The Idol of Mombasa

by Annamaria Alfieri

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Bring it here. Make sure you wrap it in a cloth before you touch it again. Then wait here for Inspector Patrick’s report. I will need to have that straightaway.”

  “Yes, sir.” Kwai left immediately and sped to the station, where he instructed the Goan lieutenant to hold a cloth over his hand when he picked up the dagger. The officer gave Libazo a warning glance, as if what he had said was a personal insult, as if he had implied that the officer’s hands were not clean. Libazo tried to explain about fingerprints, but the man told him to shut up. He then made a great fuss about getting Kwai to sign a receipt for the item. He said the words valuable and large emerald over and over, as if he were warning Kwai not to steal the dagger that would not have been in the evidence drawer in the first place if Kwai had not turned it in.

  When Kwai returned to the Fingerprint Department, Inspector Patrick was peering at the murder weapon through a magnifying glass, which he put down as soon as the new evidence arrived.

  He drew on white cotton gloves, unwrapped the dagger, and, holding it gingerly, brought the two parts of the janbia together. It was clear that they belonged to each other. He then separated the pieces, brushed the dagger’s blade and handle with his magic dust, and looked at the dagger through the glass. Then he examined the card with Kwai Libazo’s fingerprints on it, and looked back at the sheath again. Over and over.

  Once he took off the gloves and put the glass aside, he spent a long time writing his report on the police form. From time to time, he went back and reexamined the sheath and the dagger and then returned to writing.

  Kwai stood immobile against the wall, as he had been taught to do, and listened to the pen scratching out Inspector Patrick’s words. But all the while, he wished he could take up the glass and peer at the marks on the card and the ones on the dagger and the sheath. He wanted to learn how to read these signs. He thought if he could learn to do that, he would be more powerful than the medicine men of the tribes, who drew their authority from knowing things that other people did not. The medicine men’s knowledge did not seem to make them happy men. Most of the ones he had known were very quiet at best, and often cranky. Kwai was certain, though, that if he could learn to read fingerprints, it would bring him joy. The inspector confirmed this by smiling broadly when he looked up from his report.

  An askari Kwai did not know knocked and entered. “I have come from the doctor, Inspector, sir,” he said. “You can come now and take the fingerprints of the corpse. The doctor requests that you bring the murder weapon to him so that he can confirm that it killed the dead man.”

  Kwai looked at his fingertips again, still stained a bit by the ink. He knew it could not be true, but something in him vividly imagined that a person’s fingerprints would disappear when he died.

  Inspector Patrick folded his report and made Libazo extremely happy by not sealing it in an envelope before handing it over. “Take this to Egerton and Tolliver,” he said. “Tell them it is preliminary and that I am going to the morgue to take Majidi’s prints.”

  Libazo took the report and saluted. He waited while Patrick placed work tools in a wooden tray, and then put the murder weapon on top of them. Kwai held the door and let the inspector exit first. He followed until the senior man reached the bottom of the stairs. Kwai then climbed to a deserted corner of the top floor and unfolded the report. The inspector’s handwriting was very clear and easy to read:

  Mombasa, the Protectorate of British East Africa

  On the morning of Tuesday, 30 January 1912, Inspector C. W. Patrick performed fingerprint analysis of evidence concerning an investigation into the murder of Khalid Majidi, late of this city.

  Conclusions are as follows:

  1. The alleged murder weapon, a very large and heavy black marble box richly inlaid with silver and ivory, with blood encrusted on one corner—showing prints of only two individuals, at this point identity unknown. One set is suspected to be those of the deceased as the box was in his possession. The other set is assumed to be the prints of the murderer.

  2. Sheath of Arabic dagger, recovered from the deceased’s place of business in the Mombasa bazaar—fingerprints clearly matching one of the sets on the alleged murder weapon, also likely to be those of the deceased. Also clear fingerprints of Constable #23972, an ignorant askari who mishandled the evidence when it was discovered.

  Kwai bristled at the judgment against him. How could he have known what to do and what not to do if no one had ever told him? The British gave themselves excuses when they did wrong things, but they never imagined any explanation but stupidity for people like him. He suppressed a sigh and went on reading the last entry.

  3. Blade of matching Arabic dagger, taken to the Fingerprint Department from the police station near Fort Jesus, only clear prints are those of aforesaid Constable #23972 and small prints that appear to be those of a child.

  Kwai refolded the report and sped around to the front of the second floor and D.S. Egerton’s office, smarting at the thought of having to deliver a report that made him out to be a dolt.

  ***

  When Tolliver reported to Egerton’s office that morning, he expected that the only topic of discussion would be the murder of Khalid Majidi, but Egerton first took up the threat against the Grand Mufti and the role of the bookseller and the other man, the one Kwai had chased into the souk. He had turned out to be the shop owner’s nephew.

  “I questioned them myself,” Egerton said, “with Sergeant Singh as interpreter. The old man told us nothing. It took some effort, but the nephew, in the end, told all.” The D.S.’s voice took on a cold edge that disturbed Tolliver. He could imagine what had been contained in “some effort.” He did not want to think the D.S. was one of those men who would brutalize an accused to get a confession. He knew those methods were widely employed, but he did not believe they ever produced the truth. He imagined that beatings only caused men to say whatever they thought their assailants wanted to hear.

  Egerton went on; his tone had turned ironic. “It seems, for all that the bookseller sits all day in a shop full of religious tracts, according to his nephew, he actually makes his money from the infamous brothel across the way. They were afraid it would be shut down because of the G.M.’s constant religious harangues about stamping out debauchery—the need for greater devotion to the Koran and all that sort of rot.”

  “Such sermons might be a good thing,” Tolliver put in, “if they make the Arabs better behaved. Surely good Mohammedans adhere to the Ten Commandments.”

  “Not necessarily, old chap,” Egerton said. “It seems the G.M.’s idea, when it comes to the whores in the silk shop, is that they should be returned to their fathers to be dealt with. They are Somali girls, you know, and were raised as Muslim women. You know what their male relations are likely to do to them for prostituting themselves.”

  Tolliver shuddered. He had heard stories when he was in the army about girls who had been found with men. Beheadings! “Surely the bookseller and his nephew did not think they should assassinate the Grand Mufti to stop him preaching.”

  “Who can tell,” Egerton said, less as a question than as a statement of the uselessness of trying to understand such a foreign culture.

  “What will the bookseller and his nephew be charged with?”

  “I would like to say corrupting the morals of minors. Evidently, according to Singh, most of the girls are only thirteen when they are taken into that place.” He threw up his hands. “I can’t imagine how we are to handle this without getting the whole town up in arms. They will riot if we try to give British law precedence. They say a girl is of age when she is only twelve. That’s to be married off by their male relatives. But still. We can’t debate the point now. Our first aim is to keep the G.M. safe and happy and to ensure his support of Britain when he goes home to Cairo. So we jail the bookseller, or the sin-seller, whichever he is, for making a threat. That will keep him on ice until the G.M. goes home.”

  Egerton
seemed satisfied with that solution. Tolliver was considering challenging him on the question of whose laws they were supposed to be enforcing, when Kwai Libazo knocked on the door and entered carrying Patrick’s report.

  Once both officers had read it, Tolliver spoke first and to Libazo. “Have you the vaguest idea where to find the young scamp who found the knife?”

  “Yes, sir. I know exactly where he is.”

  Egerton looked surprised, but Tolliver knew Libazo was far more capable than Patrick’s report made him out to be. “Permission, sir, to go and interrogate the youngster while we wait for further results on the fingerprinting.”

  “Granted,” Egerton said. “In the meanwhile, I will report to District Commissioner Hobson-Jones that we have assured ourselves that the bookseller and his nephew were working alone. If the Commissioner gets grief from the Liwali, it will find its way here.” He gave Tolliver a piercing look. “If you take my meaning.”

  Tolliver took the words for the warning he knew them to be. If a head had to roll, it would be his.

  ***

  Vera made her way to the Mission by hiring a rickshaw to take her to the floating Nyali Bridge and then walking across, trying to enjoy the sea breeze and to ignore the fact that the wobbly structure seemed to be threatening to pitch her into the drink with every step.

  Safe on the mainland end, she fretted instead that she might find neither Robert nor Katharine Morley at home. She had decided to take them by surprise rather than give any warning that she was coming. Absurd as it was that Mr. Morley might be suspected of murder, she wanted to catch any whiff of any guilt when she announced Majidi had been murdered. Her father did not have friends who killed people.

  Still, Robert Morley needed to establish an alibi. She fervently hoped he would have a good one. But he must have it ready and tell it calmly. Not fly off the handle, as he was so prone to do.

  The path to the Mission through dense vegetation gave her another worry. Upland, one never walked unarmed in wild places where deadly animals could be lurking. She picked up her pace, her glance flitting from side to side, watching for snakes as she went. When she reached the Mission clearing, she was relieved to hear the familiar hymn “Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow,” played on a pedal organ and sung at the top of Katharine’s rather nasal voice. Vera understood that nearly all Mission women learned to play hymns so they could provide music for services. She wondered if they all took out their frustrations by playing them over and over again at top volume whenever their nerves were overwrought. She had heard her mother do the same. With her mother, it would have been “Onward, Christian Soldiers” and played with more grandeur and sung with a better sense of pitch than Katharine Morley now exhibited.

  Vera moved toward the music and found Katharine in the chapel, a picturesque building—stone halfway up and then open on three sides, with a red tile roof. A profusion of magenta bougainvillea climbed up the sides and hung across the entrance.

  Vera took up singing the hymn as she neared. She and Katharine finished it in harmony and then went to the veranda of the house, which was shaded by a lovely mango tree. Katharine ordered tea from the houseboy. They said nothing till it arrived. Katharine looked away, as if she wanted to avoid talking. Vera tried to find the right words to open a conversation, but could not. Everything she thought to say was too shocking. Or not shocking enough. A dog of indeterminate breed came to the step and looked at them but then went to the tree trunk and lay down to scratch its fleas.

  Once the boy had delivered the tea tray and withdrawn, Vera forced out the news, choosing her words carefully. “I have something dreadful to tell you.”

  But Katharine interrupted with a wave of her strong, skinny hand. She lowered her head and kept her voice unusually quiet. “Majidi has been murdered. I know. I was the one who reported it to the police.”

  Vera gulped. It took her a moment to be able to ask a coherent question. What had Katharine been doing so close to Majidi’s shop at the time he was murdered? Had she seen her brother there? “How did that come to be?”

  Katharine downed the last of her tea and refilled her cup. She cradled it in both her hands. “You remember what I told you when we met in the bazaar yesterday morning. Well, I was foiled trying to trail Robert then. When I found him gone again in the afternoon, I went straight to Majidi’s shop, hoping to get there before Robert did something…”

  “Wait a minute,” Vera said. “Do you mean you were afraid that—” She couldn’t say it—that Katharine suspected her brother was out to kill Majidi, might have actually done it. She stifled that thought. “I came here to warn him,” Vera said instead. “I am afraid that the police will…That they will want to question him.”

  Katharine glanced around, evidently afraid Robert would overhear, but then she gave Vera a determined stare. “I want to question him myself,” she whispered through clenched teeth. She finished her second cup of tea and poured herself a third.

  “Did you see him at Majidi’s shop?”

  “When I arrived there, I saw through the glass in the door that the showroom was empty. It was very quiet. I thought the shop might be closed, though there was no sign to that effect on the door. I tried the door. It opened. A bell tinkled. I waited for Majidi to come out. Nothing happened. I called out, but still nothing.”

  Vera took a sip but her tea had gone cold. She bit her lip. She wanted to urge Katharine on, but she was afraid of what she might learn. Was Katharine not the benign, sisterly person that Robert had always made her out to be in his visits to her father? She seemed almost to want to find him guilty.

  “I could not stop myself,” Katharine said after a few more sips. “I went snooping to the back and pushed aside the curtain.” She looked away as if pained anew by the sight she recollected. She sighed and shook it off. “I must say that it was not as bad as seeing poor Joseph Gautura. That was truly horrible. But Majidi looked…” Her voice trailed off.

  “So you went to the police with the news.” Vera said it as if she knew it to be true.

  “I did not,” she said, as if such an action would have been absurd. “I told the boy at the shoe seller’s stall to run to the police station near Fort Jesus. And I came directly home, hoping to find Robert here.”

  Vera could not help asking, “Was he?”

  Katharine’s eyes betrayed determination and fear. Her pale lashes blinked. “Please never tell this to another soul, Mrs. Tolliver.”

  Vera nodded her assent. “Call me Vera, please,” she said.

  “I have never questioned my brother’s goodness, but—” The tears overflowed. She drew a handkerchief out of the sleeve of the linen shirtwaist and dabbed her eyes. “Oh, what’s the use?” she cried. “I am not sure I know my brother as well as I imagined I did.”

  Vera waited a second for her to go on. When she did not speak, Vera reassured her: “I came here to try to protect Mr. Morley, Katharine. My husband has told me that he was very—that he was overwrought after the murder of Joseph Gautura.”

  “Oh, Vera. You must stop them thinking that Robert killed Majidi. You must.” She reached out and grasped Vera’s left hand with her right. Her grip was urgent, powerful.

  “Where is the Reverend Morley now?” Vera feared the answer.

  “That’s just it,” Katharine said in desperation. “I have no idea.”

  ***

  Tolliver followed the boy and Libazo down a narrow path near the shore of the mainland, across the harbor from Mombasa island. Monkeys chattered overhead, and butterflies flitted around flowering vines that hung from the trees. The air smelled salty with a dank undercurrent of rotting vegetation. A bird cooed somewhere to his left, but he could not see more than a few feet into the dense thicket. The overwhelming beauty of the place did not dispel an air of danger.

  “The boy doesn’t look like the dirty urchin you described him to be,” Tolliver said to Libazo.

  “I forced him to take a bath and bought him some decent shorts and a shi
rt,” Libazo said.

  “You did so with your own money?” Tolliver blurted out. Libazo had little enough, and Tolliver knew he sent most of what he earned to his mother.

  Libazo took no offense. “Yes, sir.”

  “I see,” Tolliver said. And he did. Libazo had taken pity on the child. His sergeant was far more emotional a man than he ever demonstrated on the surface. Kwai had done what Tolliver would have done under the circumstances. And preferred to understate it, as Tolliver would also have done.

  “Is he staying somewhere I should know about?” Tolliver asked, suppressing a smile. It was against regulations for askaris to have visitors of any sort in the barracks. And Tolliver knew that Libazo had no friends in the town who would harbor the child for him.

  “No, sir, but during the day he does hang about the police lines, polishing shoes and buttons and running errands to earn a few rupees.”

  Tolliver purposely did not ask where the boy slept. What would be the difference if the men made the orphan a pallet in some corner?

  “The boy will behave, sir,” Libazo said. “I am seeing to that.” He had raised his voice enough to be sure the child heard.

  Tolliver winked at Libazo, and then wondered if a police officer of the Protectorate had ever before exchanged such a signal with an askari.

  The boy suddenly ducked into the rank, nearly impenetrable undergrowth beside the path. He disappeared under some hanging vines and then emerged on a large mangrove limb that was practically horizontal. A person larger than he would have found it impossible to go where he had gone. “Here is where I found the dagger, sirs. Right here. But the water was up. It goes up and down, you know.”

  “With the tide.” Tolliver had noticed it when he and Vera were staying on the beach. The tides were nothing like they were up in Yorkshire, where they could reach fifteen feet. Here on the equator they were far less dramatic but, depending on the phase of the moon, they did rise and fall a few inches, which could make a difference in these swampy areas. “Why did you go in there?” he called to the boy. He was having serious doubts that the waif had come upon the dagger by accident in such an inaccessible place.