True at First Light

by Ernest Hemingway

  They were all having a good time now joking and making fun of one another and I joked a little but was careful to be very modest and contrite hoping to win back Miss Mary’s favor and hoping to keep her in a good humor in case the lion would show. I had been drinking Bulmer’s Dry Cider, which I had found to be a marvelous drink. G.C. had brought some in from Kajiado from the Stores. It was very light and refreshing and did not slow you down at all shooting. It came in full quarts and had screw-in tops and I used to drink it in the night when I woke instead of water. Mary’s extremely nice cousin had given us two small square sacking-covered pillows filled with balsam needles. I always slept with mine under my neck or, if I slept on my side, with my ear on it. It was the smell of Michigan when I was a boy and I wished I could have had a sweet-grass basket to keep it in when we traveled and to have under the mosquito net in the bed at night. The cider tasted like Michigan too and I always remembered the cider mill and the door which was never locked but only fitted with a hasp and wooden pin and the smell of the sacks used in the pressing and later spread to dry and then spread over the deep tubs where the men who came to grind their wagon loads of apples left the mill’s share. Below the dam of the cider mill there was a deep pool where the eddy from the falling water turned out back in under the dam. You could always catch trout if you fished there patiently and whenever I caught one I would kill him and lay him in the big wicker creel that was in the shade and put a layer of fern leaves over him and then go into the cider mill and take the tin cup off the nail on the wall over the tubs and pull up the heavy sacking from one of the tubs and dip out a cup of cider and drink it. This cider that we had now reminded me of Michigan, especially with the pillow.

  Sitting now at the table I was pleased Mary seemed to be feeling better and I hoped the lion would show in the late afternoon and that she would kill him dead as snake shit and be happy forever after. We finished lunch and everybody was very cheerful and we all said we would take a nap and I would call Miss Mary when it was time to go to look for the lion.

  Mary went to sleep almost as soon as she lay down on her cot. The back of the tent was propped open and a good cool breeze blew down from the Mountain and through the tent. We ordinarily slept facing the open door of the tent but I took the pillows and placed them at opposite ends of the cot and doubling them over and with the balsam pillow under my neck lay on the cot with my boots and trousers off and read with the good light behind me. I was reading a very good book by Gerald Hanley, who had written another good book called The Consul at Sunset. This book was about a lion who made much trouble and killed practically all the characters in the book. G.C. and I used to read this book in the mornings on the latrine to inspire us. There were a few characters the lion did not kill but they were all headed for some other sort of bad fate so we did not really mind. Hanley wrote very well and it was an excellent book and very inspiring when you were in the lion-hunting business. I had seen a lion come, at speed, once and I had been very impressed and am still impressed. On this afternoon I was reading the book very slowly because it was such a good book and I did not want to finish it. I was hoping the lion would kill the hero or the Old Major because they were both very noble and nice characters and I had gotten very fond of the lion and wanted him to kill some upper-bracket character. The lion was doing very well though and he had just killed another very sympathetic and important character when I decided it would be better to save the rest and got up and pulled on my trousers and put my boots on without zipping them up and went over to see if G.C. was awake. I coughed outside his tent the way the Informer always did outside the mess tent.

  “Come in, General,” G.C. said.

  “No,” I said. “A man’s home is his castle. Are you feeling up to facing the deadly beasts?”

  “It’s too early yet. Did Mary sleep?”

  “She’s still sleeping. What are you reading?”

  “Lindbergh. It’s damned good. What were you reading?”

  “The Year of the Lion. I’m sweating out the lion.”

  “You’ve been reading that for a month.”

  “Six weeks. How are you coming with the mysticism of the air?”

  That year we were both, belatedly, full of the mysticism of the air. I had given up on the mysticism of the air finally in 1945 when flying home in an overaged unreconditioned flight-weary B-17.

  When it was time I got Mary up while the gun bearers got her rifle and my big gun from under the beds and checked the solids and the soft-nosed.

  “He’s there, honey. He’s there and you’ll get him.”

  “It’s late.”

  “Don’t think about anything. Just get out in the car.”

  “I have to put my boots on, you know that.”

  I was helping her on with them.

  “Where’s my damned hat?”

  “Here’s your damned hat. Walk, don’t run, to the nearest Land Rover. Don’t think about anything but hitting him.”

  “Don’t talk to me so much. Leave me alone.”

  Mary and G.C. were in the front seats with Mthuka driving. Ngui, Charo and I were in the open back with the Game Scout. I was checking the cartridges in the barrel and the magazine of the 30-06, checking those in my pockets and checking and cleaning the rear sight aperture of any dust with a toothpick. Mary was holding her rifle straight up and I had a fine view of the new wiped dark barrel and the Scotch tape that held her rear sight leaves down, of the back of her head and her disreputable hat. The sun was just above the hills now and we were out of the flowers and going north on the old track that ran parallel to the woods. Somewhere on the right was the lion. The car stopped and everyone got out except Mthuka, who stayed at the wheel. The lion’s tracks went off to the right toward a clump of trees and brush on our side of the lone tree where the bait was covered by a pile of brush. He was not on the bait and there were no birds on it either. They were all up in the trees. I looked back at the sun and it did not have more than ten minutes before it would be behind the far hills to the west. Ngui had climbed the anthill and looked carefully over the top. He pointed with his hand held close by his face so that you could hardly see it move and then came fast down from the mound.

  “Hiko huko,” he said. “He’s out there. Mzuri motocah.”

  G.C. and I both looked at the sun again and G.C. waved his arm for Mthuka to come up. We climbed into the car and G.C. told Mthuka how he wanted him to go.

  “But where is he?” Mary asked G.C.

  G.C. put his hand on Mthuka’s arm and he stopped the car.

  “We leave the car back here,” G.C. told Mary. “He must be in that far clump of trees and brush. Papa will take the left flank and block him off from breaking back to the forest. You and I will move straight in on him.”

  The sun was still above the hills as we moved up toward where the lion must be. Ngui was behind me and on our right Mary was walking a little ahead of G.C. Charo was behind G.C. They were walking straight toward the trees with the thin brush at their base. I could see the lion now and I kept working to the left, walking sideways and forward. He was watching us and I thought what a bad place he had gotten himself into now. Every step I made I was blocking him worse from his safety that he had retreated into so many times. He had no choice now except to break toward me, to come out toward Mary and G.C., which he did not figure to do unless he were wounded, or to try for the next island of heavy cover, trees and thick brush, that was four hundred and fifty yards away to the north. To reach there he would have to cross open flat plain.

  Now I figured that I was far enough to the left and began moving in toward the lion. He stood there thigh deep in brush and I saw his head turn once to look toward me; then it swung back to watch Mary and G.C. His head was huge and dark but when he moved it the head did not look too big for his body. His body was heavy, great and long. I did not know how close G.C. would try to work Mary toward the lion. I did not watch them. I watched the lion and waited to hear the shot. I was as close as I needed to
be now and have room to take him if he came and I was sure that if he were wounded he would break toward me as his natural cover was behind me. Mary must take him soon, I thought. She can’t get any closer. But maybe G.C. wants her closer. I looked at them from the corner of my eyes, my head down, not looking away from the lion. I could see Mary wanted to shoot and that G.C. was preventing her. They were not trying to work closer so I figured that from where they were, there were some limbs of brush between Mary and the lion. I watched the lion and felt the change in his coloring as the first peak of the hills took the sun. It was good light to shoot now but it would go fast. I watched the lion and he moved very slightly to his right and then looked at Mary and G.C. I could see his eyes. Still Mary did not shoot. Then the lion moved very slightly again and I heard Mary’s rifle go and the dry whack of the bullet. She had hit him. The lion made a bound into the brush and then came out of the far side headed for the patch of heavy cover to the north. Mary was firing at him and I was sure she hit him. He was moving in long bounds his great head swinging. I shot and raised a puff of dirt behind him. I swung with him and squeezed off as I passed him and was behind him again. G.C.’s big double was firing and I saw the blossomings of dirt from it. I fired again picking the lion up in the sights and swung ahead of him and a bunch of dirt rose ahead of him. He was running now heavy and desperate but beginning to look small in the sights and almost certain to make the far cover when I had him in the sights again, small now and going away fast, and swung gently ahead and lifting over him and squeezed as I passed him and no dirt rose and I saw him slide forward, his front feet plowing, and his great head was down before we heard the thunk of the bullet. Ngui banged me on the back and put his arm around me. The lion was trying to get up now and G.C. hit him and he rolled onto his side.

  I went over to Mary and kissed her. She was happy but something was wrong.

  “You shot before I did,” she said.

  “Don’t say that, honey. You shot and hit him. How could I shoot before you when we’d waited all that time?”

  “Ndio. Memsahib piga,” Charo said. He had been right behind Mary.

  “Of course you hit him. You hit him the first time in the foot I think. You hit him again too.”

  “But you killed him.”

  “We all had to keep him from getting into the thick stuff after he was hit.”

  “But you shot first. You know you did.”

  “I did not. Ask G.C.”

  We were all walking up to where the lion lay. It was a long walk and the lion grew larger and deader as we walked. With the sun going it was getting dark fast. The shooting light was gone already. I felt wrung out inside and very tired. G.C. and I were both wet with sweat.

  “Of course you hit him, Mary,” G.C. told her. “Papa didn’t shoot until he went into the open. You hit him twice.”

  “Why couldn’t I have shot him when I wanted to when he was just standing there and looking at me?”

  “There were branches that could have deflected the bullet or broken it up. That was why I made you wait.”

  “Then he moved.”

  “He had to move for you to shoot him.”

  “But did I really hit him first?”

  “Of course you did. Nobody would have shot at him before you did.”

  “You’re not just lying to make me happy?”

  This was a scene that Charo had seen before.

  “Piga!” he said violently. “Piga, Memsahib. PIGA!”

  I slapped Ngui on the hip with the side of my hand and looked toward Charo and he went over.

  “Piga,” he said harshly. “Piga Memsahib. Piga bili.”

  G.C. came over to walk by me and I said, “What are you sweating for?”

  “How far did you hold over him you son of a bitch?”

  “A foot and a half. Two feet. It was bow and arrow shooting.”

  “We’ll pace it when we walk back.”

  “Nobody would ever believe it.”

  “We will. That’s all that matters.”

  “Go over and make her realize she hit him.”

  “She believes the boys. You broke his back.”

  “I know.”

  “Did you hear how long it took for the sound of the bullet hitting to come back?”

  “I did. Go over and talk to her.”

  The Land Rover pulled up behind us.

  Now we were there with the lion and he was Mary’s and she knew it now and she saw how wonderful and long and dark and beautiful he was. The camel flies were crawling on him and his yellow eyes were not dull yet. I moved my hand through the heavy black of his mane. Mthuka had stopped the Land Rover and come over and shaken Mary’s hand. She was kneeling by him.

  Then we saw the lorry coming out across the plain from camp. They had heard the shooting and Keiti had come out with everyone except two guards that they had left in camp. They were singing the lion song and when they piled out of the lorry Mary had no more doubt about whose lion it was. I have seen many lions killed and many celebrations. But not one like this. I wanted Mary to have all of it. I was sure it was all right with Mary now and I walked on to the island of trees and thick brush the lion had been making for. He had nearly made it and I thought of what it would have been like if G.C. and I had to go in there to dig him out. I wanted a look at it before the light was gone. He would have made it there in sixty more yards and it would have been dark when we got up to it. I thought about what could have happened and went back to the celebration and the picture taking. The headlights of the lorry and the Land Rover were centered on Mary and the lion and G.C. was making the photographs. Ngui brought me the Jinny flask from the shell bag in the Land Rover and I took a small swallow and handed it to Ngui. He took a small drink and shook his head and handed it to me.

  “Piga,” he said and we both laughed. I took a long drink and felt it warm and felt the strain slip off me like a snake shedding his skin. Until that moment I had not realized that we had the lion finally. I knew it technically when the unbelievable long bow and arrow shot had hit and broken him down and Ngui had hit me across the back. But then there had been Mary’s worry and being upset and walking up to him we had been as unemotional and as detached as though it were the end of an attack. Now with the drink and the celebrating going on and the photography, the hated and necessary photography, too late at night, no flash, no professionals to do it properly to make Miss Mary’s lion immortal now on film, seeing her shining happy face in the glare of the headlights and the lion’s great head that was too heavy for her to lift, proud of her and loving the lion, me feeling as empty inside as an empty room, seeing Keiti’s gashed slant of a smile as he bent over Mary to touch the lion’s unbelievable black mane, everyone cooing in Kikamba like birds and each man individually proud of this our lion, ours and belonging to all of us and Mary’s because she had hunted him for months and had hit him in that barred phrase standing on her own two feet and when the chips were down, and now happy and shining in the headlights looking like a small, not quite deadly, bright angel and everyone loving her and this our lion, I began to relax and to have fun.

  Charo and Ngui had told Keiti how it was and he came over to me and we shook hands and he said, “Mzuri sana Bwana. Uchawi tu.”

  “It was lucky,” I said which God knows it had to be.

  “Not lucky,” Keiti said. “Mzuri. Mzuri. Uchawi kubwa sana.”

  Then I remembered that I had given this afternoon for the lion’s death and that it was all over now and that Mary had won and I talked with Ngui and Mthuka and Pop’s gun bearer and the others of our religion and we shook our heads and laughed and Ngui wanted me to take another drink from the Jinny flask. They wanted to wait until we would get to camp for beer but they wanted me to drink now with them. They only touched the bottle with their lips. Mary stood up now after the photography and saw us drinking and she asked for the flask and drank from it and passed it to G.C. They passed it back and I drank and then lay down by the lion and talked to him very
softly in Spanish and begged his pardon for us having killed him and while I lay beside him I felt for the wounds. There were four. Mary had hit him in the foot and in one haunch. While I stroked his back I found where I had hit him in the spine and the larger hole G.C.’s bullet had made well forward in his flank behind the shoulder. All the time I was stroking him and talking to him in Spanish but many of the flat hard camel flies were shifting from him to me so I drew a fish in front of him with my forefinger in the dirt and then rubbed it out with the palm of my hand.

  On the way into camp Ngui and Charo and I did not talk. I heard Mary once ask G.C. if I had not really shot before she did and heard him tell her that she had gotten her lion. That she had hit him first and that these things did not always go off ideally and that when an animal was wounded he had to be killed and that we were damned lucky and she should be happy. But I knew that her happiness came and went because it had not been as she had hoped and dreamed and feared and waited for all of six months. I felt terribly about how she felt and I knew it made no difference to anyone else and it made all the difference in the world to her. But if we had to do it over again there was no way we could have done it differently. G.C. had taken her up closer than anyone but a great shot had a right to take her. If the lion had charged when she hit him G.C. would have had time for only one shot before the lion would have been on them. His big gun was as deadly and efficient if the lion came as it was a handicap if he had to shoot it at two and three hundred yards. We both knew that and had not even joked about it. Taking the lion at the range she did Mary had been in great danger and both G.C. and I knew that at the distance he had brought her to she had, recently, a possible error of eighteen inches on live game. This was not the time to talk about that but Ngui and Charo knew it too and I had slept with it for a long time. The lion, by deciding to make his fight in the thick cover, where he was heavy odds on to get someone, had made his choice and had very nearly won. He was not a stupid lion and he was not cowardly. He wanted to make his fight where the odds were in his favor.