by Carl Hancock
‘Mama, Papa is not very far from us here.’
‘So?’ In the five minutes that she had been in that room with her son, her original mild concern about her husband and his whereabouts had curved upwards through fear to the edge of terror. She wanted complete knowledge in a single instant, to be presented with a single huge colourful picture where she would be able to see the beginning and end in front of her.
‘Mama, I have made promises.’
Sally raised her voice in mounting anxiety and anger. ‘Do not speak in riddles. Can’t you see how you are torturing me?’
Reuben lowered his eyes. He summoned what was left of his courage.
‘Papa is very sick. He has been badly hurt.’
‘You mean that he is dead.’
‘No! No!’
‘Tell me.’ The resignation in her voice told him that it was time to give her everything he was capable of. As he spoke she watched him with her hand to her mouth and the sadness of a wounded animal in her eyes.
‘He is with the family of doctors, the people with the garden you like.’
‘I know these people, but if he …’
‘Mama, he has a wound in his back. Yes, in his spine. I was there.’
‘You? It was a gun, I know it. Your father has many enemies. Has someone been arrested yet? But why not in a hospital? Or at home here? And why were you there? It was at the Carnivore?’
‘Naivasha.’
The illumination was instant. ‘The McCalls, they did not say if any of them survived.’
‘No deaths there. It was the Briggs man. He was the one. Mama, I thought we had lost him. A strange woman, a policeman’s wife, she said that there is life. But also much danger. She is over there with him now.’
‘Then I must go there. Now.’
‘But the story must not get out. They said this.’
‘I am going, alone.’
Chapter Four
he night askari at ‘Cartref’ escorted her on foot to the door of the Daniels’ surgery. He led the way with an honest reverence. He recognised this lady. It was the only way he could express his sympathy.
She went in unannounced, the unexpected visitor whose arrival was not a complete surprise. She saw him at once, even before she took in the pleasant coolness and the scented air of the high-beamed room which put her in mind of the Catholic church her mother took her to when she was a child up in North-West District. Abel was lying face down on the raised table, close to the open door. Five white doctors wearing green gowns and masks were standing ‘round him. His three sons and his younger sister were watching David Daniels completely engaged in the delicate job of removing the bullet that was lodged tight between two vertebrae in the lower part of his patient’s back. Sonya Mboya, the only person there that Sally recognised, turned, removed her mask and gave the visitor a warm smile.
‘So your son could not hide the news. This is good. It is right for you to be with him. Please, sit with me. There are chairs on the other side.’
Maria Kabari made no attempt to introduce herself. Sally’s every move was hesitant. She was the child who had entered a strange, new land where all the humans seemed friendly, but where a dark cloud hung down threatening to engulf her at any moment. Maria took her hand and rubbed it gently with her own like a mother bringing back warmth to her child’s chilled fingers.
Sally’s agitation was not helped by her sitting down. ‘Please, being still makes my fear worse. Perhaps if I could walk in the garden. It will give me something else to think of. I know that the garden here is beautiful.’
‘Yes, very beautiful, but there is work for you here.’
Sally turned to look into the face of this stranger. She was comforted by the serenity she found there. The dark eyes and pursed lips combined into an expression of firm confidence.
‘You were the one who helped my husband. Reuben said that, without you …’
The stranger’s face lit up into a smile of pure compassion. She began to sing. The words were in a language new to Sally and she understood instinctively that the lilting melody was something that was reaching out to her from an ancient past. Maria’s gentle nod was an encouragement to Sally to share. The singing paused briefly.
‘Sally, you are a woman of prayer. We can work together.’
The melody began again and paused. ‘He needs you.’
For the first time since entering that room she felt assured enough to look carefully at the raised table that dominated its centre. The back of Abel’s head and his bare shoulders were all that she could comfortably see. They were motionless. Her prayer became fervent. Her voice blended with Maria’s as a background to the work being performed by the five doctors standing above and across from them in that cool place.
David Daniels held out his hand towards Sally Rubai. In the palm, the offending piece of metal gleamed.
‘I am showing you this to prove that this part of the job is done. I must keep it. The police will want to examine it, of course.’
‘Is he going to be all right?’
‘Ah, well, yes. Um, let’s just say that, if everything goes according to plan. He’s a very strong man. Look, his body has suffered a deep trauma …’
‘In other words, you don’t know.’
‘He’ll live. That’s for sure. But actions have consequences.’
‘And what does that mean?’
Sally was on an armchair next to Rebecca in the Daniels’ sitting room. She had reluctantly come away from the surgery, leaving her unconscious husband in the care of Maria Kabari. She found no friendliness in this room. With her mind freed from the most acute of her anxieties, questions began to surface. Who had fired the bullet that had almost killed Abel? What was her husband doing out in Londiani in the middle of the night? Why had he not been taken directly to Nairobi Hospital or the Aga Khan? What were these people trying to hide?
Abel had enemies. She had always accepted that this must be so when a good man who loved his country dearly had to deal with opponents who were out to serve their own ends whatever the cost to the wananchi. He had been lured into a trap. Reuben would have some of the answers about how this had been sprung. What had he seen? How did he escape unharmed?
Abel had many friends. It was time that they found out what was going on. They would have the skills and the connections. She must talk to doctor friends. She would implore them to move Abel from this excuse for a medical centre, which was probably illegal anyway.
She must talk to this Maria, get her to promise to stay with Abel until she could organise proper help. She would pay big money. Abel would have understood what she was up against. She must be as innocent as a dove but as wise as a serpent. She smiled when she recalled that this was just about the only quotation from the Good Book that he approved of. There in that comfortable European style room she was becoming aware of a presence in her and around her, a transformation, a kind of possession by a benevolent force. It revealed itself in several ways.
Her concern for Abel was as strong as ever, but just as strong was a certainty that all would be well with him sooner rather than later. He was being cared for. Her prayer was being answered. ‘My cup runneth over’, the words of King David dropped into her mind as a confirmation. While she was in this place she must contain her excitement. The thoughts and ideas teemed. She was the gold miner who had struck the mother lode. The dam wall was being breached and streams of living water were pouring over her.
When she returned home she would have so many things to do. She was almost afraid to identify the source of this new energy but was ready to be rushed along.
Her first task was to speak to Reuben. Together they would prepare the Rubai counterattack. He knew the facts, she had the contacts. When she was ready, she would call in the people who could help her to put her plans into action. First, though, she must take advantage of the lucky chance. They were no friends of Abel, but they were in this house and she must use them.
* * *
�
�Thomas, Rebecca, I heard the news. The girl said that they did not know about … the people.’
‘We are all safe. We have lost everything. Tell you the truth, it hasn’t hit me yet. We got a bit busy. I can’t say that I spent more than a second or two actually watching the blaze. There’s work to be done. We … what can you say?’
‘Abel?’
Rebecca moved in quickly. She had caught the despair in Thomas’s face at the mention of the name of Mister Big. For the third time in less than a year, his life had been under a mortal threat from a Rubai. He saw the rifle pointing at him not ten metres away, heard the angry scream, felt the thud of pain as his shoulder slammed into the earth. He could not find it in him to tell his truth and let her know that it had been Bertie who had saved his life with a single shot into the body of this woman’s husband.
‘Sally, everything happened so quickly and it was dark out there on the plain.’
‘But why was he there? Reuben, too.’
After a long and painful silence, the best that Tom McCall could manage was a curt, ‘I don’t know.’
* * *
‘I must go out to your surgery again. This Maria has a good heart.’
‘She has many gifts.’ These were the first words that Sonya had spoken to Sally that morning. ‘David will tell you. They were together when my Simon was brought down from Kericho.’ Sonya was ready to go further and risk upsetting Sally. ‘His hands, those healing hands, were mutilated by his killers. I pray that you will be more fortunate. Abel has his life and soon, perhaps, the return of his full health. Sally, you are right, Maria has a good heart.’
Sally left that sitting room in a state of misunderstanding. Her newly rediscovered insight was telling her that there was a conspiracy going on in this Daniels’ house. For whatever reason, envy or plain malice, these people were out to get her husband. But she had seen through them and, with God’s help, they would pay for the harm they were doing.
Over many years Sally Rubai had become accustomed to having her way, to believing that her truth was the truth. Part of this gentle arrogance was a readiness to ignore the uncomfortable signs that would have told her that all was not as well as she wanted to believe, especially when it came to understanding what her husband stood for. He loved her, he spoiled her and he protected her. How could he possibly be a ruthless thug who would stop at nothing to protect his position, for whom killing, wiping out opposition was a ready option?
When the honest, hardworking, creative people whom she had just left showed her compassion by not spelling out for her a much more accurate truth about her husband’s part in the horrors of the night that had just passed, she had conveniently, but by her light, honestly misunderstood.
She returned to the surgery with a relieved mind. The worst of a bad experience was behind her, and Abel. The scented air and the coolness of that room gave her spirits a lift. Abel was safe here.
She joined Maria on the raised platform and was taken aback to see that the woman whom everyone saw as a gifted healer was kneading lavender oil into Abel’s bare shoulders. Sally’s first reaction to this soothing process was one of resentment. This beautiful woman had invaded an intimate privacy without consent. And that strange singing again with the haunting melody did not please her either. But Sally knew that, for now, she must not upset this woman.
‘Soon I shall be meeting a very dear friend who is also the most gifted physician in the country. With his help I will be taking my husband away from this place. Until I return I ask you to stay with Abel.’
‘But, Madam …’
‘You will be rewarded well.’
‘You do not understand. When Rebecca and Tom come for me I am going home. Do not worry about your husband. He will not be left alone and he will be in good hands.’
‘Yes, and I will see to it.’
Chapter Five
hen the wild fig trees are in fruit in the gardens of Karen, flocks of starlings can be seen swooping down to feast on this abundant special treat. When one garden is stripped bare, the birds fly on until their sharp eyes light on a fresh feeding ground. Fields and woodlands are their world. They are indifferent to the ways of humans, so they would have shown no interest in the large lady in the white suit as she crossed below them. She was on her way home. She was walking. Rich, heavily pregnant women, the wives of prominent citizens do not normally behave like this. But Sally Rubai needed to be away from people and houses, even for a few minutes. She had thinking to do.
It was no great distance between the homes of the Daniels and the Rubais. They were next-door but distant neighbours. On another level a large gap separated them. For media people, the events of the night at the farmhouse on the shore of Lake Naivasha were being sorted into a comprehensible shape. An eager audience would devour this version of the truth avidly, though the offering was little more than a competent recital of some of the facts.
Many hundreds of thousands of shillings would have been gladly offered by these same media people for access to the two very different versions of the what and especially the why of these same events.
When Sally arrived home, she found that Reuben was having a shower after spending the morning in bed. She was pleased. The boy would be rested and refreshed, ready for some hard work.
While she waited for Monica to prepare lunch, she sat at the table in the room where she kept her Bible. For the first time that she could remember, she was reluctant to delve into its pages. She did not expect to find help and consolation at this worst of times in her life. Instead of turning to one of her many favourite passages, she sat quietly contemplating the events of the day and her reaction to them. There had been revelations. Her emotions had been deeply stirred. There had been moments of exhilaration followed by others of near despair. But, at the end of this roller-coaster ride for her heart and mind, she had bottomed out.
Her resolve was strong and she saw a clear path stretching before her. Until Abel recovered his powers, she was the family leader. She was ready to cause a few surprises even to herself.
The lunch dishes were not cleared away early that day. For several hours Sally and Reuben had separated themselves from the rest of the household. Reuben had found it a trying experience to be closed off with his re-energised mother while she grilled and pushed him mercilessly.
‘First thing, son. Let’s get the stuff about the fire all straightened out.’
With a little sympathetic massaging of the facts they soon created the Rubai truth on that issue which at first look might have seemed to be loaded down with evidence damning to Abel’s cause. The case would have been presented to the high court judge in these terms.
‘Your Honour, Abel Nathaniel Rubai is a deep lover of his country, a patriot of the highest calibre. Late in the evening of the night in question he received telephone calls advising him that a very serious crime was about to be committed. Londiani Farm and its inhabitants, the McCalls of Naivasha, were the target of the attack. There was no time to alert the police, so Abel took it upon himself, in company of his son, Reuben, to race up to Naivasha. (He made the difficult decision not to alert and so trouble the McCall family, just in case it was a false alarm.) On arrival at the lakeside property, they found that all was quiet. They waited and watched for an hour or more but, just when they were on the point of moving away, the now famous explosion shattered the peace. As we all know, that outrage is being investigated by the relevant authorities and forms no part of this brief.
‘We have arrived at the heart of the matter. Abel Rubai was cruelly rewarded for his effort to be of service to his fellow citizens. An attempt was made on his life. He received a gunshot wound in his lower back that almost killed him.
We confidently trust that proceedings will soon begin to deal with this matter. There is a defendant and we hope that he will soon appear before yourself or another of your esteemed colleagues to answer a charge.’
On the other side of the murram road, the Daniels family and their guests were
in low spirits. Out in the surgery Rhys Daniels, the youngest of the three doctor brothers, was taking his stint at keeping an eye on their wounded patient. They were expecting that before nightfall an ambulance would come to take Rubai away to a ‘proper hospital’.
In Cartref no story was being concocted about the events of the night. They had the would-be murderer with them. Just as, ten days before, Abel Rubai had not set the charges down on the farm to cause fires and kill forty-five young workers, so now he had paid someone else to do his work.
‘No doubt, when he comes ‘round and returns to his old self, he will open his arms and say ‘Who, me?’ and give us the old bilge, ‘Prove it, then!’ The trouble is that the courts will believe him. And think about this. Who put the bullet in his back? We know and we know why. But, ditto the above! Pretty serious stuff.’
‘Thomas, there is no Londiani any more. What will happen?’
‘I know that we are insured. I also know that there are a few broken hearts back there. This could kill Rafaella.’
‘You are wrong, Thomas. She is stronger than any of us.’
‘Yeah, right, ‘Becca. I think our best hope is Paul. He understands how the law works in this country. More important, how it doesn’t work! Maria, do you think he would mind if we called in on him in Langata on the way home?’
‘No. Comes in handy sometimes to have a lawyer for a brother!’
Sonya was the only one in the room who was crying. ‘I have a very ungodly thought in my mind. How easy to go out into the garden with this cushion in my hands. How long would it take? Two minutes? A kind of justice? I think so.’ A smile broke through. ‘Trouble is, just as I was beginning to press down, I’d see Simon fluttering his eyes with that disapproving look on his face. Simon! Simon! God, how could you let such a thing happen to our boys?’
