Rift

by Beverley Birch

  ‘That’s Anna’s!’ exclaimed Joe, his tone puzzled.

  Ella turned the pages. Sketches – some detailed and careful, others cartoon-like. Sharp, angular words scribbled here and there, as if Anna was angry. And on one page a series of caricatures: Miss Strutton, Sean, Denny, Carl, Janice, Candy. So unmistakable that Ella stared, amazed and impressed. All the teacher’s pretty neatness was there. But she also had a look of gleeful madness, and she was dressed like those cartoons of cannibals who boil victims in cooking pots: a grass skirt with a bone through her high tight knot of hair. The page was headed Savage Man and Savage Woman, and the figures were all like that, in grass skirts or furry skins, expressions and features caught with a few swift, vicious strokes.

  There they were again, on the next page: Denny was bludgeoning something with a club; Carl had skewered a bird on a stick; Candy and Janice were doing a jig; and Sean was dragging a girl to the party by the hair. Watching over it all was Strutton, but her head was turned and her face caught in horror at a tall figure approaching. It was Silowa, his shape and long braided hair recognisable from the photo Ella had, but Anna had also shaded his skin to show its blackness. He was smiling broadly and welcome burst from his mouth, but the words looping from Strutton’s were, ‘ARRGGGHH! Help! A savage!‘

  The next sheets had no cartoons, only detailed sketches of trees, careful labels filling the spaces in between: acacia thorn, olive, candle tree, fig tree, baobab . . .

  ‘Please,’ interrupted the constable, holding out his hand firmly. ‘We will give these to the inspector. Now.’

  Ella closed the book and handed it over, with Charly’s. The constable tucked them under his arm, and gestured her and Joe towards the path.

  Joe did not move. His gaze was travelling up on to the shoulder of Chomlaya and along, stopping at the point a few hundred metres away to their right, where the ridge began to curve away, out of sight.

  ‘You must come,’ the constable repeated. ‘Now, now. You must not stay here to get lost! Back now. Into the camp, if you please! We must report to the inspector and the DC.’

  Wordlessly, Joe shook his head.

  ‘What is it?’ the constable’s voice rose with alarm.

  Above, Ella could hear the shriek of a hawk. Joe looked towards it, and then at the drift of darker shapes in the distant sky. Ella knew they were vultures. She had a vision of them circling a carcass. Her heart began to thump uncontrollably.

  Then Samuel spoke quietly to the constable, and touched her shoulder, and Joe’s, and this time Joe responded, falling into step along the path. Behind, she heard Samuel murmur to Ndoto, ‘The boy says nothing, but looks at this place all the time. He does not know why, I think. Perhaps he only hears, and it is not real. But the place should be looked at again. Ndoto, you must say this to the inspector and the sergeant. But let us do this very quickly and quietly. We do not encourage hope if there is only disappointment to come . . . ’

  Ahead, Joe was suddenly walking fast, almost running. He hadn’t looked at her or spoken to her, and it seemed to Ella that he’d remembered something. It was bad. He wouldn’t tell her because it was terrible, and now she stumbled frantically after him, unthinkable possibilities suddenly drowning all the hope that had flared only moments ago in finding Charly’s book.

  Joe had remembered nothing. He had heard the pipe. Not in dream, or memory, but here, now, spiralling upwards into the bleached-white sky. It seemed to call, as if Matt played it, this pipe that Silowa had given him, that Ndigi, Silowa’s friend, had made.

  Part of Joe knew it wasn’t true.

  Yet he could hear it, still. It sang and sang in the air around him. It rose higher and higher, sang and sang and sang, that somewhere, beyond the heights of Chomlaya, Matt was alive.

  noon

  Leaving the student meeting, Murothi was stopped by Likon, heavily out of breath from running. ‘Inspector, I have to tell you – I did not think of it before, it was many days ago, but I remember just now when Tomis tells me of this talk with Joe about Silowa and bones –’

  ‘Likon, it is all right,’ Murothi quietened him. ‘Recover your breath. Then you can tell me.’

  The other breathed in, launched off again, ‘It is this: Silowa, he wishes to talk to someone at Burukanda, specially. He leaps from the car when we get there, and off he runs! In the evening he presents himself to come back to Chomlaya, and he is very joyful! He does not tell me what it is about. He does not tell me who he speaks to. He says his friend Anna has some very good idea, but I do not know what he is talking about –’

  ‘When did this happen?’

  ‘Oi! Many days. Last week . . . Tuesday?’

  ‘Who would know what it is about?’

  The other spread his hands in a gesture of helplessness. ‘I have asked Samuel; he knows nothing. We think this is a little secret these children are keeping. Inspector Murothi, I am truly sorry . . . ’

  ‘Likon, you have told me now, and that is well.’ Murothi succeeded in speaking calmly; but his head reverberated with contradictory thoughts. He had been on his way to interrogate the teacher, Ian Boyd. Now, abruptly, he changed his mind.

  ‘But you can give me some help, please. Sergeant Kaonga and the constables are busy wrestling the student books from Miss Strutton! But now let you and me go to speak to Silowa’s cousin –’

  ‘Mungai? He is here –’

  ‘Yes, you will take me to find him, and help me in this conversation?’

  They found him some little distance from the camp, with three other herdsmen, in the umbrella shade of an acacia. All sat facing the heights of Chomlaya, as if they kept watch. Their conversation was low-voiced, subdued. A bowl of food passed between them, their sticks leaned together against the tree, their long legs stretched in the dust.

  At the approach of the inspector and Likon, they rose to their feet, together. Carefully they listened to Likon’s greeting and introduction. In turn each took Murothi’s proffered hand and shook it, and Mungai looked hard at Murothi and spoke in his language that Murothi could not understand.

  ‘Likon,’ said Murothi. ‘I am sorry, I do not have Mungai’s language, and if Mungai does not have Kisewa . . . ’

  ‘Inspector, he has Kisewa, he travels far beyond his region. But of course I will help. Mungai is saying that he will stay till his young cousin is found. His family will expect this.’

  Murothi nodded. He indicated the shade, and spoke carefully in Kisewa. ‘Mungai, if you please, sit with me. I would like to understand something.’

  A murmur passed between Mungai and his companions. They resumed their places below the tree. Murothi seated himself cross-legged in front of them and sifted the seeds of several ideas. ‘I am told,’ he began, ‘that Silowa’s home is far. That he came to this region with his uncle. That he stays away from his home. I am curious about this.’

  ‘Silowa’s uncle, yes. This is my father,’ confirmed Mungai, this time in a form of Kisewa, heavily accented, that Murothi could nevertheless follow. ‘Many times it is that my father goes to Burukanda. He brings news to the people there. He tells where he has seen the old bones lying, where the rain has washed the earth to show them. At Burukanda they are very interested in bones! This time, Silowa accompanies my father there. Silowa begs to –’

  ‘He begs? Why does he do this?’

  Elaborately, Mungai sighed. ‘It is the stories. Always the stories. The boy listens to my father tell of Chomlaya, and before that, when he is small, he listens to his own father. This is in the years before the breathing illness took his father. But Silowa remembers. Many, many times, his father came to this place when he was a boy, together with my father – two boys very brave, very daring! His father tells how in days gone by, our ancestors came here when the time of their death call came. This lives in Silowa’s head. He is restless . . . ’ Mungai swept his arm wide, encompassing the rock and the plain. ‘When he has been to Burukanda and Chomlaya, and is again with his family, he wishes to return to Bur
ukanda. Restless, always restless . . . ’

  ‘And the stories? They are of things that have happened here?’

  ‘Tales told to children at their mother’s knee. Of the beginnings of all things. It is said that the Creator leaves his footprints here. My father – you should hear him – he tells these things very well! And my young cousin, Silowa, at Burukanda he learns that another man, from a very far place, has a story about Chomlaya. It is like the stories of our fathers, but also different. Suddenly my cousin is buzzing like a bee! I do not know why it has this great enchantment for him. He is a very modern boy . . . ’ Mungai sucked his teeth and wrinkled his nose in an expression that was at once fond and despairing. ‘Once he has been to Burukanda and Chomlaya he will not let anything rest! So his mother lets him come again, to try to find work and stay for some months. She hopes he will learn to let it go from his mind, and return to his home. Then,’ he paused and indicated the student camp, ‘what is troubling my thoughts, he meets these other young ones, and I do not know what has happened.’ He shook his head: a slow, sad movement which drew murmurs from the others. Throughout they had been listening attentively to his account, nodding agreement here and there.

  A sombre silence fell.

  Gently, Murothi broke it. ‘Perhaps he has just made good friends.’

  The remark provoked one of the others, a young man, barely more than a boy himself. Rapidly he spoke in his own language in a tone that did not need translation for Murothi to recognise the annoyance.

  Sympathetically, Likon glanced at Murothi. In English, he remarked, ‘Inspector Murothi, they are afraid for Silowa. They do not like this running around these foreigners’ camps.’ He addressed them again in their own language and was quickly answered. To Murothi he explained, ‘I ask if the uncle knows of Silowa’s trouble here. I am told he is with the husbands of Silowa’s sisters and the cattle, far, far,’ he waved a hand towards the north. ‘Mungai has sent a message with some who travel that way, but he does not know if it has reached them. To Silowa’s mother as well, and his sisters.’

  ‘I will find out if they know,’ said Murothi. ‘Promise him I will do this. The police have gone to find her, just as the English police are speaking to the mothers and fathers of the missing English children . . . ’

  Inexplicably, the statement chilled him. And where must I travel now? What trail must I follow? Bullying, bones, secrets, and now stories . . .

  He thought, Silowa feels called to these places, because his father, who is dead, walked these rocks; Silowa is perhaps no more than listening to the echoes.

  But in this there is something . . .

  He saw the others had turned away and were observing a plume of dust rising like blood-red smoke above the scrub. There was a glint as sunlight caught glass, the thrum of an approaching engine. Now the vehicle was plainly in sight, bumping across the tussocky ground, slowing to a halt by the student camp. On the driver’s side a lean, willowy, fair-haired woman flung open the door, got out and stretched arms above her head.

  ‘It is Véronique,’ said Likon, rising to his feet. ‘Otaka will be with her. They are archaeologists from Burukanda. They are Charly’s good friends.’

  A tall African man emerged from the vehicle. He walked round the car and he and the woman went towards the camp. They could be seen speaking to a student. The student pointed towards Murothi.

  The two visitors strode towards him.

  ‘Inspector Murothi?’ The woman’s voice, strong, clear, unfamiliar in its accent, carried easily across the open ground. ‘I am Véronique Mézard. If I may speak with you, please?’

  ‘Véronique is French,’ volunteered Likon, as if reading Murothi’s mind.

  ‘This is my friend and colleague, Otaka Ngolik,’ the woman went on, drawing closer. ‘We have been away. To the coast. We have read no newspapers, listened to no radios. A complete rest, we thought! We have only just received DC Meshami’s message that he wishes to speak to us. We have come straightaway. We saw Charly, we want to tell you –’

  Misunderstanding, Murothi’s heart flipped.

  ‘She is all right?’

  ‘No, no, I do not mean that. If I understand matters correctly, it would be in the morning just before she went missing. She spent the previous day with us at Burukanda, and the night, and then she drove back to Chomlaya early. The thing is, Inspector, this may be important, she was so very happy about something. These pupils . . . ’ she gestured towards the camp.

  ‘What something?’

  She didn’t answer directly, just turned and looked up at Chomlaya’s jagged escarpments. ‘Oh, I do not know, she did not tell me! Perhaps I talk nonsense! Perhaps she only came to talk, to send her email and collect her sister’s. To get away from this camp, which more and more she did not like. She was content that these young friends of hers were going away for a few days – but I think she got this wrong? She believed they were goingto Lengoi Springs.’ ‘She was not happy to leave them without her at the camp?’ ‘Well, she never said that. But yes, this is what I have come to think,’ Véronique replied sombrely.

  Until now, Otaka Ngolik had said nothing. At close range he was much older than the woman, his hair greyed, his manner calmly reserved. Now he commented, ‘Charly came to show us something.’

  ‘To show you, Otaka, my dear; she did not show me! And she swore you to secrecy! Inspector, Otaka has only just told me this, when we heard –’

  ‘She showed you the sketchbook,’ Otaka remarked, mildly, with a half-smile.

  ‘Ah, yes, the drawings. Which she had taken from her young friend Anna because she feared this Miss Strutton would see them. They are very clever and very angry. Have you seen them, Inspector? But this was not the main thing she came for. She was checking the rules of the Burukanda competition –’

  Murothi held up a hand. ‘Competition? Please, please. I am drowning in competitions! I hear this word with every breath in this place! Explain this Burukanda competition . . . ’

  ‘It is called the Burukanda Award,’ Véronique answered. ‘It is for students, working in teams, to develop some original work. There is quite a lot of money in the prize, to be divided among the team. Charly wished to know if there was a restriction on who could enter. And who would be judging.’

  ‘Is this the same competition the students here are working for now?’

  ‘Now they work for it here,’ Likon answered for Véronique. ‘But before – Miss Strutton has the idea to make other little competitions, lots of little competitions, to select who will be allowed to enter the big Burukanda one!’

  ‘Ah!’ said Véronique emphatically. ‘This is what Charly hates. This nonsense! This is what she tries to stop! Competitions, competitions, competitions! Team points for this, team points for that! We were able to reassure her: the rules and the judgement of the Burukanda Award are in the hands of Burukanda only. The teachers at Chomlaya camp have no say. Charly felt that her young friends had a chance of making an interesting entry. But that was all she told us; she said this was not her secret to share.’

  ‘I gave her a video camera,’ Otaka put in. ‘She could record whatever it was. She wished to ensure there was no doubt it was their work. She seemed very particularly worried about cheating or stealing.’ He took something from his pocket. ‘And she left this with me.’

  From a small cloth pouch he tipped a fragment of something dark and brown, roughly triangular in shape, and held it flat on his hand for Murothi to see.

  Murothi leaned forward to peer at it. It looked like a pebble.

  ‘Part of a hominid skull. Fossilised,’ explained the other man. ‘Here, you see, a little of the bony brow ridge. It is very prominent, thick, heavy. This suggests it is very, very early, but there is not enough to see properly. I do not know where Charly got this. She made me promise to tell no one else that I had it, not until she gave permission. I have not till now.’ Otaka turned the fragment on the palm of his hand, contemplating it, then closed his fingers over it
and slipped it back into the pouch. He looked meaningfully at Murothi. ‘If these children found anything like this near Chomlaya, it would be thrilling, it would be very, very clever of them . . . to find it, and to know what it is.’

  ‘Come,’ broke in Véronique. ‘Ride out with us, Inspector. Likon, my friend, you too.’ Briskly she blocked Murothi’s hesitation: ‘It will not take long. It may reveal something about these children’s preoccupations that you have not considered. It is only necessary to go a little way out . . . ’

  They stood on an outcrop of rock. It rose to the height of a tree, its top worn by wind and water to a broad platform curved like a shallow dish. Véronique, Otaka and Likon had climbed effortlessly, finding toeholds and fingerholds invisible to Murothi, who scrambled and slithered and arrived at the top puffing, fingersore and hot.

  ‘There you see it: an archaeologist’s nightmare. A geologist’s nightmare!’ declared Véronique.

  The full sweep of the land was revealed, its gradual fall northwards towards the long, snaking spine of rock that was Chomlaya. To their left, at its western end, the fractured and fissured dying line of the ridge was visible as the occasional jagged barb speared upward through the earth. At the eastern end, to the right of the student camp, the huge bulbous formations of reddish rock seemed to Murothi like a vast head, half-turned to look at him, resting in the afternoon sunshine.

  ‘You may see now,’ murmured Otaka, considering it through binoculars, ‘why for some it is known as Snake Rock.’

  ‘And why do you say it is a nightmare?’ enquired Murothi.

  ‘Do you know anything about rocks, Inspector?’ was Véronique’s reply.

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘With Chomlaya, it is impossible to unpick the course of its life. There is a volcanic core spewed upwards in multiple eruptions many millennia ago. But on this there are deposits of other rocks, formed from sediments swept here by wind and water over millions more years. None of this is unusual, of course. But what makes it so difficult to understand is that it has been ruptured again and again by more recent volcanic activity. It has split, buckled, twisted. Everything is topsy-turvy, up and down and round each other, jostled and tilted. And then it is confused even more by recent soil movements. We expect caves, but there are none. But the real point is this, Inspector: there has never been any serious exploration of it. Over the years, everyone has circled warily round about; we snoop to the west and east and south, but never at Chomlaya’s feet –’