by Mike Resnick
“I heard you,” answered Ngai.
“Then why did you not come to my aid?” demanded the warrior. “Are you so lacking in godly powers that you could not find me?”
“After all these years you still do not understand,” said Ngai sternly. “It is you who must search for me.”
* * *
My son Edward picked me up at the police station on Biashara Street just after midnight. The sleek British vehicle hovered a few inches above the ground while I got in, and then his chauffeur began taking us back to his house in the Ngong Hills.
“This is becoming tedious,” he said, activating the shimmering privacy barrier so that we could not be overheard. He tried to present a judicial calm, but I knew he was furious.
“You would think they would tire of it,” I agreed.
“We must have a serious talk,” he said. “You have been back only two months, and this is the fourth time I have had to bail you out of jail.”
“I have broken no Kikuyu laws,” I said calmly, as we raced through the dark, ominous slums of Nairobi on our way to the affluent suburbs.
“You have broken the laws of Kenya,” he said. “And like it or not, that is where you now live. I’m an official in the government, and I will not have you constantly embarrassing me!” He paused, struggling with his temper. “Look at you! I have offered to buy you a new wardrobe. Why must you wear that ugly old kikoi? It smells even worse than it looks.”
“Is there now a law against dressing like a Kikuyu?” I asked him.
“No,” he said, as he commanded the miniature bar to appear from beneath the floor and poured himself a drink. “But there is a law against creating a disturbance in a restaurant.”
“I paid for my meal,” I noted, as we turned onto Langata Road and headed out for the suburbs. “In the Kenya shillings that you gave me.”
“That does not give you the right to hurl your food against the wall, simply because it is not cooked to your taste.” He glared at me, barely able to contain his anger. “You’re getting worse with each offense. If I had been anyone else, you’d have spent the night in jail. As it is, I had to agree to pay for the damage you caused.”
“It was eland,” I explained. “The Kikuyu do not eat game animals.”
“It was not eland,” he said, setting his glass down and lighting a smokeless cigarette. “The last eland died in a German zoo a year after you left for Kirinyaga. It was a modified soybean product, genetically enhanced to taste like eland.” He paused, then sighed deeply. “If you thought it was eland, why did you order it?”
“The server said it was steak. I assumed he meant the meat of a cow or an ox.”
“This has got to stop,” said Edward. “We are two grown men. Why can’t we reach an accommodation?” He stared at me for a long time. “I can deal with rational men who disagree with me. I do it at Government House every day. But I cannot deal with a fanatic.”
“I am a rational man,” I said.
“Are you?” he demanded. “Yesterday you showed my wife’s nephew how to apply the githani test for truthfulness, and he practically burned his brother’s tongue off.”
“His brother was lying,” I said calmly. “He who lies faces the red-hot blade with a dry mouth, whereas he who has nothing to fear has enough moisture on his tongue so that he cannot be burned.”
“Try telling a seven-year-old boy that he has nothing to fear when he’s being approached by a sadistic older brother who is brandishing a red-hot knife!” snapped my son.
A uniformed watchman waved us through to the private road where my son lived, and when we reached our driveway the chauffeur pulled our British vehicle up to the edge of the force field. It identified us and vanished long enough for us to pass through, and soon we came to the front door.
Edward got out of the vehicle and approached his residence as I followed him. He clenched his fists in a physical effort to restrain his anger. “I agreed to let you live with us, because you are an old man who was thrown off his world—”
“I left Kirinyaga of my own volition,” I interrupted calmly.
“It makes no difference why or how you left,” said my son. “What matters is that you are here now. You are a very old man. It has been many years since you have lived on Earth. All of your friends are dead. My mother is dead. I am your son, and I will accept my responsibilities, but you must meet me halfway.”
“I am trying to,” I said.
“I doubt it.”
“I am,” I repeated. “Your own son understands that, even if you do not.”
“My own son has had quite enough to cope with since my divorce and re-marriage. The last thing he needs is a grandfather filling his head with wild tales of some Kikuyu Utopia.”
“It is a failed Utopia,” I corrected him. “They would not listen to me, and so they are doomed to become another Kenya.”
“What is so wrong with that?” said Edward. “Kenya is my home, and I am proud of it.” He paused and stared at me. “And now it is your home again. You must speak of it with more respect.”
“I lived in Kenya for many years before I emigrated to Kirinyaga,” I said. “I can live here again. Nothing has changed.”
“That is not so,” said my son. “We have built a transport system beneath Nairobi, and there is now a spaceport at Watamu on the coast. We have closed down the nuclear plants; our power is now entirely thermal, drawn from beneath the floor of the Rift Valley. In fact,” he added with the pride that always accompanied the descriptions of his new wife’s attainments, “Susan was instrumental in the changeover.”
“You misunderstood me, Edward,” I replied. “Kenya remains unchanged in that it continues to ape the Europeans rather than remain true to its own traditions.”
The security system identified us and opened his house to us. We walked through the foyer, past the broad winding staircase the led to the bedroom wing. The servants were waiting for us, and the butler took Edward’s coat from him. Then we passed the doorways to the lounge and drawing room, both of which were filled with Roman statues and French paintings and rows of beautifully-bound British books. Finally we came to Edward’s study, where he turned and spoke in a low tone to the butler.
“We wish to be alone.”
The servants vanished as if they had been nothing but holograms.
“Where is Susan?” I asked, for my daughter-in-law was nowhere to be seen.
“We were at a party at the Cameroon ambassador’s new home when the call came through that you had been arrested again,” he answered. “You broke up a very enjoyable bridge game. My guess is that she’s in the tub or in bed, cursing your name.”
I was about to mention that cursing my name to the god of the Europeans would not prove effective, but I decided that my son would not like to hear that at this moment, so I was silent. As I looked at my surroundings, I reflected that not only had all of Edward’s belongings come from the Europeans, but that even his house had been taken from them, for it consisted of many rectangular rooms, and all Kikuyu knew—or should have known—that demons dwell in corners and the only proper shape for a home is round.
Edward walked briskly to his desk, activated his computer and read his messages, and then turned to me.
“There is another message from the government,” he announced. “They want to see you next Tuesday at noon.”
“I have already told them I will not accept their money,” I said. “I have performed no service for them.”
He put on his Lecture Face. “We are no longer a poor country,” he said. “We pride ourselves that none of our infirm or elderly goes hungry.”
“I will not go hungry, if the restaurants will stop trying to feed me unclean animals.”
“The government is just making sure that you do not become a financial burden to me,” said Edward, refusing to let me change the subject.
“You are my son,” I said. “I raised you and fed you and protected you when you were young. Now I am old and you will do th
e same for me. That is our tradition.”
“Well, it is our government’s tradition to provide a financial safety net to families who are supporting elderly members,” he said, and I could tell that the last trace of Kikuyu within him had vanished, that he was entirely a Kenyan.
“You are a wealthy man,” I pointed out. “You do not need their money.”
“I pay my taxes,” he said, lighting another smokeless cigarette to hide his defensiveness. “It would be foolish not to accept the benefits that accrue to us. You may live a very long time. We have every right to that money.”
“It is dishonorable to accept what you do not need,” I replied. “Tell them to leave us alone.”
He leaned back, half sitting on his desk. “They wouldn’t, even if I asked them to.”
“They must be Wakamba or Maasai,” I said, making no effort to hide my contempt.
“They are Kenyans,” he answered. “Just as you and I are.”
“Yes,” I said, suddenly feeling the weight of my years. “Yes, I must work very hard at remembering that.”
“You will save me more trips to the police station if you can,” said my son.
I nodded and went off to my room. He had supplied me with a bed and mattress, but after so many years of living in my hut on Kirinyaga, I found the bed uncomfortable, so every night I removed the blanket and placed it on the floor, then lay down and slept on it.
But this night sleep would not come, for I kept reliving the past two months in my mind. Everything I saw, everything I heard, made me remember why I had left Kenya in the first place, why I had fought so long and so hard to obtain Kirinyaga’s charter.
I rolled onto my side, propped my head on my hand, and looked out the window. Hundreds of stars were twinkling brightly in the clear, cloudless sky. I tried to imagine which of them was Kirinyaga. I had been the mundumugu—the witch doctor—who was charged with establishing our Kikuyu Utopia.
“I served you more selflessly than any other,” I whispered, staring at a flickering, verdant star, “and you betrayed me. Worse, you have betrayed Ngai. Neither He nor I shall ever seek you out again.”
I lay my head back down, turned away from the window, and closed my eyes, determined to look into the skies no more.
* * *
In the morning, my son stopped by my room.
“You have slept on the floor again,” he noted.
“Have they passed a law against that now?” I demanded.
He sighed deeply. “Sleep any way you want.”
I stared at him. “You look very impressive…” I began.
“Thank you.”
“…in your European clothes,” I concluded.
“I have an important meeting with the Finance Minister today.” He looked at his timepiece. “In fact, I must leave now or I will be late.” He paused uneasily. “Have you considered what we spoke about yesterday?”
“We spoke of many things,” I said.
“I am referring to the Kikuyu retirement village.”
“I have lived in a village,” I said. “And that is not one. It is a twenty-story tower of steel and glass, built to imprison the elderly.”
“We have been through all this before,” said my son. “It would be a place for you to make new friends.”
“I have a new friend,” I said. “I shall be visiting him this evening.”
“Good!” he said. “Maybe he’ll keep you out of trouble.”
* * *
I arrived at the huge titanium-and-glass laboratory complex just before midnight. The night had turned cool, and a breeze was blowing gently from the south. The moon had passed behind a cloud, and it was difficult to find the side gate in the darkness. Eventually I did find it, though, and Kamau was waiting for me. He deactivated a small section of the electronic barrier long enough for me to step through.
“Jambo, mzee,” he said. Hello, wise old man.
“Jambo, mzee,” I replied, for he was almost as old as I myself was. “I have come to see with my own eyes if you were telling the truth.”
He nodded and turned, and I followed him between the tall, angular buildings that hovered over us, casting eerie shadows along the narrow walkways and channeling all the noises of the city in our direction. Our path was lined with Whistling Thorn and Yellow Fever trees, cloned from the few remaining specimens, rather than the usual introduced European shrubbery. Here and there were ornamental displays of grasses from the vanished savannahs.
“It is strange to see so much true African vegetation here in Kenya,” I remarked. “Since I have returned from Kirinyaga, my eyes have hungered for it.”
“You have seen a whole world of it,” he replied with unconcealed envy.
“There is more to a world than greenery,” I said. “When all is said and done, there is little difference between Kirinyaga and Kenya. Both have turned their backs on Ngai.”
Kamau came to a halt, and gestured around him at the looming metal and glass and concrete buildings that totally covered the cool swamps from which Nairobi took its name. “I do not know how you can prefer this to Kirinyaga.”
“I did not say I preferred it,” I replied, suddenly aware that the ever-present noises of the city had been overshadowed by the droning hum of machines.
“Then you do miss Kirinyaga.”
“I miss what Kirinyaga might have been. As for these,” I said, indicating the immense structures, “they are just buildings.”
“They are European buildings,” he said bitterly. “They were built by men who are no longer Kikuyu or Luo or Embu, but merely Kenyans. They are filled with corners.” He paused, and I thought, approvingly, How much you sound like me! No wonder you sought me out when I returned to Kenya. “Nairobi is home to eleven million people,” he continued. “It stinks of sewage. The air is so polluted there are days when you can actually see it. The people wear European clothes and worship the Europeans’ god. How could you turn your back on Utopia for this?”
I held up my hands. “I have only ten fingers.”
He frowned. “I do not understand.”
“Do you remember the story of the little Dutch boy who put his finger in the dike?”
Kamau shook his head and spat contemptuously on the ground. “I do not listen to European stories.”
“Perhaps you are wise not to,” I acknowledged. “At any rate, the dike of tradition with which I had surrounded Kirinyaga began to spring leaks. They were few and easily plugged at first, but as the society kept evolving and growing they became many, and soon I did not have enough fingers to plug them all.” I shrugged. “So I left before I was washed away.”
“Have they another mundumugu to replace you?” he asked.
“I am told that they have a doctor to cure the sick, and a Christian minister to tell them how to worship the god of the Europeans, and a computer to tell them how to react to any situation that might arise,” I said. “They no longer need a mundumugu.”
“Then Ngai has forsaken them,” he stated.
“No,” I corrected him. “They have forsaken Ngai.”
“I apologize, mundumugu,” he said with deference. “You are right, of course.”
He began walking again, and soon a strong, pungent odor came to my nostrils, a scent I had never encountered before, but which stirred some memory deep within my soul.
“We are almost there,” said Kamau.
I heard a low rumbling sound, not like a predator growling, but rather like a vast machine purring with power.
“He is very nervous,” continued Kamau, speaking in a soft monotone. “Make no sudden movements. He has already tried to kill two of his daytime attendants.”
And then we were there, just as the moon emerged from its cloud cover and shone down on the awesome creature that stood facing us.
“He is magnificent!” I whispered.
“A perfect replication,” agreed Kamau. “Height, ten feet eight inches at the shoulder, weight seven tons—and each tusk is exactly 148 pounds.”
The huge animal stared at me through the flickering force field that surrounded it and tested the cool night breeze, striving to pick up my scent.
“Remarkable!” I said.
“You understand the cloning process, do you not?” asked Kamau.
“I understand what cloning is,” I answered. “I know nothing of the exact process.”
“In this case, they took some cells from his tusks, which have been on display in the museum for more than two centuries, created the proper nutrient solution, and this is the result: Ahmed of Marsabit, the only elephant ever protected by Presidential Decree, lives again.”
“I read that he was always accompanied by two guards no matter where he roamed on Mount Marsabit,” I said. “Have they also ignored tradition? I see no one but you. Where is the other guard?”
“There are no guards. The entire complex is protected by a sophisticated electronic security system.”
“Are you not a guard?” I asked.
He kept the shame from his voice, but he could not banish it from his face: even in the moonlight I could see it. “I am a paid companion.”
“Of the elephant?”
“Of Ahmed.”
“I am sorry,” I said.
“We cannot all be mundumugus,” he answered. “When you are my age in a culture that worships youth, you take what is offered to you.”
“True,” I said. I looked back at the elephant. “I wonder if he has any memories of his former life? Of the days when he was the greatest of all living creatures, and Mount Marsabit was his kingdom.”
“He knows nothing of Marsabit,” answered Kamau. “But he knows something is wrong. He knows he was not born to spend his life in a tiny yard, surrounded by a glowing force field.” He paused. “Sometimes, late at night, he faces the north and lifts his trunk and cries out his loneliness and misery. To the technicians it is just an annoyance. Usually they tell me to feed him, as if food will assuage his sorrow. It is not even real food, but something they have concocted in their laboratories.”
“He does not belong here,” I agreed.