A Spear of Summer Grass (6 page)

“About six thousand feet.”

Dodo whimpered and clutched at the seat. “Best close your eyes until we’re down,” Ryder told her kindly. She nodded and pressed her handkerchief to her eyes, leaning as far back as she could. He turned to me, his expression challenging.

“What about you, princess? Man enough to watch?”

“Drive,” I told him, gritting my teeth.

He laughed and crashed the gears into second to start the descent. I missed the Hispano-Suiza’s suspension desperately as we bounced and jounced our way down the twisting slope. The smell of overheated metal filled the air, and by the time we descended, the brakes were so hot and slick they were barely catching at all. We skidded to a stop at a stream and Ryder parked the vehicle, turning off the engine to let it rest. The only sounds were the ticking of the hot metal and the rushing of the stream and Dora’s faint wheezing.

Ryder glanced down pointedly, and I saw that I had been clutching at his leg. I moved my hand instantly, but he merely smiled.

“It’s over, Dora,” I snapped. She roused herself as Ryder jumped from the vehicle.

“Where are you going?” I demanded.

He reached into the back and lifted a can. “Water. After a ride that hot, you have to fill the radiator. Remember that if you ever do the drive by yourself.”

He stepped around the vehicle and I made to follow. “Stay inside,” he ordered. “There’s wildlife around here and you don’t know what you’re doing.”

I opened my mouth to argue when he raised a hand, silencing me with a gesture as imperious as a Caesar’s.

There was a low snuffling sound, and then a crash as something enormous moved in the bushes beside the stream. Ryder stepped carefully backward, his eyes never leaving the shivering bushes.

“Hand me my gun.”

I twisted, reaching into the gun rack behind me. “Which one?”

“The biggest. It’s already loaded and the safety is on. Just pass it over.”

I did exactly as he told me. “Good girl,” he murmured. “Don’t make any noise or any sudden movements. You can’t make it back up that hill, the engine’s too hot. If anything happens to me, drive like hell straight down the road until you come to a
duka.
The storekeeper will know what to do.”

“If anything happens to you?”
I hadn’t known it was possible to shriek in a whisper, but I managed it. Dora was cowered against the seat, peeping over her handkerchief and pulling so hard on the flask I thought she was going to suck the finish off the metal.

“It’s probably a buffalo,” Ryder explained. “They don’t much like people, and if I have to take him, I’ll have one shot. He’ll be out of that cover too late for a second. If I miss, don’t stay to watch. It won’t be pretty.”

His tone was so calm, so matter-of-fact, we might have been discussing what he wanted for dinner rather than whether he would live or die. He hadn’t looked at me once. His whole attention was directed toward the coming reckoning. He was on the far side of the vehicle, and with his gaze fixed firmly on the bushes, it was easy to slip into the back and retrieve the Rigby. The ammunition was close at hand, and I took out two rounds, my fingers slick with sweat against the cool metal. There was no point to taking more. I wouldn’t have time to reload. I slid the cartridges into the rifle and closed the breach. I moved soundlessly to stand behind Ryder. He never moved his head, but he must have seen the shift in the shadows. His own rifle was lifted to his shoulder, one eye closed as the other sighted down the gun.

“Get back on the other side of the car. I want you to shoot from cover. Wait until you have a clear shot,” he instructed softly. “He’s coming head-on. Aim between the eyes. I’m taking the heart.”

There were a dozen things wrong with that, but I didn’t argue. I moved back to put the vehicle between us, using the hood to brace my arm. I cocked both barrels of the rifle and waited. It felt like the end of time and back again before the branches shivered hard and parted. What came through was the size of a small house, big and black and relentless. He was solid as the earth, and his eyes were narrow and mean. He paused for a moment, and I saw the sweat gathering on Ryder’s shoulders, soaking his shirt as he held the gun steady, waiting, waiting for a chance not to shoot.

But the buff didn’t oblige. It put its head down and gathered its strength, pushing off to run straight at us.

Ryder was wrong. He did have time for a second shot. His first was fast and hot and straight through the thick shoulder of the buff into its heart. I put one round into its forehead, and before I could recover from the punch of the recoil to sight the next shot, Ryder had put a second bullet into the same spot. The buffalo sat down heavily on its haunches and flopped forward, coming to rest inches from Ryder’s boot. I crept around the car, one round still in the chamber. I held the gun out to Ryder.

He didn’t take it. “No need. He’s finished,” he told me. We stood watching as the mean, piggy eyes went blank and soft and glassy. I was panting hard, and a trickle of sweat ran down the hollow of my spine, puddling in the curve of my bottom. I put a hand to my forehead and pushed away my fringe, letting the air cool my face. Little beads of perspiration rolled off my neck. I was damp and trembling all over, and my legs had second thoughts about holding me up.

Ryder looked at me closely. “You all right?”

“Yes.” The lie was easy.

He glanced at the stillness of the buffalo. “Damned good shot, princess.” He reached down and dipped a finger into the buffalo’s blood. He pressed the finger to my brow, marking me.

“First African blood,” he said gently. “It’s a hunter’s custom out here.”

He unloaded my Rigby and put the guns away. Dora was weeping quietly into her handkerchief in the car, and he said something consoling to her in soothing tones. Then he came to where I still stood, staring down at the vast emptiness of the buffalo’s corpse.

He took me by the hand and led me to the stream. He took a handkerchief from his pocket, and the sight of that small square of plain linen brought hot tears to my eyes. It ought to have been a Gypsy bandana, filthy and smelling of cheap perfume. But it was as white and clean as any my grandfather carried.

He took off his hat and knelt at the stream. When he bent his head I saw that his hair curled a little at his neck, and the bareness of his neck and the sweetness of that curling hair nearly did me in. He dipped the handkerchief into the stream and passed it over my face, wiping away the blood and the sweat, diluting my tears. “It’s all right, princess,” he said softly.

If I had leaned into him, he would have held me then. But I didn’t lean. I just sat on a rock, letting him clean me. “You’re a fool,” I told him. “You should have shot from cover as well.”

He didn’t say a word. He merely crouched at the stream and washed the blood from the handkerchief, wringing it out until the water ran clear.

“You put yourself between the buffalo and us to give us a chance to get away if it charged,” I accused.

He swivelled on his heels. “That’s my job. The clients’ safety comes first.”

“And if it’s a question of us or you, it must be you?”

He shrugged. “Like I said, that’s the job.”

“It’s a damned stupid way to earn a living.”

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a cigarette case. He extracted two cigarettes and lit them, drawing deeply until the tips glowed hot. He handed one to me and I took it. It wasn’t black and sleek like my Sobranies, but it would do. My hand shook a little, and he pretended not to notice. The cigarette case was slim and silver, sterling from the look of it. A tip from a wealthy client, no doubt. Most likely a woman.

“Why do you do this? Haven’t you any education?” The words were needle-sharp and chosen to prick.

He pulled thoughtfully on his cigarette. “I have as much education as any man needs.”

“Not if you have to risk your life just to haul stupid rich people around to shoot at animals.”

“Well, the rich are the only ones who can afford to pay me.”

He was smiling and I threw the remains of my cigarette at him. He ground it out slowly under his heel and reached a broad hand to help me up. I took it.

“Come on, princess. It’s time to get you on the road.”

I rocked a little on my heels. “I think I’m going to faint.”

“Don’t you dare,” he ordered through gritted teeth.

He made to loop an arm around my waist, but I batted him away. “I can walk on my own, thank you.”

I pushed off and made my wobbly way back to the truck, scrubbing uselessly at the bloody streaks on my white dress and shoes. I looked like a walking wedding night.

Dodo rushed from the truck as I approached. “Delilah! Darling, are you all right?”

“Quite,” I said with an artificially bright smile.

And then I slithered to the ground in as graceful a heap as I could manage.

I came to a few minutes later, my cheeks stinging and gasping for air as something toxically alcoholic was being forced between my lips. I shoved it away.

“I am awake, thank you,” I said coldly. Ryder shrugged and took a swig from the flask he’d been shoving in my mouth.

“Your loss. It’s single malt.”

I rubbed at my cheek. “Did you
hit
me?”

He shrugged. “It seemed called for under the circumstances.”

He moved away then, leaving Dora to help me up. “I have a vinaigrette somewhere, but Ryder said he could bring you to faster.”

“I’ll just bet he did,” I said, testing my jaw. “It’s going to bruise.”

“Not at all,” Dora assured me. “It was really just a tap, I promise.”

I took her word for it, although the pain in my cheek said otherwise, and I heaved myself into the truck. I turned to speak to Ryder.

“Get us to Fairlight. Get us there as quickly as humanly possible. And then go. I think I’ve seen quite enough of you for now.”

He smiled. “Pity you feel that way.”

I thought of the extremely arrogant bet he’d made at the club and felt a stab of satisfaction that at least I was making him eat his own heart out.

“Really? And why is that?” I asked sweetly, prolonging the pleasure of the moment and his humiliation.

He turned to face me. “Because I live at Fairlight.” He leaned closer, so close I could see the yellow flecks in the blue of his eyes. “Howdy, neighbour.”

6

We drove on in silence. Dora slept, mouth open, snoring gently as she cradled her flask. I made no move towards the luncheon basket and neither did he. He seemed content to drive forever on roads that stretched off to nowhere. The
murram
gave way to straight dirt, but that didn’t slow him down. My grandfather always swore it was better to drive as fast as possible on a dirt road because you were halfway through the next bump by the time you felt the first. Ryder seemed to believe the same. We flew down the road, raising a cloud of dust that must have been visible for miles across the savannah.

Ryder didn’t say a word, but his silence was comfortable. He wasn’t upset in the least. My silence was different. Mine had sharp edges and a thorny underbelly, and my biggest annoyance was that he didn’t seem to notice. I had planned to punish him with it, but if he didn’t even care, there wasn’t much point. I finally sighed and asked the inevitable.

“How much farther?”

He shrugged. “Nobody measures miles in Africa. Journeys are measured in time—a two-day walk, a four-hour drive. But it depends on the roads. When the rains have come, it can take two days to get to Nairobi. It’s dry just now, so we’ll only be another half hour or so.”

I resorted to my stocking flask then, taking discreet sips at first, but subsiding eventually into the deep pulls of an accomplished drinker. I felt only a little better as we approached Fairlight. There were no gates—or rather, there were, but they were rusted, hanging limply from broken hinges.

“I do hope this is not a sign of things to come,” I muttered darkly, but Ryder said nothing. He wore a grim smile I did not like, and I soon realised why.

The estate was, in kindest terms, a wreck. The fences were broken, offering a gap-toothed smile to the savannah beyond, while the house itself was long and low, squatting with its back to the drive. It was built of solid stone and handsome enough, but the trim was chipped and peeling and the boards of the veranda were warped. I alighted from the truck without a word and stood, overcome by the awfulness of it all. From the overgrown bushes to the torn curtains at the windows, the entire place lacked care. I thought of the sketches in Nigel’s diary and could have wept. It was like being shown a photograph of a winsome orphan one meant to adopt, only to arrive and find the child had rickets and a snotty nose and was dressed in rags. I felt my shoulders sag as I stood, rooted to the spot.

Of all emotions, disappointment is the most difficult to hide. Rage, hatred, envy—those are easy to mask. But disappointment strikes to the heart of the child within us, resurrecting every unsatisfactory Christmas, every failed wish made on a shooting star. And I made no attempt to hide it. The journey had been tiring, the company less than enjoyable, and the various stresses of the day had finally taken their toll.

I turned to find Ryder watching me closely. “You might have warned me.”

“It seemed kinder to let you hang on to your illusions for a little while longer.”

I gave him a chilly look. “I’m afraid I haven’t any cash on me. You will have to ask Dora for what we owe you. Good day.”

He gave a snort. He strode forward and took my arm. “Come with me.”

I had little choice. The hand on my arm was firm and for a moment it was delicious to give myself up to being bossed around. He led me up to the veranda and around the house to where the property overlooked the edge of a large green lake. The sun was dipping low to the ground, brushing the last of its warm rays over the shimmering surface, and turning the waters to molten gold. A flock of flamingos rose suddenly, flashing their gaudy feathers in a pink farewell as they departed. Across the lake a hippopotamus wore a crown of water lilies draped drunkenly over one eye and munched contentedly as a light breeze ruffled the lake water. I took a deep breath and saw, for just an instant, the Africa I had thought to find. Then, in a violent burst of crimson and gold, the sun shimmered hotly on the lake and was gone, sinking below the horizon, leaving only purple-blue shadows lengthening behind.

“There’s no such thing as evening in Africa,” he told me. “Now the sun is down, you’d best get inside. There’s no moon tonight, so the lions will be out.”

I turned to face him. “Are you saying that just to scare me?”

“No, I’m saying it to save you. You strike me as the type of woman just stupid enough to go for a walk in this country and get herself eaten.”

I thought for a moment then shrugged. “You’re probably right about that. Thank you for this,” I said, waving a hand toward Lake Wanyama. “It is truly lovely.”

“Africa is a complicated place, Miss Drummond. It’s the most beautiful place on earth and the most dangerous. Don’t forget that.”

“I won’t,” I promised.

He hesitated. “You have staff in the house. They aren’t worth much, but they do know how to find me. I have a
boma
about ten minutes’ walk from here. If you need me, send one of the houseboys. Do not try to find me on your own under any circumstances.”

I nodded. “Understood.”

“Good.”

Still he did not leave, and the strange twilight created an atmosphere that was oddly intimate. “It was kind of you to show me the lake at sunset.”

A quirk of the lips was the nearest he came to a smile. “I just didn’t want to see you give up so fast. It doesn’t suit you.”

And with that he turned and strode away into the gathering darkness.

Dora called to me then and I joined her on the front veranda. An assortment of servants had emerged from the house and were shuffling towards the pile of baggage, haphazardly taking as little as possible before scuttling into the house with it.

“Is there any sort of organisation?” I asked her. “Anyone in charge?”

She shrugged. “I asked, but they don’t seem to understand English.”

“Of course they understand English. You there, yes, you with the turban. Are you the boss?”

He shook his head and pointed to a cottage some little distance away. The place was dark and shuttered, and after a lengthy conversation involving more hand signals than words I discovered that the farm manager lived in that cottage but was not presently at home.

“It seems we are not expected,” I told Dora. “I suppose Mr. Fraser’s insistence on my departing Nairobi so suddenly has caught the staff on the hop. We weren’t scheduled to arrive for almost a week yet,” I reminded her. I turned back to the fellow in the turban. “May we go inside at least instead of standing out here getting devoured by insects?”

I swatted at the various things trying to suck my blood and the fellow understood me at once. He gestured for us to follow and we entered Fairlight at last. I gave a sigh of relief. It wasn’t as bad as I had feared based on the outside. Of course, candlelight makes everything look nicer, and I realised Fairlight was not wired for electricity. There were candles and paraffin lamps instead.

“How very nineteenth-century,” I murmured. “Is there food?” I mimed eating.

He nodded and waved us through. The entry hall, panelled in some very nice tropical woods, gave onto a pleasant drawing room with a broad fireplace with a mossy velvet fender. The dusty parquet floors were scattered with moth-eaten hides of various animals, and trophy heads hung on the walls, staring with blank, glassy eyes. Feathers were spilling out of the armchairs, but at least they looked comfortable, and I sank into one with an audible sigh.

He disappeared down a service passage and reappeared a few minutes later with a tray.

“Soup,” he said, pointing to the tray. There was no soup to be found, but there was a mixed rice dish with bits of unidentifiable meat and curry spices, some roasted potatoes, flatbreads and more boiled eggs.

“By the time we leave Africa, I’m going to be clucking,” I told Dora.

“Don’t complain. At least you know a boiled egg can’t poison you,” she said, peering suspiciously at the meat.

I was too ravenous to care. I forked in the food as fast as I could, and I was happy to find there was a rice pudding for dessert and happier still to find the supply of booze. I poured us each a nightcap and we stretched out by the fire.

“I’m so tired I don’t think I can get up to go to bed,” Dora said at last.

“I know.” I eyed the oozing sofa with distaste. “You realise we will have to do something about this place. If we’re going to be in exile for months, we cannot live like savages.”

“Hush,” she said, her eyes closed. “They’ll hear you.”

“No, they won’t. And they don’t think of themselves as savages. Besides, I wasn’t talking about them. It’s one thing to live in a hut with a leopard skin for a blanket because you don’t know better. It’s entirely different to live in these conditions and do nothing to improve them,” I told her, plucking a loose feather out of the upholstery.

“Tomorrow,” she promised, her voice drowsy. She began to murmur her prayers, but I kept talking.

“We’ll make a list,” I said, warming to the idea. “It will be nice to have a project. And Nigel will be very happy to know the place is being spruced up. Materials might be an issue, but labour should be cheap.”

Dora’s only reply was a snore, and I lay awake, watching the shadows on the ceiling. We never did get up and go to bed. My first night at Fairlight was spent drinking on a mouldering sofa in a house that wasn’t mine, listening to the sounds of a darkness that was darker than any I had ever known.

The next morning I awoke to find Dora poking me in the shoulder and an assemblage of various native fellows standing in a line, staring at me curiously.

“What the devil is their problem?”

I tried to roll over, but Dora stopped me. “Well, you do look a bit of a fright.”

I sat up and took inventory. Crumpled silk dress stained with red dust and Ryder’s fingerprints on the sleeve. Shoes caked in mud and buffalo blood. Empty flask on my lap, and I knew without even looking in a mirror that yesterday’s maquillage would be smeared everywhere.

“Say no more. Is there hot water?” I croaked.

“After a fashion,” she said. She pushed a cup of hot coffee into my hands. I detested coffee and she knew it, but it did the trick. I drank it down and lurched to my feet.

She showed me to the bathroom and I turned back to face her. “Is this a joke? Dodo, I count seven different kinds of insects, including a spider that may well be poisonous.”

“Spiders are arachnids,” she corrected.

I slammed the door in her face and applied my bloody shoe to the lurkers in the bathtub, eradicating all, except one little scorpion that dodged behind the toilet. I flung myself into the hot water and scrubbed, grateful that she had unpacked my French-milled soaps and a proper washcloth. After I was clean and dry and had washed my hair, I felt a pinch better.

Dodo had laid out a particularly fetching frock of green-and-black figured silk with green suede shoes, and as I put them on I wondered if they’d make it through the day. This country was hard on shoes, I thought ruefully. The white suede pair covered in Anthony Wickenden’s blood had been burned by the Norfolk staff, and the white silk ones soaked in buffalo blood would be next. I could have cried.

I emerged from my room looking vastly improved and feeling famished. Dora had found the dining room and there was toast, proper toast, with oranges and boiled eggs and some sort of meat that fought back when I poked it with a fork.

“Make a list, Dodo. First order of business—find a cook.”

Mercifully, she remembered the untouched picnic hamper from the previous day and we fell on it like Mongols, tearing into the parcels only to find flatbreads hardened to the consistency of rocks and some fruit that lay limp and apologetic in the bottom of the basket. There was a clutch of boiled eggs there as well, and some sort of potted meat I wouldn’t have touched if you’d offered me a palace on the moon.

When the meager meal was finished, we took a tour of the house led by the turbaned fellow whose name, as unlikely as it seemed, was Pierre.

“Surely that can’t be right,” I murmured to Dodo. But the name gave me an idea, and I turned to him.
“Parlez-vous français?”

His face lit up.
“Oui!”
And then he burst into a volley of rapid and fairly grammatical French. In a very few minutes I learned everything I needed to know about him and about the situation at Fairlight. Dora, whose French limped along at its most athletic, had been left far behind. She waited for me to translate.

“Pierre was educated at a mission school not far from here. French Benedictine nuns who taught him their own language and a smattering of Latin, but no English.”

“Latin?”

“That’s what the man says. He remembers Nigel quite well, although he was merely the houseboy at the time. Since then he’s grown and married. Two wives, although he hopes to add a third soon.”

“Goodness,” Dora said faintly, but I noticed she was looking at Pierre with heightened interest. His features were arresting, more akin to those painted on an Egyptian tomb than what one would expect to find in sub-Saharan Africa. His nose was sharp and beaky and his skin the colour of polished walnuts. He was tall and stately and moved with such peculiar grace, he would have put any Paris mannequin to shame.

“He’s Somali and Christian—good for us because it means that, unlike a Mohammedan majordomo, he’ll touch pork and alcohol.”

“Well, that covers your nutritional requirements,” she put in.

She wasn’t wrong. I related the rest of what Pierre had told me. “There’s a farm manager, a fellow called Gates. He has a wife and a pair of children, but they’re away for a few days. There’s a cottage down the road that Fairlight lets to an artist from New York, and farther on is the
boma
where Ryder lives. They are our nearest neighbours. He said we should expect people coming from farther afield as soon as they realise we’re here. Apparently newcomers are fresh meat.”

I gave her a wolfish smile and she turned to Pierre and asked him in her halting French if she might see the garden. Since she always believed that volume was at least as important as vocabulary in making herself understood, she stood a foot away from Pierre, repeating,
“LE JARDIN. COMPRENEZ-VOUS? LE JARDIN?”