He shows me a picture of the fearsome creature whose curly horns — so ridiculously and fussily flipped up, like an outdated hairdo — may soon adorn the wall of his South Florida hacienda.

"Africa is the ultimate for hunters," agree my other seatmates who, having shot everything from elk to pigs all the way from Saskatchewan to Florida, clearly know of what they speak. They're flying from Miami first to South Africa and then to Mozambique where they're on a hunting holiday for the next three weeks.

High on my seatmate's Africa wish list: two zebras, the skins to be used for rugs and pillows. And if he gets his cape buffalo early enough, he says, he just might have a go at killing the "man-eating" lion in Mozambique that his outfitter told him all about.

"It's best to get them mounted back in the United States," his buddy advises, chewing knowingly on a toothpick. The buddy hunted in Africa last year and learned the ropes. He's going to be picky this year, he insists. Last year he wasted time and money by shooting non-trophy game. Not this time, though.

My seatmate sees me reading and offers that he likes Hemingway. His tray table is strewn with hunting magazines. Wedged in the seat, separating him from me, is a thick text entitled The Perfect Shot. It shows and tells, in graphic detail, where to put the cross hairs for all manner of African game. I flip through anatomical drawings of the wildebeest, sable antelope, leopard, lion and elephant.

"ELEPHANTS?!" I can't help bursting out. "You hunt elephants?"

The world's largest land mammals cost $30,000 to shoot, says my seatmate who assures me he likes elephants. Considers them sacred, no less. They're not on his list.

Whew.