Black Mischief (21 page)

He did not pause as he shifted his attention to Lydia. He was revelling in his new role of the superior being passing down his gifts of consolation and concern. Papa's confidence in him was working better than Reuben could have hoped.

‘Lydia, where have you been hiding yourself? I cannot count the number of times we have sent our people to your house to check on your welfare. Your mother says that you have not been home for days. Even my father is worried about what might have happened to you. He needs to speak to you about some small matter. But you probably know that.'

He bent to look closely into her face. ‘My dear, those awful wounds. Our doctor could help. No need to go to that terrible place.'

Lydia had had enough of his false chatter, his empty concern. ‘What is the matter, Reuben? Why do you talk like some idiot? Have you been drinking, taking a few puffs of bhang?'

Rebecca's reaction was a badly stifled laugh. This girl had the gift and her admiration for her deepened by the minute. She herself had seen through Reuben, but she would not have had the words to derail his effort to play the role of a mini Mister Big so easily.

‘Lydia, you must want to go home. Your family is anxious. There is a car and a driver waiting for us outside.'

‘When I am ready to go home, I will know how to find a matatu going my way. Remember the day when we met? Tom Mboya Street?'

‘You asked me for a light.'

‘And you could have been my first customer. I liked you better in those days. We took a matatu from the city.'

‘So, the car is over there, just outside the gates. Matatus don't come around these parts. Let's be on our way.'

Rebecca was ready to join in the fun. ‘Oh, that's all taken care of, Mister Rubai. We were on our way to a meeting. Sonya, Doctor Mboya, the widow I think you called her, has this plan, a memorial to her husband. You said that your family wanted to help in some way. We must find her. I think that a donation …'

It was Lydia's turn to feel admiration for her companion. She was enjoying the growing agitation revealing itself in Reuben's expression.

‘Donation? What is this?'

‘She wants to open another clinic. Money, Reuben. Your papa has some of that stuff, doesn't he?'

‘This is your last chance. This is a serious matter, Lydia.'

‘Is it though, Reuben? Shall I tell you something that is really important? Rebecca and I have been talking. She thinks that I would make a good nurse.'

‘Nurse?' Reuben was highly amused by the idea. ‘Nurse? Make sure they don't put you on a men's ward. You'd be jumping into bed with the patients. Anyway what would a wash girl know about nursing? Oh, but I forgot. Mama told me you were there this afternoon when they took her in.'

He focused his attention on Rebecca. He talked as if they were alone.

‘Rebecca, we keep on bumping into each other. Not his afternoon, though. I missed the funeral, but I got to come over to that place anyway. Mama's little accident. I was called in to rescue her and Papa, take her off to a proper hospital. They told me you were there, but perhaps you were busy, or hiding somewhere.'

‘And why would I want to hide from you?'

‘Of course. And I had driven fast hoping, but there you are. Mama told me later that you looked stunning in black. This death business. I hate it. Don't you? And, yes, how's the farmer boy? I think I noticed him as I came in. Seemed to be talking to three little kids.'

‘Shall I take your questions in order?'

Without another word of his own, Reuben turned away and trudged towards the gate on his way back to the pink palace and an inteview with his father.

nly an hour before he had left the sitting room where his mama was stretched out on a sofa, still in shock. The fleshy part of her upper arm where the bullet had struck was swathed in a thick dressing. She was too upset to take in the final instructions of her husband to their son who was eager to set out for the Daniels' house, very confident that he would please his father for the second time.

‘My spies tell me that she was hanging around with Mboya's lot this afternoon. There hasn't been a sniff of her at the shack on Ngong Road. She owes me a few, Papa.'

‘Tell her that we need to clear up a misunderstanding. Tell her that I have something that she left behind at the farm a couple of nights ago.'

Sally was beginning to lock in to what was being said. She wanted to know more. After Reuben left the room, she sat up and asked casually, ‘Anyone I know?'

Abel realised that he had made a miscalculation. He was surprised to notice how alert Sally had become. Had she been doing some faking of her own? He tried the vague, reassuring bluster that Sally was usually happy with.

‘Of course, Sally. One of Reuben's friends. Poor family. One of the kids is sick and they are trying to pay for a house near the hospital. We thought we could help but … well, we think she is more likely to accept a gift from you. But after the accident and all that …'

* * *

‘So, where is she?' In the hour Reuben had been away, his father had moved to a back veranda where he was on to his third Tusker. He was looking out over the lawn towards the tall fence separating the house from a patch of unspoilt bush. One of the askaris had spotted a family of leopard out there a few nights before.

It relaxed him to sit in luxurious safety and remember the days of his youth, walking back to the shamba after a night out with his friends. Every sense was alert. One time he had been scared to hear coming to him across the fields the screams and shrieks of someone in big danger. Abel, the would-be bush boy, gave up his game of careful glances to left and right and with silent, padded steps ran for home. Just after midnight news had come that Gabe Ndoto, a good friend from Kakamega High, had been taken by a lion.

That had been a memorable night for Abel, too. His father, Nathaniel, had not allowed him to go to bed until they had visited the Ndoto home and his boy had viewed for himself the mangled remains of his friend.

They were still within hearing of the wailing and the keening of women gathered to mourn the hideous death, when his father explained: ‘Did you see that, boy? Did you take notice? Gabe was a fine, fine boy and now he's just bits of flesh. No future for him. Abel, try to keep risks out of your life. Be in control. Control, do you understand me, son?'

Abel had made the dutiful, expected reply to his father's brief advice but, as the years passed, he came to see the truth of it more and more. It pained him to acknowledge that he had failed to impress his oldest boys with this same truth.

‘You tell me that you know this girl well, that she owes you something, but you cannot persuade her to travel a couple of hundred metres to speak to me. Julius was right. He said that you were weaker than mouse piss.'

This time Abel had made sure that Sally would hear nothing of the exchanges with their second son.

Reuben bit hard on his lip but held his ground. ‘Papa, give me another chance.'

‘So?'

‘I will take a car and wait outside the house until she goes home …'

‘You think she is going home? And I have boys over there watching all the ways out, just in case I'm wrong.'

‘So, I will not be standing in the election.'

Mister Big frightened his son with a long burst of uninhibited laughter. The noise attracted the attention of Mama who came rushing out onto the veranda on her well-upholstered, electric wheelchair.

‘Abel, Abel, what is happening? I thought there was a breakin.'

Abel's laughter shrank to a chuckle. ‘Sally, calm down. You must still be in shock. Either that or this household is heading for the loony bin. I laugh and my wife thinks that the robbers have arrived. I tell our son and heir that he is about as useful as a cockroach in a plate of rice and he thinks I'm going to pull him from the election.'

‘But, Papa, if you think that I am stupid …'

‘What's that got to do with it?'

‘But to be a good member …'

‘Son, have I ever told the most important word in a successful man's vocabulary?'

‘Many a time, Papa. Control. Mzee Nathaniel told you.'

‘But like your big brother you never understood it. Listen. Me and your mama here have a heap of money. Control. I have two hundred men working for me. Control. If one of them makes a foolish move, he knows what will happen. You are going to win the seat of Nakuru South. Being a winner, that's my business.'

‘So, you are going to be controlling me?'

Sally could hold her tongue no longer. ‘Abel, can't you see that you are scaring the boy out of his wits? Reuben, you will be the MP. The people will love you and Papa will be around to help you to learn the business. Mind, you will have to ask him exactly what this business stuff is.'

‘Plenty of work down there. You will have a house, perhaps a woman. When we take over our first flower farm …'

‘Abel, please, no farms for a while. Look what happened last time we went hunting for a farm on the side of the lake.'

‘Unfinished business, my dear. Oh, things are going to be mighty different and sooner than you think. And, by the way, that girl. Has she come to her senses yet? That's the trouble with some poor people. They want the money but don't know how to behave when you try to give it to them.'

‘Mama?'

‘It's all right, boy. There's been a lot of excitement around this place today. Let's all go inside. Time for some of that new season's coffee from the farm. Samson brought it back this afternoon. And when I checked earlier there was half that chocolate cake left, enough for four big slices.'

Sally was ready to turn her chair around and escape from the chill air of early night. On her way back to the warmth of the south sitting room an uncomfortable thought was nagging at her. Was he trying to hide something from her? This girl, did he owe her something? Had Reuben got her into some trouble? She could have coped with this, but why was Abel making a fuss over something that he wanted her to believe was a nothing?

his is our hospital. Doctor Simon created a miracle for our people here. You people are like angels to us. Doctor David says John is well, so he is well. He is hungry, too. We must feed him. Afterwards, he will sleep. We have the dawa from the doctor.'

Rebecca had tears in her eyes as she watched the group of a dozen women and children make their way slowly past the line of dukas and disappear ‘round a corner into the beginnings of the huge warren of crisscrossing alleys and tracks and lanes that were the homes of thousands and thousands of Nairobi's poorest of the poor.

There were more tears now when she recalled the moment. This time she was sitting on a sofa in the main house of Cartref, so close to Tom that she could feel the warmth of his body. Sixteen people were scattered around that comfortable room sharing a time of memory and meditation. It was an hour and more since the last of the guests and visitors had driven through the main gates and set off into the night carrying their private memories of a long day.

Sonya was squashed with her three boys into the armchair where Simon loved to sit when he visited the house. She had asked her family and friends to recall a moment they had shared with Simon. Rebecca had been first to speak.

‘I never met Simon, but I always read the articles he used to write in
The Nation
. Those stories about his days in the bush clinics were so funny and serious at the same time. One time he said he had a dream for a good hospital in every town and an even better clinic in every village.

‘Thomas knows that in my heart I have longing to help the people of our town to enjoy the blessing of a new hospital. At present, it is little more than a longing, a dream. I will never forget his simple, beautiful words. If the dream comes true, that young mother will be there at the opening. Her words will be carved by a Naivasha craftsman in a cut of the finest wood we can find and the work placed where all can read them. I hope that John will still be a very small boy when he comes. “This is our hospital”.'