Wachera ignored her.
Mona's eyelids fluttered, her mouth opened, and a bit of the juice went in.
Grace flew to Wachera and grabbed the gourd. "What are you giving to her?"
"Acacia," said the medicine woman, using the Kikuyu name for the tree. "This will draw the fire out of her body."
"How do I know it won't kill her? How do I know it isn't your medicines that are making her sick?"
Wachera turned a cold, flat stare upon Grace. Then she reached out and took a firm hold of the gourd. "My medicines do not make the child sick. She has the evil spirits of sickness in her body."
"Nonsense. There are no such things as evil spirits."
"They exist."
"Show them to me."
"They cannot be seen."
"And I tell you there are no such things. Mona is ill because she took some germs into her body. Tiny things which we call 'microbes' are making her sick."
"Show me these microbes."
"They're too small to be seen—" Grace blinked. She let Wachera take the gourd and watched Mona sip the medicine in her half sleep.
When the gourd was empty, Wachera pounded more acacia roots, stirred them into cold rainwater, and drew the goatskin off Mona. Using a soft chamois, she sponged the girl's feverish body from head to foot.
THEY SAT FACING each other with the cook fire between them, Grace wrapped in goatskins against the cold drafts, Wachera stirring another millet stew. Every so often Grace looked through the door where she could see her brother's polo field turning into a lake. She looked at the sleeping form of Wachera's son, at Mona, who tossed and turned in fever, and finally at the medicine woman.
Grace had never been this near to Wachera, had never gotten a really good look at her. But now that she did, she saw what she had missed before: that the Kikuyu woman was, in fact, beautiful, her body not yet ravaged by time and hard living, and there was dignity in her eyes. There was also, to Grace's surprise, compassion.
Grace watched the nimble brown hands add bits of vegetable to the stew. Copper bracelets glinted in the fire's glow; earlobes stretched with rings of beads brushed dark brown shoulders. Wachera had lived alone in this hut for nine years, shunning the company and security of the village to hold on to a patch of seemingly insignificant ground, her only companion a little boy. How could she stand it? Grace wondered. Wachera was still young, and certainly she must be desirable to the men of her tribe. How could she give up so much for a fight that was futile and in which she was totally alone?
"You're on your own, Grace." Valentine's voice suddenly echoed in her memory. "I won't help you with your mission. You've made your choice to come to Africa and take care of a bunch of natives that ultimately will never appreciate you. I don't agree with what you're doing. You won't receive any help from me."
Then Grace pictured her own little cottage and the shadows in it that were her only companions.
Wachera looked up. Their eyes met. Grace shivered and drew the goatskins more tightly about her. There were unspoken questions in the medicine woman's gaze; Grace saw the studied curiosity, the wanting to know, and realized the look must mirror her own.
Finally Wachera said quietly, "Why did you come?"
"Come?"
"To Kikuyuland. Was it because your husband came?"
"I have no husband."
Wachera frowned. "The one they call Bwana Lordy—"
"He is my brother."
"Then who owns you?"
"No one owns me."
Wachera stared. This was a concept alien to her. They were speaking in Kikuyu, and there was no word in that language meaning "spinster." Only very young girls were unmarried. In the Kikuyu tribe all women were married.
"No one owns you," Grace said.
"That is true." Wachera was an oddity in her tribe. And were it not for the fact that she was the medicine woman and the widow of the great Mathenge, she would be an outcast. She looked over at Mona and said, "Is she your daughter?"
"She is the daughter of my brother's wife."
Wachera's eyes widened. "You have no babies of your own?"
Grace shook her head.
The millet stew bubbled; drafts rattled the bamboo frame of the hut. The young African woman retreated into baffled thought.
"I knew your husband," Grace said softly. "I respected him."
"You killed him."
"I did not."
"Not by your own hand," Wachera said, her tone hard. "You poisoned his mind first."
"I did not turn Mathenge from the Kikuyu way. We are not all alike, we wazungu, just as not all Kikuyu are alike. I was opposed to the destruction of the sacred fig tree. I told my brother to leave it alone."
Wachera considered this. Then she looked again at Mona, who was starting to waken, and went to her. The two women examined the burn and thigh wound, and when Wachera began to bathe both in juice from a gourd, Grace said, "What is that?"
"It is the blood of the sisal plant."
Grace watched the long ebony fingers work quickly and expertly. In her own clinic, if she did not protect a wound with iodine or permanganate, a serious infection would result. The medicine woman had neither, yet Mona's wounds were healing cleanly.
Grace looked around the hut, at the gourds and leather pouches hanging from the circular wall, at the magic charms, the strings of herbs and roots, at the belts studded with cowry shells and beaded necklaces that looked as if they were hundreds of years old, and she tried to find the witchcraft she had thought was practiced here.
"Lady Wachera," Grace said, using the Kikuyu form of polite address, "you cursed my brother and his descendants. Why now do you take care of his daughter?"
Wachera took Mona into her arm and raised a gourd of cold herbal tea for her to drink. "What I do here will make no difference to the thahu. The future of this child is a very bad one. I have seen it."
Grace looked at Mona's white face, at the fluttering eyelids, at the pale lips drinking reflexively. What indeed was the girl's future? Grace found herself wondering. Mona's parents were no parents at all; there was little love in the big stone house for her. And the Treverton inheritance was going to go to Arthur. What did lie in Mona's years to come? Grace tried to picture the teenager, the young woman, the wife and mother, but saw only a blank. Where would Mona go to school, whom would she marry, where would she live, how would she make her way in the world? Grace had never thought of it before, but now that she did, it troubled her.
A feeling of deep possessiveness swept over her. She wanted to take the child away from the dark medicine woman and cradle her back to life. I gave birth to you, Grace thought as Mona was laid back to peaceful sleep once again. On the train from Mombasa, when I nearly lost both of you. Your mother didn't have the strength to bring you into the world; it was my will that gave you life. You belong to me.
"I save the daughter of your brother's wife," Wachera said quietly, "because you saved my son."
Grace looked at David standing in the doorway, contemplating the rain. He was a lanky, pensive boy who she suspected would one day be as handsome as his father.
"We should not be enemies, you and I," Grace said at last to Wachera, surprised herself with the revelation.
"We can be nothing else."
"But we are alike!"
Wachera gave her a suspicious look.
"We are the same," Grace said with passion. "Is there not a proverb that says the crocodile and the bird are both hatched from an egg?"
The medicine woman looked at the memsaab long and consideringly; then she reached up and untied the leather thong that held a leaf dressing to Grace's forehead. Feeling the light touch of Wachera's fingertips, and knowing without having to look at it that her head wound was healing well, Grace tried to think of the words that would express what had come so suddenly and unexpectedly into her heart.
"We both serve the Children of Mumbi," she said softly as Wachera dabbed the wound with sisal juice, taking care that none ran
into Grace's injured eye. "We both serve life."
"This is not your land. Your ancestors do not dwell here."
"No, but my heart does."
They shared a gourd of sugarcane beer, passing it back and forth in silence, both listening to the rain and staring at the thickening stew. Presently other sounds joined the steady patter of rain: donkeys braying; men shouting; a car motor grinding. Grace then recognized the voice of Mario drawing close to the hut.
When she started to rise, Wachera stayed her with a hand. "Twenty harvests ago," she said, "you brought Njeri from Gachiku's belly. Gachiku was my husband's favorite wife. Njeri was the joy of his eye."
Grace waited.
"The thahu that we feared never came. Njeri, who is my son's sister, is a girl now, and she will bring honor to our family."
"Memsaab!" came Mario's voice outside the hut. Feet made sucking sounds in the mud. "Are you in there, memsaab?"
"Lady Wachera," Grace said softly, "I shall never be able to thank you enough for what you have done. You saved my little girl's life. I am in your debt for always."
Their eyes met one last time.
"Good-bye, Memsaab Daktari," Wachera said.
27
T
HE CHEVROLET TRUCK RACED DOWN THE DIRT ROAD, kicking up gravel and stones and leaving a long red-dust cloud in its wake. James Donald gripped the steering wheel with white knuckles; he watched the road for potholes and boulders as he maneuvered the vehicle at top speed. When it flew down the ridge in a great noise of gears grinding and chassis squeaking, women in the fields straightened up from their work, and the men constructing the new stone buildings of Grace Treverton Mission shielded their eyes and commented among themselves that the wazungu always seemed to be in a hurry.
Finally the truck jolted to a stop amid a shower of sand and debris; before the motor died, James was out of the cab and running. A few Africans who recognized him waved and called out, but he was oblivious of them. His long legs carried him through the busy compound and up the veranda steps of the recently repaired Birdsong Cottage. A startled Mario was asked a breathless "Where is the memsaab?" And before he finished replying, "She is at the village, bwana," Sir James was running back down the steps and off toward the river.
His boots thundered across the wooden bridge; he sweated in the hot sun. When he arrived at the village entrance, he didn't slow his pace. People turned and stared when they saw the white man come flying suddenly into their midst, asking urgently for Memsaab Daktari.
He found her in the center of a circle of women, demonstrating first-aid splinting of sprains and fractures. She looked up when he pushed through. "James!"
"Grace, thank God I've found you!" He reached for her hand. "What—"
"You have to come with me! It's an emergency!" He pulled her through the circle and ran with her, his hand holding tight to hers.
Grace's pith helmet flew off; she said, "James, wait."
He kept running, pulling her along.
"My medical bag is back there," she said, out of breath.
He didn't reply. They ran under the natural arch and down the forest path.
"James, what's happened! When did you get back to Kenya?"
He turned off the path suddenly and plunged into the woods, his grip still firm on her hand. They pushed through bush and over tangled undergrowth; birds flew up out of their way; monkeys complained overhead. "James!" she cried. "Tell me—"
He stopped suddenly, swung around, pulled her into his arms, and put his mouth over hers.
"Grace," he murmured, kissing her face, her hair, her neck, "I thought I'd lost you. They said you were dead. They said you'd been killed in the fire. I came at once."
They kissed hungrily, Grace with her arms about his neck, holding tight to him.
"I drove all the way from Entebbe," he said. "When I got to Nairobi, they said you were alive."
"Wachera—"
"Dear God, I thought I'd lost you." He buried his face in her hair; his strong arms held her so tightly to him that she could hardly breathe.
They sank to the ground in the privacy of wildflowers and bamboo and cedar trees. He covered her with his hard body; she saw the blue African sky through branches. The forest swirled around them as James murmured, "I never should have left you," and then no more words were spoken.
THEY LAY IN her bed, awake and talking softly. It was nearly dawn; soon the mission would be alive with the sound of hammers and chisels, of children singing in their outdoor classroom. This time James and Grace had made love slowly, stretching the night hours to savor each and every minute.
"I was out in the bush when word came," James said. Grace lay in the crook of his arm; he stroked her hair as he spoke. "Every mile of the long drive here I thought I was coming to your funeral."
"I was in Wachera's hut for the first few days after the fire. The storm isolated us."
"I'll never leave you again, Grace."
She smiled sadly and laid her hand on his bare chest. If she never had anything else again, she had last night. "No, James. You must go back. Your life is with Lucille and your children. We don't have the right."
"We have the right by our love for each other."
"And how would we live?"
"I'll go back to Kilima Simba." But even as he said it, James heard the hollowness of his words. The pain of it made him draw her tighter to him. "I have loved you for ten years, Grace. There were times when it was torture just to be near you. I thought going to Uganda would make it easier. But I have thought about you every day since we left."
"And I have thought about you. I will never stop loving you, James. My life and my soul belong to you."
He raised up on one elbow and looked down at her. He memorized every detail of her face, of her hair on the pillow, the curve of her collarbone. The image would go back with him into the Uganda jungle.
"I'm going to write that book," she said, "the medical handbook for rural workers. I shall dedicate it to you, James." She reached up and touched his cheek. The lines in his face were more deeply etched; his skin was more sunburned. She knew he would never be more handsome than he was at this moment.
James kissed her, and they began again, for the last time.
PART FOUR
1937
28
D
AVID MATHENGE STRETCHED IN THE EARLY DAWN. HE looked over at his mother's hut, where she still lay sleeping, and thought of the ugali left over from their supper the night before.
He was hungry. It seemed to him he was always hungry these days, starved, in fact, not just for food but for other things, for the freedom to change his way of life, for the chance to make the fiery and untouchable Wanjiru his. At nineteen David Kabiru Mathenge was a youth who was all appetite. His tall, wiry body was fired by an energy and restlessness he could barely control. With each dawn that he rose and stepped out of the bachelor hut he had built for himself, it seemed to him that the world had shrunk a little more during the night. Even now he squinted in the morning opalescence and was sure the river had gotten smaller, the bank narrower. He felt as if he were being squeezed in from all sides. David wanted to break out of this suffocating, tiny world and escape into the bigger one where he could breathe, where he could be a man.
Wanjiru.
He had hardly slept for thinking of her, burning for her. What sort of magic spell had been cast on him that he was so consumed with sexual desire? But David knew it was not witchcraft that made him hunger for Wanjiru; it was the girl herself.
Perhaps physically Wanjiru could not be considered a beauty. Her face was round and a bit ordinary, but her body was desirable; she was tall with large, jutting breasts and firm, strong legs. However, it was Wanjiru's spirit that inflamed David, the cold fire in her eyes, the heat in her voice, her refusal to be docile and humble even in the presence of men. Especially in the presence of men! Wanjiru had disrupted more than one peaceful political meeting under a fig tree by speaking up, boldly and loudly,
trying to incite the men into rash action instead of, as she put it, just saying words, words, words. They resented this, of course. The men didn't like Wanjiru; they avoided her because she had gone to school and could read and write and, though they wouldn't admit it, knew more about colonial policy than some of them. She was an outcast among the clan for her defiance of the British and for her intractable stand on elevating the status of African women. Wanjiru embarrassed the young men who were David's friends; she made them uncomfortable. They would laugh nervously when she passed by and make lewd remarks. But there was lust in the eyes of not a few of them, David had seen, when Wanjiru appeared.
She was both a gladness to his heart and a curse. Thoughts of her made his spirit soar, but thoughts of her burdened him also. He found himself thinking more and more of the old custom of ngweko, which was still practiced in the villages but which was dying out because of pressure from the missionaries.
Ngweko means "fondling" in Kikuyu, and it was a form of ritualistic intimate contact between young people before marriage. Boys and girls would congregate for dances and parties; partners would be chosen, and the couples would pair off into huts. Once alone, the young man would take off all his clothes, the girl her upper garment, retaining her leather apron and tying it back between her legs for modesty. Then the pair would lie down on the bed facing each other, intertwine their legs, and engage in affectionate fondling of breasts and torsos while carrying on a conversation of lovemaking until they fell asleep. Ngweko did not culminate in sexual intercourse, for that was taboo, nor might the girl touch the boy's member, nor he draw aside her apron, and should a boy impregnate a girl, he would have to pay a fine of nine goats to her father and the girl must provide a feast for all the men in her age-group.
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