Natalie looked in the back of the Land Rover. She shuddered in shock. She couldn’t help it. She had seen Kees barely five days before, but he was now just skin and bone; he must have lost thirty pounds, more. His facial skin was stretched tight over his jawbone, the stubble of his beard dark against the rust red of his cheeks. His eyes, deep in their sockets, like tiny craters, raked this way and that, unfocused, fearful, and bewildered at the same time. But Kees was alive.
“Where are we going to put him?” said Arnold.
“We’re not,” said Christopher. “We’re going straight to Jack’s plane. We only came back here so Jack could pick up his keys and Jonas could get some medicines from the refrigerator. Did you take out the seats as we asked?”
“Yes,” said Natalie. “The plane is ready. I also filled it with Avgas.”
Jack, who had arrived back from his own tent, heard this. He stretched his arm around her and squeezed. “Thank God for Dr. Nelson. You’ve saved us fifteen precious minutes. If Kees makes it, you may have saved his life.” He turned to Jonas. “Ready?”
Jonas nodded.
As they got into the Land Rover, Jack shouted to his mother, “I’ll radio in from Nairobi.”
Christopher and Natalie followed them in another Land Rover as they sped out to the strip. Christopher helped Jonas lift Kees into the back of the plane to save time as Jack did his preflight checks. Then they watched as first one engine, then the other, cranked into life. Jack taxied to the far end of the strip and took off, waving briefly as he banked eastward.
• • •
The waves of human voices built on each other, like giant rollers thudding on to a beach, each one more powerful than the others. The third movement of Brahms’s German Requiem. How different male voices were from female ones, Natalie thought. Not just a different sound but different moods. Female choirs soared, male voices consoled.
Dinner this evening had been close to a riot. In view of the fact that Kees had been found alive, and after Jack had radioed in to say they had reached the hospital in Nairobi safely, Eleanor had allowed a bottle of champagne to be brought from the fridge. As usual, there hadn’t been enough for more than one glass per person, but even so tongues had been loosened, now that the cloud hanging over them had been lifted.
There had been much laughter at dinner, as if, not being allowed expression for days, it was now pouring out of everyone. And, with Jack away, they were playing as many of his records as they could, one after the other, jazz alternating with classical in random order.
Natalie sat next to Christopher. “Tell me, where exactly was Kees found? How was he found?”
Christopher edged his chair closer to hers. “He was between two large boulders, in the shade. But he was near a track and he had pulled a log across it, forcing anyone who came by to stop, to move it out of the way. As far as we could make out, he had wandered in the sun for the first day, because the kind of rock formation he was looking for didn’t support much vegetation. He didn’t realize he had been in the sun for so long until it was too late, when he felt sick and had to rest. He fell asleep and woke in the middle of the night. His sunstroke was bad the next day and as the sun moved round, during the afternoon, his shade disappeared. He tried to move, fell, hit his head, and passed out, in full sunlight. Again, when he woke it was dark.
“It was amazing no predators found him, but since he wasn’t near any trees, that helped. By the third day, he was severely dehydrated, and though he heard the planes looking for him, he was too weak to stand or wave. The only thing he could do, had done, was use a log to block the track he was near. But that track is hardly used at all these days, and Iku Liguru only drove that way this morning because he had fought with his daughter and wanted to make it up to her by picking some rare wildflowers which grow in that area.”
Christopher stopped speaking as the music fell silent. Then he said, “I’m sorry if I frightened you—the other day, I mean, in the plane. I suppose I panicked.”
Arnold Pryce, in charge of the gramophone tonight, put on some jazz—loud, fast, and, to Natalie’s ears, crude.
“I’m not sure I have the temperament to be a pilot.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself. It was a momentary slip.”
“If Jack hadn’t been there—”
“But he was!”
“Were you very frightened?”
She paused. “It all happened so quickly … there wasn’t time … Jack reacted before I did.”
Christopher nodded. “He was quick to see what was happening. Those bloody birds.” He let some time go by. The jazz got faster still.
A water buffalo moaned in the gorge.
“I need more lessons.” He breathed out. “But not from Jack. Jack makes me nervous. I suppose it’s him being my brother.”
Natalie said nothing. Where was this going?
The jazz ended in what sounded to Natalie like an apocalypse of drums.
“Look,” said Christopher, leaning forward, “it’s Christmas in just over a week. The ancillary staff get a few days off, and the guards, and with this new ruling of my mother’s—that we must only be in the gorge in pairs—we are all going to stand down for seventy-two hours. I wondered … I wondered if you wanted to drive over to Kubwa. It’s on the slopes of the mountain before you get to Ngorongoro and there are some hot springs. The water is very restorative and, well, since we have had such a wearing few days, I thought it might help us unwind, get the cobwebs out of our hair, prepare us for the ordeals to come … the press conference and the trial …”
Natalie was relieved to hear Chopin’s “Farewell to Poland” waltz. For her, the piano beat the drums any day.
But how did she respond to Christopher, who had just handed her a nice little dilemma?
“Jack has already asked me to spend Christmas with him, at a Swahili village called … Limu, Lomu? On the coast, anyway.”
“Lamu. It’s not far from the Somalia border. Did you say yes?”
She shook her head. “I haven’t given him an answer yet, no.”
“Then you are going to have to choose between brothers.”
“Oh no,” replied Natalie, shaking her head again. “Oh no. You’ve both put me in an impossible position and there’s only one way out.” She stood up. This had gone far enough. “I’m going to say no to both of you. Good night.”
• • •
When Natalie reached the breakfast table the next morning, Eleanor and Christopher were discussing the press conference.
“Most of the British delegation will be staying at the Rhodes,” Christopher was saying. “That’s not far from the Coryndon Natural History Museum, where the director has said we can use their premises. It’s central, and the room will be filled with natural history specimens—that will produce the right atmosphere, don’t you think?”
“Yes, it will. Excellent. Well done, Christopher.” Eleanor looked up and smiled as Natalie sat down. She let Natalie sip some coffee and slice into her fruit before asking, “And the documentation, Natalie, how is that coming along?”
“Well, no one has worked on it for a few days, for obvious Kees-related reasons. But we’re almost there, I think. Once Jack gets back from Nairobi, we can polish what we have, and you can see it soon after. Forty-eight hours at the most, I should think.”
Eleanor nodded. “Good. Things are falling into place. I still can’t say I’m happy with the route we are taking but … since we are going that way, we must give it our best shot, as the Americans say.” She looked across to Natalie. “There’s been no further word from the odious Richard Sutton Senior, or from Russell, I suppose?”
“One short note from Russell. He’s still not happy.”
“And did you try to soften him up?”
“Yes, of course. I haven’t heard back. My letter crossed with his.”
She swallowed some fruit.
“I don’t think Russell will soften, Eleanor.”
Eleanor nodded, removing her sp
ectacles at the same time.
Just then Naiva brought in a large plate.
“Ah, eggs!” cried Eleanor. “Christopher—” and she looked across. “I’m famished. Be an angel, go and radio Jack. Find out how Kees is this morning.”
Christopher got to his feet and, taking his coffee mug with him, crossed to his mother’s tent, where the radio-telephone was.
Eleanor waited, as usual, while everyone else was served, before spooning two eggs on to her own plate.
“Arnold, how close are you to finishing your part in the press conference?”
“It’s just a matter of tinkering, don’t worry. This creature—I take it we are still calling him, or her, Homo kiharensis, yes—?”
Eleanor nodded.
“Well, we now know more or less what his or her diet was and—”
“Before you go into that, may I say something?”
Everyone looked at Natalie.
“Sorry, Arnold,” she said. “But I’m sure your news about diet will be accepted by the rest of us. I wanted to raise a point where I don’t expect universal agreement.”
“Go ahead,” said Arnold. “These eggs are too good to let them get cold, anyway.” He attacked his food.
“I can understand why you want to call these remains Homo kiharensis.” Natalie swallowed some coffee, and looked over her mug at Eleanor. “I see how that fits into what we are trying to achieve. But I wonder if we are not … if we are not missing a trick here.”
Eleanor wiped the remains of egg yolk from her plate with some bread. “I don’t follow.”
“Consider an alternative name,” replied Natalie gently. “Consider Homo suttoniensis.”
Eleanor gave a stunted gasp. “What—! I don’t believe—!” She tailed off.
No one else spoke.
“As a mark of respect, as an acknowledgment that he, and Russell, and Daniel here found the first bones.”
Eleanor was shaking her head. She was just about to speak when Christopher stood over her. She looked up. “Yes?”
Natalie noticed a stain on Christopher’s shirt. He had spilled his coffee over himself.
“I spoke to Jack,” he said quietly, very quietly. “Kees died in the night.”
“What! No. No!” Eleanor wrapped her fingers around her mouth, but said nothing more.
Behind her spectacles, her eyes glinted.
Natalie, shocked herself, couldn’t make out whether or not there were tears in Eleanor’s eyes.
“Jack and Jonas will stay in Nairobi today, alert the family, and make the arrangements to fly the body back to Holland. They’ve already started. He died in hospital so there are no legal problems.” Christopher looked around the table and put his hand on his mother’s shoulder. “Apparently, his internal organs had suffered and withered too much for him to survive. He died at 4:15.”
Eleanor scraped back her chair and hurried to her tent.
She disappeared inside.
Christopher sat back down at the breakfast table. “I know I shouldn’t say this, but I’m starving.”
• • •
“Eleanor? Eleanor? It’s Natalie. Are you there? May I come in?” Natalie stood by the radio-telephone at the entrance to Eleanor’s tent. In more matter-of-fact tones, she repeated, “Eleanor.”
Following Christopher’s devastating news, the high spirits in the camp, the high spirits that had carried over from the night before, had vanished entirely. No one now felt like exposing himself or herself to the airless heat of the gorge, and people found chores to do in camp. Grief shared is grief lessened.
Eleanor hadn’t been seen all morning. There had been no more activity on the radio-telephone. Jack and Jonas were obviously shouldering the burden of telling the next of kin and making the other arrangements—finding a coffin, making the airline booking, liaising with the Dutch embassy over customs/immigration clearance, and whatever else was needed.
The flap to Eleanor’s tent moved, and she appeared.
Yes, she was diminished, Natalie thought. Her hair was less than its immaculate self, her skin had lost its sheen, her fingers were shaking. She was still in shock. For the first time, Natalie thought, Eleanor looked old.
“Yes?” she said, in a flat, cold voice. “I can’t face talking about Richard—”
“No, no. That’s not why I’m here.” She lowered her voice. “Let’s sit down. I have something to tell you, about Kees.”
Eleanor looked at her sharply, as she slumped to a chair.
“But first,” said Natalie, “here.” She held up her whiskey flask and poured a shot into the cap. “I know you don’t have a head for spirits, but now is not the time to quibble. This is medicinal.” She attempted a smile.
Eleanor looked at her, fiercely to begin with, but then her face dissolved into a small smile and she took the cap.
“Knock it all straight back,” whispered Natalie. “It will help. I’ve already had one—just one.”
Eleanor sniffed the liquid, made a face, but swallowed the contents of the cap all at once. She coughed, wiped her lips with the back of her hand, nodded her head. “I see what you mean. I suppose I feel a bit better now. What is it you have to tell me?”
Natalie took back the cap and screwed it on the flask. She slipped it into her pocket.
“A little while ago, Kees told me something in confidence. Normally, I would have respected that confidence but… given what has happened, given how traumatic the past few hours and days have been, and because Kees is now dead, I regard myself as released from that confidence.”
Eleanor looked at her. Her skin was not quite so … dead as it had been. The whiskey was having an effect.
“We were working in the gorge when Kees told me he was homosexual—”
“What!”
“Yes. He confessed to me because, he said, he had watched me being in a minority of one in the camp, over the Ndekei trial, and he said that he wanted me to know that, although he didn’t agree with my stance, he did sympathize with my solitary position.”
“But why are you telling me this now?”
“Hold on. I haven’t finished.” Natalie took a deep breath. She wanted to do this slowly. “That wasn’t the whole picture. Kees also told me because he was feeling miserable and he had to talk to someone. I suppose he thought that, with us both being ‘outsiders,’ or people in a minority, I would be more sympathetic—”
“Sympathetic to what?”
“Hold on. He told me that, a day or so before, he had received a letter from, as he put it, an older friend—an older male friend—in Amsterdam, a friend who meant a great deal to Kees, whom he lived with, yet who had met someone else, he said, and who was emigrating to America, to San Francisco.”
“I still don’t—”
“Eleanor, please! What I’m saying is that I don’t think Kees’s disappearance was accidental.”
Eleanor, in the act of wrapping her spectacles around her ears, stopped what she was doing.
“Yes, that’s what I came to say. I think he was emotionally disturbed and that his disappearance had, at least in part, suicidal elements. He had been thrown over by his lover, he was all alone down here—doing important work, yes—but with nothing to look forward to, back at home. He was devastated.”
Eleanor, having just put on her eyeglasses, snatched them off again. “But … but if you’re right, that was a ghoulish way to go about it.”
“I’m not sure there’s a non-ghoulish way to commit suicide but … as I told you, weeks ago, when my mother was killed there was always a doubt in my mind that she might have been suicidal too. So, in the midst of my grief at her death, I read books on suicide.” Natalie ran her tongue along her lips. “People don’t always mean to kill themselves outright. Often they put themselves in danger, at risk—they will turn on the car engine in their garage, for instance, or slit their wrists and lie in a bath of warm water—but, but, they will do so in such a way, at certain times of the day, when other family members, or
neighbors, will interrupt what they are doing and find them. They put themselves in a situation where whether they live or die is a matter of chance, and depends on whether they are found or not.”
She took out her handkerchief and wiped the sweat off her throat. “I think that’s what happened with Kees. He went off in search of his precious chert and allowed himself to stay out too long, too long in the sun, knowing it was dangerous, that he could die of dehydration or be eaten by lions or hyenas, but also knowing that we would come looking for him. With suicidal people, these calculations are always tricky. If people find you in time, they make a fuss of you, you are the center of attention for a while, and you either make a recovery or … or you bide your time until you feel depressed all over again.”
She put away her handkerchief. “I’m not an expert, of course, but it seems to me that on this occasion Kees made a calculation that almost worked, but in the end didn’t.”
Eleanor turned this over in her mind, not speaking for some considerable time. “And you’re telling me all this to reassure me? To lessen my feelings of guilt?”
“That comes into it, yes. I could see this morning how hard you had taken Kees’s death, how you must be thinking that, after however many years it is of trouble-free digging, all of a sudden you have two deaths on your hands. For what it’s worth, I don’t think you can be held responsible for either death. That’s why I’ve told you about Kees.” She wasn’t going to add what Kees had said about Richard Sutton. She didn’t want that argument just now.
Eleanor again turned Natalie’s remarks over in her mind. “And you tell me all this … you offer me this … comfort, I suppose you’d call it, despite our differences over … over Ndekei?”
“I’m not that calculating, Eleanor. At least I don’t think I am. I could see how upset you were—we all could. I happened to know things that were relevant. You couldn’t know what I knew, you blamed yourself more than was reasonable.” She wiped her lips with her tongue. “I could pick on myself if I chose to—I knew what a mess Kees was in and didn’t think it through, didn’t anticipate he wasn’t fit enough to be left on his own.”
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