by Robert Edric
He asked the owner of the boat how long the animal had been trussed and caged. The man shrugged and said he had acquired it already bound from a collector at Ankoro. Fletcher asked him where it was going, but the man knew only as far as Port Elys on the coast.
‘I’d shoot it in the head here and now,’ Fletcher said to me. ‘Except then I’d have to pay him for it.’
The animal had fixed its eye on me, though I doubt if it saw much through its fear and suffering.
The Arab overheard Fletcher’s remark about shooting the giraffe, and seeing that we had satisfied our curiosity, he hurriedly began pulling the cover back over the cage. He called for help from the watching men below and several leaped aboard to assist him.
‘Do you want to see what’s in the other boats?’ I asked Fletcher.
‘Nothing as valuable as this,’ he said.
We waited until the giraffe was once again covered and Fletcher told the Arab to go, to untie his mooring ropes and take his chances with the faster water downriver. At first I thought this was a prelude to increasing the man’s bribe, but Fletcher made his intentions clear by leaving the vessel and starting to untie the ropes himself.
Minutes later the boat and its attendant canoes were pulled away from us, slowly at first, then ever faster, half turning in the middle current until its steam was raised and its paddle turned fast enough to correct its course. We watched the smaller vessels rise and fall behind it on the swifter water, and heard the muffled cacophony of screams and cries to which this increasing motion gave rise.
10
I next encountered Klein on his knees in the garrison yard. I had gone to the gaol early, hoping to see Frere alone. I had with me the journals he had asked for, and several of my charts – those mapping out the further reaches of our immediate influence – in the hope that I might finally start piecing together his journey away from us. I wanted to start making sense of what had happened to him during his absence, to better understand his reasons for leaving us.
The priest was praying aloud, and I heard his voice as I entered the yard. Bone and his men sat at the garrison door and watched him, deriving a great deal of amusement from what they saw. Occasionally, one or other of the men would say something and they would all burst into laughter. Klein seemed unaffected by this. Perpetua and Felicity knelt on either side of him, and a group of twenty or thirty women who had accompanied him from Kirasi knelt in a group behind him.
I went to Bone before approaching the gaol. Klein had looked up at my arrival, watched me briefly and then resumed his prayers. Bone told one of his men to fetch a chair for me, and then told me to sit beside him.
‘How long has he been here?’ I asked him.
‘Here before dawn. Three hours this racket’s been going on. Him and the two black-and-white crows, they been here all that time. The others come and go. It’s like he’s got them working a rota. Two stand up to leave and two more appear to join in the fun.’
‘They been swapping clothes,’ the man who fetched my chair said.
‘What?’
‘Over there,’ Bone said. He indicated where a narrow gate led into the surrounding trees. ‘The ones who come turn up half naked and the ones who go give them their clothes. Some nice-looking ones among the recent arrivals.’
The men around me nodded vigorously at this. Some sat and stared in silent, hopeful anticipation at what this nakedness still suggested to them.
Bone wiped a hand across his mouth. ‘Some real lookers.’
I studied the group of women. Most were young, some barely out of childhood. They were the women Klein held the greatest sway over. Some were as black as our local Manyema, but others were octaroons with fuller limbs and creamier complexions, and several among them looked almost white at that distance. It was these women Bone and his men watched the closest. Occasionally, one or other of those kneeling at the rear of the group turned her head to look at us. There was something suggestive in the way they did this, all the time keeping their hands tightly clasped, as though this alone would betray them to Klein. I watched as two women, both paler than most, rose and quietly walked away from the worshippers.
‘See,’ Bone said, and he pointed to where two others had come to take their place. These women stood by the narrow entrance inside the yard. Both wore short blouses and cloths tied at their loins. One of them pointed to where we sat and whispered to the other. They came towards the departing women, who took off their skirts and handed them over. There was nothing secretive or furtive about the exchange, and for several moments all four women stood near-naked in view of the watching men.
‘How long does he intend keeping this up?’ I said, hoping to divert attention away from the women, but no-one answered me.
Bone eventually said, ‘Who cares?’
Frere, I thought, but said nothing.
The two new arrivals then walked past us to join the others. They glanced at us as they went, and one of them gave a shy wave.
‘It’s you she’s after,’ one of the men said to me. I felt myself blush at the suggestion and the man saw this and laughed. He made some further remark. The girl who had waved paused for a moment and looked at me. She lifted a hand to her chest and brushed something from her blouse. This display was much appreciated. And then her companion tugged at her sleeve and the two of them continued towards Klein. I expected the girl might look back at me before kneeling and beginning her praying, but she did not.
‘You should have beckoned her over,’ Bone said. ‘She’d have come, that one. Been round here a lot the past few days.’
I could tolerate this no longer – not so much the men’s behaviour or their remarks, for I would have expected nothing more in the presence of the women, but the fact that they included me among their number, the fact that I was obliged to share in and prolong their pleasure.
Ensuring that my charts were well fastened and revealed nothing of their contents, I rose and went to the worshippers. I made a point of walking in a wide circle around them until I stood directly in front of Klein. His own clasped hands were pressed into his eyes, his head bowed, but I knew that he had seen me. My shadow lay in a line towards him, and I moved forward several paces until it touched his knees. On either side of him, Perpetua and Felicity kept their heads bowed, but further back, many among the worshippers looked up at me while intoning their words. I stood without speaking for several minutes while this continued.
Klein had attached himself to me for most of the journey from Kirasi, while Cornelius, Perpetua and Felicity had walked ahead of us. On several occasions I had suggested joining them, but Klein had resisted this, saying that he enjoyed talking with me, and bemoaning the fact that it had been several months since he had been able to have such a discussion over a variety of shared interests. He was an impermeable conversationalist, asking my views only as a primer for delivering his own, and expressing these in a manner which made it clear to me that I might now, having listened to him, wish to reconsider my own opinions. He made several derogatory remarks concerning Cornelius and asked me questions about the man I did my best not to answer. He called frequently for one of his attendants to bring him drink. He grew intoxicated as we walked, though swore to me that he was drinking only a tonic for his blood. I quickly tired of him, and wondered if this was another reason why Cornelius had asked me to accompany him to the mission.
I put this to Cornelius later that same night and he said, ‘Of course,’ and poured me another glass of his brandy. I asked him what he had talked about with Perpetua and Felicity and he became evasive. I knew he had discussed more than his own lost ‘wife’ and daughter, but we were both exhausted by our day’s journey and it was beyond me to pursue the matter.
Upon our arrival at the Station, Klein and his congregation took up residence in the chapel, and he announced that he would hold a service there that same night. None of us took him up on the offer, though he gathered a sizeable flock from our boatmen, loaders and porters, most of whom went
, as they often went to these gatherings, more out of a sense of curiosity than commitment. Some went because they had once been at Kirasi, and some went for word of their relatives who had been there. These men and women led such uncertain, fractured lives in our employ, and Klein’s service appealed to them as a beacon might appeal to a mariner. Those of us who did not attend could not help but hear the prayers and hymns aimed directly at us through the darkness.
I stood before him now and waited. He made a great play of finishing his prayer, of soliciting its responses and then of concluding it. Eventually, he fell silent, and this silence spread outwards across the yard. I heard the muted applause of Bone and his men.
‘A pity they cannot learn to appreciate more what we are attempting here,’ Klein said, his hands still clasped, his eyes still firmly closed.
‘Is that why you came?’
‘You know why we came. We have business across the river.’
‘Then why not do all this there?’
‘We are still in possession of the chapel, still caretakers of the Lord’s house here.’ He smiled as he said this, lowered his hands and opened his eyes. I expected him to rise, but he remained on the ground, and I saw what an advantage this gave him over me.
‘I doubt he’ll thank you for it,’ I said, indicating the gaol behind me.
‘It is not his thanks we seek.’
‘Frere holds firm opinions concerning the nature, even the existence of all you hold so dear,’ I said, only then realizing that Frere might be overhearing everything that was being said.
‘He may have forsaken the Lord, but he will soon enough be remembered by the Lord.’
There was something reassuring in the glibness and the predictability of this answer.
‘Remembered?’
‘We are all His children. We will all one day be remembered by Him.’
‘You seem very certain of that.’
‘Certain that Frere will be remembered? Or that he will be remembered sooner than most?’ His smile narrowed and he looked up at me, his gaze unflinching in the full glare of the sun, able to see clearly and directly that which I was still reluctant to even glimpse.
‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Your own conviction wavers. You yourself would not deny all that he denies.’
‘Is that why you’re here – the saved soul of the redeemed sinner? Is everyone beyond your own obedient flock already lost to you?’
Perpetua and Felicity looked up at my words, and I wished there was some way I might signal my apology to them. Behind them, many of the other worshippers were growing restless now that they were no longer unified in their worship. Klein saw this and he turned to look at them, causing them all to fall silent and to bow their heads.
‘He’ll be in there laughing at you,’ I said.
‘Oh, I don’t doubt it. But our perseverance may yet give him cause to reconsider. Who knows, he may even wish to repent.’
‘Like Cornelius repented when you banished the mother of his child?’
He shrugged at this. ‘She was what she was. Only he refused to see that.’ He then clicked his fingers and Perpetua and Felicity came forward to help him to his feet. They brushed the dirt from his clothes, beginning with his shoulders and moving down to his feet. He took no real satisfaction in the attention of the two women, only that I was there to watch them attend so willingly to his silent bidding.
‘I am a child to their devotion,’ he said to me as the women straightened his jacket and wiped the dust from his legs. He signalled again to them and they stopped this work and withdrew, one to each side of him, a proscribed distance, each handmaiden facing straight ahead, her arms by her side.
‘You’ve trained them well,’ I said. I knew that soon two others might be picked from his congregation and the surplices handed over. Perhaps some among the crowd had already played the role and knew better than most how they were being used by the man.
‘Have you been in to see him?’ I said to Klein.
‘I have no desire to see him. He is a murderer. He murdered a child. A murderer. A child killer.’ He paused. ‘And possibly worse. If you cannot see these things, then it is well that others are looking on your behalf. What brilliant light does that man give off that you are so blinded by it? Oh, but then perhaps you alone are blinded by it because of your connection to him. Perhaps that is nearer the truth.’ He went on before I could answer him, his speech of veiled suggestion and condemnation well prepared. ‘No, I have not been inside to see him and nor shall I. What is there to discover that I do not already know? Any good I may do, I can do from where I stand.’
I doubt I had felt contempt for any man as I felt it then for that priest.
He turned away from me and held up his hands. He thanked everyone for what they had done. He thanked the Lord for allowing them to be there, and for them to have been guided by His goodness.
‘What now?’ I asked him.
‘Now? Now you and he shall sit together for an hour, and he, in all likelihood, will tell you none of what you came hoping to hear, and to avoid that awkward silence and all it implies concerning your friendship you will fill his head with talk of your tedious life here and of his coming inquisition. You will no doubt share a joke and laughter about my own presence here, just as those others –’ he motioned without turning to where Bone and his men still sat ‘ – make their own lascivious remarks about my congregation. And then, at the end of your long hour together, having achieved nothing, you will be happy to leave him and he will be even happier to see you go. And no doubt this charade will continue until he confesses everything to you – because, oh yes, that is the role you imagine you have cast yourself in – or until you and he face the truth together and forsake each other for good. There, is that sufficient of an answer for you? What now? What now? Was there ever anything said so useless?’
And with that he turned and left me, snapping his fingers for Perpetua and Felicity to accompany him.
Passing Bone and the others, he called for his congregation to avert their eyes from the soldiers, which most did immediately. He then turned to the garrison and held his Bible towards the men there while the women behind him passed out of the yard and into the trees beyond.
11
I opened one of my tin trunks this morning to find that it had been invaded by white ants and that much of what had been stored inside – books, clothing, a case of pens and pencils – had been reduced to dust. Only the inedible parts of the books’ bindings remained untouched, along with a handful of metal buttons, and all that remained of my mapping pencils were the silver clasps which held them together. I could not remember what had been in the case, whether they had been empty journals or full ones, or the novels I had gathered together and brought out with me, most of which had been presents from my mother and sisters.
Each member of my family had presented me with an inscribed keepsake: a toy crocodile and lion from Caroline; a framed sampler of Daniel and his lions from Victoria; and a silver hand mirror from Elizabeth. My father had given me a pair of hunting pistols, each of a different bore and calibre, and each with my initials set into their grips. My mother, as I suspected she might, presented me with a Bible, so bound that when it was closed and locked it was sealed tight inside a japanned tin case. Because she had worked earlier in her life for various missionary societies, I imagined this gift was in some way connected to her past, and I saw in it how much of her own thwarted ambition I now embodied.
I sought out all these precious things and took them from their wrappings. I had neither read from the Bible – the place was strewn with other, cheaper, expendable editions – nor fired the pistols other than to show them off to Fletcher. He told me they would be good for shooting small birds. Or fish, he said. Fish? I said, but he was already laughing.
During my first months here I had slept with the toy animals on the cabinet beside my bed, the silver mirror between them. It became my nightly ritual to ensure that all three pieces were in their place. Durin
g the daytime I locked them in my desk. I had hoped to send the head of either a crocodile or a lion back to Caroline, but that was when I imagined both were plentiful and might be easily or cheaply had.
My mother gave me the names of a dozen missionaries she had known, and the places they had served along the river. Some of those places no longer existed, and most had changed their names. She told me to try and contact some of the people she had once known and to pass on her regards to them, speaking as though they lived in the next county and I was calling on them for tea. It was only when I realized she was talking of people she had known thirty or thirty-five years ago that I understood the futility of this request. I read out some of the names to Cornelius, but even he shook his head at them.
I took the trunk of dust outside and emptied it. I salvaged the buttons because they had some value, but I kicked away everything else until it was scattered. Several men watched me from a distance and then came over and searched sifting with their fingers through what I had discarded. I told them there was nothing to find, but either they did not understand me or did not believe me. They retrieved the half-eaten pages of unidentifiable novels and gathered these together; they picked up tiny pieces of the gold-painted binding as though it were gold itself. One man even found the metal cap to one of my pens and rose yelling from the other sifters as though he had found a jewel.
* * *
On one of our expeditions, Frere and I had gone in search of a lake, supposedly five days to the north-east of us, in Uregga country, and supposedly the home of a monster, a creature the size of twenty elephants, according to the Uregga porters who told us of it. There were many such tales, many such monsters, but we went anyway. The most we could hope for, Frere suggested as we departed, was a variant species of lake hippopotamus, though he was doubtful of even that. It was one of our first expeditions together, and undertaken at a time when he still believed they would be frequent and sanctioned.
