Green City in the Sun (41 page)

     This was Grace's cleanest hut; it was as free from insects and rodents as any thatch structure could be. Here she performed surgery that she did not send down to the big hospital in Nairobi: minor operations and emergencies. David had never seen the inside of this place, which the mission workers regarded with great awe because Memsaab Daktari worked very powerful magic in here. Surely it was taboo for him to enter!

     "Go on!" whispered Mona close behind him. "I dare you!"

     David swallowed. His mouth was dry; his pulse raced. Each clap of thunder seemed to shake the ground. Lightning flashes lit up the mission compound in quick, eerie scenes. The trees at the perimeter were whipped into a frenzy; a great rushing noise whistled down from Mount Kenya, as if Ngai were breathing fury.

     David stood frozen with fear.

     "Go on!" shouted Mona, the wind snatching the words from her mouth and carrying them away. "Or are you a coward?"

     With fists curled at his sides, his thin body shaking from fear and cold, David closed his eyes and took a step forward.

     "Go on—go all the way in!"

     The hut shook as thunder and wind clapped and swirled around them. Thatch flew from the roof. Dust came up in funnel clouds, stinging the children's eyes. Fingers of fire streaked across the black sky. In the forest nearby a tree was struck and began to burn.

     Mona gave David a shove. He fell forward onto his hands and knees. She pushed him again; the wind came up behind her and slammed her into the hut. The door crashed shut.

     Both children cried out.

     The walls of the hut shuddered as the wind shot through cane and papyrus. David and Mona looked up.

     The roof was burning.

     They ran to the door and tried to push it open, but it was wedged tightly closed.

     They were trapped.

     SMELLING SMOKE, GRACE set aside her journal and went to the window. Three huts were on fire.

     "Dear God," she whispered. "Mario!
Mario!"
She flew out the front door, down the steps, and around to the houseboy's rondavel, where he was already coming out, pulling up his shorts.

     Mission workers started to appear, blinking sleepily, running to the burning huts. When Mario headed for the surgery hut, Grace cried, "No! Leave the equipment. Save the patients!"

     They went straight to the long hut that was the inpatient ward and saw that the two night nurses were already leading people outside. Two walls were on fire; the roof was ablaze.

     The wind carried sparks from hut to hut until every structure was on fire. Flames reached up to the sky as workers struggled with stretchers, wrestled with wheelchairs and furniture. Grace tried to supervise the chaos, shouting over the roar of the wind and fire. But panic seized the crowd. Men dashed into burning huts and got themselves trapped trying to rescue tables and chairs. Oxygen tanks exploded; glass was heard shattering above the noise of the inferno. People ran to and fro, waving their arms, screaming, while Grace caught them, gave orders, tried to direct the safe evacuation of the patients.

     "Memsaab!" shouted Mario, tugging at her nightgown. "Look!"

     She turned. Her house was on fire.

     
Mona!

     "Mario, where's Mona? Have you seen her?"

     He ran toward the cottage but was thrown back when flames exploded from a hut. Grace picked him up and dragged him to safety. She ran toward her house, calling Mona's name. As she passed the surgery
hut, which was half ablaze, she thought she heard voices calling out.

     She ran to the door and pressed her ear to it. Smoke billowed out through cracks. The roof was a cone of fire. Grace listened. She heard the children's voices, calling feebly.

     "Mona!" Grace tried to open the door.

     Men came running with banana leaves. They pounded the flames that were licking down the walls. Someone threw handfuls of dirt. Grace pushed at the door with all her might; then one of the Africans pulled her away and shoved with his own body.

     The hut started to cave in. The cries of the children could no longer be heard.

     Soon the entire compound was a blazing hell, and the Africans began to retreat in fear.

     Grace screamed and pounded on the door. Cinders and sparks showered down on her. Heat seared her face and lungs. "Mona!" she cried.

     Finally the door gave way and smoke poured out. Covering her face, Grace fell to her hands and knees and reached inside. The ceiling was starting to come down. She felt a limb and seized it and pulled with all her strength. David's body came out just as a chunk of flaming papyrus fell. It struck Grace on the head. She tugged at David until he was out of danger. Then, fighting heat and smoke, she ran back for Mona.

     And then the rain broke.

     It burst from bulging clouds and washed down on the inferno. The flames shrank; a great hiss began to fill the air. The thunder and lightning moved on; the rain came down hard until it was falling like a river.

     Grace slogged in the mud, tripping on her nightgown. Thatch once flaming now grew sodden and heavy. She plunged through steam and smoldering papyrus, slipping and sliding, searching for Mona.

     The Africans withdrew, then vanished into the deluge.

     Grace found Mona, trapped beneath the instrument cabinet which had fallen over. Before she could get hold of the child, the roof collapsed beneath the force of the storm and buried the girl. Grace dug frantically, tearing at the soaked thatch until her hands bled. Mona lay motionless, one pale arm flung out at an unnatural angle.

     The rain came down on Grace with punishing force, plastering her hair to her face. She tried to lift the cabinet but could not. She called out for help, the wind driving rain into her mouth. Grace could not see more than a foot or two in front of her. The rain was like a solid wall. And it was quickly turning the charred floor of the hut into a lake. Mona had only moments before been in danger of burning to death; now she would drown if Grace did not get her out in time.

     "Help!" she cried. "Someone! Mario!"

     She looked around in desperation. The compound was deserted; black remains of huts and hospital furniture hissed in the downpour.
"Help!"
she screamed. "Where
is
everyone?"

     Then she saw a shape emerge through the driving rain. It came slowly toward her.

     "Please help me," Grace sobbed. "My little girl is trapped. She might still be alive."

     Wachera stared down with a stony expression.

     "Damn it!" cried Grace. "Don't just stand there! Help me lift this cabinet!"

     The medicine woman said just one word:
"Thahu."

     "This is no bloody
thahu!"
shouted Grace, tugging at the cabinet, ripping her nails. "It's a storm, nothing more! Help me!"

     Wachera didn't move. She stood in the downpour, her leather dress drenched, rain running off her shaved head.

     Grace shot to her feet. "Damn it!" she shouted. "Help me save this girl!"

     The eyes of the medicine woman flickered to the pathetic arm stretched out from under the cabinet. The water level was rising around Mona's lifeless body.

     
"I saved your son!"
Grace screamed.

     Wachera turned her head. When she saw David, stirring to consciousness in the mud, her expression changed. She looked from the boy to the white woman, then down at the cabinet. Without a word she bent and took hold of one end. Grace seized the other, and together, panting and struggling, the two women managed to drag the heavy piece of furniture off the girl's body.

     Grace dropped to her knees and gently turned Mona over. Wiping hair
and mud from the shockingly white face, she said, "Mona? Mona, darling? Can you hear me?"

     Grace felt the side of the girl's neck and found a pulse. She put her cheek to the gray lips and detected a faint breath. Alive. But only barely.

     She tried to think. She sat up with her niece in her arms and looked around the compound. Where was everyone?

     As if reading her mind, Wachera said, "They all have left you. They fear
thahu.
They fear the punishment of Ngai."

     Grace ignored her. Cradling the lifeless girl against her, she looked frantically around for shelter. All the huts were destroyed; her own house was gutted, the wind sending rain into what was left. Her mind struggled; she couldn't think clearly. She sat in the mud, trying to keep the rain off Mona's face.

     
My instruments, my medicines, my dressings...

     All gone.

     Then she thought of Bellatu. Its bedrooms and dry beds. There would be some sort of medicines in one of the bathrooms; dressings could be made out of sheets.

     Grace tried to stand. The blow to her head had made her dizzy. Blood trickled into her right eye.
Get to the house.
But the road—it would be impassable!

     Through the rain she saw her own Ford truck sunk up to its running board in the mud. The road to Nyeri would also be one long bog. No one, she knew, would be able to get through.

     Holding Mona tight against her, Grace tried again to stand. She slipped and fell. Then she saw the ugly gash in the girl's leg. She tried to find Mona's pulse.

     
I'm losing her!

     The third time Grace managed to stay on her feet. She began to stumble through the rain, toward the path that climbed up the ridge. Mona was a dead weight in her arms; the stormy world around her tilted; the ground seemed to move beneath her.

     Grace started to sob. She plodded through knee-deep mud, her feet catching on the hem of her nightgown, the rain pushing her back, Mona
growing heavier and heavier. She had to get to the house, or they both would drown out here, alone, in the mud....

     And then two arms, shiny black with rain, reached out, and suddenly Grace's burden was lifted. Wachera took up Mona with ease and turned away. Grace stared after her.

     She saw the boy follow his mother; they were heading for the polo field. "Wait," Grace whispered. Her head swam. She put a hand to her forehead, and it came away bloody.

     Cold and wet and numb, Grace staggered over the ruins behind the African medicine woman, who walked in the direction of her hut.

G
RACE OPENED HER EYES
.

     There was little to see, just the smoky interior of an African hut.

     She tried to move. Every joint and muscle in her body hurt. Her mind was a fog; she couldn't remember where she was, what had happened.

     She lay still and listened to the rain patter on the thatch, recognizing the smells in the hut. They were at the same time familiar and alien. Someone was talking. Singing? She tried to move again. The hut swung around her. She felt sick.

     
I'm hurt. I must go slowly.

     Bit by bit the fog lifted from her brain, and her thoughts began to coalesce into a sharper focus. The rain. There had been a storm. And a fire ... Mona!

     Grace sat up abruptly. The hut tilted. In the darkness she saw the glow of hot stones over a cook fire and the silhouettes of three people—one sitting, two recumbent. As her eyes grew accustomed to the dark, Grace recognized Wachera's face, her coppery features set in deep concentration. Then there was David, asleep on a bed of banana leaves, his body covered by a goatskin.
Across the small hut lay Mona, white as death.

     Grace opened her mouth. Her lips and tongue were dry; she had difficulty speaking. "Mona..."

     But the medicine woman held up a hand and said, "You are not well. Your head received a bad wound. Lie down."

     "I must see to Mona."

     "I have taken care of her. She lives. Now she sleeps."

     "But... she was bleeding."

     Wachera got up from her place at the cook fire and went to the girl. Lifting the goatskin blanket, she pointed to the wounded leg.

     Grace stared. Mona's thigh was clean, and a dressing of grass and leaves had been tied in place by a leather thong.