Burn My Heart (10 page)

One evening, just two days before the half-term holiday, Lance was called out during prep to take a telephone call. When he returned to the form room, he passed Mathew a note.

THAT WAS MY MUM. YOU ARE COMING HOME WITH US FOR THE WEEKEND! GREAT!

Lance winked and Mathew winked back, but for the rest of prep his Latin verbs were tangled in a panic that something was wrong. Why hadn’t Mother rung him herself?

His mother’s phone call came when prep had ended.

‘Your father and I have to go to Nairobi on Friday, so I’ve asked Lance’s mother if they’d mind having you Friday night. She suggested that you stay the weekend. I thought you’d jump at the chance!’ Mother sounded cheerful.

‘Lance has already told me,’ he said accusingly. ‘Why are you going to Nairobi?’

His mother must have heard his agitation. ‘It’s nothing serious, darling! Just some legal papers to sign for your grandmother’s estate in England. We’ll collect you on Sunday. Your father and I are invited for lunch. You’ll be having so much fun I expect you won’t want to come home with us afterwards!’ She laughed lightly.

Mathew wanted to say that she should have asked him first whether he wanted to spend the whole weekend with Lance. But instead he changed the subject to ask about Duma and ‘any news’. All was well, said Mother, apart from an invasion of siafu ants. They had come silently in the middle of the night and demolished ten crates of newly bought chicks by morning. Mathew probed her for so many details of this massacre of the chicks
that, in the end, his mother said she had to go.

Lance was so obviously pleased about the weekend that Mathew soon stopped feeling churlish. Lance said that Mathew could try out his new King 1,000-shot air rifle. If his dad wasn’t on police duty, he might even take them out shooting. But there was something else that Lance was planning. He dropped hints that they were going to have an adventure at the weekend.

‘I won’t say what it is, Mat,’ he whispered in assembly during ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’. ‘But you’ll remember it forever.’ Mathew nudged him with his knee. Old Fowler with his black cloak and apparently telescopic glasses was scowling in their direction from the stage. Mathew opened his mouth and his lungs.

‘
The purple headed mountains,

The river running by…
’

It was the verse he liked best. Old Fowler’s eyes moved on. Lance returned Mathew’s nudge. They vied with each other as to who could sing loudest.

‘
The sunset and the morning

That brightens up the sky.
’

The weekend would be great after all.

By the time they arrived at the Smithers’ on Friday, it was close to sunset and there was only time for a quick run with the dogs around the strip of garden between the house and the inner security fence. Mathew held back, letting Lance run ahead in a game full of barking, shouting and jumping. He would never admit to Lance that he found the Rhodesian ridgeback and the black Dobermann intimidating. Each time he came, the dogs always sniffed him aggressively before tolerating his presence. That was how they had been trained, said Inspector Smithers. He wanted them to be fiercely protective.

At six o’clock, the servants trooped out of the house down to the first gate, where the Turkana guards let them out. When Lance’s dad called the boys inside, the dogs galloped ahead of them. He locked the door then bolted it with a large iron bar that swung across the entire doorway.

Inside the dining room, the cook had laid out a
meal of cold meats, salads and a trifle for dessert. Although Mathew was ravenous, he remembered his table manners. When Mrs Smithers asked questions about school, he tried not to talk with his mouth full. Inspector Smithers seemed to half-listen.
A bit like Father
, thought Mathew. Father was always preoccupied with the farm whereas Lance’s dad was probably thinking about his police work. They were still at the table when the phone rang in the hallway. Lance jumped up to get it. Seconds later he was back.

‘Urgent, for you, Dad! Mr Morrison!’ Lance raised his eyebrows to Mathew as Inspector Smithers rose swiftly from the table.

Mrs Smithers continued her conversation about school but she stopped mid-stream when her husband reappeared. He was brief. The Morrisons’ dogs had been barking for the last ten minutes. They thought there were intruders and had rung the local police station but no one had answered. They lived about six miles away on the north-west road.

‘I’ll have to go. Lock up well behind me,’ Lance’s dad instructed as he left the room.

‘Take care, dear!’ Mrs Smithers called after him. Mathew thought he saw her upper lip quiver a little.

‘He’s going to get guns and ammo from our safe before he goes,’ Lance said in a confidential tone to Mathew.

Lance helped his mother bolt the door behind his father. No one spoke for a minute. They heard the jeep rev up and listened to it rumbling while the guards opened up the first set of gates. Lance broke the silence.

‘Dad will take his team, won’t he, Mum?’

‘He will.’

‘Where are they?’ Mathew was curious. As far as he knew, the nearest police post was some miles away.

‘Oh, not far.’ Lance glanced furtively at his mother. ‘Do you want to play Monopoly?’ He was changing the conversation.

Inspector Smithers had not come home by the time Lance’s mother said it was time for bed. Lance’s bedroom window faced the front of the house. Although Lance tried not to show it, Mathew could tell that he was anxious. At least three times while they were changing into their pyjamas, Lance lifted a corner of the curtain to check outside. After all the hints about an adventure, Mathew was surprised when Lance turned off the light, climbed on to the bunk bed above Mathew and said goodnight. They were going straight to sleep just like at school!

For a while Mathew lay awake. The rough hippo grunts sounded closer here than at home. The same river ran through both their farms. He wondered what kind of weekend he would have after all. He
was already missing Duma. Would Mother have let him stay with Lance, if she knew that Inspector Smithers went out at night? Mathew couldn’t imagine Father leaving him and Mother on their own.

Mathew was beginning to worry that he would never fall asleep when Lance shuffled above him.

‘Are you awake, Mat?’ he whispered.

‘I can’t sleep.’

‘Me neither.’ Lance slipped off the top bunk. He tiptoed across the room and Mathew heard a drawer being pulled open. It sounded as if Lance was foraging for something. A light suddenly beamed into Mathew’s face. He blinked.

‘You’re in my power!’ Lance hissed in a funny voice. He kept the torch trained on him until Mathew covered his eyes.

‘Cut it out, Lance!’

‘Sshh! You’ll make Mum hear!’ Lance held the torch down. ‘Look, we might as well start what I was planning for tomorrow. As long as we’re careful we can use my bedroom instead of my hideout.’

‘For what?’

‘A secret society.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘We make one. Just you and me. What do you say?’

Mathew sat up. Lance had sprung this so unexpectedly.

‘What would we do?’

‘Whatever we like! The chief thing is we bind each other to loyalty and secrecy. We take an oath and swear never to break it.’

Mathew pressed his fingers into his palms so intensely that they hurt. He needed to think.

‘So what do you say?’ Lance repeated.

‘Is the oath forever?’

‘Yes, that’s the point.’ Lance sounded so sure of himself. ‘Listen, if you don’t want to make a secret society with me – if it scares you stiff – I’ll get someone else! I thought you’d be pleased.’

‘I am! I just wanted to think about it.’

‘And?’

‘OK, we’ll do it.’ If he said anything else, Lance would say he was a sissy.

They sat on the floor in the middle of the room with a flickering candle stuck on a saucer between them. Lance held the blade of his pocket knife over the flame for a few seconds. He turned the blade from one side to the other. Then he lowered the forefinger of his other hand towards the flame. He lifted the blade and with a quick slash he sliced the skin near the top of his finger. Mathew tried not to flinch. Blood made him feel sick. The blood bubbled up and oozed from the cut. Lance kept his finger extended but turned it so that a drop splashed into the flame, which sizzled but stayed
alight. Lance lifted his finger to his mouth and sucked it.

‘Your turn,’ he said to Mathew, holding out the knife. ‘Sterilize it first in the flame.’

Mathew prayed that his hand wouldn’t tremble as he held the blade above the candle. He and his finger were under Lance’s microscope! If he didn’t pass this test, his friendship with Lance would be over. Lance would mock him. Life at school would be impossible. He held his breath, thrust forward his other hand and, with a hasty stroke, drew the blade across the forefinger. The pain tore to his head. He clenched his teeth not to yell while he waited for the blood to trickle into the flame. Only then could he press his lips against the torn skin. Years ago, on their bush walks, Kamau had taught him that saliva helped stop infection. He raised his eyes to meet Lance’s, tasting his own blood. They held each other’s gaze for a few moments, each with his hand by his mouth. Lance lifted his other hand like a scout. Mathew copied him and they pressed their palms together, raised above the flame.

‘Repeat after me,’ said Lance. ‘If I am called to help, or stand by, a member of this society…’

‘If I am called to help, or stand by, a member of this society…’

‘…at any time of day or night, I will do so, or…’

‘…at any time of day or night, I will do so, or…’

‘…may this oath kill me.’

Mathew’s finger flew back to his mouth. When children promised ‘Cross my heart and hope to die’, no one really meant it. But Lance sounded deadly serious.

‘…may this oath kill me,’ he whispered, loud enough for Lance to hear.

Lance launched into a further oath. It was a pledge never to reveal the secret society to anyone on pain of death. Mathew had just pledged himself for a second time, when they heard the rumble of an approaching vehicle. Lance blew out the candle. He leapt up to sneak a look through the curtains.

‘Dad’s back! Get into bed! Pretend you’re asleep.’

‘Won’t your mother be mad if there’s blood on the sheets?’

‘Are you still bleeding?’ Lance fumbled in his drawer. Mathew felt a handkerchief shoved into his hand and wound it around his finger.

They clambered into bed. Mathew followed the sounds of the dogs barking, the engine being turned off, the door being unbolted, lowered voices, then heavy footsteps. The door opened quietly. Mathew kept his eyes shut.

‘Dad? I couldn’t sleep! Did you get anyone?’ Lance sounded excited.

‘Shh! You’ll wake Mathew. I’ll tell you in the morning.’ The door closed.

The bed above Mathew shook as Lance pummelled his pillow.

‘Why couldn’t he tell me now?’ Lance whispered fiercely. Mathew didn’t reply. He was exhausted and ready for sleep.

At breakfast, Mrs Smithers noticed Mathew’s finger. Although it was no longer bleeding, it was swollen and it hurt. She insisted on taking him to the bathroom to attend to it but when she asked how he had cut it, he said that he’d done it accidentally opening Lance’s knife. Lance grinned as Mathew returned with his bandage. Lance’s cut didn’t look so red and angry but, even so, Mathew noticed that he kept it out of his mother’s sight.

‘Where’s Dad?’ Lance asked. ‘Did he say he’ll take us shooting?’

‘He set off early, while you children were still asleep.’

Lance groaned. ‘He promised to tell me what happened last night!’

‘Nothing happened, dear. The Morrisons are fine. He’s just gone to check that all is well there this morning.’

Mrs Smithers was talking like Mother when there was more to a story than she wished to reveal. Mathew was surprised that Lance didn’t probe
further and wondered whether it was because of the servant. He was a Kipsigi boy not much older than Mugo who came shuttling back and forth from the kitchen with their bacon and eggs, crackling hot from the cook’s pan. Instead Lance asked if he could take Mathew to the dairy.

‘I want to show him the new Sussex stud cow. She’s massive! The stud bull is coming soon! Titanic Man for Titanic Lady!’ Lance winked at Mathew.

‘I’d rather you two played around the house until your father is back.’

‘Nothing’s going to happen to Mathew and me, Mum!’ Lance objected. ‘It’s broad daylight! Dad would let us go! Give us a time to come back and we’ll keep to it, I promise!’

‘You’re as bad as your father once you’ve got an idea.’ Mrs Smithers sighed.

‘It’s only the dairy, Mum! You can almost see it from here since Dad cleared the bush.’

‘All right, but I want you back by eleven. Is that clear?’

Mathew smiled to himself. He wasn’t the only person that Lance pressured! Probably the only person to whom Lance didn’t do it was his father.

Once past the guards and the gate, they raced each other to the dairy. The bush had been cut down
for over a quarter of a mile to allow a clear view of anyone approaching the house. Only a few whistling thorns had somehow escaped the pangas. The dairy was situated below a short dip. Beyond the dairy, the bush had been left in its natural state. The grass was short where the cattle had grazed but there was also a stretch of thicker bush to the right where grazing was more difficult and where the grass was still longer.

The two of them had remained neck and neck but as they descended the dip, Lance took the lead. A small rucksack bobbed on his back. He began to veer away from the dairy buildings, heading along a rocky path that cut between some prickly pear bushes.

‘Aren’t we going to see Titanic Lady?’ Mathew panted.

Lance ignored the question. He was up to something.

‘Where are we going?’

‘Quit worrying!’ Lance called over his shoulder. ‘Just follow me!’

Mathew fell silent. His heart was pumping rapidly from running. They appeared to be heading for where the bush was most dense. It occurred to him that although Lance was so confident, he had grown up mostly in Nairobi and knew much less about the bush than he did.