The Weather in Africa

by Martha Gellhorn

  His immediate boss, Johnny Leitch, thought well of Ian, who worked hard and was eager to learn but also clearly odd man out in the general chumminess. When Ian thanked him for his teaching and gave notice, saying he meant to buy a small farm, Johnny Leitch said, ‘There’s no better way to learn than trying it on your own. You can use your digs here as a base if you want, while you’re looking around.’ The trouble was that Ian had no idea how to look round and was too proud to admit himself helpless from the start. Johnny Leitch showed him the advertisement in the Kenya Weekly News, roaring with laughter.

  ‘Luke Hardy’s a card, a real old settler. He must have been pissed to the eyes when he sent that in. It’s pretty country near Karula. Well, there’s your farm, Ian. Whatever you do you couldn’t make it worse.’

  Ian asked for leave to visit Fairview Farm at once.

  Lying in Luke Hardy’s guest room bed, Ian thought about accidents. From what little he knew of life, he had decided the whole thing was purely accidental. God was not up there with his eye on the sparrow, busily planning for one and all. There was no plan. People believed they could direct their lives but in fact they were tossed around by accidents. Accidents wiped out his private world and his future, fourth generation in his father’s firm and in his father’s house. He had not considered that there might also be good accidents, but there were. The first was coming to Africa, the second was coming to Fairview Farm. He began to allow himself hope.

  By habit, Ian was up and dressed with the sun. So was Luke Hardy, apparently sober though with slitted eyes and a hoarse voice.

  ‘Show you the early milking,’ Luke said. ‘Take your car if that’s all right, mine’s at the workshop.’ Where, he did not add, it had been as long as he could remember, perishing of old age and disuse.

  In the cool first light, the scene looked so crazy that Ian had to swallow back laughter. Inside a rough circle, fenced with whistling thorn, half naked barefoot Africans sat on stools, sunk in cow dung, and milked the herd while shouting conversation and laughing their heads off. An ox cart dragged milk cans to a dilapidated shed where other talkative Africans worked hand separators. Ian wondered if you could get fatal diseases from germ-laden cream. The watu were plainly astonished to see Luke and greeted him with beaming smiles.

  ‘Haven’t been down here much lately,’ Luke muttered. ‘Might as well stop in at the office.’

  Farther along the track, the office occupied one small section of a modest building, cracked cement walls, broken window panes, corroded tin roof. A big African stood in the office door trying to make himself heard above the uproar of a milling jolly mob.

  ‘Simuni,’ Luke said. ‘Head man. Assigns jobs.’

  Here, Luke received an ovation. The mob swirled around him, grinning and shouting Jambo, Bwana, habari. Luke looked embarrassed. He told Simuni to move them off, he wanted to show this Bwana the farm map. Inside the office was a chaos of cobwebs, cigarette butts in dirty tins, loose papers, papers stuck on spikes, ledgers jumbled on shelves and spilled on the floor. The farm map, tacked to the wall, was yellow and fly-specked. Luke began to explain it and gave up; the map was long out of date.

  ‘Africans aren’t much good at paperwork,’ he said, defensively. ‘But Simuni is a good man, trustworthy, doesn’t drink.’

  He indicated the open door to the next room; Ian glanced in. This was the farm storeroom. Ian could not imagine how the watu ever found anything from salt sacks to nails in such total disorder. Luke was sitting in the Dodge with the scowl of a man ready to pick a fight. He couldn’t pick a fight with Paynter who gave him no excuse, no hint of criticism.

  ‘Don’t bother to stop,’ Luke said as they passed the workshop, which appeared to be a scrap iron dump where three merry Africans prodded in the motor of an antique Bedford lorry.

  Luke perked up at the spring. Thick trees, tangled with wild flowering vines, surrounded a large deep transparent pool. The bottom was flat grey pebbles and white sand. The water moved slightly in the current from an unseen source. Ian didn’t know what he had expected to see but nothing as lovely as this. A rusty intake pipe and a collapsing pump shed failed to spoil the magic of the place.

  ‘It’s really a small version of that spring they’ve got at Tsavo, Mzima, you know?’ Luke said. ‘And that supplies all of Mombasa. You can do anything if you’ve got enough water, water is the most important thing you can have.’ Luke seemed to be encouraging himself rather than Ian.

  Ian said, ‘Yes,’ and stood entranced.

  Luke sighed. ‘Better finish it, take you to the African lines.’

  Ian had thought everything a marvellous joke except the spring which was simply marvellous. How or why this farm worked was a mystery, but it did work; the proof being that it fed Luke and his watu. But the African lines were not funny. Rondavels with flaking walls and soggy ruined thatch dotted a large dust patch that stank of garbage and human excrement. Naked black children swarmed around like benign bees, pushing each other to reach Luke. Bwana, Bwana, they shrieked, beside themselves with pleasure. Ian noted their protuberant bellies, their filth, flies nestled in the corners of eyes, noses running yellow slime, scabs and sores. Women, with colourless lengths of cloth wrapped above their breasts, scratched at maize plants, hung rags of clothing to dry on bushes, squatted by blackened cook pots. They too laughed and yelled fond greetings. Mr Hardy had no right to the watu’s affection when he let them live like animals.

  Driving back to the house, Luke said angrily, ‘It wasn’t always like this. I wrote in the paper the place was in rotten condition. I told you it was a mess.’

  Ian said, ‘I don’t mind working my balls off.’

  Luke did not speak at breakfast and pushed food away while Ian consumed papaw, fried ham and eggs, toast, lime marmalade and coffee with the thick cream that was Luke’s livelihood. Luke left him at the table and took a weak whisky and water to the verandah. Ian was not sure whether he should follow; he knew that the morning tour had upset Luke. He could not know that Luke was communing with Sue, blaming himself bitterly.

  ‘I don’t see where you put it,’ Luke called from the verandah. ‘Eating like that and looking like a beanpole. Come on out if you’re finished.’

  Ian was a chary of smiles, not wanting to expose those tombstone choppers. But in this fresh clear light, the view was so heart-lifting that he smiled all over his face. Africa lay before him and not a human habitation in sight. The land was lion colour shading off to blue green in the distance. It surged upward to trees on the high range in the south, descended in plateaux below him to rise slowly again to a far mountain rim, dropped sharply to a screen of woods on the north.

  Moved to speech for once, Ian said, ‘I think this must be the most beautiful place in the world.’

  Luke grunted. ‘Want to see more or have you had enough?’

  ‘I’d like to see everything.’

  The farm roads were rivers of dust, a foot deep, more than a foot. The Dodge churned up blinding clouds of it. Hidden beneath the dust, rocks jarred the axles violently. More fences lay draggled on the ground than stood firm on their posts. Unless the dust blew back and obscured the view, everywhere Ian looked was wonder and delight.

  Luke had said the bulls were pastured in the southern section. They passed a Masai herder in a squashed felt hat and ancient army overcoat. Luke told Ian to stop. The Masai wore his huge pierced earlobes neatly draped over the tops of his ears, and delicate bead bracelets on his delicate wrists. Luke asked about the bulls; the Masai, pleased to see Luke like all the other farm people, said he knew where the heifers were.

  ‘Go on, we’ll find them,’ Luke said. ‘The herders are Masai. They live in their dung huts off there, south east. Give them some blankets and an old army overcoat from time to time, sack a man if he loses cattle, otherwise leave them alone, that’s my system. They’ve got their own ways.’

  ‘The others?’ Ian asked. If you talked you got a mouthful of dust.

  ‘Kipsigis. Good ch
aps. The house servants are Luos. There’s not a single bloody-minded bastard on my farm,’ Luke said, again defensive.

  On a hill where Luke got out to scan his property for the invisible bulls, Ian inspected a round brick reservoir. The trough that circled it was filled with sludgy water, as much muck as water. He climbed on the trough to peer over the top. The water smelled like a sewer; he thought it might be a graveyard for vultures, bats, snakes if they could make the trip. Obviously no one had emptied and cleaned the tank in living memory.

  Luke watched Ian’s face for a sign of contempt but there was none. ‘I have four of those on the farm,’ Luke said. ‘They need whitewash with a lot of lime and copper sulphate.’

  Ian nodded.

  ‘I can’t locate the bulls but there’s a nice view at the south if you want to see it.’

  After a particularly rough jolt on a buried rock, Luke said, ‘Had a bad war, did you?’

  Ian was driving slowly, now, with concern for his car, the best he could get, second-hand, 28,000 miles on the meter; had to wait your turn for new vehicles. ‘I only had a few days of war, after that I was a P.O.W. in Germany.’

  ‘The whole time?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He steeled himself for more questions and for sympathy and blessed Luke for shutting up. The track corkscrewed towards the tree line. The pick-up was about ready to boil.

  ‘Do your parents approve this scheme,’ Luke said. ‘You buying a farm out here on your own?’

  Ian gritted his porcelain teeth; Luke saw the tight muscles in his cheek.

  ‘My parents are dead.’ God damn it to hell, why does he ask questions? What business is it of his? Say you’ll sell me the farm or say you won’t. I’m not here to tell you my life story, I’m here to buy or get out.

  ‘Stop,’ Luke said, unnecessarily as the track ended at the trees.

  Luke led him to the edge of the ridge.

  ‘It’s a pretty good view in my opinion,’ Luke said.

  Eagles must see the earth like this. Africa went on for ever, in waves of mountains. Ian felt the sky as a presence, alive like the land, another continent spread over them in endless layers of shining blue. He had no words for any of the beauty of this farm, least of all for this.

  ‘Yes, it is,’ Ian said.

  Luke walked a few yards into the lion grass, where he bent to wrench out handfuls of the tough golden stalks. He beckoned to Ian. At his side, Ian read the headstone, unevenly carved by someone who was not a stonecutter. Susan Elizabeth Grant Hardy, beloved wife of …

  ‘I’m not asking you to do anything about it,’ Luke said. ‘Not keep the bush cut back or anything. I’m just asking you to see it’s never disturbed.’

  Ian realized that Mr Hardy had finally made up his mind to sell him Fairview.

  At lunch, Ian said, ‘I’ll collect my kit at Ol Ilyopita and be here late tomorrow morning, if that’s all right.’

  ‘You haven’t asked the price, son. You’ll lose your shirt if this is the way you do business.’

  Ian permitted himself a guarded smile so as not to flash the full repellent display at Luke.

  ‘How do you know I won’t want a hundred thousand pounds?’

  Ian let his smile rip; to hell with the teeth.

  ‘I know,’ he said.

  Luke was on the verandah, with a noticeably darker glass in hand. After seeing the headstone on the mountain, Ian understood why Luke drank and why he abandoned his farm. No drink was available in Oflag XV B but he had wished to die when he lost his family, and he had abandoned his own home without once visiting it again; the emptiness was unbearable. If he were as old as Luke, he wouldn’t trouble to live either.

  ‘You must have nipped right along,’ Luke said. ‘How’s your Swahili? Want a noggin before lunch?’

  ‘Beer, please. I think I can make out.’ In his spare time, when the other young gentlemen employees at Ol Ilyopita were whooping it up, he memorized word lists, wrote out exercises, and when alone with Africans he practised. Upcountry Swahili was a patois that even a language dummy like him could learn.

  ‘Good. Seems better to me if you potter around on your own. I’ve told Simuni you’re the new Bwana. Get the feel of it, talk to the watu. I’ll be leaving in a week.’

  Ian felt a flutter of panic. ‘A week, sir?’

  ‘No sense hanging about. We’ll have to go to Karula, tomorrow or the day after. Show you the ropes, introduce you around. The station where you’ll ship your cream. The post office, you can take over my box. The general store, I’ve got to pay my bill, you open an account. The bank, we have a little business at the bank, don’t we? Sign a deed, get a big fat cheque from you. And the Sports Club. Means two tennis courts.’

  ‘I don’t play tennis,’ Ian lied. Oh no, people, natter and merriment, all the dumb misery of it.

  ‘Nobody does except the kids when they come back on holiday. The courts look like the craters of the moon. People stop in for a drink after they’ve finished their errands; gives them energy to drive home for lunch. Meet the neighbours.’

  ‘I’d rather not, sir.’

  ‘What do you mean? Of course you have to meet the neighbours, not all of them, just whoever is in town. You can’t skulk into Fairview like a criminal. People would think there’s something wrong with you. It’s getting much too civilized here but even so neighbours depend on each other in a pinch. And you’ll need advice, Paynter. They’re experienced farmers.’

  Ian decided not to think about it, and was glad to have a free run of the farm. He couldn’t very well pry and probe, with Luke distressed beside him.

  ‘Is it all right if I start after lunch, sir?’

  ‘The watu knock off at two thirty; six thirty to two thirty, straight eight hours. We better eat. Kimoi, chakula!’

  Ian had a long talk with Simuni, inquiring what rules and routine had governed this farm before Bwana Looki retired to the verandah and the booze. It was clear enough that anarchy now reigned. He feared the watu would resent him as an interloper but Simuni was helpful and friendly. Another reason to be grateful to Luke, who must have spoken on his behalf. When Simuni left for the shameful African lines, Ian started to clear the chaos in the office. He returned to the house at six; Luke was in bed. For two days, with excitement, Ian roamed over the farm and made notes on the order of reconstruction. Aside from Luke’s splendid house, everything had to be torn down. A new corrugated tin roof and a few coats of white paint would fix the house. But what if Luke took the furniture with him?

  Ian did not know how to approach this matter. ‘Unless you want all the furniture,’ he began.

  Luke, as usual, was drinking his lunch.

  ‘All thrown in, lock, stock and barrel, including one shotgun and one rifle. I won’t want any of it at the coast. You’ll have plenty to do without furnishing a house. That’s woman’s work.’

  ‘Thank you very much, sir.’ He was overjoyed and hoped Luke could feel his gratitude since he was unable to express it. The atmosphere of the house depended on Luke’s excellent things; the house would lose its quality if stripped of them. But now he had to tackle a tricky question and he dreaded offending Luke. ‘I thought of doing some building.’

  ‘I daresay.’

  ‘Could you recommend anyone?’

  ‘Going to call in an outside construction man, are you? I made it with my own watu.’ Then, remembering the condition of Fairview, Luke was ashamed of his boasting tone. ‘George Stevens in Nakuru. He doesn’t soil his hands but he has tough Sikh foremen. Be sure you get a definite contract on costs in advance. Otherwise you’ll find they’ve put up a latrine and charged you for the Taj Mahal.’

  Latrines happened to be one of Ian’s major priorities.

  They proceeded to Karula in convoy, Luke ahead in his old Austin, Ian close behind ready to push when the Austin stalled on the boulders and gullies in the road. Luke was taking the Austin to the garage, to charge the battery, tune up the engine, get the old bus fit for the trip to M
ombasa. Ian thought with anxiety of Luke in that decrepit car on the long hard journey to the coast. The garage was not reassuring. Behind the petrol pump, vehicles in various states of dismemberment were parked in the workshop, an expanse of oil-stained cement floor under a tin roof supported on flimsy posts. Africans battered away at these cars, shouting comments and advice. Two brave men worked in a pit edged with old railroad tracks to prevent the truck above from sliding down on them. A fat Sikh, the owner, bounced from his box-like office to welcome Luke with protracted handshaking.

  ‘Yes, yes, Bwana Looki, leave all to me, fine as new day after tomorrow,’ said the Sikh whom Ian instantly classed as a prize liar in a trade renowned for lying.

  Ian had not paid attention to Karula when passing through but Luke now took him round as if they were sightseeing an important city. The station provided no amenities for travellers but was better equipped for freight, the large godown being at present loud with caged chickens and smelling strongly of posho and kerosene. The post office and the bank on the main road, though toy-size, were the only stone buildings. Wooden one-room African dukas and beer parlours lined the two short dusty side streets. The general store looked palatial by contrast, a long narrow shed, painted yellow, with five smeared windows letting in light on a range of merchandise from patent medicines through food stuffs and toys to hardware. The proprietor received them in his office, beneath a photograph of the Aga Khan, and assured Ian it would be his greatest joy to serve him. The remainder of Karula was a sprawl of African shanties and an open fly-ridden market where women sat on the ground by mats displaying small heaps of vegetables and nameless African herbs. Ian saw no cause for Luke to fret about an excess of civilization.