The Beautiful Mother

by Scholes, Katherine

  They often sat out on the verandah sipping cups of tea, looking across the banks of reeds towards the lake – the expanse of silver water surrounded by the wide arc of the saltpan. Rising up behind it was the mountain, the upper slopes anointed with white lava, a drift of white smoke emerging from the summit. The whole scene was like a fantasy – a world in which snow and ice had been transformed into heat and salt.

  Carl would carry one of Stein’s chairs outside for Essie to use. As she sat on the seat with its lumpy stuffing and torn upholstery – feeding Mara or rocking her to sleep – she would listen to the two men talk. They covered topics of all kinds, Simon occasionally having to ask for Essie’s help with an English word. They always came back to the wild animals, birds and plants of the East African Rift Valley. Simon’s tribe came from further south, beyond Serengeti, but the flora and fauna were much the same as here.

  Simon told them how the honeyguide bird, Tik’iliko, helped Hadza hunters find trees where there were hives, in return for a feed of honeycomb enriched by bee larvae. It was a deal that worked for them both: the hunters couldn’t see the nests from the ground, and the honeyguide couldn’t break them open. Simon enacted how bird and hunter whistled back and forth to one another as they traversed the bush together, the bird in the air, the man on the ground.

  Simon shared the techniques of tracking and stalking – unchanged from the time before humans first began farming, ten thousand years ago. He invited Carl to discover how hard it was to fully draw back the long bow that he carried. Essie saw the effort that it took – the straining muscles in Carl’s shoulders and arms. An arrow on its own was not enough to bring down larger prey, Simon explained. The sap of the desert rose was boiled down to make a poison that was lethal and had no known antidote. Daubed on an arrowhead, it could cause a giraffe, eland or zebra to collapse – but not an elephant.

  He described how the Hadza men left their tribes for the major hunting expeditions. The events were always scheduled during the time of the full moon. This meant that the hunters would return laden with meat and be rewarded with sexual favours, at the very time when their women would be most fertile. The Hadza all bled at the same time, Simon claimed, during the time of the ‘dark moon’.

  Essie knew what Simon was referring to: menstrual synchronicity. Among scientists, it was a contentious topic. Some believed pheromones interacted so that the cycles of women who lived together gradually became aligned. Other researchers said this was nothing but a myth. Essie remembered when a Swiss student had carried out a survey of female students and volunteers living in Magadi Camp. She’d claimed that by the end of the digging season they were all menstruating together. Ian didn’t believe in menstrual synchronicity. Neither did Julia. Essie avoided becoming involved in the debate, even though she had ticked the box on the survey that ended up showing that she was bleeding at the same time as the other women who took part. Ian knew Essie was menstruating then too, of course; for reasons of contraception they both had to track her periods. But he made it clear he wasn’t convinced the research was sound. He pointed out that the topic would have been discussed between the participants; perhaps clues to who was where in their cycle had been inadvertently conveyed. Maybe there was even collusion in order to create a result – it wouldn’t be the first time such a thing had happened. Ian’s male colleagues shared his skepticism – they seemed confronted by the idea of females having some secret power. For a while there had been tension in the camp, as the women (excluding Julia) had sided against the men. But the controversy had drifted into the background when a new academic arrived, with a focus on the latest carbon-dating techniques.

  While Simon talked, Carl listened intently. He didn’t take notes like most people would, given the rare chance to talk to someone who knew so much. Essie followed his example even though she knew that precious details might be lost if she tried to recall it all later.

  About a week ago, Essie had been sitting with Mara, drinking tea as usual, when Simon started describing to Carl the different methods for butchering particular birds and animals. He explained how each part of the body – hide, fur, bone and flesh – was used for food or medicine. Essie was struck by the fact that Carl was not disturbed by the discussion, even though the photographer’s work involved capturing on film the beauty and grace of some of the same creatures, or ones like them. She could have risked telling him, she now realised, about how she had sat around a fireside as a little girl eating muttonbirds – or shearwaters, as he called them. There was the other name, too, that he’d mentioned. Moonbirds.

  Moonbirds . . .

  As Essie shaped the word with her tongue, images rose up in her mind. Not just the memories of taste, smell or the greasy shine on her fingers. She saw herself walking over a ground pitted with holes, her small feet bare and grey with dirt . . .

  She was kneeling in the tussock grass, eyeing one of the small burrows. Holding her breath, she forced herself to reach in – wanting to be brave like the older kids. Knuckles brushed the earth, her heart hammering. If it was cold down there, she’d been warned, she had to pull out quickly. There could be a snake in residence, not a chick. She swallowed on a tense throat. She couldn’t tell how warm or cool it felt. The earth was smooth, crumbly. There was no jabbing beak, no brush of furry feathers . . . A shaky smile touched her lips. The burrow was empty – no snake; but no chick, either. Relief washed through her. She wouldn’t have to yank the bird out of the hole, then shake the body to snap the neck. But onlookers had seen her do her best. She’d tried. She’d proved she was brave enough for that – but only just . . .

  As the edges of the memory turned to a haze she let out a slow breath. It was as if Simon’s descriptions of his experiences had called up something from her past that she didn’t know she’d retained. She imagined what Simon would think if she were to share the memory now – how it would sit with his picture of her as a European. She kept it to herself, though. The Lawrences always made a point of holding themselves apart from the local people. It would not be wise, as Ian’s wife, for Essie to undermine this carefully preserved status. She let the conversation flow on around her.

  As they came to know one another better, Carl began to draw out Simon’s personal story. Being an outsider to Magadi Camp, and not the man’s employer, he was freer to ask frank questions. Essie learned that Simon’s Hadza name was Onwas. He’d adopted a new one to enrol in school and used it ever since. He couldn’t conceal his origins from other Africans – they always understood who belonged to which tribe – but having an English name made it clear that he saw himself as part of the modern world. Before coming to work at Magadi, he’d been a farmhand for a number of years. His goal had always been to strive hard and secure a good future for himself.

  One day, when the sun had been especially hot, Essie decided they should seek the shelter of the Mission house a bit earlier than usual. That meant there was time for a longer conversation. While they drank their tea on the verandah, Simon talked about the pressures that had been faced by the Hadza. He recounted how his parents, along with many of their relatives, had been influenced by the British Administration to give up their nomadic way of life. There was a scheme to teach the Hadza to settle down and grow cotton. Houses were built for their use, along with schools and clinics. But the projects failed. Simon wanted to study, so he stayed. But many of the people returned to the bush.

  ‘They didn’t want to pay the hut tax,’ Simon explained. ‘The Hadza have never owed payments to others. But the main problem was that they didn’t like farming. It took up too much time. And it wasn’t fun.’

  As he said this, Simon eyed his bow and arrows, which were leaning up against the front wall of the house. Essie remembered encountering him after his night out with Mara’s relatives, when he’d tried to conceal how much he’d enjoyed the shared hunting expedition. She wondered if he would describe working for the Lawrences as ‘fun’ – or if that lifestyle requirement only applied to Hadza pori – the wi
ld Hadza.

  ‘Five years ago,’ Simon went on, ‘some groups of Hadza were forced into lorries and driven to Yaeda Chini. Armed police came, too.’

  ‘This was done by the Tanzanian government?’ Carl enquired.

  Simon nodded. ‘They wanted to change the Hadza, too.’

  ‘What happened at Yaeda Chini?’ Essie asked the question tentatively; anything involving an armed escort wasn’t likely to end well.

  ‘People became ill. The diet was very poor compared with what they were used to. They caught diseases they’d never had before. And they became bored. They drank too much alcohol. Smoked marijuana all day. And there was something else that happened . . .’ Simon had to pause, struggling to find the right words. ‘Sadness overcame them. It reached into their hearts and dragged them down. They gave up dancing, playing gambling games. They gave up the wish to be alive.’

  Essie felt the words fall, leaden, into the air. She thought of Lorna, dropped into a world where there was no sparkling sea to dive into, no family bonfires on the beach. Only cooking, cleaning, shopping, dressing up to meet strangers, knowing all the time that she wouldn’t manage to look right, sound right . . .

  ‘The Hadza who survived ran away, back to the bush,’ Simon said. ‘They are still there.’

  ‘That’s good, then?’ Essie queried.

  The tense look remained on the man’s face. Simon gestured at Mara, who was asleep in Essie’s arms. Her arms draped down, one fist shiny-wet from being in her mouth. ‘Her mother might have survived in a hospital. And Hadza children should go to school. One day they might have no choice but to change the way they live. Land has been turned into game reserves and farms. We are not allowed to hunt there.’ Simon frowned, deep lines marking his face. ‘We have to find a way to adapt to the present but hold on to what we need from our past.’ He shook his head. ‘I don’t know how it will turn out.’

  Essie hugged Mara against her chest, wrapping her arms around her as if she could somehow protect her from such a complex world. The threats to the Hadza way of life that Simon had described only added to a whole tapestry of anxieties that already hung in the back of Essie’s mind. There were so many ordinary, everyday dangers that Mara was going to face as well. And all the decisions about her future lay in the hands of her family, her tribe. Essie would not be in charge.

  She comforted herself with the thought that there were still things she could do. Send money to Nandamara. Medicines. Clothes. Schoolbooks. She could make regular visits to wherever the Hadza were. Charter planes to track them down if necessary . . .

  But these were just fantasies, Essie knew. In Hadza society people didn’t have any use for money. They didn’t acquire possessions. They didn’t even store food. They didn’t have a place they called ‘home’. Everywhere was home. It was such a radically different way of living that Essie found it impossible to grasp. What she did understand was that she could contribute nothing to it. Essie had to trust that Giga would breastfeed Mara until she was old enough to be weaned onto powdered baobab pod, liquid honey and chewed-up meat. She had to believe Nandamara, along with the rest of the family, would keep his granddaughter safe and happy.

  Essie’s role would be to let Mara go, completely. If she didn’t, the child would not belong anywhere. The Hadza people were in danger of being caught between two worlds – but Mara would be in an even more difficult position. She’d be caught between two families as well. Essie could not be tempted to live in the half-light of waiting and hoping that she and Mara would meet up again. The Hadza would return to camp in the Painted Cave now and then, as they always had. It might even turn out to be an annual event, but Simon had said the Hadza didn’t normally move in such a planned way. When the tribe did manage to visit, Essie might get to see Mara. It would be reassuring to know that she was safe, healthy, happy. But at the same time it would be agonising, surely, for Essie to watch the little girl’s life unfolding without her. And what kind of existence would Essie have? She could drive herself mad. She remembered the absent look on Lorna’s face, year after year. Essie had assumed her mother was lost in her illness. Perhaps she was just living elsewhere – abandoning those who were with her, in the here and now.

  It was one thing for Essie to tell herself all this, but another to accept what it would mean. When she thought of returning Mara to the Hadza, heart-searing visions crowded her head. She pictured the moment when she would have to pass the baby over to Nandamara, or Giga, and then walk away empty-handed. She saw Mara crying, reaching out for her – afraid of these people who were now strangers to her. Essie couldn’t imagine returning to the camp, packing up the nursery and giving all Mara’s things away . . .

  As a sense of panic descended, mad visions came to her. She thought of escaping with Mara – just climbing into the Land Rover and driving off towards the horizon. She saw herself living somewhere in a distant corner of the country, just her and the baby. But there was no substance to the idea – Essie knew that. What kind of life would Mara have as the daughter – illegally acquired – of a white woman? The pair would attract interest wherever they went. Essie would soon be arrested. Who could say what would happen to Mara then? There was Ian to think of, as well. Essie’s marriage. Her work. Anyway, the Hadza baby had her own loving family who were waiting to take her back. Mara belonged with them.

  Essie’s thoughts circled endlessly, going over well-trod ground – and leading her always back to the same place: that future time when Mara would no longer be a part of her life. Rational arguments were no help to her now. Emotions built up inside her like a head of steam that had no way to escape. Her heart pounded, and her throat clammed up as if she was trying to swallow something much too big to go down.

  Essie closed her eyes. Julia had warned her, just a few days ago, that she was becoming too attached to Mara. They were sitting at the breakfast table, waiting for Ian and Diana to join them. Essie had been playing a peekaboo game with the baby.

  ‘You can’t imagine what it will be like to lose her,’ Julia had stated. ‘You think you can – but you can’t. Losing a child is not like anything else.’ As she continued, her matter-of-fact manner disintegrated. Her voice became taut, her cheeks flushed. ‘You will always be wondering, worrying . . . Is she safe? Is she sick or hurt? Is she calling my name? You will lie awake at night, trying to stop your thoughts. But nothing will help you. Nothing . . .’

  Julia’s voice cracked, and she stood up suddenly, tipping over her chair. Before Essie had a chance to respond, she had walked away.

  Now, sitting in her chair on the verandah, Essie rested her cheek on Mara’s head, feeling the hard curve of her skull beneath the soft hair. She drew in the baby’s smell. Milk. Talcum powder. The subtle fragrance of the nursery soap, and the hint of wood smoke that seemed to infuse everything here, as if fire was a part of the air that all Africans breathed.

  The words of the Maasai woman came to her. ‘Wewe ni mama yake katika wakati huu.’ You are her mother at this moment.

  This moment is all you have.

  Essie picked up Mara’s hand, turned it over and kissed the damp palm. She held it there, over her mouth, the little fingers pressed against her lips. She barely heard Simon and Carl talking together. She just breathed in Mara’s smell. She imagined it filling her lungs, entering her blood, and travelling all the way to her heart.

  FOURTEEN

  The pool was a large circle set into a bed of pale rock, its edges fringed with reeds. It came into view some way off, as Essie rounded a heap of boulders. She stared in surprise. The other waterholes she’d seen up here were little more than large, deep puddles; this one was almost as big as the Swimming Bath down on the plains.

  Essie hurried towards it. The pool had to be spring-fed, she realised – a part of the underground anatomy of the volcano. That meant that it could actually be hot or cold or somewhere in between. She hoped it was cool, so she could splash refreshing water on her sweaty face. The air was stifling. Tommy bleated as he
trailed after her; Rudie could be heard panting from an open mouth.

  As she came closer to the pool, Essie’s step faltered. Ranged along one side were half-a-dozen tall stones, each about the height of a child. They were like featureless statues: a sculptor’s blanks. They looked as if they could have been placed there deliberately, the way they were grouped, rather than dropped randomly by a flow of debris during an eruption or tumbled down the slopes by an earthquake.

  Essie eyed the stones as she walked on. They were probably lava monoliths. One was taller than the others. Its position, relative to the slopes behind it, invited the eye to travel up to the volcano. Essie was reminded of Neolithic sites in Europe – not of the scale of Stonehenge; more like the Devil’s Arrows in Yorkshire. They were created for use in rituals connected with the sun, the stars, the moon – the changing seasons of life and death. But these stones, here at Magadi, could not have been transported and erected by humans – there was no precedent for this kind of large-scale activity in East Africa, let alone in this remote spot. Yet even while she knew all this, Essie couldn’t help imagining that the distinctive stones, along with the surprising existence of the pool, were the outcome of something more than chance.

  Looking back up towards the hillside boulders, Essie saw Simon approaching, holding Mara on his hip. A short way behind him was Carl. He’d taken time off from his own work today to join them in the foothills. The plan had arisen casually – Essie wasn’t even sure exactly how it had happened. She told herself Ian would approve, though. After she’d informed him about her first visit to the Mission house, he’d said it was good to have a connection with Frank Marlow’s flamingo man. That way, the Lawrences could call on his services when they needed a professional photographer. It could prove very useful. Ian had not yet met Carl Bergmann himself. He’d been too busy to issue an invitation to lunch at the camp. When the occasion did come around, Essie had a secret hope that Carl would pick up Mara, as he often did, and cuddle her against his chest. Then Ian would see how this other man enjoyed and admired the Hadza baby, instead of just treating her as an unwanted disruption to his world.