We spotted the nyati early, before the sun had begun to clang like a blacksmith’s hammer on the anvil of southern Africa. They were not the first of the safari—you couldn’t travel very far in Mozambique in the early ’70s without seeing thousands of Cape buffalo—but those had been mere background for the intoxicating realization that we were, at long last, in Africa. It was the first safari for both my companion, Jack Carter, and me. We’d flipped a coin, agreeing to alternate shooting opportunities as they came, regardless of species…except for two.