It was generally understood that I was married to Miss Marlene who on this safari, through photographs I had received and letters, was supposed to be working for me in a small amusement Shamba I owned called Las Vegas. They all knew Miss Marlene as the author of “Lili Marlene” and many people thought that she was Lili Marlene and we had all heard her on our first safari many times singing a song called “Jonny” on the old crank-up phonograph when
This is the material from which legends are built and the fact that one of my wives was supposed to be Lili Marlene was no deterrent to the religion. I had taught Debba to say, “Vámonos a Las Vegas,” and she loved the sound of it almost as much as, “No hay remedio.” But she was always afraid of Miss Marlene although she had a large picture of her wearing what looked to me like nothing on the wall above her bed along with advertisements for the washing machine and garbage disposal units and the two-inch steaks and cuts of ham and the paintings of the mammoth, the little four-toed horse and the saber-toothed tiger that she had cut from
Because I was awake now and I was not sure that I would ever sleep again, I thought about Debba and Miss Marlene and Miss Mary and another girl that I knew and, at that time, loved very much. She was a rangy-built American girl running to shoulders and with the usually American pneumatic bliss that is so admired by those who do not know a small, hard, well-formed breast is better. But this girl had good Negro legs and was very loving although always complaining about something. She was pleasant enough to think about at night though when you could not sleep and I listened to the night and thought about her a little and the cabin and Key West and the lodge and the different gambling places we used to frequent and the sharp cold mornings of the hunts we had made together with the wind rushing by in the dark and the taste of the air of the mountains and the smell of sage back in the days when she cared for hunting other things than money. No man is ever really alone and the supposed dark hours of the soul when it is always three o’clock in the morning are a man’s best hours if he is not an alcoholic nor afraid of the night and what the day will bring. I was as afraid as the next man in my time and maybe more so. But with the years, fear had come to be regarded as a form of stupidity to be classed with overdrafts, acquiring a venereal disease or eating candies. Fear is a child’s vice and while I loved to feel it approach, as one does with any vice, it was not for grown men and the only thing to be afraid of was the presence of true and imminent danger in a form that you should be aware of and not be a fool if you were responsible for others. This was the mechanical fear that made your scalp prickle at real danger and when you lost this reaction it was time to get into some other line of work.
So I thought of Miss Mary and how brave she had been in the ninety-six days she had pursued her lion, not tall enough to see him properly ever; doing a new thing with imperfect knowledge and unsuitable tools; driving us all with her will so we would all be up an hour before daylight and sick of lions, especially at Magadi, and Charo, loyal and faithful to Miss Mary but an old man and tired of lions, had said to me, “Bwana kill the lion and get it over with. No woman ever kills a lion.”
IT WAS A BEAUTIFUL day for flying and the Mountain was very close. I sat against the tree and watched the birds and the grazing game. Ngui came over for orders and I told him he and Charo should clean and oil all the weapons and sharpen and oil the spears. Keiti and Mwindi were removing the broken bed and taking it to Bwana Mouse’s empty tent. I got up to go over. It was not badly broken. One cross leg in the center had a long fracture and one of the main poles that held the canvas was broken. It was easily repairable and I said I would get some wood and have it sawed to measure and finished at Mr. Singh’s.