Boss Takes All (2 page)

From her kneeling position Maria looked up into his face. Was that the suggestion of a smile? Was she mocking him? He tried to assert himself.

‘I don't know who you are, but I want you to leave my father in peace. Come away now. Now, curse you! And you, policeman, do your duty. You're supposed to be the law in this godforsaken hellhole. You'll be damned sorry if you don't. I know people who could make you an ex-policeman by morning!'

Maria, ignoring his big talk, took his breath away with a single short sentence. ‘Do you think that your father is dead?'

A mixture of fear, amazement and wild, blind hope made him speechless. She continued.

‘This man is still with us, just.'

This time Maria's words had an opposite effect on Reuben Rubai. The blind hope swelled into excitement. The speech returned, but it was without a coherent focus.

‘You mean that … look, you'd better not … who are you, anyway? You're no doctor. I'm warning you …'

‘He is with us. Just. He is very close to the edge.'

Reuben, chastened into silence, meekly waited. This woman, this witch, had humbled him.

‘What must I do?'

‘There is nothing for you to do and everything you can allow someone else to do.'

Reuben screamed out in frustration. ‘Please, none of this clever crap! I want my father back.'

‘Then, listen! Listen! A bullet is lodged in your father's spine. He cannot be treated here. Help lies sixty miles from this place, in a house that we both know.'

‘You must get him to a hospital …'

‘What is it about your family and “proper” hospitals? Let me be unkind but honest for a moment. The only people who can help your father owe you and especially your father nothing. Nothing! He has brought them nothing but the bitterest grief. But they can and they will help him. Listen! You will travel with your father.'

‘We have a car, close by, on the road up there.'

‘I'm not sure. Any journey will be dangerous. Time is against us, so, okay, we will have to use it.'

In the near distance, in the direction of Londiani, they could hear the rising hubbub of people in gathering numbers. There were the noisy outbursts of a crowd caught up in a state of wild excitement. They were thrilled to be witnesses to a great event. They would have stories to tell. Tom McCall expressed the fear that all in that dark corner of the farm felt. ‘There's danger. Those people must not find us here. They'll soon piece together some kind of story and, Rubai, it could be the end of you. You're coming with me to that car. I'll drive us down. You can ride in the boot.'

‘McCall, you'll be sorry for this!'

‘Fine! Stay here, then. Rebecca, will you sit with me? Maria, what do you think?'

‘I wish we had six or seven pillows.'

‘Sorry. We're right out of them just now in Londiani. Bertie, could we borrow a few pillows? We'll charge this pair for them.'

‘Sure, Tom, but not none of their blood money for me, thanks very much!'

‘And, Reuben, when we arrive at our destination, you will travel on to your home and wait for the morning. Tell your mother that your father has been called away unexpectedly on government business. You will be a fool if you let any news of this come out. It will be your choice, but if you want to help you father … Got that, cretin?'

ally Rubai enjoyed her early mornings. The new baby was only a few weeks away, so there were always some words to share with the new Julius. She could not wait to hold him in her arms. Her maid, Monica, spoiled her mistress, making sure that there were plenty of sugary treats on the breakfast tray. Sally looked forward to reading the early edition of
The Nation
fetched by one of the boys from the Karen dukas. She leaned back and scanned the front page. Nothing special there, but today she could look forward to the features supplement and especially for her favourite, ‘Mary's recipes from the country'. When Monica turned on the radio to catch the latest local news, the word Londiani made Sally sit up.

‘Reports are still sketchy, but we understand from an eyewitness that there was a series of explosions at about two am followed by a large conflagration which completely destroyed the rambling farm complex. Regular listeners will recall that less than ten days ago we reported on the fire that struck the working part of this lakeside farm. On that occasion there were forty-five deaths, mostly from among the young workforce who had just arrived to start the new day in the fields.

‘So far there have been no reports of casualties from this morning's tragedy. Our eyewitness who was at the scene only minutes after the first of the explosions stated graphically, “No one in there could have survived even a few seconds of that fire from hell.”

‘We will keep you up to date on this breaking story. Now, to other news.'

Sally, in slippers and dressing-gown, was soon on her way to her husband's screen room. Abel was usually there first thing, that is if he had not spent the whole night sitting in front of those blue and green squares of light that fascinated him so much. He was not there, so she went on to the breakfast room.

‘Reuben! You are very early, boy.' She paused to take a closer look at him. ‘Is there something the matter? Your eyes are very red. Have you slept?'

‘Fine, Mama. Yes, I was a little late in. Out in the “Carnivore”. Ziggy Kormai is up from Zim for a few days. We were in school together. A few of us invited him out. And, you know how it is …'

‘No, I most definitely do not know how it is. More about that later. Terrible news about Londiani. I'm looking for your father.'

Reuben stifled a gasp.
How could she …?

‘What is the matter with you, boy? So, you haven't seen Papa?'

‘Well, look, I got this message. Someone down at the Carnivore. He got it from someone else.'

‘What is going on here? Are you sick?'

He suddenly felt very weak. There had always been something in his mother's manner that made it almost impossible for him to lie to her. She had a way of narrowing her gaze that made him feel that her eyes were burning a path into his brain and his closest thoughts. He made a massive effort.

‘The message was that Papa was called away at short notice. Government business.'

Sally slowly poured herself a glass of milk, all the while scrutinising the minutest shifts in her son's expression. She drew in an extra long breath before speaking again.

‘Now, this time, the truth. What's your Daddy's expression? “Strictly no bullshit!”.'

Reuben was emotionally drained. He sat down at the table and looked across at his mother. His personality and his strength of mind were being tested to their limits. Above all things, he wanted to be honest with this woman who for all his life had been his loyal, loving supporter. Wave after wave of warm currents passed through his tired mind blocking his thoughts like an electronic jamming machine. Deep inside were the words he needed, but they were out of reach. She was asking for truth. Yes, he could have managed to bring out some version of what, just then, he perceived as reality, but at what cost? In one or two sentences he could come close to breaking her heart.

‘Mama, Papa is not very far from us here.'

‘So?' In the five minutes that she had been in that room with her son, her original mild concern about her husband and his whereabouts had curved upwards through fear to the edge of terror. She wanted complete knowledge in a single instant, to be presented with a single huge colourful picture where she would be able to see the beginning and end in front of her.

‘Mama, I have made promises.'

Sally raised her voice in mounting anxiety and anger. ‘Do not speak in riddles. Can't you see how you are torturing me?'

Reuben lowered his eyes. He summoned what was left of his courage.

‘Papa is very sick. He has been badly hurt.'

‘You mean that he is dead.'

‘No! No!'

‘Tell me.' The resignation in her voice told him that it was time to give her everything he was capable of. As he spoke she watched him with her hand to her mouth and the sadness of a wounded animal in her eyes.

‘He is with the family of doctors, the people with the garden you like.'

‘I know these people, but if he …'

‘Mama, he has a wound in his back. Yes, in his spine. I was there.'

‘You? It was a gun, I know it. Your father has many enemies. Has someone been arrested yet? But why not in a hospital? Or at home here? And why were you there? It was at the Carnivore?'

‘Naivasha.'

The illumination was instant. ‘The McCalls, they did not say if any of them survived.'

‘No deaths there. It was the Briggs man. He was the one. Mama, I thought we had lost him. A strange woman, a policeman's wife, she said that there is life. But also much danger. She is over there with him now.'

‘Then I must go there. Now.'

‘But the story must not get out. They said this.'

‘I am going, alone.'

he night askari at ‘Cartref' escorted her on foot to the door of the Daniels' surgery. He led the way with an honest reverence. He recognised this lady. It was the only way he could express his sympathy.

She went in unannounced, the unexpected visitor whose arrival was not a complete surprise. She saw him at once, even before she took in the pleasant coolness and the scented air of the high-beamed room which put her in mind of the Catholic church her mother took her to when she was a child up in North-West District. Abel was lying face down on the raised table, close to the open door. Five white doctors wearing green gowns and masks were standing ‘round him. His three sons and his younger sister were watching David Daniels completely engaged in the delicate job of removing the bullet that was lodged tight between two vertebrae in the lower part of his patient's back. Sonya Mboya, the only person there that Sally recognised, turned, removed her mask and gave the visitor a warm smile.

‘So your son could not hide the news. This is good. It is right for you to be with him. Please, sit with me. There are chairs on the other side.'

Maria Kabari made no attempt to introduce herself. Sally's every move was hesitant. She was the child who had entered a strange, new land where all the humans seemed friendly, but where a dark cloud hung down threatening to engulf her at any moment. Maria took her hand and rubbed it gently with her own like a mother bringing back warmth to her child's chilled fingers.

Sally's agitation was not helped by her sitting down. ‘Please, being still makes my fear worse. Perhaps if I could walk in the garden. It will give me something else to think of. I know that the garden here is beautiful.'

‘Yes, very beautiful, but there is work for you here.'

Sally turned to look into the face of this stranger. She was comforted by the serenity she found there. The dark eyes and pursed lips combined into an expression of firm confidence.

‘You were the one who helped my husband. Reuben said that, without you …'

The stranger's face lit up into a smile of pure compassion. She began to sing. The words were in a language new to Sally and she understood instinctively that the lilting melody was something that was reaching out to her from an ancient past. Maria's gentle nod was an encouragement to Sally to share. The singing paused briefly.

‘Sally, you are a woman of prayer. We can work together.'

The melody began again and paused. ‘He needs you.'

For the first time since entering that room she felt assured enough to look carefully at the raised table that dominated its centre. The back of Abel's head and his bare shoulders were all that she could comfortably see. They were motionless. Her prayer became fervent. Her voice blended with Maria's as a background to the work being performed by the five doctors standing above and across from them in that cool place.

David Daniels held out his hand towards Sally Rubai. In the palm, the offending piece of metal gleamed.