Hannah’s sigh told everything. ‘I’m sorry about Lars, I really am. I wish we could be friends, like before. But it’s all changed. What I feel for Viktor – it’s like being swept along in a flood. And I don’t want it to stop. Viktor has changed my life. I can’t tell you what he means to me.’

‘Well, take care,’ Sarah said, trying to hide the concern she felt. There was no point in voicing it over the telephone.

She drove back to the camp, singing. Piet loved her. That’s what Hannah had said. He talked about her all the time. And she would be seeing him at Christmas. In the meantime she had a job that was fulfilling beyond any expectations. Life was wonderful.

The more time she spent among the elephants, the closer her bond with them became. Dan had assigned Erope to work with her, and she found him a wise and patient teacher. He taught her to track, to interpret the spoor and the signs of an animal’s passing, and to move through the bush unnoticed, keeping downwind of her subjects so that she could get near them without disturbing them. Soon she could identify specific family groups within the herd, and recognise each individual elephant by name. She photographed them and recorded their characteristics in her log, illustrating her observations with sketches and written notes. They knew the Land Rover, and some of them allowed her to approach within a few feet. She found herself sharing her experiences silently with Piet, imagining that he walked with her through the bush, or sat beside her on a boulder above the river or overlooking the swamp where the animals wallowed in the midday heat. She felt very close to him out here. At night, when she had finished with her notes she wrote to him, telling him all she had discovered about her elephants during the long hot hours in the bush. Then she put the letters carefully in the back of her desk drawer.

Sitting out on the rocks with Erope one evening, she marvelled at the glory of their surroundings. The light was mellow as it lit the tops of the doum palms, gradually turning the sky to a pale lavender streaked with red. They had been following a family of elephant led by a splendid old matriarch called Judith. During the course of the day she had taken her group away from the main herd to an area that she considered better grazing. Normally, they would reassemble at sundown, calling out to one another with rumblings and trumpetings of pleasure as the families were reunited. But Judith’s small unit had been making slow progress, and Sarah realised that they would not make it to the swamp before nightfall.

‘It is time to go back to the car, Sarah,’ Erope said. ‘There is not enough light now, for your camera to do good work.’