by Karen Rispin
I felt weird, too. It would have been better if Mrs. Geisler had said right out, "Your brother drinks!" Instead, it was like everyone was keeping a secret.
People talked. Rick even told some funny stories about vet school. It felt like a play, all fake. The Geislers went back to the buffet for dessert, and I followed them. As I came up behind them, I heard Mr. Geisler say, "His being here will hurt their witness for God. They can't possibly stay as—"
Mrs. Geisler poked him. He stopped talking in the middle of the sentence.
Until she poked him, I wasn't paying attention to what he said. Now I wondered if he was talking about Mom and Daddy. I sucked in my breath and tried to pretend I hadn't heard. Not stay as what? I wondered. My stomach went tight from worry. I didn't even feel like eating dessert, and it was trifle, my favorite.
We went out to the terrace after lunch. We could see the water hole where animals come to drink. After a fancy meal the British have cheese and biscuits. We ate ours out on the terrace. The biscuits are really crackers, and there were five or six different kinds of cheese. It was fun to cut off some cheese with the elegant silver knife.
Sandy flipped a cracker onto the low wall at the edge of the terrace, and an agama lizard with a bright-red head grabbed it. Three other lizards chased him. I took a bite of cheese and leaned back to watch. The cheese was smooth and tangy on my tongue. I ate a cracker slowly and wondered. Should I worry about what I'd heard the Geislers say?
I squinted out into the sunshine. There wasn't much moving by the water hole. I could see a herd of zebras. They were quite far away under the edge of the trees. Two tall marabou storks stood still near the water. Each was balanced on one long, light grey leg. Their black backs and white fronts made them look like ratty old men in tuxedos. They are scavengers. That means they eat dead things. Other times I'd seen them pulling off scraps of meat with their big pick-shaped beaks. Swallows were darting out over the water and around the lodge.
Suddenly one of the marabou storks snapped at a swallow that had come right by its head. The stork caught the swallow! The swallow's wings showed for a second, sticking out of the bigger bird's beak. Then the stork threw its head back and gulped at the swallow. It had to do it five times before it had the little bird completely down.
Rick swore and said, "Did you see that? That gooney bird just ate a swallow"
He turned to look at us with his eyebrows high on his forehead.
"It did!" Sandy blurted. "It did! I saw it too."
I glanced uneasily at the Geislers, hoping they hadn't noticed Rick's swearing. One look told me they had. Mr. Geisler looked blank instead of friendly. Mrs. Geisler was looking down at her hands.
The Geislers left right after lunch. Since they were staying at Tsavo too, Mom had invited them over for breakfast tomorrow. Now I wondered if they'd come. They had seemed so nice.
After lunch we got in the car and drove toward Mzima Springs. Three Land Rovers passed us going really fast. Dust from the Land Rovers covered our car. When they went by us, I saw African men in the back of the Land Rovers. They had on green camouflage uniforms. Rifles stuck out of the back.
"Is there a war? Those men looked like the army to me," Rick asked, coughing at the dust.
"Not that I know of. It's probably just a small war." Daddy said.
"Kevin! Don't tease," Mom said, sounding irritated. "That was a poaching control unit."
"It looked military to me," Rick said insistently.
"It is, in a way. The units are trained like army units. They have to be to make any difference."
"Why?" Sandy asked.
"It's this way," Daddy explained. "Elephant tusks are worth a lot of money. At some point, people started looking at elephants as if they were walking treasure chests. Poor people, poor governments, and greedy politicians started killing the elephants. Even underpaid park rangers got involved in the killing. There are only one-tenth the number of elephants in Kenya now that there were in 1970."
Rick was nodding emphatically. "I've read about it. African elephants are on the endangered species list now. I remember reading that Kenya was doing something about it. So that military-looking bunch are an antipoaching unit. Good!"
"Why did the government change their mind?" Sandy asked. "Was it because they were afraid the tourists wouldn't come anymore?"
"That's right," Daddy said. "They needed the money from tourism. Besides that, countries that give Kenya money said they wouldn't help anymore unless the Kenyan government made the poaching stop."
"So they made the antipoaching units!" I said triumphantly. "Now the elephants are safe."
"Not always," Mom said. "Their tusks are still worth a lot of money. And there are plenty of places in the bush for the poachers to hide."
"Well, I hope they shoot all the poachers!" I said fiercely.
"Anika!" Mom said, but Rick was laughing.
"My bloodthirsty kid sister," he said, still chuckling. "I like elephants better than poachers too. I bet there wasn't much poaching here until you Christians came. Christianity tells people that they are boss of everything. Then they kill and take whatever they want."
My mouth dropped open. He was trying to blame everything on Christians!
Dad was talking, saying, "You sound very set against Christianity."
"See," Rick explained, "I'm really into the environment. That's why I'm in vet school. I don't want to work with tame animals that people rule. I want to work with the wild ones. For me it's like my religion. I want to be one with the trees and creatures. That's healthy. Christianity is different. It has a father-figure God who is a bossy ruler. It's the paternalistic religions with a domineering god that have let people wreck things. It's Christianity that told men to subdue the earth and dominate it. Before that, people lived as part of the whole, in harmony with nature."
I frowned in confusion. What did he mean? Half of the words didn't make sense to me. But I could tell that Rick had a different religion from ours. Besides, he thought Christianity was bad. I wanted to yell that he was wrong, but it was so confusing. I tried to shove the whole mess out of my head.
We'd been bumping down the road to Mzima Springs while we talked, and suddenly we were there.
The sun poured over me like warm syrup when I got out of the car. It was so strong it felt as if it had weight. I tipped my chin up and let it shine on my face. It laid warm fingers on my shut eyes. Sunshine always made me feel better inside.
Opening my eyes, I looked around. I could see doum palms with their fan-shaped leaves. Big, yellow-barked fever trees lifted their flat tops into the air. Quiet, dry, hot sky stretched out over the land. Signs on the path said proceed at your own risk. I guess they meant if we got bit by a crocodile, it was our own fault.
"Let's go to the tank! I want to see the fish!" Sandy said. She was hopping up and down at the edge of the path.
A group of little brown-grey vervet monkeys were in a tree by the path. We stopped to watch them. Two little kid monkeys were wrestling. They were the same size as miniature poodles. One let go and ran up a branch. The other chased it right out to the feathery leaves on the tip of the branch. A mother monkey had a tiny baby hugged to her tummy. It had a wrinkled face smaller than a walnut. A bigger monkey was sitting up like a man near the base of the tree. He looked bored and bossy.
"Hey, look," Rick said, laughing. "That monkey has bright blue—" He stopped and looked back at me and Sandy. Then he grinned and said, "Never mind. Anyway, I've got to get a picture of this."
Daddy frowned, and I giggled.
Sandy kicked me and whispered, "It's not funny. That was a gross thing to say!"
Mom glared at me, too. I managed to stop giggling for a few minutes, but every time I thought of what Rick said, I started again. Rick was really confusing me. I guess I'd always thought non-Christians were rotten people, or at least mixed-up like my cousin Tianna and her family. Rick didn't seem like that. He talked like Christians were the bad guys.
"Come on!" Sandy said, trying to make us hurry. "Come on, Rick! I'll show you the tank. It's awesome!"
On the way there we saw hippos on the far side of the water. All we could really see were little dark bumps on the water. The bumps were hippo eyes, noses, and ears.
"Whoosh!" Another hippo came up with a steamy snort. I could see it flip its ears to shake the water out. It floated with just its eyes, nose, and ears out like the others. One of the other hippos sank under the water. The heavy, green bush smelled of mud. We walked down to the tank.
The tank is a big box set down into the water. It has fingerprint-smeared glass on three sides and a bench in the back. Looking out into the water was like seeing into another world. A strange, clear, underwater room stretched out across the mud in front of us. Light flashed off the silver sides of barbel fish half as long as my arm. I looked far out to where the details blurred into a soft bluish fog. I couldn't see the hippos.
"Is the water ever clear!" Rick said.
"It comes underground down a lava tube all the way from the Chyulu Hills." Daddy said in his tour-guide voice.
"Once we saw a hippo underwater right by the tank." Sandy cut in excitedly. "It was the best! There was this huge animal sort of half swimming, half walking. Was it ever big. You know they are really dangerous. They bite people in half."
Rick looked at her with one black eyebrow up.
"They do!" Sandy insisted. "If you get in their way when they are walking at night they bite you in half!"
I cringed, wishing that Sandy would quit talking so much. Rick didn't seem to mind, though.
"Right in half?" he asked, laughing.
"Well, dead, anyway. Their teeth are this big." She held out her hands about a yard apart. "And they poke clear through you. It's true. Right, Dad?"
Daddy nodded and said, "Hippos are unpredictable. I wouldn't walk here at night while they are out of the water grazing."
"I don't care!" I said. "I think hippos are neat! I mean, they're so weird with their huge, flat, grass-mowing lips. I like the way they open their enormous mouths at each other when they play-fight."
"I'm not saying hippos are bad," Daddy said. "I don't think Sandy was either. God made them the way he wanted them. We just need to respect them to stay out of trouble."
Rick was watching Daddy with a puzzled look on his face. He suddenly asked, "And shoot them if they inconvenience you?"
"Some would look at it that way," Daddy said mildly.
"Not me!" I blurted, glaring at Daddy. He was going to make Rick think Christians really were bad guys.
Rick and Daddy both laughed, and we headed back for the car.
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Chapter Three
Before dark we looked for the lions we'd seen sleeping. We looked again the next morning. We wanted to see them hunt. We never did find the lions, but something even better happened. Before breakfast we actually saw a leopard.
Mom was sitting in the front seat. Sandy volunteered to sit in the middle so that Rick could have a window in back. She was being so sweetsy-nice it made my teeth ache.
"There!" Mom suddenly said in a high, excited voice. "Kop, Stevin! Kop!"
Dad put on the brakes. "OK, I'm kopped now," he said, chuckling. "What is it?"
"It's a leopard! I just happened to glance up. There is a leopard in that acacia tree! I saw him go up the trunk!"
The car jerked as Daddy drove backwards. A second later we were under the tree, looking up. It was a leopard. He was standing on a branch, staring at us with savage, green eyes. There were patches of gold, early-morning sun across the tree branches. The leopard matched his background. The spots on his tawny hide made him blend in so much he was almost invisible.
Something sharp jabbed me in the ribs. "Ow! Sandy, back off," I hissed. Her hair was right in my face.
"But I can't see," she wailed. "Move over and give me room."
"Shhh!" Mom whispered. "Be still! You'll bother the leopard."
I scootched over and looked up at the leopard. For a second I couldn't find it. My eyes frantically searched the tree. "Hey, look!" I blurted. Then I remembered to be quiet. "He's got a kill!" I whispered. "It's the first wild leopard I've ever seen, and he's got a kill. See, it's where the branch he's on touches the trunk."
"Where?" Rick said. I looked over at him. He was leaning down toward my side of the car. He needed to look up out of my window to see the leopard.
"Move, Sandy," I said. "Give Rick a chance to look." Both of us ducked back and scootched down. Sandy, Rick, and I ended up stacked three-deep in front of the window. "The kill is there, right by the tree trunk." I whispered. "You can see a leg hanging down. I think maybe it's a wildebeest."
"Oh yeah! Awesome!" Rick whispered. Rick seemed huge and strange that close to us. I could hear him breathing.
We all held still, watching. The car door felt cool and dusty on my cheek. The leopard took two steps toward us along the branch and hissed. He paused, then sat down, staring at us. That leopard was the most beautiful animal I'd ever seen.
"You want to pet that one?" Daddy asked quietly. He was teasing Mom because she'd said she wanted to pet the lions.
"No… I don't think so," Mom said thoughtfully. "There's something menacing about its eyes. It reminds me of Blake's poem about the tiger: 'Tiger, tiger burning bright in the forests of the night. What immortal hand or eye dare frame thy fearful symmetry.'"
"Praise him for what he has made," Daddy answered softly.
The leopard was nervous with us so near his kill. His tail twitched. He licked his back. Then he stretched and glared at us. Suddenly he paced down the branch and took a good grip on his kill. Then he yanked it out of the crotch of the tree. He turned and carefully backed down the tree. His shoulder and neck muscles slid under his sleek hide. On the ground he took a better grip of the kill. It was a wildebeest. You could tell it was heavy, but he trotted off quickly, dragging it between his front legs. His black ears were flat against his skull.
Everybody was quiet on the drive back to camp. It was like the leopard had hypnotized us. Just before we got there, Rick leaned forward to Mom and Daddy and said, "Your attitude toward animals puzzles me."
"Not what you expected?" Daddy asked.
"Do you believe differently than other Christians?" he asked. "You don't seem to think of animals as objects for people to do with as they like—or do you?"
"Killing the animals isn't Christians' fault," I interrupted. "Tell him!"
There was a long pause. Why didn't they answer? Was it because it was Christians' fault? I frowned. It couldn't be.
"Tell him!" I insisted again.
"It has to do with taking half the truth and not the whole of it," Mom said.
"Huh?" I asked, but we were pulling up behind our cabin, and the conversation stopped.
The Geislers did come to breakfast. They laughed and talked. Mr. Geisler's reddish blond mustache spread out across his face in the funniest way when he laughed. Still, things didn't feel right. I watched them, wondering.
"Tell them," Mrs. Geisler mouthed silently at her husband. I guess she thought nobody was looking at her.
He shook his head and mouthed, "Later."
Just then I saw a marabou stork walking in front of our cabin. It was inside the circle of white stones where you're allowed to walk. I got up and went toward it. The Geislers were making me nervous. Trying to see the stork close up was an excuse to get away from them.
Slowly and carefully, I walked up to the stork. It watched me. I got closer and closer. I could see its round yellow eyes. There were tiny black hairs sticking out of the bare red wrinkles on its neck. I took another step. It jerked its head and took off. Its huge black wings blew air across my face. The wind blew something across the ground by my foot. I jerked my foot back. It was one of those huge black ants that sting. My foot jerking made the ant fall into an antlion hole. I squatted down to watch.
My head was full of confused ideas as I watc
hed the ant. What Rick had said about Christians and animals really confused me. Mom's answer hadn't helped at all. Besides, what was with the Geislers?
The ant was struggling to climb out of the cone-shaped antlion hole. Its black legs scrambled in the soft, dusty sides. I couldn't see the antlion. It was under the dust. But I could see what it was doing. It was flicking dirt onto the ant to make the ant lose its grip. See, if the ant lost its grip and slid to the bottom of the hole, the antlion would grab it and eat it. It didn't work, though. This ant was too big. It could reach to the top of the hole. The ant's front legs got a grip on a piece of grass. It pulled itself out and got away.
I felt with my finger in the bottom of the hole. My finger touched the round body of the antlion. I pinched him gently and picked him up. He was light brown and a little smaller than a grain of rice. He had big pincers. I dropped him. He dug a new hole by flicking the dust up with his head and backing in circles.
I smiled. God made such weird and neat things. I thought about Rick saying that he liked nature. It wouldn't be the same without knowing God. I could practically feel God smile at me. "Help Rick get to know you too," I prayed quietly.
I looked down at the antlion hole. I'd made that antlion do a whole lot of work just so I could watch him. Sort of to try and pay him, I found a smaller ant that didn't sting and dropped it into his hole. It scrambled frantically while the antlion flicked dirt at it. The antlion caught the ant in his pincers. He was dragging it under the dust when I heard Mom calling.
"Where on earth have you been?" Mom asked. "You knew we had to pack up and go right after breakfast. I don't know where you heave your lead sometimes!"
I giggled.
"Leave your head," Mom said carefully, correcting herself, then smiled. "The same place I leave mine, I guess. Get in there and get packed up!" She took a playful swat at me as I went through the door into Sandy's and my room.
"You have to do dishes tonight!" Sandy said as soon as I walked into the room. "I had to do breakfast dishes all by myself because of you."
