“Gabriel believed in science. In many ways, Gabriel was a naïve young man. He would often quote great men, like Hippocrates. Science is the father of knowledge, but opinion breeds ignorance, he would say.” Samuel paused, and dropped his eyes to the ground. “I will remember Gabriel more for his own words. He once told me that science is a light. That light cannot be counted upon to shine where you think it will. It will shine only upon the path of evidence. If you stick to that path, he said, you will learn something. Something that will guide you, he said.” Samuel stared north, over the expanse of savannah. “I suppose we should go.”
“So, you’re looking for that light? That path?”
“He deserves to have his work completed.” Samuel started toward the Land Cruiser. “Do not forget your rifle, Mr. Jack.”
—·—
“Stop,” Jack said.
Samuel stepped on the brakes. The Land Cruiser slowed to a stop. He stared out the windshield at savannah. “Why here?”
Jack grabbed the backpack and rifle. He opened the door and slid out. “Next lesson.”
“I think we should return to headquarters, Mr. Jack.”
Jack slammed the door. Slinging the rifle over one shoulder, he dug into the pack as he walked. Pulling out the PVC, he began assembling the quadrat, veering toward a distant margin of acacia. Nearing its edge, Jack stopped and dropped the quadrat. It settled into the grass. He turned to Samuel. “There. Is that random?”
Samuel looked down, then up, then spun around, eyeing the surroundings as he rubbed the scar on his chin. “It appears random.”
“It’s not.”
“It is not?” Samuel looked confused.
“I chose this spot. I could do this all day. Selecting sites that appear representative, but my bias would affect the results. If we were only studying impacts, we could start at places that show those impacts, but we still need inferences about the larger ecosystem. We need random study sites, and sampling repeated with enough frequency to deal with the variability in the ecosystem.” He looked into Samuel’s eyes.
He stared back.
Clueless. “Samuel, are you really prepared for this? To go on? You can send me home, I can come back when things blow over.”
“Show me. How do we achieve random?”
Jack slipped off a pack strap and pulled Gabriel’s plan from the pack. Then, a booklet. “We can achieve random the old way or the new way. The new? Random numbers generators. The old?” He held up a booklet. “This.” He flipped through the pages. “It appears Gabriel was rather traditional, maybe because of who he studied under at Oxford. These are random numbers tables. Fortunately for us, he’s generated a list of random sampling locations. Places to start. We’ll go to those locations, then use the tables to place the quadrat. Make sense?”
Blank stare.
“Okay, let’s do this. Assume this was one of Gabriel’s study sites. We could lay out a one hundred meter tape, and stake it out, running north.” He pointed, then opened the book and turned to a 4 digit table. “The first number is 4139.” He stood. “We could be random by following our tape north for forty one meters, then east for thirty nine meters. Then, we’d drop our quadrat, see what we get.”
Samuel nodded.
“We’d repeat those steps using the sequence of numbers on the table.”
A loud chattering rose up from the east, beyond the line of acacia.
Jack turned. “What’s that?”
“Birds. Long-tailed fiscal.” Samuel pointed toward a patch of tall grass. “There. Secretary bird.”
Streams of plumage. Feathers flowing from yellow eye patches. A terrestrial raptor, stalking on long legs, picking through grass, snapping at the ground. It stood upright, a lizard in its beak. It quickly devoured its prey.
“Uh . . . and . . . uh, that’s how we achieve random.” Jack stared, amazed. “I have never seen anything like that.”
“Follow me,” Samuel said.
“Where we going?”
“To water. To see birds. People come thousands of miles to see this.”
Jack picked up the quadrat, slung the rifle over his shoulder, and followed.
“We must be careful. We do not want to encounter hippopotamus. If we do, we must avoid threatening their access to water. They are faster than we, and dangerous.”
Seemed unlikely, but Jack didn’t dispute it.
Beyond the veil of acacia, Samuel stooped and waved Jack over. He pointed. Near-shore, long-legged, black and white birds, standing in a cluster. “Marabou storks,” he whispered.
Jack watched as one opened its wings. Huge. Tremendous wingspan.
“Black-winged stilt. Egyptian goslings,” Samuel said, pointing to birds near shore.
The stilt pecked in shallow water, the goslings floating nearby.
“And across the way, African spoonbill.”
“Too much to take in.”
Samuel pulled off his pack, dug out binoculars, and scanned along an arc. “No sign of hippopotamus. Not yet.” He pointed, and whispered, “Black rhino. Far end, in the water.” He offered the binoculars.
“I see him,” Jack whispered back. He watched the beast slog forward, head down, drawing from brown water. “Big guy.”
“Yes.” Samuel ducked his head, and moved right. He stopped, stared, then turned back. He raised a finger to his lips.
Jack froze.
Samuel waved him to follow.
They crept right, staying behind acacia.
Samuel knelt. Squinting, he stared past thorny branches, scanning the shore.
“What is it?” Jack whispered.
“Sh-h-h-h. I saw something.”
Jack turned and looked. Trees. Shadows. A hippo? No. Another rhino? No. “What? A lion maybe?” he asked.
“No,” Samuel whispered. “Potentially more dangerous.” He continued scanning the shore, then gave a slow nod and pointed. “There.”
“What?”
“A man.”
Jack searched—in the shadows, along the edges of the trees—seeing nothing.
“He’s moving toward the rhinoceros,” Samuel whispered.
Through the leaves, Jack could see the outline of the rhino, knee deep, head down, slurping up water.
Samuel dropped to all fours and crawled forward. He stopped and readied his rifle.
Jack fell back, then followed, stopping beside him. “What are you doing?”
Samuel parted the grass with his rifle. “I would try scaring him away, but there may be others. I think he will wait, let the animal return to shore. But is he alone?”
“What if he isn’t, and what’s wrong with a guy out here watching a rhino?”
“He is not simply watching. He is a poacher.”
“How do you know?” Jack turned, disoriented by the ruckus of sound, of birds in abundance. He noticed a head, bobbing in and out of view, moving laterally. “Are you sure?”
“He carries a rifle.