You Have Not a Leg to Stand On (4 page)

New York and Colorado

We returned to Marriot's little haven, but we still had no idea what we were going to do. One day my Brother-in-law Douglas, my little wife's elder brother, of whom Marriot was very fond, breezily walked into our little house. He threw a newspaper on to my lap, and said, ‘There you are, you can go and do that.' He'd circled an advert for the sale of a 2000 acre wheat ranch in the mountains of Colorado in America, for 2,000,000 dollars.

Just by chance, on a visit back to Stoke Mandeville, we'd met a flirty French girl called Anne-Marie, who'd also been paralysed in a car accident a few years before. Her boyfriend, a very wealthy Iranian I think, had said to us, ‘If ever you think of something you'd like to do, that needs financing, I'll look into it if you like.' So I rang him. He said ‘As it happens I'm going to San Francisco next week, so I'll fly to Colorado with my lawyer. We'll meet the agents and go and see the place, then take it from there,' True to his word, he did all that and when he came back, he said ‘You must go and see it for yourself, because you'll have to run it.'

A relatively major problem we had was that we didn't have any money, other than the value of our house in Clapham, which was presently let. Well, not enough money, even for the flights there and back. So we flew from London to New York on stand-by. We couldn't book the flight back because you obviously can't book a stand-by. At Kennedy Airport we were met by the brother of a very dear friend in Kenya. He gave us the most outstanding few days in New York anyone could ever dream of having. So unexpected, out of the blue, and with no money.

Peter was a huge, all-enveloping character, full of merriment and a zest for living. Every part of every day was to be lived to the full. From the first cup of coffee in the morning to the last double vodka at midnight, whether at work or play, was to be packed with humorous activity, innovation and generosity. All this didn't exactly make for a peaceful existence, but for a visitor to New York, for the first time, it was the most exciting time anyone could ever wish for. We stayed with Peter for only about a week, but the amount we packed into that week made it seem more like a month. I'd always understood New York was a city like no other. How right it proved. ‘New York never sleeps.' You could feel the thrum of that city, from the walls, on the pavements, high up in the sky, deep down in the basements, the whole city was alive. So it was very apt that, by profession, Peter was an indoor and outdoor garden designer. He ran his own little nursery right in the middle of the city, and when I wheeled into that small shop, we really did feel we were magically being pulled into another world. His three bubbling girls working for him were all slightly different. You couldn't put your finger on it, wacky, quirky, not ‘off-the-wall' but nearly. Great fun to be with for a while, but living in ‘Wonderland' I think would be too exhausting for the average person. I do wonder what happened to them, what would they be doing now? Peter took us to the early morning flower market, the famous fish market, the vegetable market, the unbelievable meat market. The sheer amount of food consumed by one city in one day, admittedly an extraordinary city, was for me, coming from East Africa, where all food is a precious commodity, somehow seemed to highlight the difference between the third world and the developed world. He took us to New York Central Station where we swallowed the biggest, juiciest oysters I'd ever tasted. Being inside a building like that, and watching all the thousands of people scurrying around all knowing where they were going, on the whole not bumping into each other, reminded me so much, of huge flocks of little birds. They glide about the evening sky, painting great patterns, shapes and waves before settling on their roosting trees or grasses. Apparently they do bump into each other when forming all those lovely arching waves, but it happens so quickly, we humans can't pick it up.

Peter took us to nightclubs high up in the sky, I'd always imagined nightclubs were in basements. Sitting at a table so high up, drinking an enormous dry martini, where all single helpings of food and drink were enough for six Africans, I temporally became quite overwhelmed, a sensation I don't remember having had before. Looking out over the city at midnight, was simply stunning, mesmeric.

This man-made view is now very similar to many modern cities; Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Bahrain, Muscat, Shanghai and of course closer to home, Chicago and Detroit. However often I visit one, I never cease to marvel at the sheer engineering feat, the complexity of bringing together all the different trades we use every day, and now take for granted, to build these fantastical structures.

Peter, with his exuberant, imaginative personality was well suited to creating little garden havens throughout the city. Once he'd created a garden it had to be maintained, and as it grew it changed character, and so on. He had access to so many apartments he said he felt like Dick Whittington, being given keys to the city. He'd also built himself a most unusual, beautiful octagonal house, in the country about three hours north of New York. It was on a cliff top overlooking the forests of New England; you can imagine the spectacular golden rolling views in the Autumn. He had, of course, taken charge of the wheelchair for once, my little wife, who never takes her eye off me, ever, was able to relax in the knowledge, with his great strength, nothing untoward would happen to me.

But life is so cruel, a few years later Peter was diagnosed with cancer. After only a year, a man of such character, generosity and a love of life, and so many friends who loved him, was reduced to nothing. He died a bitter, miserable, agonising death in his beautiful home, looked after by his sisters.

The full, colourful, wonderful, joyful week flashed by, and so it was back to work, waiting in the standby queue to Colorado Springs, where we were met by two very baffled land agents. However, they were very polite and dutifully drove us to our motel for the night. The following day was to be the beginning of a very strange experience, from which we only just emerged by the skin of our teeth.

The highway dived south-west into the first range of the Rockies. Up and up we climbed, looking back over huge expansive blue mountains. The drive took about four hours, owing to the nationwide 50 mph speed limit in America at the time. We started to descend, ears popping, and soon, there, laid out before us, was a dead flat plain, edged all around in the far distance by a thin line of more blue mountains. In the centre of the picture, which somehow seemed familiar, was a small township consisting of a few shops either side of the highway, a petrol station and a motel. We stopped the car. All was silent. ‘And there,' said the agent proudly, ‘is Alamosa,' he paused, then said, ‘And there, to the left, is your ranch.' We looked in silence. ‘Gosh,' I said. I turned to look at my little wife. The look on her face was a mixture of horror and terror. She was speechless, motionless, her deep brown eyes staring at the scene in front of us. They began to fill with water. The agent awkwardly broke the silence, ‘I guess we'd better check-in first, then we'll go see Jim.'

Jim Hunter was the owner of the ranch, and as luck would have it, the Mayor of Alamosa. The enormous production of wheat per acre relied upon vast quantities of water sprayed on to the crop, night and day, through boomed roundels, covering a hundred acres each. The water came from deep wells, or boreholes for which only he seemed to have the rights. We were taken to his house, a typical modern American house which also came with the property, and introduced to his wife. I asked for and was shown, the spreadsheets showing the enormous profitability, so we asked why they'd decided to sell. The wife's eyes filled with tears. It turned out, the previous winter when the whole plain was covered in deep snow, their son had crash-landed his small aeroplane when trying to land in front of the house and was killed.

The comprehensive meeting lasted about a couple of hours, then the Mayor suggested a tour of the ranch. This was man's business so the wives were left together to chat. The only thing of any note was a large metal hanger full of beautiful farm machinery. I love farm machinery, it takes me back to when I was a boy on my father's ranch. Inside the hanger were two enormous four-wheel drive tractors with air-conditioned cabs. Along the sides were all manner of attachments, ploughs, harrows, seed drillers. By now, the younger of the two agents had, completely unselfconsciously, taken charge of me and the chair, We stopped in front of two attachments I'd never seen before. They were quite simple, each had an enormous thick hook, more than 3-foot long. The Mayor said, in his broad southern drawl, ‘See these, these are responsible for the enormous tonnage we get per acre. The whole plain has very deep topsoil, but it's packed like concrete. These hooks break it up. Then I put the ploughs in to turn it over, then the harrows. Then,' he paused for effect, ‘I drill twice, first time deep, and the second just above the first.' He paused again, ‘Double drilling, double tonnage.' The three of us just looked at him and nodded. It made sense, why hadn't anyone thought of it before. Maybe they had, but I'd never heard of it.

That evening we were taken by the agents to a motel in Alamosa where we'd spend the night. I went to the room to rest a bit. I was still retching and retching every morning and still felt sick at the thought of eating, so I got tired very quickly. I don't know why, but I felt I had to insist on buying supper for the two agents. I suppose it must have been because I felt so insecure. My wife meanwhile, had gone to the shop attached to the motel where she had a very strange experience. While she was looking around, the little Chinese woman in charge, sidled up to her, and whispered, ‘What are you doing here?' My wife was obviously a bit taken aback, she said, ‘We're thinking of buying The Hunter Ranch. ‘She looked shocked and very frightened and said, in a, fearful whisper, ‘No, no you mustn't, you must go, he is a very bad man, we live in fear of our lives,' She scuttled away.

The following morning we were driven back to Colorado to meet the younger agent's family. I always had a very high regard for Americans, as they were the nicest, most outgoing groups of all the nationalities who came to visit us on the farm. But still I was surprised by their daughter who was no more than twelve. On hearing we were invited to a barbecue on Saturday said, ‘You'll have a nice time, they're very charming people, so you'll have a lot in common.' Can you imagine an English girl of twelve saying that? Indeed, we did have a nice time and they were very charming. A couple of days later, after waiting for more stand-by flights, we were back with Marriott, shattered and wondering what on earth we'd done. I hadn't noticed my poor little wife had come out in a rash all over her body, with the awful prospect of going to live in Alamosa Colorado. I've asked her now why didn't she say anything at the time, and she says, ‘I couldn't, you were suicidal.' She also says I wouldn't have understood her feelings, because all men are autistic, in just varying degrees.

A few weeks later, during negotiations with Jim Hunter, our backer, our financier, our whole reason for doing all this, suddenly died of a heart attack. All negotiations immediately ceased and my wife's rash disappeared overnight.

Africa

It wasn't until years later, when we found our beautiful little ship, the Saga Ruby, we were able to enjoy being ‘on' the sea as opposed to being ‘in' the sea. On occasion we were at sea for six days on the trot; it was these days that were of such special significance. The whole outside wall of our cabin was glass which slid open on to a balcony. I would sit there for hour after hour, drinking coffee and watching the sea. Suddenly a small school of flying fish would break the surface and wing their way ahead of the ship. Dolphins would come and play in the prow for ages, jumping over the waves. Such a beautiful, graceful freedom.

A couple of years after Gwynne dashed me out to the exposed reef and through the waves to let me float free in the beautiful immensity of the Indian Ocean, he himself was to suffer his own considerable trauma.

He was, by profession, a bush pilot, so it was that feeling of the need to be free, he understood so well, without having to explain or vocalise it in any way. He was working for a French company in Southern Sudan ferrying the workers back and forth from their camp on the border with Kenya to where they were building a huge canal, called the Jonglei Canal. Its purpose was to divert the White Nile away from its natural course through the Sudd swamp, and join it again about three hundred kilometres north; thereby increasing the water available for agriculture a hundredfold.

Although The Sudd can be looked upon as a nuisance, it is a vast ecosystem in its own right. The implications of depriving it of such a vast quantity of water so quickly surely can't have been thought through properly. It was the lack of thought, or sheer stupidity, that, arguably, gave the Southern Sudanese Freedom fighters the right to stop the canal being built. It was, for this reason, Gwynne, his pregnant wife, little son and fellow pilots were captured. Apart from his wife and child, who later had to be abandoned to be found by the following army, the others were held hostage in the bush for more than a year. They only just survived by catching grubs and insects. The small amount of water they were given was filthy and stale. They were all very, very ill and at times close to death.

Finally, a ransom was negotiated and they were released. The reason why this episode in Gwynne's life comes into my story is because, just before he was captured, he had spotted and bought a small, all-terrain vehicle. He thought it would be ideal for me. He could NOT have been more right. I have used that vehicle, and ones like it, to this very day. When I'm in it, I literally can go anywhere. It's very fast so I can speed along any beach at about thirty miles an hour. It can swim out to the reef at low tide. It floats, so deep pools make no difference. I can fly out through the tall grass on the savannah plains in amongst the herds of game. As long as I don't get too close they don't gallop away. They don't know what I am, so they just stand and stare. I can climb over huge boulders, I can pick my way through dense woods, or through forests of tall majestic oak trees or beach or pine. It's rather like an upturned bath only wider. It has six balloon tyres; three either side, all driven simultaneously by a small motorbike engine. It's steered by two levers that brake one side or the other. The only trouble with this one, my first one, is the engine would suddenly decide to stop, and nothing, nothing would persuade it to start again.

For some reason, best known to herself, my little wife, who looks after me as though I'm made of the thinnest porcelain imaginable, doesn't let me drive alone in the car. The buggy is another matter entirely. All she'd ask, 'Have you got enough petrol?' I'd say, ‘Yes, and I'll be some time, I don't know how long.' That's all.

So it was on one occasion, I set out, on my own, down from the house in the Valley, on to the plains below. In those days the plains were full of all sorts of game, Thompson gazelle, Grant, Kongoni, Zebra, prancing Impala, all the plains game. Way, away I went,further and further; it was so beautiful; compelling. I stopped and turned off the engine. I was ‘there', complete, listening to the silence. The sound of the soft breeze wafting gently through the tall brown succulent grass, the sweet smell of fresh hay, the munching of the animals all around. I felt part of the whole, I was part of nature.

I don't know how long I was there, but it must have been an hour or two. I began to think I should get back. I reluctantly turned the key to start the engine. It didn't take. I turned it again, still it didn't fire. I opened the choke; still nothing. I wasn't worried yet; I waited a bit, I tried again, nothing, again and again, still nothing. The battery started to show signs of strain. There was nothing I could do, I just sat there, I was marooned. What was I to do? I looked all around me in a different light; instead of the beauty I've just described, I saw nothing for miles around; there were no roads anywhere near, why would anyone come this way. I knew I'd eventually be missed, but where would they begin to look for me? I just sat in a stunned stupor. I stared ahead, empty of thought.

Then slowly in my gaze, on the horizon, there seemed to be a figure. I went on staring. It was a figure, it was a Maasai, his skin covered in red ochre, his hair braided with fat and ochre, falling to his shoulders. He was carrying his long sharp spear and wooden knobkerrie, his long knife in its red leather sheath around his waist. He stopped right in front of the buggy, threw the blunt end of the spear into the ground to lean on, he said, ‘Sorba (hello).' I said ‘Sorba.' He said, ‘Habari (How are things).' I said in Swahili, ‘I can't start my engine.' ‘Ah,' he said and continued in Swahili, ‘let me look.' I lifted the cover off the engine, we both bent over looking into it, like two men anywhere in the world, ‘Ah,' he said again. He pulled his spear out of the ground, turned it around, and carefully threaded the long sharp blade down to a little screw on top of the carburettor. He gave it a small, gentle turn and said, ‘Jarribu (try it).' I turned the key and the engine burst into life.

Without another word, he got into the buggy next to me and pointed with his spear where he wanted to go. After a little while we approached his Manyatta (a collection of rounded huts made of dung). A crowd of little children, all completely naked, poured out of all the huts, screaming with laughter, running to greet us. They were laughing so much they could hardly stand up. As the Moran stood up to get out, the children, still doubled up with laughter, formed an orderly little queue. They moved one by one, towards the Moran, bowed their little heads, while he gently laid the flat of his hand on each one. We shook arms goodbye, and amid gales of laughter, from jumping, waving, naked little black bodies, I sped off into the fast approaching gloom.

I was slightly worried about my reception. Dusk was just beginning to come down. I'd been away quite a long time. I drove into the parking area and up to my chair. I transferred out of the buggy, into the chair and gingerly pushed myself on to the veranda. Everyone was there, merrily chatting away. I got a warm greeting from all the family, and a kiss from My little wife, ‘Hello, hello, have you had a lovely time?' ‘I've had a wonderful time.'

This moment, and its reaction was very significant. It meant I was getting back my independence. No one was trying to take away my independence, but inevitably, I'd become mollycoddled and it was now up to me, to show I could stand on my own two feet, so to speak.

It must have been on this visit to my family in the Valley, we were driving into Nairobi when an incident took place with a traffic policeman. A new flyover had been built over our usual road, to relieve the incredible volume of traffic that had come about since we were last here. I made a stupid mistake and started to come down off the flyover into the oncoming traffic. Very quickly I realised the mistake and backed up, but two or three cars had to weave their way around me. Only a couple of minutes from joining the dual carriageway, a policeman stepped forward with his arm up in the air and the other vigorously waving me to the side. He was furious, ‘What do you think you were doing?' he shouted in his thick Kenyan accent, ‘You could have caused a grave accident,' 'I'm very sorry Officer, you see the last...' ‘No, no, no, no,' he shouted waving his finger in my face.‘Do not make excuses to me', then pointing to his badge on his cap, ‘You have not got a leg to stand on.' I paused and said, ‘Do you know Officer, you're absolutely right.' He stood back and puffed up, ‘So... I am right.' ‘Yes Officer, I'm very sorry, I shall never make that mistake again.' He paused and half shouted, ‘OK, this time I will let you go, but if I ever have to stop you again, I will throw the book at you, now go.' I went.