‘You dance fine, my friend,’ I shouted. ‘My wife done teach you fine.’
‘Yes, yes,’ roared the Fon over the top of Jacquie’s head. ‘No foine dance dis. Your wife na good wife for me.’
Eventually, after half an hour’s dancing, they returned to their chairs, hot and exhausted. The Fon took a large gulp of neat gin to restore himself, and then leaned across to me.
‘Dis your wife na foine,’ he said in a hoarse whisper, presumably thinking that praise might turn Jacquie’s head. ‘She dance foine. She done teach me foine. I go give her mimbo … special mimbo I go give her.’
I turned to Jacquie who, unaware of her fate, was sitting fanning herself.
‘You’ve certainly made a hit with our host,’ I said.
‘He’s a dear old boy,’ said Jacquie, ‘and he dances awfully well … did you see how he picked up that samba in next to no time?’
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘and he was so delighted with your teaching that he’s going to reward you.’
Jacquie looked at me suspiciously. ‘How’s he going to reward me?’ she asked.
‘You’re now going to receive a calabash of special mimbo … palm wine.’
‘Oh God, and I can’t stand the stuff,’ said Jacquie in horror.
‘Never mind. Take a glassful, taste it, tell him it’s the finest you’ve ever had, and then ask if he will allow you to share it with his wives.’
Five calabashes were brought, the neck of each plugged with green leaves, and the Fon solemnly tasted them all before making up his mind which was the best vintage. Then a glass was filled and passed to Jacquie. Summoning up all her social graces she took a mouthful, rolled it round her mouth, swallowed and allowed a look of intense satisfaction to appear on her face.
‘This is very fine mimbo,’ she proclaimed in delighted astonishment, with the air of one who has just been presented with a glass of Napoleon brandy. The Fon beamed. Jacquie took another sip, as he watched her closely. An even more delighted expression appeared on her face.
‘This is the best mimbo I’ve ever tasted,’ said Jacquie.
‘Ha! Good!’ said the Fon, with pleasure. ‘Dis na foine mimbo. Na fresh one.’
‘Will you let your wives drink with me?’ asked Jacquie.
‘Yes, yes,’ said the Fon with a lordly wave of his hand, and so the wives shuffled forward, grinning shyly, and Jacquie hastily poured the remains of the mimbo into their pink palms.
At this point, the level of the gin bottle having fallen alarmingly, I suddenly glanced at my watch and saw, with horror, that in two and a half hours it would be dawn. So, pleading heavy work on the morrow, I broke up the party. The Fon insisted on accompanying us to the foot of the steps that led up to the Rest House, preceded by the band. Here he embraced us fondly.
‘Good night, my friend,’ he said, shaking my hand.
‘Good night,’ I replied. ‘Thank you. You done give us happy time.’
‘Yes,’ said Jacquie, ‘thank you very much.’
‘Wah!’ said the Fon, patting her on the head, ‘we done dance foine. You be good wife for me, eh?’
We watched him as he wended his way across the great courtyard, tall and graceful in his robes, the boy trotting beside him carrying the lamp that cast a pool of golden light about him. They disappeared into the tangle of huts, and the twittering of the flutes and the bang of the drums became fainter and died away, until all we could hear was the calls of crickets and tree-frogs and the faint honking cries of the fruit bats. Somewhere in the distance the first cock crowed, huskily and sleepily, as we crept under our mosquito nets.
Mail by Hand
My good friend,
Good morning to you all.
Your note to me received and contents well understood.
I am a beat relief from that cough but not much.
I agree for you to hire my landrover as from today on weekly payments. I will also want to bring to your notice that the landrover will be under your charge as from today, but any time I am called for a meeting at Ndop, Bemenda or elsewhere, or any urgent matter, I shall inform you to allow me the motor for the day.
I want to remind you of the last trip which you hired the landrover and settlement has not yet been made.
Your good friend,
Fon of Bafut
Chapter Four. Beef in Boxes
As soon as Bob and Sophie had joined us in Bafut we set about the task of organizing our already large and ever-growing collection. The great, shady verandah that ran round the upstairs rooms of the Fon’s Rest House was divided into three: one section for reptiles, one for birds and one for mammals. Thus each of us had a particular section to look after and whoever finished first lent a hand with somebody else’s group. First thing in the morning we would all wander to and fro along the verandah in our pyjamas carefully looking at each animal to make sure it was all right. It is only by this day-to-day routine of careful watching that you can get to know your animals so well that you detect the slightest sign of illness, when to anyone else the animal would appear to be perfectly healthy and normal. Then we cleaned and fed all the delicate animals that could not wait (such as the sunbirds who had to have their nectar as soon as it was light, and the baby creatures that needed their early morning bottles) and then we paused for breakfast. It was during mealtimes that we compared notes on our charges. This mealtime conversation would have put any normal mortal off his food, for it was mainly concerned with the bowel movements of our creatures; with wild animals, diarrhoea or constipation is often a good indication as to whether you are feeding it correctly, and it can also be the first (and sometimes the only) symptom of an illness.
On any collecting trip acquiring the animals is, as a rule, the simplest part of the job. As soon as the local people discover that you are willing to buy live wild creatures the stuff comes pouring in; ninety per cent is, of course, the commoner species, but they do bring an occasional rarity. If you want the really rare stuff you generally have to go out and find it yourself, but while you are devoting your time to this you can be sure that all the common local fauna will be brought in to you. So one might almost say that getting the animals is easy: the really hard part is keeping them once you have got them.
The chief difficulty you have to contend with when you have got a newly caught animal is not so much the shock it might be suffering from capture, but the fact that the capture forces it to exist in close proximity to a creature it regards as an enemy of the worst possible sort: yourself. On many occasions an animal may take to captivity beautifully, but can never reconcile itself to the intimate terms on which it has to exist with man. This is the first great barrier to break down and you can only do it by patience and kindness. For month after month an animal may snap and snarl at you every time you approach its cage, until you begin to despair of ever making a favourable impression on it. Then, one day, sometimes without any preliminary warning, it will trot forward and take food from your hand, or allow you to tickle it behind the ears. At such moments you feel that all the waiting in the world was justified.