A Fool's Knot (27 page)

Naively, Bill suggested that this might not be altogether a bad thing since the land historically was theirs and was only placed inside Kenya at the whim of the Berlin Conference. Possibly, Bill continued, they simply resented being governed by people they saw as foreigners. Makau, apparently interpreting this as a personal slight, replied in an insulting tone that a visitor to the country, especially an Englishman, whose ancestors had drawn the boundaries in the first place, should not even voice such an opinion, let alone to a servant of the government he criticised. Had John not rescued the situation with his characteristic conciliatory words they might all have been asked to leave there and then. A person is pregnant with his friend, he had said, smiling, thus transferring responsibility for Bill's remarks to himself. Makau, now laughing, heartily slapped John hard on the back and the air was cleared. The evening then continued with the two men, John and Makau, discussing details of the various troubles between the two districts. Somalis and Kambas, it seemed, had repeatedly clashed near the banks of the Tana River and had fought a series of minor battles. Somali swords, they explained, had killed Kambas and cattle had been stolen as the spoils of war. The Kamba, in return, had secured interest on their loan to the Somalis by abducting a number of their women and so the skirmishes continued, until a detachment of Kenya police armed with rifles had been sent to the area to keep the peace. John in Mwingi and Kamau in Garissa had jointly directed the operation and things were much quieter now.

So having politely and pragmatically cut short their stay in Garissa, they set off with another day to fill in the direction of Mwingi and ultimately, of course, Nairobi. Bill suggested that they should call in to see Janet in Migwani to thank her for the use of her house on their first night in Kenya. Back in Migwani, after their excursion to John's ancestral home, they had waited until late afternoon before returning to Nairobi to rendezvous with Lesley and Anna. They had hoped to see Janet again, but they did not. It crossed neither Lesley's nor Bill's mind that the essential trip John had made back to Kitui in the middle of their stay in Mombasa had been for anything other than work. John, in fact, had seen Janet, and quite a lot of her, because that weekend trip to supervise a delivery of materials to his farm was mainly spent in a Kitui hotel room.

John, of course, remembered Janet saying how much she liked to visit the town's weekend dances at the Umoja. What he had also registered, after his recent stay in her house, was how much Father Michael's departure had changed her outlook. She seemed much more vulnerable, somehow. And this was underlined by Solomon Musee's appearance at her door. She had turned him away, but he would be back. He would be there at the dance, intent on publicly associating himself with her. And if she rejected him, he might react.

John also knew Solomon Musee from his time as a magistrate in Mwingi. Solomon had come before the court on three separate occasions, each time with a different co-defendant, but each time on the same charge of threatening someone with a knife after a drinking session. Each time, the case was dropped by the accuser. John knew Solomon Musee, but Janet did not.

And so he made the mammoth trip, leaving their Mombasa beach hotel early on Friday morning to drive to Nairobi to check on work, and then to Kitui that same afternoon, arriving after dark. He made it to the dance at the Umoja, though, and met Janet. Solomon was also there, but because John was around, he kept his distance. The distance between John Mwangangi and Janet Rowlandson, however, significantly narrowed that night. In fact, it shrank to an ecstatic zero several times. When they parted the next morning, they resolved to meet again in two weeks. John asked Janet if she would skip the next dance, because he could not be there, but he did not tell her about his suspicion of Solomon Musee. And so their weekends together took on the air of a regular commitment.

In Migwani, in her own house, she now felt a new strangeness. It was just over a week since her night with John and, of course, the first time since then that she had met Lesley. This new strangeness emanated from the realisation of how easy it was to become devious, even duplicitous. She had never done anything like that before, and yet she was carrying it off like a pro. She and John had become lovers and were due to meet again in just a few days, and yet here she was socialising with his wife and daughter, as if nothing had changed. Having never learned to lie, she felt nervous, ill at ease. It never crossed her mind, of course, that she was not the only woman present practising the art.

And so the travellers contrived the perfect farewell for Bill, who was to return to England the following day, so full of the stories of his holiday, that his new partner would become worried that he would overwhelm their dinner guests with boredom over the coming weeks. For once Anna was allowed to share the happiness and was not sent to bed at her usual time. Janet's invitation to stay the night had been tempered by a warning that they would have to accept what was available, which was not very much. Having told her not to worry, they looked on with embarrassment as first her cook and then Janet herself made repeated excursions down to the town to buy the things their party would need. Migwani's butcher was nearly sold out of meat and could provide only the stomach and intestines of a goat. With some hilarity, Daniel, Janet's young cook, who had become more of a friend than a servant during her stay, seized the opportunity to cook a real meal for her guests. Stewed and served in a rich gravy with thick chapattis on the side, the offal made the perfect meal with which to end Bill's stay in Kenya. “Authentically African” was Bill's comment to Daniel as he collected the dishes. Lesley had found the prospect of eating such things distasteful and had picked at her meat, but had eaten enough beans and chapatti, both of which she found more familiar now, to feel full. The others, of course, had attacked their food with delight, despite the fact that John, having chewed a piece of particularly tasty intestine, had momentarily reduced all the others to helplessness by suggesting that the cook “might have left the shit in it.” Their shared hilarious revulsion, however, was only temporary and, aided by significant quantities of the bottled Tusker beer, they all ate well.

It was Daniel, the young man with the name, Nzoka, snake, who revealed the real surprise. Unknown to Janet he had made an excursion of his own to the bar near the teashop, whose trademark was bay leaves in its tea. For five shillings he had bought a large quantity of the locally brewed millet beer,
mawa
, which was brought for sale in Migwani from Thitani in large calabashes by the wives and daughters of the man who brewed it, whose family had been brewing beer for generations. When they had all finished eating the small stringy mangoes of which Migwani could always provide a multitude just after the rains, he announced his surprise by setting the beer on the table in a large aluminium cooking pot. Daniel, as he had predicted, found the scene very entertaining, with the sticky sweet mango juice still dripping from their fingers, lips and chins, the diners, Janet included, leaned over the pot and peered into it with expressions of profound disbelief and confusion lost in the expanse of their staring eyes.

“What on earth is that?” asked Bill, breaking into laughter.

Janet turned to look at Daniel, who was laughing very hard indeed. “I think that Bwana Mwangangi can tell you,” he said, thoroughly amused.

As they all looked to John for enlightenment, he smiled at Daniel and said, “I've not seen any of this for quite a while. I thought that people had stopped making it.”

“I bought it from the Maluki bar. They make it in Thitani and bring it here to sell,” explained Daniel, as John nodded his understanding. “Maluki's bar in the market is the only one which can sell it. That is why there are so many old men around that place on market day.”

“What is it?” asked Janet impatiently.

“Beer,” replied John. “It's a special beer made from millet flour. It's called
mawa
.”

“Its origin,” observed Bill, still peering with apparently grave interest at the liquid, “would be easier to describe than its appearance. It looks like the contents of a vacuum cleaner, swimming,” he said.

“No,” said Janet, laughing. “Not here. If you don't hit the dust with a brush, it generally walks away. And there are no vacuum cleaners.” From the beginning of her stay in Migwani, ants had always been a problem in her house. As time passed, however, she had learned to ignore them, having learned that once she had carefully picked them out from the marmalade or jam and ejected them to the side of the plate, breakfast tasted the same as it always had. She was thankful for Daniel's initiative. It had provided a focus for their conversation and allowed her the luxury of relegating her recent intimacy with John to the background of her thoughts.

“The best way,” announced John, “to find out what it is like is to taste it.” With that he told Bill to empty his glass, which he then filled with
mawa
from the pot. This rendered Bill quite speechless and prompted Janet to a fit of laughter, which Anna shared. Even Lesley, though revolted by the sight of the opaque grey liquid, could not help but laugh at the confused expression on Bill's face as he held up the glass to the light of the storm lamp and tried in vain to peer through it.

“Amazing,” said Bill, still unable to bring himself to drink. “It's totally opaque, like porridge.”

Remembering the milk at his father's house, John smiled and poured a glass for himself, saying, “You seem to be making a habit of this. I'm sure you'll enjoy it if you try some.”

John drank from his glass as the others watched, struck dumb by their conviction that he would choke. When he did not, Daniel poured some of the beer for Janet and Leslie and also some for himself. Anna protested, but no one was going to allow her to have a share. “Cheers,” he said, raising the glass and drinking.

The others now decided to try the experience. All three winced. Lesley coughed and spluttered through her laughter and replaced the glass on the table, pushing it forcefully away in a single movement. A moment later, after wiping her lips with her handkerchief, she looked at the others in disbelief, saying, “How can you possibly drink that?”

“I am not sure whether to drink it or chew it,” said a concerned-looking Bill, as he watched the thick liquor stick to the glass, repeatedly turning and twisting it to get a better view of the contents.

Janet's reaction was different. After approaching the exercise with great caution, she had cast fear to the wind and taken a sizeable gulp of the liquid and swallowed it. She was helpless for a second or two, gasping like a fish out of water. After slamming the glass hard on the table, she rushed to the kitchen to get a glass of cold water, which she drank in one. Returning to the others, much to the amusement of Daniel, who was quite beside himself with laughter, she sat down, wiping her now running eyes, “Wow.. it's like drinking neat gin with flour in it!” This comment apparently renewed Bill's interest to try more and he drank again, this time with more conviction.

Before long, they had all overcome their initial problems and went on to finish the pot. Lesley, who declared with some conviction that she did not like it, was the only one to remain with a glassful in front of her. Eagerly, Bill took it from her and finished it off. He announced that he had really started to enjoy it. They did not have long to wait before they all began to realise just how strong it was. The word ‘beer' was clearly misapplied, since a few minutes later they all knew they were quite drunk and filled with euphoria. All, Lesley and Anna included, if only by association, much enjoyed the hours that followed. Impromptu parties such as this had always been the most enjoyable part of life in Migwani for Janet. In the past, with Father Michael, she had often returned from the bar in such a mood and they had spent some hours telling stories and dancing to music from a radio.

It was after midnight before the euphoria died down and the weariness of a day's journey caught up with the travellers. As quickly as they had begun, the festivities ceased and everyone lolled exhausted in their chairs.

After a while Janet rose from her chair, rubbed her eyes and yawned, saying, “I had better get some sheets and blankets for you. Bill, would you mind sleeping here?”

She was cut short by John who, without a second thought, said, “Don't bother about us. There are too many of us to stay here. We'll go and stay in the Safari Bar in town.”

Janet determinedly avoided a glance towards Lesley. This, clearly, was John's carefully calculated way of ensuring there was no risk of extended private contact between his wife and herself, who now, of course, was his lover. The evening had gone well, bypassing, from John and Janet's shared perspectives, difficult terrain, smoothed by Daniel's perfectly timed injection of local brew.

Suddenly revitalised, Bill looked up and smiled. At last he would spend a night in a local hotel and find out just what one might receive for the meagre fee. They left Janet, truly grateful for the hospitality she had shown. Lesley, leading the very sleepy Anna by the hand was the first to leave, thanking Janet again and kissing her goodbye, telling her that she must come to Nairobi soon to stay for a weekend.

After Lesley and Anna had walked off towards the car, Bill and John remained with Janet in her kitchen, still trying to express their thanks. Janet maintained that there was no need for them to go to the hotel, but John would hear none of it, stating that he thought they had overstayed their welcome already. Quickly, Bill scribbled his address in her address book and told her that if ever she might need somewhere to stay in London, she would be more than welcome in his house. Bidding a fond goodbye, they left and joined Lesley and Anna in the car.