We had some tea and I took a Campari and Gordon’s with a splash of soda.
“This exotic life is charming,” Willie said. “I wish I could join in it. What does that stuff taste like, Miss Mary?”
“It’s very good, Willie.”
“I’ll save it for my old age. Tell me, Miss Mary, have you ever seen Papa turn into a snake?”
“No, Willie. I promise.”
“We miss everything,” Willie said. “Where would you like to fly, Miss Mary?”
“The Chulus.”
So we flew to the Chulus going by Lion Hill and crossing Miss Mary’s private desert and then down over the great swampy plain with the marsh birds and the ducks flying and all the treacherous places that made that plain impassable clearly revealed so that Ngui and I could see all of our mistakes and plan a new and different route. Then we were over the herds of eland on the far plain, dove colored, white striped and spiral horned, the bulls heavy with their awkward grace, breaking away from the cows that are the antelope cast in the form of cattle.
“I hope it wasn’t too dull, Miss Mary,” Willie said. “I was trying not to disturb any of G.C.’s and Papa’s stock. Only to see where it was. I didn’t want to frighten any creatures away from here or disturb your lion.”
“It was lovely, Willie.”
Then Willie was gone, first coming down the truck path at us bouncing into a roar as the widespread crane-like legs came joggling closer to clear the grass where we stood and then rising into an angle that creased your heart to take his course as he diminished in the afternoon light.
“Thank you for taking me,” Mary said, as we watched Willie until the plane could no longer be seen. “Let’s just go now and be good lovers and friends and love Africa because it is. I love it more than anything.”
“So do I.”
In the night we lay together in the big cot with the fire outside and the lantern I had hung on the tree making it light enough to shoot. Mary was not worried but I was. There were so many trip wires and booby snares around the tent that it was like being in a spiderweb. We lay close together and she said, “Wasn’t it lovely in the plane?”
“Yes. Willie flies so gently. He’s so thoughtful about the game too.”
“But he frightened me when he took off.”
“He was just proud of what she can do and remember he didn’t have any load.”
“We forgot to give him the meat.”
“No. Mthuka brought it.”
“I hope it will be good this time. He must have a lovely wife because he’s so happy and kind. When people have a bad wife it shows in them quicker than anything.”
“What about a bad husband?”
“It shows too. But sometimes much slower because women are braver and more loyal. Blessed Big Kitten, will we have a sort of normal day tomorrow and not all these mysterious and bad things?”
“What’s a normal day?” I asked watching the firelight and the unflickering light from the lantern.
“Oh, the lion.”
“The good kind normal lion. I wonder where he is tonight.”
“Let’s go to sleep and hope he’s happy the way we are.”
“You know he never struck me as the really happy type.”
Then she was really asleep and breathing softly and I bent my pillow over to make it hard and double so I could have a better view out of the open door of the tent. The night noises all were normal and I knew there were no people about. After a while Mary would need more room to sleep truly comfortably and would get up without waking and go over to her own cot where the bed was turned down and ready under the mosquito netting and when I knew that she was sleeping well I would go out with a sweater and mosquito boots in a heavy dressing gown and build up the fire and sit by the fire and stay awake.
There were all the technical problems. But the fire and the night and the stars made them seem small. I was worried though about some things and to not think about them I went to the dining tent and poured a quarter of a glass of whisky and put water in it and brought it back to the fire. Then having a drink by the fire I was lonesome for Pop because we had sat by so many fires together and I wished we were together and he could tell me about things. There was enough stuff in camp to make it well worth a full-scale raid and G.C. and I were both sure that there were many Mau Mau in Laitokitok and the area. He had signaled them more than two months before only to be informed that it was nonsense. I believed Ngui that the Wakamba Mau Mau were not coming our way. But I thought they were the least of our problems. It was clear that the Mau Mau had missionaries among the Masai and were organizing the Kikuyu that worked in the timber-cutting operations on Kilimanjaro. But whether there was any fighting organization we would not know. I had no police authority and was only the acting Game Ranger and I was quite sure, perhaps wrongly, that I would have very little backing if I got into trouble. It was like being deputized to form a posse in the West in the old days.