by Peter Rimmer
“I say, there are giraffe over there.”
“Tame,” said Harry. “Fed from a baby’s milk bottle. Teat and all. Mother was killed. We all have a soft spot for animals on Elephant Walk.”
“Strange name for a farm.”
“We’re on the migration path of the elephant. Once every decade or so. My father saw them walking through the valley, the baby elephant holding their mothers’ tails in their trunks. He called our farm Elephant Walk. Maybe someday soon we’ll see the elephant migration again. Just hope they don’t migrate through my tobacco lands at the height of the growing season. Typical. But that’s Africa. Life really. Just when you think you are winning something happens to knock you back… Don’t worry about your gear. Quite safe. No one has ever stolen anything on the farm. Tembo will unpack the horses in the stables and give them a good rub down. After lunch, we can wander over and you can get what you want. You’ll stay a few days, won’t you? Plenty of room. Cottage to yourselves. We appreciate a bit of company every now and again. There’s my sister, Madge, and her three children. Barend was killed last year so don’t ask her about her husband. Poor Madge. My mother has moved in with Madge to help look after the children. They are wild. Their lack of shouting worries me now I come to think of it. The only time you don’t hear their treble voices is at night when they are asleep… Their silence is ominous… Grandfather. He’s my mother’s father. He lives in his own house. Jim and his wife, Jenny, have another house to themselves. My wife and I have the oldest house built by my father. You’ll be in the guest cottage. Mostly we all eat together. Seems silly to cook four different meals. My veranda is the meeting place where we are going to get you that cold beer. Ralph Madgwick and Keppel Howland. Have I got the names right? Are you a Manx man from the Isle of Man, Keppel?”
“How did you know that, sir?”
“Please, no sir. Africa is different. Everyone is treated the same among the British and the Boers. The Boers are the Dutch descendants. My nephew and nieces are Boers. Their grandfather Martinus Oosthuizen was a Boer general during the Anglo-Boer War. My sister married his son.”
“Wasn’t he executed by the British for treason?”
“They hanged him for going out with G J Scheepers. They were both from the Cape Colony and technically British. One of the reasons the Boers still hate the British. That and the concentration camps where so many of their women and children died of disease all cooped up together. I don’t blame the Boers hating the British. Every time you have a war with someone, you sow the seeds of hatred… Your name, Mr Howland. It’s Manx. Had a chap with me in France. Same name… There’s my wife, Tina. We’ve only been married six months and you don’t have to start counting. Anthony, shall we say, was a little early.”
Keppel could not believe his eyes. In the middle of the African bush, as far away from civilisation as man had ever been, walking towards him with a lovely smile was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in his life. He felt the shock straight down into his loins.
“Meet my wife, Tina,” said Harry Brigandshaw. “What’s upset His Lordship this time?”
“Life itself,” said Tina.
Keppel was gawping at her. Large, brown, bedroom eyes. Brown hair with a hint of red. Mid-twenties. Not even the recent baby could deny the voluptuous body.
She looked from Ralph to Keppel and back again as they were introduced to her by Harry. The thought of new conversation was better than any present. After six months on the farm, she was lonelier than she had ever been in her life. From the fast life of a flapper in London to living on an African farm. Harry, however much she tried to persuade him, was not going back to live in London. He loved the bush, something Tina was beginning to hate. Getting herself pregnant on the SS Corfe Castle on its journey from England to Africa was plain stupid. Only half intended. If Barnaby St Clair could see her life as a wife and mother, he would laugh his head off… Trying not to gush too obviously, she began to talk too much as she walked back to the house and her wailing son. There had to be something wrong with him making all the noise. It was a sound she was growing to hate. Demanding. Immediate. Imperial.
“He really has got a good pair of lungs,” said Harry proudly. “Where are the others?”
“Tinus Junior poked the baby in his cot under the tree and started him off. They scarpered. Down to the river. With luck, they’ll drown.”
The men laughed nervously. It was clear the mother of the child was deadly serious but it had to be a joke. Keppel was still gawping at her. Ralph just thought women were curves. Different. The girl was grinning so maybe she was not going to drown the general’s grandchildren.
“You see how mothers protect their offspring,” said Harry fondly. “I’ll have a word with Tinus.”
“Won’t do any good. Never listens to anyone.”
“He needs his father.”
“He needs his ears boxed.”
To Ralph who was saying nothing, but doing a lot of thinking, all was not well in paradise. Looking at the girl and her husband, there had to be a good ten years or more difference in their ages. Like Keppel, he was following every word out of the girl’s mouth. Ralph thought her the most sexually provocative woman he had seen in his life. He felt all the danger signs. When they were alone he would warn Keppel. The last thing Ralph wanted in his life was trouble… And to Ralph Madgwick, Mrs Brigandshaw was trouble. No doubt about it. Trouble with a capital T.
Taking his eyes off the woman, Ralph had a look around the family compound they were walking towards. The grounds between the thatched homes were perfectly kept. The msasa trees had been left standing along with other trees Ralph had yet to find the names of. At the base of each tree trunk, a ring of small rocks held a flower bed. The rest of the spacious garden was well-cut lawns all the way to the river a quarter of a mile down the slope where the trees fed by the river were much bigger. Near the house was one large outside cooking area with a permanent spit, a thick-topped wooden table and heavy wooden benches that had not warped in the sun. The small area, around the table, was paved with slivers of indigenous rock. Ralph learnt later the paving was made by making a hot fire on top of the big rocks that dotted the Rhodesian landscape, causing the rocks to flake.
Water was being sprayed on the garden. A system of pipes and small metal windmills brought the river water up the slope to a reservoir behind the houses from where gravity fed the sprinklers on the lawns. The engineering was so simple and perfect Ralph smiled as his eyes followed the metal pipe all the way up to the reservoir. Without the water, the gardens would have been a desert, not a riot of green, well-cut grass, flowering shrubs and flowers of every colour.
“My grandfather,” said Harry, following Ralph’s eyes. “He’s something of an inventor. All you need in Africa is water right around the year and everything blooms. Trouble is, it only rains properly for three months of the year and that is never certain. A dam on the river and much bigger windmills to reservoirs on the granite kopjes and water will be plentiful for the whole farm through the year. Can you imagine damming the Zambezi River? The whole of Rhodesia would be the Garden of Eden. Wind, water and man’s ingenuity and we’ll all live like kings. What the blacks need from us is our engineering. Our knowledge of science. When we got to the farm and before grandfather put his mind to it, we were carrying every drop of water up from the river in buckets. That was before the tractor and fifty-gallon drums on the trailers. Even that was backbreaking hard work… I do believe that son of mine has stopped crying. Come and have a look at him. One day he’s going to inherit the farm like I did from my father. I like continuity. Gives a family stability. The sense of belonging.
“My first wife was shot dead by a lunatic when she was pregnant. Tina has given me back my life. Without children, life has no future. No purpose. What is the point in building something when you know you will die and strangers will inherit your work? That may be selfish but it is the nature of man. I want at least ten children.”
“I don�
�t know about that,” said Tina nervously giggling. “There’s more to life than breeding. Thank goodness for Poppy. Don’t know what I would do without her.”
Ralph looked across at the large pram in the direction of which he was being marched by the proud father. A large black woman Ralph thought must be Poppy had taken up the child in the fattest arms he had ever seen and was cradling the boy, talking to him in her own language. The loving attention had stopped the son and heir howling his lungs out.
When Ralph reached the child to add his own praise for the ears of the parents the small mouth was gurgling happily, the eyes smiling up at what the child thought was his mother. Keppel was shown the child in his turn and voiced his complete approval. What else could he say? The child stayed in the arms of the nanny.
When Poppy tried to give the child to its mother, the boy abruptly changed from gurgling to howling but once returned to the comfort of his nurse the noise immediately stopped as the danger was over. Ralph shook his head very slightly. There were going to be strange goings-on in Africa by the look of what he saw on the lawn. Then he remembered his own nanny in England. A village girl who could neither read nor write but gave him the first and only love in his life. If he were lucky at bedtime back then his mother would come to the nursery and kiss the children good night. They never saw their father during the week. Their father worked in the City. Catching the six twenty-five back from Waterloo. When father arrived home from a ten-minute walk from Ashtead railway station, the children were meant to be asleep. Ralph still to the day, called his father ‘sir’. He was supposed to be learning his trade in the Baltic Exchange. To join the family firm. The family were in shipping.
Looking around the farm hoping no one had seen the shake of his head, he thought Harry Brigandshaw was right. Inheriting this beautiful farm was a far bigger prize than a seat on the Baltic Exchange, a three-storey house on five acres in Surrey and the family holiday home on the cliff overlooking the sea at Looe in Cornwall. Well, maybe he would keep the house in Looe. It was the only time for six weeks each year in the summer when the family were all together. For breakfast, lunch and supper. Father out of a pinstriped suit and without his rolled umbrella looking, as Ralph thought smiling back to those summers, ridiculous in shorts, lily-white knees and long socks.
The small entourage left the two-week-old, Anthony Brigandshaw, with Poppy.
Another servant in white shorts and shirt appeared as they reached the veranda of the largest and oldest house. The thatch was darker and thicker where new layers of grass had been combed on the top each year. It was almost lunchtime. On a long table covered with a white tablecloth was a spread of cold foods on large, oval plates. Next to each plate was a large silver serving spoon. A pile of dinner plates stood at one end of the long table next to three piles of cutlery. Silver dessertspoons. Silver forks. Knives made in Sheffield with ivory bone handles. Another servant brought in a cut-glass bowl the size of a small fish tank full of green salad that caught Ralph’s full attention. He was given a poured glass of beer by Harry Brigandshaw.
“Cheers,” said Harry. “Welcome to Elephant Walk.”
The cook, who had brought the bowl of salad, and Ralph’s craving for greens to a climax, rang a gong with a leather-ended stick three feet long. The lunch gong boomed out calling the rest of the compound.
To Ralph it was quickly obvious a couple more to lunch made no difference to the catering. The others arrived and were introduced to Keppel and Ralph. No one seemed to think the newcomers’ arrival abnormal. No one even asked what they were doing in Africa. Everyone drank one cold beer or a glass of cold lemonade from a bowl floating with ice and served with a cut-glass ladle that poured a full glass of lemonade in one go.
Each served himself with food and went out to the long wooden table outside under the trees. Everyone’s plates were piled high.
Ralph, taking his own, began to fill it with greens. The salad dressing was oil, vinegar, herbs and garlic, which he poured over his salad.
“You can’t eat out after dark,” confided a young girl to Ralph. “Mosquitoes. Just before dusk, we slot together the fly screens to close in the veranda before lighting the lamps.” The girl had a North Country accent. She was visibly pregnant. In the introductions, he had missed her first name. She was Mrs Bowman, the wife of the assistant tobacco manager – that much he knew.
“Strange as it may seem,” said Harry Brigandshaw as he filled his dinner plate with food next to Ralph, moving confidently from the laden table, “I think I know one of your family. Madgwick. Not a common English name. Clive Madgwick. Baltic Exchange. We do business together.”
“My father.”
“Now that is a coincidence. What on earth were you doing stuck up on the Zambezi escarpment the other day?”
“Trying to avoid working for father.”
“You have my sympathy. I hate the City… Come and chat to my maternal grandfather, Sir Henry Manderville. Title’s been in the family for donkeys’ years. One of the oldest baronetcies in England. Goes back to the Conqueror. Quite a character. My grandfather I mean. He never worked out of the countryside in his entire life.”
“Never had a job in my entire life,” said Henry Manderville whose grandson had meant him to overhear the conversation.
“Then what’s all this tobacco crop?” asked Harry. Ralph thought it sounded like an old family joke.
“Fun, Harry, when work is fun it is no longer work. Any more than connecting up the water system. May I remind you I had the first pull and let go in Rhodesia; Mr Crapper would have been proud of me. I’m sorry, my dear. Rude to talk of lavatories at lunchtime.” Mrs Bowman had actually blushed. “You two lads come sit with me and tell me what you’re up to. Have to be up to something so far from home.”
“Prospecting,” said Keppel.
“Any success?”
“None at all,” said Ralph.
“Better talk to Harry. Has a degree in geology from Oxford. Never used it. What with this farm and Colonial Shipping. Problem with inheritance. You can never do what you want to do. Always what you have to do… Harry has a pile of books in the house. You have to know what you’re not looking for he always says. Then the rare and precious become obvious. You will make him happy talking about geology. How long are you staying with us?”
“A few days.”
“You’ll need more than that to be a geologist, I think. I’ve tried reading them. All double Dutch. All you’ve put on your plate is salad.”
“We’ve lived on meat for months.”
“When you have some time, I’ll show you how we grow tobacco in Rhodesia. I think I rather started it. Chap who’ll inherit my title when I’m dead lives in Virginia. Tobacco country. Used to be a lumberjack in Canada before he went to America. Don’t have any male heirs. Wife died when she was still a girl. Never had the notion to marry anyone else. Emily, Harry’s mother, is my only child. Now we are plentiful again. With Madge’s children and the new heir to Elephant Walk. Don’t know what cousin George will do with the title as he can’t use it in America. When they kicked us British out of America, they declared a republic. No lords and ladies after that. Rather a pity… Oh, not the lords and ladies. America not being part of the Empire. That’s a pity. The Anglo-Saxon world against the rest so to speak. When a family divides itself, it falls. In the end. United we stand. Divided we fall… Not in my lifetime of course. But mark my words. Families can’t afford to quarrel with each other… This is the way to do it. Communal life. Everyone together…
“Oh, dear. Here come the children up from the river. Must have been miles away. Why the gong has to make so much noise… Now there’ll be a racket. Those children can do nothing in silence. Just look at them! They’ve been swimming in the river again. A crocodile will get one of them. Harry takes young Tinus up in the aeroplane. Boy says he’s going to be a pilot. Just as well the last war was the war to end all wars. Pilots in wartime don’t last very long. Harry was lucky. The Germans he killed wer
e not so lucky. But I’m not sure about the end of the war. The retribution forced on Germany at Versailles was far too harsh. You can’t blame the whole nation for the mistakes of the leaders. Always be magnanimous in victory. It pays. Only foolish nations bear a grudge… You were lucky being too young for the war.”
“We lied about our age,” said Keppel.
“Did you now?”
“Our best friend was killed. He was seventeen years old.”
“Life isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”
With both Ralph and Keppel staring at him the old man walked off, his mind seemingly far away, looking at another life. Twenty yards down he turned back to look at them again.
“When you’re my age you’ll understand. Enjoy the happy times. Always enjoy the happy days… I’m an old man. I’m sorry… Give yourselves another plate of salad… Tomorrow then. We’ll do the grand tobacco tour.”
“We’ll look forward to it, sir,” said Ralph.
To Ralph’s quiet amusement Harry’s mother had sent the owner of the estate off to wash his hands. Despite the earlier cleaning with the rag, Harry’s hands were still visibly dirty. The grey-haired woman was coming across to Ralph and Keppel. Her stride purposeful.
“That son of mine would eat his lunch off the workshop floor. Has it brought to him to save time. He didn’t show you the bathroom before pouring you a glass of beer?”
“No, Mrs Brigandshaw.”
“Put your plates down and follow Harry. Civilisation my foot. Without us women, it would all collapse in a week. I’ve tried making them change for dinner. My father just laughs at me, which encourages Harry… When you come back we’ll have a good talk together.”
“My mother always…,” began Ralph thinking he was back at school.
“No. No. I believe you come from Ashtead where you grew up. I grew up near Hedley. Hastings Court… How’s my salad?”
“Marvellous.”