondrazaka, Ambatolampy, Antsirabe and Ambositra.
They were all long and complicated. How did anyone remember which town beginning with an ‘A’ they lived in?
He’d printed the map off and had brought it along – just in case. It was folded and waiting to be used along with his red Victorinox penknife and his compass. And when he went on to Google Earth, he’d found the island floating like a huge, grey-green whale in the Indian Ocean, lolling up against the east coast of southern Africa, in water the colour of blue ink. When he went in closer on Google Earth, the grey-green had turned into forest … lots of it!
At least he knew what he was heading for.
3
The Journey Out
“So, you’re looking for frogs,” Malingu had shouted over the rubbery swish of the windscreen wipers and the sharp backfiring snorts of the Nissan truck as he’d tried to negotiate through people, carts, beaten-up old cars and the oxen that were browsing at the side of the road.
It was a sort of a truck. Sort of a Nissan. But mostly more mongrel than Nissan. Each door was a different colour and looked borrowed from something else. The bonnet was held closed with rope and the front fenders were so bent and rusted they were more like feelers on a very large, brightly coloured bug.
Ollie’s father nodded. “Not just any frogs – specifically the golden mantella.”
“Highly venomous!” Malingu smiled. He had a front tooth made completely of gold.
“Yes. So you know your stuff. But also highly endangered. On the Red List.”
Ollie gave his father a look. “Not as venomous as Phyllobates terribilis, the poison-dart frog in South America. Otherwise when they captured you in Botswana, they could’ve brought you straight here to Madagascar, instead of trying to take you to South America to collect frog toxins.”
His dad laughed. “Good job you’re here to protect me this time, Ollie.”
Rain had started pelting down as they’d left the sprawling shantytown edges of Antananarivo. The first drops fell fat and round like coins into the dust. Then it came down in white sheets like an avalanche and hammered on the roof and bonnet of the truck. Talking became impossible, even for someone who talked as loudly and as fast as Malingu. They bumped over potholes with spine-shuddering jolts and splashed through puddles the size of small lakes.
The journey had started at Heathrow airport in London four days ago – though it felt more like four weeks. They’d touched down first at O.R. Tambo airport in Johannesburg. Then they’d flown to Antananarivo in Madagascar, another town with an ‘A’ except this time a real capital ‘A’ as it was the capital of Madagascar.
Co-ordinates: 18.9386° S, 47.5214° E, Ollie had written in his notebook. Greenwich Mean Time +3.
Antananarivo, or Tananarivo, or Tana for short – he could guess why the name had been shortened – was a city as far from any kind of city he’d ever seen in England. It was a jumble of wooden houses and skyscraper buildings all mixed up between markets with blue awnings and purple jacaranda trees and steep steps going up to a cathedral and narrow streets jammed with ancient cars and carts pulled by humped oxen that were called zebu.
Inside the cab of the mongrel Nissan truck it was as steamy as a sauna. Ollie stared out through the downpour as the shapes of trees on either side of the road disappeared in a wet deluge.
He raised his voice. “Does it always rain so much?”
“This is Madagascar,” Malingu shouted back. “You must expect rain. Lots of it. It rains every day.”
He wound down the window a smidgen and sniffed. The air had a green, murky smell. “Every day?”
“How else do you think trees grow so tall? It’s a rainforest because it rains. Simple as that!”
They turned off the main road that went to the port of Toamasina, into a narrow road signposted Ambatondrazaka via Andilanotoby. Two more towns beginning with ‘A’. Ollie had lost count. He wished he’d started a list. He tried out the names in his head but there were too many parts to them. Ambatondrazaka. A name with five ‘A’s’ in it could be on a TV quiz show.
Finally the tarred road gave up and became a muddy track through the forest. They slewed in the mud from side to side as if each tyre had its own idea of where it wanted to go.
Malingu clutched the steering wheel fearlessly with one hand and gesticulated with the other as he gave a loud and fast gunshot commentary on just about everything. “Good weather for frogs,” he added as an afterthought.
“What about pirates?” Ollie asked.
Malingu laughed loudly so that his gold tooth flashed. “Good weather for pirates too. Pirates don’t care about rain.”
“No – I mean do you still get pirates here?”
“Yes. Plenty.” Malingu was grinning.
“Plenty?”
His father gave him a nudge. “Come on, Ollie, he’s having you on. The last pirate was probably seen here in the 1800s. Even the unfortunate Kidd, who spent time in Madagascar, was dead by 1701. He was hanged at Execution Dock on the Wapping waterfront but died hard.”
“How come?”
“They say the rope broke with his weight and he fell to the ground. Then he was hanged a second time, with another noose. Afterwards, his body was placed in chains and gibbeted and hung up for everyone to see.”
Ollie didn’t want to be distracted. “If so many pirates came to Madagascar, is there still pirate treasure here like gold and stuff?”
But before Malingu could reply, he swerved abruptly. They skidded onto a small mud track and bumped over a particularly deep pothole so that Ollie’s head hit the roof of the cab. “Phew! Nearly missed that turn-off!”
“Are we close to the camp?”
Malingu shook his head. “No. A few hours still.”
“A few hours?” he peered through the steamy window. The forest had closed in on them. They were in a tunnel of smudgy green. He wound down the window a little more and squinted upwards. No sign of sky through the thick mesh of canopy. But there was enough water gushing down to have Noah worried. They were practically driving in a river.
“At this rate, we’ll never get there.” But instantly he wished he could’ve swallowed his words. They were hardly out when the tyres of the truck went into a spin and a swirl of mud sprayed up against the windscreen. The truck came to a jolting halt that almost tossed them out through the front windscreen.
His father threw open the passenger door of the cab and jumped out into the downpour.
“What does it look like?” Malingu shouted from his side.
His father shook his head. His hair was plastered Napoleon-style against his forehead and his shirt was clinging to him. “Not good. Pretty bad in fact. Well and truly stuck.”
Malingu got out and kicked the tyre. “At least there’s no puncture.”
Ollie jumped down as well. His trainers disappeared into the mud. He had mud socks