Several months later, I return to the Timbavati. We have searched for Marula high and low, for days, which have now become weeks. But she has been absent, having recently lost her two newborn cubs, and on my last day in the bush, I have nearly given up.
But it is a special day. I am with Ant, and Given is tracking, just as it was on my very first time meeting Marula, my very first time in Africa. We are down to less than an hour on this last drive, before I must head to the airport. We are tracking lion, when Given suddenly raises his hand and Ant brings the vehicle to a halt. Given has picked up on the tracks of a leopard. “Mafasi,” I hear him say in Shangaan, as he studies the tracks. Female. He sets off to see where they lead, while we wait with the vehicle, with the other guests, I doing everything in my power to keep my hope in check.
Minutes later, Given steps out onto the road and waves, and we race to meet him. “I have found the leopard,” he says, as he climbs back onto the tracking seat. “Now you must find her,” he grins. My eyes scan the nearby leadwood trees in the direction where he had come from, desperate. And then I see her.