“We were trying to work up on this lion and this friend of mine climbed up a little rock kopje with his gun bearer to look ahead to see if the lion had showed. The lion was for Mary because he and I had both killed lions. So we didn’t know what the hell had happened when we heard him shoot and then something was down in the dust roaring. It was a leopard and the dust was so deep that it rose solid in a cloud and the leopard kept on roaring and nobody knew which direction he was coming out of the dust. This friend of mine, Mayito, had hit him twice from up above and I had shot into the moving center of the dust and ducked and moved to the right where it was natural he would break out. Then he showed his head up just once out of the dusk, still talking bad and I hit him in the neck and the dust started to settle. It was sort of like a gunfight in the dust outside of an old-time saloon out West. Except the leopard didn’t have any gun but he was close enough to have mauled anyone and he was awfully worked up. The photographer took pictures of Mayito and him and of all of us and him and of me and him. He was Mayito’s because Mayito hit him first and hit him again. So the best picture of him was the one with me and the magazine wanted to use it and I said they couldn’t unless I killed a good leopard alone by myself. And so far I’ve failed three times.”
“I didn’t know the ethics were so rigid.”
“Unfortunately they are. It’s the law too. First blood and continuous pursuit.”
Arap Meina and the Chief Game Scout had brought back the word that the two lionesses and the young lion had killed far up on the edge of the salt flat. The bait had not been uncovered except where hyenas had pulled at it and the two scouts recovered it carefully. There were birds in the trees around it that would surely draw the lion but the birds could not get at the remains of the zebra, which were high enough to draw the lion surely. He had not fed nor killed in the night, and since he was not hungry and had not been disturbed we might, almost surely, find him in the open in the evening.
We had lunch, finally, and Mary was very cheerful and gracious with all of us. I believe she even asked me if I wanted any more of the cold meat. When I said no thank you, that I had enough, she said it would be good for me, that any man who drinks a great deal needs to eat. This was not only a very old truth but had been the basis of an article in the
G.C. said that the Prize was as good as mine and that I ought to win it for bragging alone since Churchill had been awarded it, at least partially, for oratory. G.C. said that he had not followed the Prize awards as closely as he should but that he felt I might well be awarded it for my work in the religious field and for my care of the natives. Miss Mary suggested that if I would try to write something, occasionally, I might win it for writing. This moved me very deeply and I said that once she had the lion I would do nothing but write just to please her. She said that if I wrote even a little it would certainly please her. G.C. asked me if I planned to write something about how mysterious Africa was and that if I planned to write in Swahili he could get me a book on up-country Swahili that might be invaluable to me. Miss Mary said that we already had the book and that she thought even with the book it would be better if I tried to write in English. I suggested that I might copy sections of the book to help me get an up-country style. Miss Mary said I could not write one correct sentence in Swahili nor speak one either and I agreed with her very sadly that this was true.
“Pop speaks it so beautifully and so does G.C. and you are a disgrace. I don’t know how anyone can speak a language as badly as you do.”
I wanted to say that at one time, years before, it had looked as though I were going to speak it quite well. But that I had been a fool not to have stayed on in Africa and instead had gone back to America where I had killed my homesickness for Africa in different ways. Then before I could get back came the Spanish war and I became involved in what was happening to the world and I had stayed with that for better and for worse until I had finally come back. It had not been easy to get back nor to break the chains of responsibility that are built up, seemingly, as lightly as spiderwebs but that hold like steel cables.