“No. Mthuka brought it.”
“I hope it will be good this time. He must have a lovely wife because he’s so happy and kind. When people have a bad wife it shows in them quicker than anything.”
“What about a bad husband?”
“It shows too. But sometimes much slower because women are braver and more loyal. Blessed Big Kitten, will we have a sort of normal day tomorrow and not all these mysterious and bad things?”
“What’s a normal day?” I asked watching the firelight and the unflickering light from the lantern.
“Oh, the lion.”
“The good kind normal lion. I wonder where he is tonight.”
“Let’s go to sleep and hope he’s happy the way we are.”
“You know he never struck me as the really happy type.”
Then she was really asleep and breathing softly and I bent my pillow over to make it hard and double so I could have a better view out of the open door of the tent. The night noises all were normal and I knew there were no people about. After a while Mary would need more room to sleep truly comfortably and would get up without waking and go over to her own cot where the bed was turned down and ready under the mosquito netting and when I knew that she was sleeping well I would go out with a sweater and mosquito boots in a heavy dressing gown and build up the fire and sit by the fire and stay awake.
There were all the technical problems. But the fire and the night and the stars made them seem small. I was worried though about some things and to not think about them I went to the dining tent and poured a quarter of a glass of whisky and put water in it and brought it back to the fire. Then having a drink by the fire I was lonesome for Pop because we had sat by so many fires together and I wished we were together and he could tell me about things. There was enough stuff in camp to make it well worth a full-scale raid and G.C. and I were both sure that there were many Mau Mau in Laitokitok and the area. He had signaled them more than two months before only to be informed that it was nonsense. I believed Ngui that the Wakamba Mau Mau were not coming our way. But I thought they were the least of our problems. It was clear that the Mau Mau had missionaries among the Masai and were organizing the Kikuyu that worked in the timber-cutting operations on Kilimanjaro. But whether there was any fighting organization we would not know. I had no police authority and was only the acting Game Ranger and I was quite sure, perhaps wrongly, that I would have very little backing if I got into trouble. It was like being deputized to form a posse in the West in the old days.
G.C. turned up after breakfast, his beret over one eye, his boy’s face gray and red with dust and his people in the back of the Land Rover as trim and dangerous looking and cheerful as ever.
“Good morning, General,” he said. “Where is your cavalry?”
“Sir,” I said. “They are screening the main body. This is the main body.”
“I suppose the main body is Miss Mary. You haven’t strained yourself thinking this all out have you?”
“You look a little battle fatigued yourself.”
“I’m damned tired actually. But there’s some good news. Our pals in Laitokitok are all going in the bag finally.”
“Any orders, Gin Crazed?”
“Just continue the exercise, General. We’ll drink a cold one and I must see Miss Mary and be off.”
“Did you drive all night?”
“I don’t remember. Will Mary be over soon?”
“I’ll get her.”
“How is she shooting?”
“God knows,” I said piously.
“We’d better have a short code,” G.C. said. “I’ll signal shipment received if they come out the way they should.”
“I’ll send the same if they show up here.”
“If they come this way I imagine I’ll hear of it through channels,” then as the mosquito bar opened, “Miss Mary. You’re looking very lovely.”
“My,” she said. “I love Chungo. It’s absolutely platonic.”
“Memsahib Miss Mary, I mean.” He bowed over her hand. “Thank you for inspecting the troops. You’re their Honorary Colonel you know. I’m sure they were all most honored. I say, can you ride sidesaddle?”
“Are you drinking too?”
“Yes, Miss Mary,” G.C. said gravely. “And may I add no charges of miscegenation will be preferred for your avowed love for Game Ranger Chungo. The D.C. will never hear of it.”
“You’re both drinking and making fun of me.”
“No,” I said. “We both love you.”
“But you’re drinking though,” Miss Mary said. “What can I make you to drink?”
“A little Tusker with the lovely breakfast,” G.C. said. “Do you agree, General?”
“I’ll go out,” Miss Mary said. “If you want to talk secrets. Or drink beer without being uncomfortable.”
“Honey,” I said, “I know that in the war the people in charge of the war used to tell you everything about it before it happened. But there are many things G.C. doesn’t tell me about. And I am sure there are people who don’t tell G.C. things too long ahead of time. Also when people told you all about everything in the war you weren’t camped in the heart of possibly enemy country. Would you want to be wandering around by yourself knowing projects?”
“Nobody ever lets me wander around by myself and I’m always looked after as though I were helpless and might get lost or hurt. Anyway I’m sick of your speeches and you all playing at mysteries and dangers. You’re just an early morning beer drinker and you get G.C. into bad habits and the discipline of your people is disgraceful. I saw four of your men who had obviously been on a drinking bout all night. They were laughing and joking and still half drunk. Sometimes you’re preposterous.”
There was a heavy cough outside the door of the tent. I went outside and there was the Informer, taller, and more dignified than ever and impressive in his shawl-wrapped, porkpie-hatted drunkenness.
“Brother, your Number One Informer is present,” he said. “May I enter and make my compliments to the Lady Miss Mary and place myself at her feet?”
“Bwana Game is talking with Miss Mary. He’ll be out directly.”
Bwana Game came out of the mess tent and the Informer bowed. G.C.’s usually merry and kind eyes closed like a cat’s and peeled the layer of protective drunkenness from the Informer as you might slice the outer layers from an onion or strip the skin from a plantain.
“What’s the word from town, Informer?” I asked.
“Everyone was surprised that you did not fly down the main street nor show Britain’s might in the air.”
“Spell it ‘mite,’ ” G.C. said.
“To respectfully inform I did not spell it. I enunciated it,” the Informer went on. “All of the village knew that the Bwana Mzee was in search of marauding elephants and had no time for aerial display. A Mission-educated owner of a Shamba returned to the village late in the afternoon having flown with the ndege of Bwana and he is being tailed by one of the children of the bar and duka run by the bearded Sikh. The child is intelligent and all contacts are being noted. There are between one hundred and fifty and two hundred and twenty certifiable Mau Mau in the village or within short outlying districts. Arap Meina appeared in the village shortly after the arrival of the airborne owner of the Shamba and devoted himself to his usual drunkenness and neglect of duty. He is voluble in talking about the Bwana Mzee in whose presence I stand. His story, which has wide credence, is that the Bwana occupies a position in America similar to that of the Aga Khan in the Moslem world. He is here in Africa to fulfill a series of vows he and Memsahib Lady Miss Mary have made. One of these vows deals with the need for the Memsahib Lady Miss Mary to kill a certain cattle-killing lion indicated by the Masai before the Birthday of the Baby Jesus. It is known and believed that a great part of the success of all things known depend on this. I have informed certain circles that after this vow has been performed the Bwana and I will make the visit to Mecca in one of his aircraft. It is rumored that a young Hindu girl is dying for the love of Bwana Game. It is rumored—”