In the House of the Interpreter (20 page)

He believed, as I would learn years later, that Mau Mau was “evil through and through, and has done much harm to African and European alike; but it is a resistance movement,” waging a legitimate nationalist struggle against foreign occupation and “like resistance movements in the war [World War II], Mau Mau fights not only against European invaders but even more fiercely against African collaborators.” He had faith “in the British Empire and the great traditions for which it stands.” Indeed, he believed that the colonial administration, as opposed to the political white settlers, had integrity and was essentially well intentioned; yet precisely because of his faith in the empire, he led efforts in documenting proofs of wrongs done by the colonial forces and presenting them to authorities higher up the chain of command. In some areas, he had told the joint session of the Royal Africa and the Royal Empire societies, “the average Kikuyu has hardly known which to fear more, the Mau-Mau or the forces of law and order. By both,
men have been robbed, beaten, carried off, and killed, and there is almost no hope of redress. They hardly try for it. To whom should they go?” He emphatically told them, “we shall never destroy Mau Mau by killing gangsters or imprisoning oath takers, we shall destroy it only by disposing of the foundations on which it rests by showing that we are not enemy invaders.” He was truly a mystery.
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Now I was back in his office, facing, for the last time, the man whose shadow had fallen on the entire school during my four years. He asked me whether I knew what I was going to do, pending the Cambridge results. I would be teaching at a primary school called Kahũgũinĩ. Though I had never been there, I tried to explain where it was, but he beat me to it. Is that in Gatũndũ? I said yes. Then he gave me a prep talk about temptations out there in the world. He had one piece of advice: Whatever you do, don’t be a politician. All politicians, black, white, and brown, are unmitigated scoundrels.

I took the piece of paper, a certificate based on how the school viewed each of the students. It vouched for character. Among the remarks, one jumped out: he has shown a pioneering spirit. I looked at Carey Francis. I did not see myself as a pioneer. But I valued this comment more than anything else, for it could only refer to my participation in work and youth camps. My activities at Mutonguini and the escarpment had been noticed. Thank you, Mr. Francis. Thank you, Alliance.

Outside the office, on the parade ground where I first disembarked on January 20, 1955, it hit me all at once. Now it was December 1958. The piece of paper in my hands simply certified that after four years I had forever left what Carey Francis used to describe as an oasis in a desert. The desert and the oasis produced each other. I had once seen it as a sanctuary surrounded by bloodhounds, but in time, over the four years, the howl of the hounds had quieted to a faint whimper. Now, outside these walls, were human voices that drowned or matched those of the hounds. I felt a mixture of delight and dread. I was leaving the walls to plunge into the unknown.

Alas, I had half forgotten that, outside the gates, the hounds were still crouched, panting, waiting, biding their time to pounce …

The saga of the hounds begins in April 1959, four months after I left Alliance. I am sitting by the window, a few seats from the back of a bus traveling from Nairobi to Limuru. At a roadblock near Banana Hills, the police wave us to a stop. Two officers, one wielding a machine gun and the other a rifle, rush in, shouting
don’t move
. They imprint themselves in my mind as Messrs. Machine Gun and Rifleman. Mr. Machine Gun stands by the entrance to block anyone from exiting. Mr. Rifleman quickly walks up and down the aisle; then he relaxes, slings his rifle on his right shoulder, and starts demanding identity and tax papers, beginning with those near the entrance. Although there is nothing unusual about this in a country under a state of emergency since 1952, the drama still jolts me.

Up to now it has been a Friday of triple pleasure. I have just received a full month’s salary with three months arrears as an untrained teacher at Kahũgũinĩ Primary School in Gatũndũ, where I had started in January, a month after I left Alliance. I have been getting a percentage of the wages pending results of the Overseas Cambridge School Certificate exams, which I took in December. It may not be much,
even with the four months arrears, but fifty pounds is the largest amount of money I have ever held in my hands.

With some of it, I am able to transform my wardrobe. This is important for a new self. At Alliance, trousers were not allowed. Even shoes were for Saturdays and Sundays only. The school did not want clothes to reflect and deepen social difference. The rule was fine for me because I could not have afforded the extra expense. But after leaving school I wanted to mark the difference between the Alliance and after-Alliance lifestyle, the way I had seen my predecessors do.

Earlier today I asked Kenneth to accompany me to an Indian tailor where sometime back I had ordered made-to-measure gray woolen trousers. It was gabardine or worsted wool, the shopkeeper had explained. Very expensive. At the time, I could only afford a down payment, with the rest to be paid in monthly installments. Now with my full salary plus arrears, I was able to pay the remaining amount. I could hardly wait to change into the new pair of woolen trousers and put my old pair in a box. When I did, I walked around in the shop, looking every inch a college-bound student. Even Kenneth, who was used to wearing trousers of reasonable quality since he had started earning earlier, was impressed and ordered his own made to measure.

In addition to the full wage and new clothes, two other items of news have added to the value of this Friday. I have passed the Overseas Cambridge School Certificate, with Distinctions, in English language, history, physics with chemistry, and biology, second only to Henry Chasia. I have also clocked a credit in additional math. In my bag, I have
acceptance papers to Makerere University College, one of nineteen admissions from Alliance. I brought them all to the headquarters in Kĩambu as proof of having passed the exams, the condition for securing my arrears, but I also take pride in having them with me. Throughout the morning, among the throng of teachers old and new who, as usual, have traveled from all over the district to the headquarters to receive their salaries, I have felt like waving the papers to everybody to see that I am a graduate of Alliance and a prospective college student. But I have not done so. I want to share the news with my mother first. It’s the result of our pact, made twelve years ago.

So eager was I to get home that, in Nairobi, I rejected entreaties from Kenneth and Patrick to while away the time in the city and take a later Nairobi-Limuru bus. The anticipation of the smile on my mother’s face as I place the money and papers on her lap would not let me stay. And now this delay at Banana Hills!

It is irritating. Inconvenient. Otherwise I do not see how it should concern me. I never leave my passbook behind; it tells my status as a student. Of course, I have left Alliance, but fortunately I have the admission papers to Makerere in July. Passengers without passbooks or tax receipts or identity papers are hounded out of the bus, where other officers order them to squat in twos at the roadside. The acts are
repetitive, other people’s boring business, and I resume my reveries.

A slap on the shoulder and a bellowing voice startle me. I look up, only to see the face of growling Mr. Rifleman.

Are you drunk or what? Show me your tax papers.

I’m a student, I say. I have just left school. Alliance High School, I add, to make an impression.

Is this the route to Alliance?

No, I am going home. Limuru.

Where are you coming from? School?

Kahũgũinĩ Gatũndũ.

Gatũndũ? Is that not Jomo Kenyatta’s home?

Kahũgũinĩ is not Gatũndũ, I say, half a truth.

Are you a Kenyatta follower?

I am a student, I answer vaguely.

Is Alliance at Kahũgũinĩ?

No. It is at Kikuyu. Carey Francis, you know, the mathematician, is the principal.

So Carey Francis told you not to pay poll tax?

No. I am just a student.

And what were you doing at Kenyatta’s place?

Kahũgũinĩ! I say to clarify the distinction. I explain that I have secured a temporary position pending exam results—

Mr. Rifleman interrupts me. Oh, so you are a teacher. And I take it that you don’t teach for free, or do you?

No, but—

Don’t play games with me. Show me your tax receipts.

I don’t have any. Look at these papers. I am going to Makerere. Uganda. In July! First-year university student.

He laughs loudly. By now all the passengers are focused on us. He is performing for them. He calls out to the other policeman, Mr. Machine Gun. Come and see who says that he is an Alliance prince bound for Makerere to meet with the Kabaka, the king of Buganda, too important to pay taxes. He continues waving the papers, which he has not bothered to read. I should not have mentioned Alliance, Makerere, or Uganda.

Are you saying that you are more educated than Dr. Julius Kĩano?

I try to ignore the sarcasm. No, I say.

Then listen. Even Julius Kĩano, Tom Mboya, and Oginga Odinga
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pay taxes, he says, thrusting the papers back to me and ordering me to get out, literally pulling me from my seat and shoving me along the aisle. Not to be outdone by Mr. Rifleman, Mr. Machine Gun pushes me to the ground, where another policeman directs me to the back of the line of captives. There must have been other victims from earlier buses because the line is quite long.

I still harbor hope that the misunderstanding will be cleared up, that they will realize that in mentioning Alliance and Makerere, I was not trying to show that I am more important than any other person, and they will let me back onto the bus. But then the bus leaves. With a sinking heart, I watch it disappear in the distance. Soon afterward, the roadblock is also dismantled, and Messrs. Rifleman and
Machine Gun leave in a jeep. We are still guarded by others, also armed with rifles, but these are underlings and they either don’t or won’t tell us the next step. This is so absurd. I have a lot of money in my pocket, I have Makerere papers, I won’t see my mother tonight, and nobody at home knows my fate.

And then at that moment, another bus from Nairobi arrives and stops by the scene. Curious about the long line of squatters, the passengers peer through the windows. Among them are Kenneth and Patrick. They come out of the bus and ask what the matter is, but our guards just shrug their shoulders. What do they want to do with the captives?
Shauri ya Wakubwa
, they say, but they do allow me to speak to Kenneth. I give him most of the money and my parcel of old clothes to take to my mother. Their bus also leaves, but now I have the comfort of knowing that somebody will take the news of my arrest to my family. My mother will get some of the money all right, but that is not how I envisioned the scene.

They keep us in the sun till the last bus has gone. They have allowed us to sit instead of squatting, and I am grateful for this small mercy. My worries deepen. It is not only the uncertainty of what next. Even if released, I will now not know what to do, where to spend the night, or how to walk the twenty kilometers to Limuru. I know that my auntie Kabera is married and lives around Banana Hills, but I don’t know the actual location of her homestead. I am in limbo. The absurdity of my situation increases. Trying to make sense of it all, I retrace the events of the day.

In the morning, at Kahũgũinĩ, I was the revered teacher. Teaching had not been my first choice, even as a temporary post, pending acceptance to college. I had really wanted to be a journalist, and when the editor of the
East African Standard
, the only major English daily in Kenya, conducted interviews at Alliance, I had presented myself, but I was not successful. Once I started, however, I developed a feeling for teaching and forgot all about my journalistic ambition. I felt a rapport with my students. The headmaster, Kĩmani Ware, who pronounced his last name as if it were the English word of the same spelling, was given to dramatics, and within weeks of my joining the school, everybody in the region knew that an Alliance genius was on his staff. When the results of the Cambridge exams were printed in the
East African Standard
, Kĩmani Ware would carry the page with him as evidence of the genius on his staff.

This morning we traveled from Kahũgũinĩ to Kĩambu together, and later, after we received our pay, he had urged me to go back with him to Thika and Kahũgũinĩ, offering to accompany me to Limuru the following day. But I had declined: I had to go home to my mother to celebrate the success of our pact.

Now I am here on a roadside, not knowing what is going to happen next.

The jeep that took Messrs. Rifleman and Machine Gun returns eventually; the officers whisper something to our guards, and then leave. A decision at last, but not in our favor. They shove us into a line of twos and escort us to Thĩmbĩgwa home guard post. The post consists of a main
building of stone walls and iron roof next to a few others of timber around an open yard. A fence of barbed wire surrounds the entire compound. We are crowded into a room with hardly any light. All the other rooms in the barrack are full. There must have been a general sweep; our bus was the last into the net. If only I had heeded the voices of Kenneth and Patrick or even that of Kĩmani Ware, I would not have been caught in the dragnet. I don’t want to wallow in self-pity, but I cannot comprehend the turn of events from hope in the morning to despair in the evening.