the people and when you can't talk with people and can't overhear you don't
get anything that's of anything but journalistic value.'
'You want to knuckle down on your Swahili then.'
'I'm trying to.'
'Even then you can't overhear because they're always talking their own
language.'
'But if I ever write anything about this it will just be landscape
painting until I know something about it. Your first seeing of a country is
a very valuable one. Probably more valuable to yourself than to anyone else,
is the hell of it. But you ought to always write it to try to get it stated.
No matter what you do with it.'
'Most of the damned Safari books are most awful bloody bores.'
'They're terrible.'
'The only one I ever liked was Streeter's. What did he call it?
{Denatured Africa}. He made you feel what it was like. That's the best.'
'I liked Charlie Curtis's. It was very honest and it made a fine
picture.'
'That man Streeter was damned funny though. Do you remember when he
shot the kongoni?'
'It was very funny.'
'I've never read anything, though, that could make you feel about the
country the way we feel about it. They all have Nairobi fast life or else
rot about shooting beasts with horns half an inch longer than someone else
shot. Or muck about danger.'
'I'd like to try to write something about the country and the animals
and what it's like to someone who knows nothing about it.'
'Have a try at it. Can't do any harm. You know I wrote a diary of that
Alaskan trip.'
'I'd love to read it,' P.O.M. said. 'I didn't know you were a writer,
Mr. J. P.'
'No bloody fear,' said Pop. 'If you'd read it, though, I'll send for
it. You know it's just what we did each day and how Alaska looked to an
Englishman from Africa. It'd bore you.'
'Not if you wrote it,' P.O.M. said.
'Little woman's giving us compliments,' Pop said.
'Not me. You.'
'I've read things by him,' she said. 'I want to read what Mr. J. P.
writes.'
'Is the old man really a writer?' Pop asked her. CHAPTER TWO
Molo waked me by pulling on the blanket in the morning and I was
dressing, dressed, and out washing the sleep out of my eyes before I was
really awake. It was still very dark and I could see Pop's back shadowed
against the fire. I walked over holding the early morning cup of hot tea and
milk in my hand waiting for it to be cool enough to drink.
'Morning,' I said.
'Morning,' he answered in that husky whisper.
'Sleep?'
'Very well. Feeling fit?'
'Sleepy is all.'
I drank the tea and spat the leaves into the fire.
'Tell your bloody fortune with those,' Pop said.
'No fear.'
Breakfast in the dark with a lantern, cool juice-slippery apricots,
hash, hot-centred, brown, and catsup spread, two fried eggs and the warm
promise-keeping coffee. On the third cup Pop, watching, smoking his pipe,
said, 'Too early for me to face it yet.'
'Get you?'
'A little.'
'I'm getting exercise,' I said. 'It doesn't bother me.'
'Bloody anecdotes,' Pop said. 'Memsahib must think we're silly
beggars.'
'I'll think up some more.'
'Nothing better than drinking. Don't know why it should make you feel
bad.'
'Are you bad?'
'Not too.'
'Take a spot of Eno's?'
'It's this damned riding in cars.'
'Well, to-day's the day.'
'Remember to take it very easy.'
'You're not worried about that, are you?'
'Just a touch.'
'Don't. It never worries me a minute. Truly.'
'Good. Better get going.'
'Have to make a trip first.'
Standing in front of the canvas circle of the latrine I looked, as each
morning, at that fuzzy blur of stars that the romanticists of astronomers
called the Southern Cross. Each morning at this moment I observed the
Southern Cross in solemn ceremony.
Pop was at the car. M'Cola handed me the Springfield and I got in the
front. The tragedian and his tracker were in the back. M'Cola climbed in
with them.
'Good luck,' Pop said. Someone was coming from towards the tents. It
was P.O.M. in her blue robe and mosquito boots. '{Oh}, good luck,' she said.
{Please}, good luck.'
I waved and we started, the headlights showing the way to the road.
There was nothing on the salt when we came up to it after leaving the
car about three miles away and making a very careful stalk. Nothing came all
morning. We sat with our heads down in the blind, each covering a different
direction through openings in the thatched withes, and always I expected the
miracle of a bull kudu coming majestic and beautiful through the open scrub
to the grey, dusty opening in the trees where the salt lick was worn,
grooved, and trampled. There were many trails to it through the trees and on
any one a bull might come silently. But nothing came. When the sun was up
and we were warmed after the misty cold of the morning I settled my rump
deeper in the dust and lay back against the wall of the hole, resting
against the small of my back and my shoulders, and still able to see out
through the slit in the blind. Putting the Springfield across my knees I
noticed that there was rust on the barrel. Slowly I pulled it along and
looked at the muzzle. It was freshly brown with rust.
'The bastard never cleaned it last night after that rain,' I thought,
and, very angry, I lifted the lug and slipped the bolt out. M'Cola was
watching me with his head down. The other two were looking out through the
blind. I held the rifle in one hand for him to look through the breech and
then put the bolt back in and shoved it forward softly, lowering it with my
finger on the trigger so that it was ready to cock rather than keeping it on
the safety.
M'Cola had seen the rusty bore. His face had not changed and I had said
nothing but I was full of contempt and there had been indictment, evidence,
and condemnation without a word being spoken. So we sat there, he with his
head bent so only the bald top showed, me leaning back and looking out
through the slit, and we were no longer partners, no longer good friends,
and nothing came to the salt.
At ten o'clock the breeze, which had come up in the east, began to
shift around and we knew it was no use. Our scent was being scattered in all
directions around the blind as sure to frighten any animals as though we
were revolving a searchlight in the dark. We got up out of the blind and
went over to look in the dust of the lick for tracks. The rain had moistened
it but it was not soaked and we saw several kudu tracks
, probably made early
in the night and one big bull track, long, narrow, heart-shaped, clearly,
deeply cut.
We took the track and followed it on the damp reddish earth for two
hours in thick bush that was like second-growth timber at home. Finally we
had to leave it in stuff we could not move through. All this time I was
angry about the uncleaned rifle and yet happy and eager with anticipation
that we might jump the bull and get a snap at him in the brush. But we did
not see him and now, in the big heat of noon, we made three long circles
around some hills and finally came out into a meadow full of little, humpy
Masai cattle and, leaving all shade behind, trailed back across the open
country under the noon sun to the car.
Kamau, sitting in the car, had seen a kudu bull pass a hundred yards
away. He was headed toward the saltlick at about nine o'clock when the wind
began to be tricky, had evidently caught our scent and gone back into the
hills. Tired, sweating, and feeling more sunk than angry now, I got in
beside Kamau and we headed the car toward camp. There was only one evening
left now, and no reason to expect we would have any better luck than we were
having. As we came to camp, and the shade of the heavy trees, cool as a
pool, I took the bolt out of the Springfield and handed the rifle, boltless,
to M'Cola without speaking or looking at him. The bolt I tossed inside the
opening of our tent on to my cot.
Pop and P.O.M. were sitting under the dining tent.
'No luck?' Pop asked gently.
'Not a damn bit. Bull went by the car headed toward the salt. Must have
spooked off. We hunted all over hell.'
'Didn't you see anything?' P.O.M. asked. 'Once we thought we heard you
shoot.'
'That was Garrick shooting his mouth off. Did the scouts get anything?'
'Not a thing. We've been watching both hills.'
'Hear from Karl?'
'Not a word.'
'I'd like to have seen one,' I said. I was tired out and slipping into
bitterness fast. 'God damn them. What the hell did he have to blow that lick
to hell for the first morning and gut-shoot a lousy bull and chase him all
over the son-of-a-bitching country spooking it to holy bloody hell?'
'Bastards,' said P.O.M., staying with me in. my unreasonableness.
'Sonsabitches.'
'You're a good girl,' I said. 'I'm all right. Or I will be.'
'It's been. awful,' she said. 'Poor old Poppa.'
'You have a drink,' Pop said. 'That's what you need.'
'I've hunted them hard, Pop. I swear to God I have. I've enjoyed it and
I haven't worried up until to-day. I was so damned sure. Those damned tracks
all the time -- what if I never see one? How do I know we can ever get back
here again?'
'You'll be back,' Pop said. 'You don't have to worry about that. Go
ahead. Drink it.'
'I'm just a lousy belly-aching bastard but I swear they haven't gotten
on my nerves until to-day.'
'Belly-ache,' said Pop. 'Better to get it out.'
'What about lunch?' asked P.O.M. 'Aren't you frightfully hungry?'
'The hell with lunch. The thing is, Pop, we've never seen them on the
salt in the evening and we've never seen a bull in the hills. I've only got
to-night. It looks washed up. Three times I've had them cold and Karl and
the Austrian and the Wanderobo beat us.'
'We're not beaten,' said Pop. 'Drink another one of those.'
We had lunch, a very good lunch, and it was just over when Kati came
and said there was someone to see Pop. We could see their shadows on the
tent fly, then they came around to the front of the tent. It was the old man
of the first day, the old farmer, but now he was gotten up as a hunter and
carried a long bow and a sealed quiver of arrows.
He looked older, more disreputable and tireder than ever and his get-up
was obviously a disguise. With him was the skinny, dirty, Wanderobo with the
slit and curled up ears who stood on one leg and scratched the back of his
knee with his toes. His head was on one side and he had a narrow, foolish,
and depraved-looking face.
The old man was talking earnestly to Pop, looking him in the eye and
speaking slowly, without gestures.
'What's he done? Gotten himself up like that to get some of the scout
money?' I asked.
'Wait,' Pop said.
'Look at the pair of them,' I said. 'That's goofy Wanderobo and that
lousy old fake. What's he say, Pop?'
'He hasn't finished,' Pop said.
Finally the old man was finished and he stood there leaning on his
property bow. They both looked very tired but I remember thinking they
looked a couple of disgusting fakes.
'He says,' Pop began, 'they have found a country where there are kudu
and sable. He has been there three days. They know where there is a big kudu
bull and he has a man watching him now.'
'Do you believe it?' I could feel the liquor and the fatigue drain out
of me and the excitement come in.
'God knows,' said Pop.
'How far away is the country?'
'One day's march. I suppose that's three or four hours in the car if
the car can go.'
'Does he think the car can get in?'
'None ever has been in but he thinks you can make it. '
'When did they leave the man watching the kudu?'
'This morning.'
'Where are the sable?'
'There in the hills.'
'How do we get in?'
'I can't make out except that you cross the plain, go around that
mountain and then south. He says no one has ever hunted there. He hunted
there when he was young. '
'Do you believe it?'
'Of course natives lie like hell, but he tells it very straight.'
'Let's go.'
'You'd better start right away. Go as far as you can in the car and
then use it for a base and hunt on from there. The Memsahib and I will break
camp in the morning, move the outfit and go on to where Dan and Mr. T. are.
Once the outfit is over that black cotton stretch we're all right if the
rain catches us. You come on and join us. If you're caught we can always
send the car back by Kandoa, if worst comes, and the lorries down to Tanga
and around.'
'Don't you want to come?'
'No. You're better off alone on a show like this. The more people the
less game you'll see. You should hunt kudu alone. I'll move the outfit and
look after the little Memsahib.'
'All right,' I said. 'And I don't have to take Garrick or Abdullah?'
'Hell, no. Take M'Cola, Kamau and these two. I'll teil Molo to pack
your things. Go light as hell.'
'God damn it, Pop. Do you think it could be true?'
'Maybe,' said Pop. 'We have to play it.'
'How do you say sable?'
'Tarahalla.'
'Valhalla, I can remember. Do the fe
males have horns?'
'Sure, but you can't make a mistake. The bull is black and they're
brown. You can't go wrong.'
'Has M'Cola ever seen one?'
'I don't think so. You've got four on your licence. Any time you can
better one, go ahead.'
'Are they hard to kill?'
'They're tough. They're not like a kudu. If you've got one down be
careful how you walk up to him.'
'What about time?'
'We've got to get out. Make it back to-morrow night if you can. Use
your own judgment. I think this is the turning point. You'll get a kudu.'
'Do you know what it's like?' I said. 'It's just like when we were kids
and we heard about a river no one had ever fished out on the huckleberry
plain beyond the Sturgeon and the Pigeon.'
'How did the river turn out?'
'Listen. We had a hell of a time to get in and the night we got there,
just before dark, and saw it, there was a deep pool and a long straight
stretch and the water so cold you couldn't keep your hand in it and I threw
a cigarette butt in and a big trout hit it and they kept snapping it up and
spitting it out as it floated until it went to pieces.'
'Big trout?'
'The biggest kind.'
'God save us,' said Pop. 'What did you do then?'
'Rigged up my rod and made a cast and it was dark, and there was a
nighthawk swooping around and it was cold as a bastard and then I was fast
to three fish the second the flies hit the water.'
'Did you land them?'
'The three of them.'
'You damned liar.'
'I swear to God.'
'I believe you. Tell me the rest when you come back. Were they big
trout?'
'The biggest bloody kind.'
'God save us,' said Pop. 'You're going to get a kudu. Get started.'
In the tent I found P.O.M. and told her.
'Not really?'
'Yes.'
'Hurry up,' she said. 'Don't talk. Get started.'
I found raincoat, extra boots, socks, bathrobe, bottle of quinine
tablets, citronella, note book, a pencil, my solids, the cameras, the
emergency kit, knife, matches, extra shirt and undershirt, a book, two
candles, money, the flask . . .
'What else?'
'Have you got soap? Take a comb and a towel. Got handkerchiefs?'
'All right.'
Molo had everything packed in a rucksack and I found my field glasses,
M'Cola taking Pop's big field glasses, a canteen with water and Kati sending
a chop-box with food. 'Take plenty of beer,' Pop said. 'You can leave it in
the car. We're short on whisky but there's a bottle.'
'How will that leave you?'
'All right. There's more at the other camp. We sent two bottles on with
Mr. K.'
'I'll only need the flask,' I said. 'We'll split the bottle.'
'Take plenty of beer then. There's any amount of it.'
'What's the bastard doing?' I said, pointing at Garrick who was getting
into the car.
'He says you and M'Cola wont be able to talk with the natives there.
You'll have to have some one to interpret.'
'He's poison.'
'You {will} need someone to interpret whatever they speak into
Swahili.'
'All right. But tell him he's not running the show and to keep his
bloody mouth shut.'
'We'll go to the top of the hill with you,' Pop said and we started
off, the Wanderobo hanging to the side of the car. 'Going to pick the old
man up in the village.'
Everyone in camp was out to watch us go.
'Have we plenty of salt?'
'Yes.'
Now we were standing by the car on the road in the village waiting for
the old man and Garrick to come back from their huts. It was early afternoon
and the sky was clouding over and I was looking at P.O.M., very desirable,
cool, and neat-looking in her khaki and her boots, her Stetson on one side
of her head, and at Pop, big, thick, in the faded corduroy sleeveless jacket
that was almost white now from washing and the sun.
'You be a good girl.'
'Don't ever worry. I wish I could go.'
'It's a one-man show,' Pop said. 'You want to get in fast and do the
dirty and get out fast. You've a big load as it is.'
The old man appeared and got into the back of the car with M'Cola who
was wearing my old khaki sleeveless, quail-shooting coat.