“Not the best, but good.”
“Why did you become a Christian?”
“Through ignorance.”
“You could be worse.”
“I would never be a Moslem,” and started to add sir but I checked him.
“It is a long strange road and maybe you had better throw the shoes away. I will give you a good old pair and you can mold them to your feet.”
“Thank you. Can I fly in the aircraft?”
“Of course. But it is not for children nor Mission boys.”
Then I would have said I am sorry but there is no such word in Swahili nor in Kamba and it is a just way of conducting a language since you are warned not to make errors.
The Interpreter asked me about the scratches and I said that they were from thorn trees and Mr. Singh nodded and showed the Interpreter where his thumb had been cut by the saw in September. It was an impressive cut and I remembered when it had happened.
“But you also fought with a leopard today,” the Interpreter said.
“There was no fight. It was a medium-sized leopard who had killed sixteen goats at the Kamba Shamba. He died without making a fight.”
“Everyone said you had fought him with your hands and killed him with the pistol.”
“Everyone is a liar. We killed the leopard first with a rifle and then with a shotgun.”
“But a shotgun is for birds.”
Mr. Singh laughed at this and I wondered some more about him.
“You are a very good Mission boy,” I said to the Interpreter. “But shotguns are not always for birds.”
“But in principle. That is why you say gun instead of rifle.”
“And what would a fucking babu say?” I asked Mr. Singh in English.
“A babu would be in a tree,” Mr. Singh said, speaking English for the first time.
“I am very fond of you Mr. Singh,” I said. “And I respect your great ancestor.”
“I respect all of your great ancestors although you have not named them.”
“They were nothing.”
“I shall hear of them at the proper time,” Mr. Singh said. “Should we drink? The woman, the Turkana, brings more food.”
The Interpreter now was avid for knowledge and the scent of it was breast high and he was half Chagga and had a low but strong chest.
“In the library at the Mission there is a book which says the great Carl Akeley killed a leopard with his bare hands. Can I believe that?”
“If you like.”
“I ask truly as a boy who wishes to know.”
“It was before my time. Many men have asked the same question.”
“But I need to know the truth.”
“There is very little of it in books. But the great Carl Akeley was a great man.”
You could not break him away from scent of knowledge since you had sought it all your life and had to be content with facts, coordinates and statements vouchsafed in drunkenness or taken under duress. This boy, who had removed his shoes and rubbed his feet on the wooden floor of Mr. Singh’s back parlor and was so intent on knowledge that he did not know that Mr. Singh and I were embarrassed by his public foot hardening, moved in, as unshod as a hunting dog, from plane geometry to something far beyond calculus.
“Can you justify a European taking an African as his mistress?”
“We don’t justify. That is the function of the judiciary. Steps are taken by the police.”
“Please do not quibble,” he said. “Excuse me, sir.”
“Sir is a nicer word than Bwana. At one time it had a certain meaning.”
“Can you then condone, sir, such a relationship?”
“If a girl loves the man and there is no coercion, to me it is not a sin if adequate provision is made for the issue per stirpes and not per capita.”
This came like an unexpected block and I was as pleased as Mr. Singh that I could throw it with no change of pace. He fell back on the basic that he had been crammed on.
“It is a sin in the Eyes of God.”
“Do you carry Him with you and what type of drops do you use to ensure His clearest vision?”
“Please do not make fun of me, sir. I left everything behind me when I entered your service.”
“I have no service. We are the last free individuals in a country slightly larger than Connecticut and we believe in a very abused slogan.”
“May I hear the slogan?”
“Slogans are a bore, Mission boy…. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Then to take the curse off having offered a slogan and because Mr. Singh was becoming solemn and ready to reenlist I said, “Harden your feet well as you are doing. Keep your bowels open and remember that there is some corner of a foreign field that shall be forever England.”
He could not quit which might have been his Chagga blood or might have been the Masai strain and he said, “But you are an officer of the Crown.”
“Technically and temporarily. What do you want? The Queen’s shilling?”
“I would like to take it, sir.”
It was a little bit rough to do but knowledge is rougher and more poorly compensated. I took the hard shillingi out of my pocket and put it in the boy’s hand. Our Queen looked very beautiful and shining in silver and I said, “Now you are an informer; no that is wrong,” because I saw Mr. Singh had been hurt by the dirty word. “Now you are commissioned as a temporary interpreter for the Game Department and will be remunerated at the stipend of seventy shillings per month in so long as I hold the tenure of acting temporary Game Ranger. On the cessation of my tenure your appointment shall cease and you will receive a gratuity of seventy shillings from the date of ceasing of tenure. This gratuity will be paid from my own private funds and you hereby avow that you have no claims of any sort nor any possible future claims against the Game Department nor any other, etc., and may God have mercy on your soul. The gratuity shall be made in a single payment. What is your name, young man?”
“Nathaniel.”
“You will be known in the Game Department as Peter.”
“It is an honorable name, sir.”
“No one asked for your comments and your duties are strictly confined to accurate and complete interpretation when as and if you are called on. Your contact will be with Arap Meina, who will give you any further instructions. Do you wish to draw any advance?”
“No, sir.”
“Then you might go now and toughen your feet in the hills behind town.”
“Are you angry with me, sir?”
“Not at all. But when you grow up you may discover that the Socratic method of acquiring knowledge is overrated and if you ask people no questions they will tell you no lies.”
“Good day, Mr. Singh,” the former convert said, donning his shoes in case there was a spy from the Mission about. “Good day, sir.”
Mr. Singh nodded and I said, “Good day.”
When the young man had gone out of the back door and Mr. Singh had drifted toward the door almost absentmindedly and then returned to pour another drink of White Heather and pass me the water in the cooling jug, he settled himself comfortably and said, “Another bloody babu.”
“But not a shit.”
“No,” Mr. Singh said. “But you waste your time on him.”
“Why did we never speak English together before?”
“From respect,” Mr. Singh said.
“Did the original Singh, your ancestor, speak English?”
“I would not know,” Mr. Singh said. “That was before my time.”
“What was your rank, Mr. Singh?”
“Do you wish my serial number as well?”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “And it is your whisky. But you put up with Unknown Tongue for a long time.”
“It was a pleasure,” Mr. Singh said. “I learned much Unknown Tongue. If you like, I would be very happy to enter your service as an unpaid volunteer,” Mr. Singh said. “At present I am informing for three government services none of whom coordinate
their information nor have any proper liaison.”
“Things are not always exactly as they seem and it is an Empire which has been functioning for a long time.”
“Do you admire the way it functions now?”
“I am a foreigner and a guest and I do not criticize.”
“Would you like me to inform for you?”
“With carbons furnished of all other information delivered.”
“There are no carbons or oral information unless you have a tape recorder. Do you have a tape recorder?”
“Not with me.”
“You could hang half Laitokitok with four tape recorders.”
“I have no desire to hang half Laitokitok.”
“Neither do I. And who would buy at the duka?”
“Mr. Singh, if we did things properly we would perpetrate an economic disaster but now I must go up to where we left the car.”
“I will walk with you if you don’t mind. Three paces to the rear and on your left.”
“Please don’t trouble yourself.”
“It is no trouble.”
I said good-bye to Mrs. Singh and told her we would be by with the car to pick up three cases of Tusker and a case of Coca-Cola and walked out into the lovely main and only street of Laitokitok.
Towns with only one street make the same feeling as a small boat, a narrow channel, the headwaters of a river or the trail up over a pass. Sometimes Laitokitok, after the swamp and the different broken countries and the desert and the forbidden Chulu hills, seemed an important Capital and on other days it seemed like the Rue Royale. Today it was straight Laitokitok with overtones of Cody, Wyoming, or Sheridan, Wyoming, in the old days. With Mr. Singh, it was a relaxed and pleasant walk which we both enjoyed and in front of Benji’s with the gas pump, the wide steps like a Western general store and the many Masai standing around the hunting break. I stopped by it and told Mwengi I would stay with the rifle while he went to shop or drink. He said no that he would rather stay with the rifle. So I went up the steps and into the crowded store. Debba and the Widow were there still looking at cloth, Mthuka helping them, and turning down pattern after pattern. I hated shopping and the rejection of materials and I went to the far end of the long L-shaped counter and began to buy medicines and soaps. When these were stacked into a box I began to buy tinned goods; mostly kipper snacks, sardines, silts, tinned shrimp and various types of false salmon along with a number of tins of local tinned meat which were intended as a gift for my father-in-law and then I bought two tins each of every type of fish exported from South Africa including one variety labeled simply FISH. Then I bought half a dozen tins of Cape Spiny Lobster and, remembering we were short of Sloan’s liniment, bought a bottle of that and one half dozen cakes of Lifebuoy soap. By this time there was a crowd of Masai watching this purchasing. Debba looked down and smiled proudly. She and the Widow could still not make up their minds and there were not more than a half a dozen rolls of cloth to be inspected.
Mthuka came down the counter and told me the car had been filled up and that he had found the good posho that Keiti wanted. I gave him a hundred-shilling note and told him to pay for the girls’ purchases.
“Tell them to buy two dresses,” I said. “One for the cambia and one for the Birthday of the Baby Jesus.” Mthuka knew that no woman needed two new dresses. She needed her old one and the new one. But he went down and told the girls in Kikamba and Debba and the Widow looked down, all impudence replaced by a shining reverence as though I had just invented electricity and the lights had gone on over all of Africa. I did not meet their look but continued purchasing, now moving into the field of hard candies, bottled, and the various types of chocolate bars both nutted and plain.
By this time I did not know how the money was standing up but we did have the gas in the car and the posho and I told the relative of the owner who was serving behind the counter to load everything and box it carefully and I would return to pick it up with the bill. This gave Debba and the Widow more time to select and I would drive the hunting car down to Mr. Singh’s and pick up the bottled products.
Ngui had gone to Mr. Singh’s. He had found the dye powder we wanted to dye my shirts and hunting vests Masai color and he and I drank a bottle of Tusker and took one out to Mwengi in the car. Mwengi had the duty but next time it would be different.
In the presence of Ngui Mr. Singh and I again conversed in Unknown Tongue and non–flying pigeon Swahili.
Ngui asked me in Kamba how I would like to bang Mrs. Singh and I was delighted to see that either Mr. Singh was a very great actor or that he had not had the time or opportunity to learn Kamba.
“Kwisha maru,” I said to Ngui, which seemed sound double talk.
“Buona notte,” he said and we clinked bottles.
“Piga tu.”
“Piga tu.”
“Piga chui, tu,” Ngui explained just a little beerily, I thought, to Mr. Singh, who bowed in congratulations and indicated that these three bottles were on the house.
“Never,” I said in Hungarian. “Nem, nem, soha.”
Mr. Singh said something in Unknown Tongue and I made signs that he give me the bill, which he proceeded to write out, and I said to Ngui, in Spanish, “Vámonos. Ya es tarde.”
“Avanti Savoia,” he said. “Nunaua.”
“You are a bastard,” I said.
“Hapana,” he said. “Blood brother.”
So we loaded up with the help of Mr. Singh and several of his sons. It was understandable that the Interpreter could not help since no Mission boy could be seen carrying a case of beer. But he looked so sad and he was so obviously troubled by the word nunaua that I asked him to carry the case of Coca-Cola.
“May I ride with you when you drive?”
“Why not?”
“I could have stayed and watched the rifle.”
“You don’t start on your first day watching the rifle.”
“I am sorry. I meant only that I could have relieved your Kamba brother.”
“How do you know he is my brother?”
“You addressed him as brother.”
“He’s my brother.”
“I have much to learn.”
“Never let it get you down,” I said laying the car alongside of Benji’s front steps where the Masai who wanted to ride down the Mountain were waiting.
“Fuck ’em all,” said Ngui. This was the only English phrase he knew or at least the only one he used, since for some time English had been considered the language of the hangman, government officials, civil servants and Bwanas in general. It was a beautiful language but it was becoming a dead language in Africa and it was tolerated but not approved. Since Ngui, who was my brother, had used it I used it in return and said, “the long and the short and the tall.”
He looked at the importuning Masai that had he been born in the older times which were still within the span of my life, he would have enjoyed dining on, and said in Kamba, “All tall.”
“Interpreter,” I said and corrected to say, “Peter, will you be so good as to go into the duka and tell my brother Mthuka that we are ready to load?”
“How will I know your brother?”
“He is Kamba tu.”
Ngui did not approve of the Interpreter nor of his shoes and he was already moving with the compact insolence of an unarmed Kamba through the spear-carrying Masai who had gathered hopeful of a ride, their positive Wassermanns not flying like banners from the spear shafts.
Finally everyone came out and the purchases were loaded. I stepped out to let Mthuka take the wheel and to let Debba and the Widow in and to pay the bill. I made the bill with ten shillings to spare and I could see Mwindi’s face when I came home with no money. He was not only the Secretary of the Treasury but also my self-appointed conscience.
“How many Masai can we take?” I asked Mthuka.
“Kamba only and six others.”
“Too many.”
“Four others.”
So we loaded with Ngui and
Mwengi choosing and Debba very excited and stiffly proud and unlooking. We were three in the front seat and five in the back with Kamba only and the Widow riding with Ngui and Mwengi and four second favorites seated on the sacks of posho and the purchases in the rear. We might have taken two more but there were two bad places in the road where the Masai always became seasick.
We came down the hill which was the term we used for the lower slope of the big Mountain and Ngui was opening the beer bottles which are as important in Wakamba life as any other sacrament. I asked Debba how she was. It had been a long and, in some ways, a hard day, and with the shopping and the change of altitude and the curves she had more than a full right to feel any way she was. The plain was laid out before us now and all the features of the terrain and she took hold of the carved holster of the pistol and said, “En la puta gloria.”
“Yo también,” I said and asked Mthuka for snuff. He passed it to me and I passed it to Debba who passed it back to me, not taking any. It was very good snuff; not as powerful as that of Arap Meina but enough snuff to let you know you had snuff when you tucked it under your upper lip. Debba could not take snuff but she passed the box, in her pride and in our descent of the hill, to the Widow. It was excellent Kajiado snuff and the Widow took it and passed it back to Debba who gave it to me and I returned it to Mthuka.
“You don’t take snuff?” I asked Debba. I knew the answer and it was stupid of me and the first undelighting thing that we had done all day.
“I cannot take snuff,” she said. “I am unmarried to you and I cannot take snuff.”
There was nothing to say about this so we did not say anything and she put her hand back on the holster which she truly loved, it having been carved better in Denver than anyone had ever been carved or tattooed, by Heiser & Company, in a beautiful flowered design which had been worn smooth with saddle soap and lightened and destroyed by sweat, still faintly incrusted from the morning of this day, and she said, “I have all of you in the pistol.”
And I said something very rude. Between Kamba there is always impudence by the woman carried into insolence and far past it if there is no love. Love is a terrible thing that you would not wish on your neighbor and as, in all countries, it is a moveable feast. Fidelity does not exist nor ever is implied except at the first marriage. Fidelity by the husband that is. This was the first marriage and I had little to offer except what I had. This was little but not unimportant and neither of us lived with any doubts at all.
True at First Light Page 28