18

IT WAS A BEAUTIFUL day for flying and the Mountain was very close. I sat against the tree and watched the birds and the grazing game. Ngui came over for orders and I told him he and Charo should clean and oil all the weapons and sharpen and oil the spears. Keiti and Mwindi were removing the broken bed and taking it to Bwana Mouse’s empty tent. I got up to go over. It was not badly broken. One cross leg in the center had a long fracture and one of the main poles that held the canvas was broken. It was easily repairable and I said I would get some wood and have it sawed to measure and finished at Mr. Singh’s.

Keiti, who was very cheerful that Miss Mary was arriving, said we would use Bwana Mouse’s cot which was identical and I went back to my chair and the bird identification book and more tea. I felt like someone who had dressed for the party too early on this morning that felt like spring in a high alpine plateau and as I went over to the mess tent for breakfast I wondered what the day would bring. The first thing it brought was the Informer.

“Good morning, brother,” the Informer said. “How is your good health?”

“Never better, brother. What is new?”

“May I come in?”

“Of course. Have you had breakfast?”

“Hours before. I breakfasted on the Mountain.”

“Why?”

“The Widow was so difficult that I left her to wander alone in the night as you do, brother.”

I knew this was a lie and I said, “You mean you walked to the road and caught a ride up to Laitokitok with one of Benji’s boys in the lorry?”

“Something like that, brother.”

“Go on.”

“Brother, there are desperate things afoot.”

“Pour yourself your pleasure and tell me.”

“It is set for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, brother. I believe it is a massacre.”

I wanted to say, “By them or by us?” but I controlled myself.

“Tell me more,” I said, looking at the Informer’s proud, brown, guilt-lined face as he raised a shot glass of Canadian gin with a glow of bitters in it to his gray red lips.

“Why don’t you drink Gordon’s? You’ll live longer.”

“I know my place, brother.”

“And your place is in my heart,” I said quoting the late Fats Waller. Tears came into the Informer’s eyes.

“So this St. Bartholomew’s eve is for Christmas Eve,” I said. “Has no one any respect for the Baby Jesus?”

“It is a massacre.”

“Women and children too?”

“No one said so.”

“Who said what?”

“There was talk at Benji’s. There was much talk at the Masai stores and at the Tea Room.”

“Are the Masai to be put to death?”

“No. The Masai will all be here for your Ngoma for the Baby Jesus.”

“Is the Ngoma popular?” I said to change the subject and to show that news of impending massacres meant nothing to me, a man who had been through the Zulu War and whose ancestors had done away with George Armstrong Custer on the Little Big Horn. No man who went to Mecca not being a Moslem as another man might go to Brighton or Atlantic City should be moved by rumors of massacres.

“The Ngoma is the talk of the Mountain,” the Informer said. “Except for the massacre.”

“What did Mr. Singh say?”

“He was rude to me.”

“Is he participating in the massacre?”

“He is probably one of the ringleaders.”

The Informer unwrapped a package he had in his shawl. It was a bottle of White Heather whisky in a carton.

“A gift from Mr. Singh,” he said. “I advise you to examine it carefully before drinking, brother. I have never heard the name.”

“Too bad, brother. It may be a new name but it is good whisky. New brands of whisky are always good at the start.”

“I have information for you on Mr. Singh. He has undoubtedly performed military service.”

“It is hard to believe.”

“I am sure of it. No one could have cursed me as Mr. Singh did who had not served the Raj.”

“Do you think Mr. Singh and Mrs. Singh are subversives?”

“I will make inquiries.”

“The gen has been a little shadowy today, Informer.”

“Brother, it was a difficult night. The coldheartedness of the Widow, my wanderings on the Mountain.”

“Take another drink, brother. You sound like Wuthering Heights.”

“Was that a battle, brother?”

“In a way.”

“You must tell me about it someday.”

“Remind me. Now I want you to spend the night in Laitokitok, sober, and bring me some information that is not bullshit. Go to Brown’s Hotel and sleep there. No, sleep on the porch. Where did you sleep last night?”

“On the floor of the Tea Room under the billiard table.”

“Drunk or sober?”

“Drunk, brother.”

* * *

Mary would certainly wait for the bank to open so that she could get the mail. It was a good day for flying and there was no sign of anything building up and I did not think Willie would be in any hurry about getting out. I put a couple of cool bottles of beer in the hunting car and Ngui, Mthuka and I drove out to the airstrip with Arap Meina in the back. Meina would mount guard over the plane and he was smart and very sharp in his uniform and his .303 with the sling was freshly polished and oiled. We made a run around the meadow to put the birds to flight and then retired to the shade of a big tree where Mthuka killed the engine and we all sat back and were comfortable. Charo had come along at the last minute because he was Miss Mary’s gun bearer and it was only proper that he should meet her.

It was past noon and I opened one of the quarts of Tusker and Mthuka and Ngui and I drank from it. Arap Meina was under discipline for a recent drunkenness but he knew I would give him some later.

I told Ngui and Mthuka I had a dream last night that we should pray to the sun as it rose and again to the sun as it set.

Ngui said he would not kneel down like a camel driver or a Christian even for the religion.

“You don’t have to kneel down. You turn and look at the sun and pray.”

“What do we pray in the dream?”

“To live bravely, to die bravely and to go directly to the Happy Hunting Grounds.”

“We are brave already,” Ngui said. “Why do we have to pray about it?”

“Pray for anything you like, if it is for the good of us all.”

“I pray for beer, for meat and for a new wife with hard hands. You can share the wife.”

“That’s a good prayer. What do you pray for, Mthuka?”

“We keep this car.”

“Anything else?”

“Beer. You not get killed. Rain good in Machakos. Happy Hunting Grounds.”

“What you pray for?” Ngui asked me.

“Africa for Africans. Kwisha Mau Mau. Kwisha all sickness. Rain good everywhere. Happy Hunting Grounds.”

“Pray to have fun,” Mthuka offered.

“Pray sleep with wife of Mr. Singh.”

“Must pray good.”

“Take wife of Mr. Singh to Happy Hunting Grounds.”

“Too many people want to be in religion,” Ngui said. “How many people we take?”

“We start with a squad. Maybe make a section, maybe a company.”

“Company very big for Happy Hunting Grounds.”

“I think so too.”

“You command Happy Hunting Grounds. We make a council but you command. No Great Spirit. No Gitchi Manitou. Hapana King. Hapana Queen’s Road. Hapana H.E. Hapana D.C. Hapana Baby Jesus. Hapana Police. Hapana Black Watch. Hapana Game Department.”

“Hapana,” I said.

“Hapana,” Mthuka said.

I passed the bottle of beer to Arap Meina.

“Are you a religious man, Meina?”

“Very,” said Meina.

“Do you drink?”

“Only beer, wine and gin. I can also drink whisky and all clear or colored alcohols.”

“Are you ever drunk, Meina?”

“You should know, my father.”

“What religions have you held?”

“I am now a Moslem.” Charo leaned back and closed his eyes.

“What were you before?”

“Lumbwa,” Meina said. Mthuka’s shoulders were shaking. “I have never been a Christian,” Meina said with dignity.

“We speak too much of religion and I am still acting for Bwana Game and we celebrate the Birthday of the Baby Jesus in four days.” I looked at the watch on my wrist. “Let us clear the field of birds and drink the beer before the plane comes.”

“The plane is coming now,” Mthuka said. He started the motor and I passed him the beer and he drank a third of what was left. Ngui drank a third and I drank half of a third and passed what was left back to Meina. We were already putting up storks at full speed at the approach and seeing them, after the running rush, straighten their legs as though they were pulling up their undercarriage and commence their reluctant flight.

We saw the plane come over blue and silvery and spindle-legged and buzz the camp and then we were barreling down along the side of the clearing and she was opposite us, with the big flaps down, passing us to land without a bounce and circling now, her nose high and arrogant, throwing dust in the knee-deep white flowers.

Miss Mary was on the near side now and she came out in a great, small rush. I held her tight and kissed her and then she shook hands with everyone, Charo first.

“Morning, Papa,” Willie said. “Let me have Ngui to pass some of this out. She’s a bit laden!”

“You must have bought all Nairobi,” I said to Mary.

“All I could afford. They wouldn’t sell the Muthaiga Club.”

“She bought the New Stanley and Torr’s,” Willie said. “So we’re always sure of a room, Papa.”

“What else did you buy?”

“She wanted to buy me a Comet,” Willie said. “You can pick up quite good bargains in them now, you know.”

We drove to camp with Miss Mary and me sitting close together in front. Willie was talking with Ngui and Charo. At camp Mary wanted the stuff unloaded into Bwana Mouse’s empty tent and I was to stay away and not watch it. I had been told not to watch anything in detail at the aircraft either and I had not watched. There was a big bundle of letters, papers and magazines and some cables and I had taken them into the mess tent and Willie and I were drinking a beer.

“Good trip?”

“Not lumpy. The ground doesn’t really heat up anymore with these cold nights. Mary saw her elephants at Salengai and a very big pack of wild dogs.”

Miss Mary came in. She had received all the official visits and was beaming. She was well-beloved, well-received, and people had been formal about it. She loved the designation of Memsahib.

“I didn’t know Mousie’s bed was broken.”

“Is it?”

“And I haven’t said a thing about the leopard. Let me kiss you. G.C. laughed at your cable about him.”

“They’ve got their leopard. They don’t have to worry. Nobody has to worry. Not even the leopard.”

“Tell me about him.”

“No. Sometime when we are coming home I’ll show you the place.”

“Can I see any mail you’re finished with?”

“Open it all.”

“What’s the matter with you? Aren’t you glad to have me back? I was having a wonderful time in Nairobi or at least I was going out every night and everyone was nice to me.”

“We’ll all practice up and be nice to you and pretty soon it will be just like Nairobi.”

“Please be good, Papa. This is what I love. I only went to Nairobi to be cured and to buy presents for Christmas and I know you wanted me to have fun.”

“Good, and now you’re back. Give me a hold hard and a good anti-Nairobi kiss.”

She was slim and shiny in her khakis and hard inside them and she smelled very good and her hair was silver gold, cropped close, and I rejoined the white or European race as easily as a mercenary of Henry IV saying Paris was worth a mass.

Willie was happy to see the rejoining and he said, “Papa, any news beside the chui?”

“Nothing.”

“No troubles?”

“The road at night is a scandal.”

“It seems to me they rely a little too much on the desert as being impassable.”

I sent for the saddle of meat for Willie and Mary went to our tent for her letters. We rode out and Willie took off. Everyone’s face shone at the angle he pulled her into and then, when he was a distant silver speck, we went on our way home.

Mary was loving and lovely and Ngui was feeling badly because I had not taken him. It would soon be evening and there would be Time and the British airmail papers and for the bright receding light and the fire and a tall drink.

The hell with it, I thought. I have complicated my life too much and the complications are extending. Now I’ll read whichever Time Miss Mary doesn’t want and I have her back and I will enjoy the fire and we’ll enjoy our drink and the dinner afterwards. Mwindi was fixing her bath in the canvas tub and mine was the second bath. I thought that I would wash everything away and soak it out with the bathi and when the canvas tub had been emptied and washed out and filled again with former petrol tins of hot water from the fire, I lay back in the water and soaked and soaped with the Lifebuoy soap.

I rubbed dry with my towel and put on pajamas and my old mosquito boots from China and a bathrobe. It was the first time since Mary had been gone that I had taken a hot bath. The British took one every night when it was possible. But I preferred to scrub every morning in the washbowl when I dressed, again when we came in from hunting and in the evening.

Pop hated this as the bathi ritual was one of the few surviving rites of the old safari. So when he was with us I made a point of taking the hot bathi. But in the other kind of washing yourself clean you found the ticks you’d picked up in the day and had either Mwindi or Ngui remove those that you could not reach. In the old days, when I had hunted alone with Mkola, we had burrowing chiggers that dug into the toes under the toenails and every night we would sit down in the lantern flare and he would remove mine and I would remove his. No bathi would have taken these out, but we had no bathi.

I was thinking about the old days and how hard we used to hunt, or rather, how simply. On those days when you sent for an aircraft, it meant you were insufferably rich and could not be bored by any part of Africa where it was at all difficult to travel or it meant that you were dying.

“How are you really, honey, after your bath and did you have a good time?”

“I’m well and fine. The doctor gave me the same stuff I was taking and some bismuth. People were very nice to me. But I missed you all the time.”

“You look wonderful,” I said. “How did you get such a fine Kamba haircut?”

“I cut it square at the sides some more this afternoon,” she said. “Do you like it?”

“Tell me about Nairobi.”

“The first night I ran into a very nice man and he took me to the Traveler’s Club and it wasn’t so bad and he brought me home to the hotel.”

“What was he like?”

“I don’t remember him terribly well, but he was quite nice.”

“What about the second night?”

“I went out with Alec and his girl and we went someplace that was terribly crowded. You had to be dressed and Alec wasn’t dressed. I don’t remember if we stayed there or went somewhere else.”

“Sounds wonderful. Just like Kimana.”

“What were you doing?”

“Nothing. I went out to a few places with Ngui and Charo and Keiti. I think we went to a church supper of some kind. What did you do the third night?”

“Honey, I don’t remember really. Oh, yes. Alec and his girl and G.C. and I went somewhere. Alec was difficult. We went a couple of other places and they took me home.”

“Same type of life we’ve been having here. Only Keiti was difficult instead of Alec.”

“What was he difficult about?”

“It escapes me,” I said. “Which of these Times would you rather read?”

“I’ve looked at one. Does it make any difference to you?”

“No.”

“You haven’t said you loved me or were glad to have me back.”

“I love you and I’m glad to have you back.”

“That’s good and I’m so glad to be home.”

“Anything else happen in Nairobi?”

“I got that nice man who took me out to take me to the Coryndon Museum. But I think he was bored.”

“What did you eat at the Grill?”

“There was fine fish from the big lakes. In filets, but like bass or walleye pike. They didn’t tell what fish. Just called it samaki. There was really good fresh smoked salmon that they flew in and there were oysters, I think, but I can’t remember.”

“Did you have the Greek dry wine?”

“Lots of it. Alec didn’t like it. He was in Greece and Crete I think with that friend of yours in the RAF. He doesn’t like him either.”

“Was Alec very difficult?”

“Only about small things.”

“Let’s not be difficult about anything.”

“Let’s not. Can I make you another drink?”

“Thank you very much. Keiti’s here. What do you want?”

“I’ll take Campari with just a little gin.”

“I like it when you’re home in bed. Let’s go to bed right after supper.”

“Good.”

“You promise you won’t go out tonight?”

“I promise.”

So, after the supper I sat and read the Time air edition while Mary wrote in her diary and then she walked on the new cut path with her searchlight to the latrine tent and I turned off the gaslight and put the lantern on the tree and undressed folding my things carefully and laying them on the trunk at the foot of the bed and got into my bed, folding the mosquito bar back under the mattress.

It was early in the night but I was tired and sleepy. After a while Miss Mary came in to the bed and I put the other Africa away somewhere and we made our own Africa again. It was another Africa from where I had been and at first, I felt the red spilling up my chest and then I accepted it and did not think at all and felt only what I felt and Mary felt lovely in bed. We made love and then made love again and then after we had made love once more, quiet and dark and unspeaking and unthinking and then like a shower of meteors on a cold night, we went to sleep. Maybe there was a shower of meteors. It was cold enough and clear enough. Sometime in the night Mary left the bed for her bed and I said, “Good night, blessed.”

I woke when it was getting light and put on a sweater and mosquito boots over my pajamas and buckled my bathrobe around with the pistol belt and went out to where Msembi was building up the fire to read the papers and drink the pot of tea Mwindi had brought. First I put all the papers in order and then started to read the oldest ones first. The horses would just be finishing at Auteuil and Enghien now, but there were no French racing results in these British airmail editions. I went to see if Miss Mary was awake and she was up and dressed, fresh and shining and putting drops in her eyes.

“How are you, darling? How did you sleep?”

“Wonderfully,” I said. “And you?”

“Until just this minute. I went right back to sleep when Mwindi brought the tea.”

I held her in my arms feeling her fresh early morning shirt and her lovely build. Picasso had called her my pocket Rubens once and she was a pocket Rubens, but trained down to one hundred and twelve pounds and she had never had a Rubens face and now I felt her clean, freshly washed-ness and whispered something to her.

“Oh yes, and you?”

“Yes.”

“Isn’t it wonderful to be here alone with our own Mountain and our lovely country and nothing to spoil it?”

“Yes. Come on and get your breakfast.”

She had a proper breakfast with impala liver broiled with bacon and a half of papaya from town with lemon to squeeze on it and two cups of coffee. I drank a cup of coffee with tinned milk but no sugar and would have taken another cup but I did not know what we were going to do and I did not want coffee sloshing in my stomach whatever we did.

“Did you miss me?”

“Oh yes.”

“I missed you terribly but there were so many things to do. There wasn’t any time at all, really.”

“Did you see Pop?”

“No. He didn’t come into town and I didn’t have any time nor any transport to get out there.”

“Did you see G.C.?”

“He was in one evening. He said for you to use your own judgment but adhere strictly to the scheme as outlined. He made me memorize it.”

“Is that all?”

“That’s all. I memorized it. He’s invited Wilson Blake down for Christmas. They get in the night before. He says for you to be prepared to like his boss, Wilson Blake.”

“Did he make you memorize that?”

“No. It was just a remark. I asked him if it was an order and he said no, that it was a hopeful suggestion.”

“I’m open to suggestion. How was G.C.?”

“He wasn’t difficult in the same way Alec was. But he’s tired. He says he misses us and he’s very outspoken with people.”

“How?”

“I think fools are beginning to annoy him and he’s rude to them.”

“Poor G.C.,” I said.

“You’re both quite a bad influence on each other.”

“Maybe,” I said. “Maybe not.”

“Well, I think you’re a bad influence on him.”

“Didn’t we go into this once or twice before?”

“Not this morning,” Miss Mary said. “Certainly not recently. Did you write anything while I was away?”

“Very little.”

“Didn’t you write any letters?”

“No. Oh, yes. I wrote G.C. once.”

“What did you do with all your time?”

“Small tasks and routine duties. I made a trip to Laitokitok after we killed the unfortunate leopard.”

“Well, we are going to get the real Christmas tree and that will be something accomplished.”

“Good,” I said. “We’ll have to get one we can bring back in the hunting car. I’ve sent away the truck.”

“We’re going to get that one that is picked out.”

“Good. Did you find out what sort of tree it is?”

“No, but I’ll find it in the tree book.”

“Good. Let’s go and get it.”

We started out, finally, to get the tree. Keiti was with us and we had shovels, pangas, sacking for the roots of the tree, large guns and small guns in the rack across the back of the front seat and I had told Ngui to bring four bottles of beer for us and two of Coca-Cola for the Moslems. We were clearly out to accomplish and except for the nature of the tree, which would make an elephant drunk for two days if he ever ate it, we were out to accomplish something so fine and so blameless that I might write about it for some religious publication.

We were all on our good behavior and we noted tracks without commenting on them. We read the record of what had crossed the road that night. And I watched sand grouse flighting in long wavering wisps to the water beyond the salt flats and Ngui watched them too. But we did not comment. We were hunters but this morning we were working for the Forestry Department of our Lord, the Baby Jesus.

Actually we were working for Miss Mary so we felt a great shifting in our allegiance. We were all mercenaries and it was clearly understood that Miss Mary was not a missionary. She was not even under Christian orders; she did not have to go to church as other Memsahibs did and this business of the tree was her shauri as the lion had been.

We went into the deep green and yellow-trunked forest by our old road that had become overgrown with grass and weeds since we had been over it last, coming out in the glade where the silver-leafed trees grew. Ngui and I made a circle, he one way and I the other, to check if this rhino and her calf were in the bush. We found nothing but some impala and I found the track of a very big leopard. He had been hunting along the edge of the swamp. I measured the pug marks with my hand and we went back to join the tree diggers.

We decided that only so many could dig at a time and since Keiti and Miss Mary were both issuing orders, we went over to the edge of the big trees and sat down and Ngui offered me his snuff box. We both took snuff and watched the forestry experts at their work. They were all working very hard except Keiti and Miss Mary. It looked to us as though the tree would never fit into the back of the hunting car but when they finally had it dug out it was obvious it would and that it was time for us to go over and help with the loading. The tree was very spiky and not easy to load but we all got it in finally. Sacks wet down with water were placed over the roots and it was lashed in, about half its length projecting from the rear of the car.

“We can’t go back the same way we came,” Miss Mary said. “It will break the tree in those turns.”

“We’ll go by a new way.”

“Can the car get through?”

“Sure.”

Along this way through the forest we hit the tracks of four elephants and there was fresh dung. But the tracks were to the south of us. They were good-sized bulls.

I had been carrying the big gun between my knees because Ngui and Mthuka and I had all seen these tracks where they crossed the north road on our way in. They might have crossed over from the stream that ran into the Chulu swamp.

“All clear now to campi,” I said to Miss Mary.

“That’s good,” she said. “Now we’ll get the tree up in good shape.”

At camp Ngui and Mthuka and I hung back and let volunteers and enthusiasts dig the hole for the tree. Mthuka drove the car over out of the shade when the hole was dug and the tree was unloaded and planted and looked very pretty and gay in front of the tent.

“Isn’t it lovely?” Miss Mary said. And I agreed that it was.

“Thank you for bringing us home such a nice way and for not worrying anybody about the elephants.”

“They wouldn’t stop there. They have to go south to have good cover and feed. They wouldn’t have bothered us.”

“You and Ngui were smart about them.”

“They are those bulls we saw from the aircraft. They were smart. We weren’t smart.”

“Where will they go now?”

“They might feed a while in the forest by the upper marsh. Then they’ll cross the road at night and get up into that country toward Amboseli which the elephant use.”

“I must go and see they finish properly.”

“I’m going up the road.”

“Your fiancée is over under the tree with her chaperone.”

“I know. She brought us some mealies. I’m going to give her a ride home.”

“Wouldn’t she like to come and see the tree?”

“I don’t think she would understand.”

“Stay at the Shamba for lunch, if you like.”

“I haven’t been asked,” I said.

“Then you’ll be back for lunch?”

“Before.”

Mthuka drove the car over to the waiting tree and told Debba and the Widow to get in. The Widow’s little boy bumped his head against my stomach and I patted it. He got into the back seat with Debba and his mother but I stepped down and had Debba come and sit in the front seat. She had been a brave girl to come to the camp, bringing the mealies and to stay at the waiting tree until we had come in and I did not want her to ride back to the Shamba in any but her usual place. But Miss Mary being so nice about the Shamba had put us all on our honor as though we had been given our parole.

“Did you see the tree?” I asked Debba. She giggled. She knew what sort of a tree it was.

“We will go and shoot again.”

“Ndio,” she sat up very straight as we drove past the outer huts and stopped under the big tree. I got down to see if the Informer had any botanical specimens ready to transport, but could locate nothing. He probably has them in the herbarium, I thought. When I came back Debba was gone and Ngui and I got in the car and Mthuka asked where we were going.

“Na campi,” I said. Then thought and added, “By the big road.”

Today we were in suspense, suspended between our new African Africa and the old Africa that we had dreamed and invented and the return of Miss Mary. Soon there would be the return of whatever Game Scouts G.C. brought and the presence of the great Wilson Blake who could enunciate policy and move us or throw us out or close an area or see that someone got six months as easily as we could take a piece of meat to the Shamba.

None of us was very cheerful but we were relaxed and not unhappy. We would kill an eland to have for Christmas Day and I was going to try to see that Wilson Blake had a good time. G.C. had asked that I try to like him and I would try. When I had met him I had not liked him but that had probably been my fault. I had tried to like him but probably I had not tried hard enough. Perhaps I was getting too old to like people when I tried. Pop never tried to like them at all. He was civil or moderately civil and then observed them through his blue, slightly bloodshot and hooded eyes without seeming to see them. He was watching for them to make a mistake.

Sitting in the car under the tall tree on the hillside I decided to do something special to show my liking and appreciation for Wilson Blake. There was not much in Laitokitok he would care for and I could not picture him as truly happy at a party given for him in one of the illegal Masai drinking Shambas nor in the back of Mr. Singh’s. I had grave doubts if he and Mr. Singh would get on too well. I knew what I would do. It was absolutely an ideal present. We would charter Willie to fly Mr. Blake over the Chulus and all of his domain that he had never seen. I could not think of a finer nor more useful present and I began to like Mr. Blake and to give him almost most favored nation status. I would not go along but would stay modestly and industriously at home photographing my botanical specimens, perhaps, or identifying finches while G.C. and Willie and Miss Mary and Mr. Blake worked out the country.

“Kwenda na campi,” I told Mthuka and Ngui opened another bottle of beer so that we would be drinking while we crossed the stream at the ford. This was a very lucky thing to do and we all had a drink from the bottle while we watched the small fish in the pool above the long ripple of the ford. There were good catfish in the stream but we were too lazy to fish.