A Spear of Summer Grass. Deanna Raybourn
a horsey odour of sweat and grass and something musty riding just underneath. I was still smiling when Dora turned to me.
“I’ve often wondered – did you love any of them? The others who came after Johnny?”
She didn’t look at me and I didn’t look at her. Some questions are so direct the only way to ask them is sideways.
“What would you say if I told you I loved all of them and none?”
“I’d say you were dodging the question.”
“Then call me the Artful Dodger,” I told her.
She didn’t say anything, but the sigh she gave was eloquent enough. It said she got what she expected and less than she hoped.
“Fine. You want a real answer? The truth is I have loved them all when I remembered to. But it’s easy to forget.”
“I don’t see how.”
“You close your eyes and suddenly he’s not there anymore. What you loved, or thought you loved, just isn’t there, and there is a man-shaped hole in your memory of where he used to be. The sad part is when it happens when he’s sitting at the same table or lying in the same bed. You can turn and look at him and not even remember his name because he was just a visitor. He was a man who was only passing through your heart, and you never really made a place for him, so he just keeps passing. My husbands since Johnny have been passing men. Not a stayer among them.”
“And Johnny?”
“Johnny was a stayer,” I told her, wiping the red dust from my face. “That Johnny was a real stayer.”
Dodo was done asking questions then, and even if she wasn’t, I was finished answering. We watched the zebra for a while, until they faded back and stood, lathered up, their striped sides heaving as they watched us move farther and farther away.
Dora reached for the guidebook. “It says here the telegraph wires are on poles that are higher than customary on account of the giraffes,” she read.
“Tell me more,” I ordered, and she did, reading from the guidebook until her voice was hoarse, reading until the flat, tilted plains of Africa ran us up to Nairobi, reading until I wasn’t thinking about Johnny anymore but about telegraph wires and giraffes and man-eating lions grinding up the bones of the dead.
* * *
A little past noon we rolled into Nairobi, a flat town coated in red dust that looked as if it had been scooped up somewhere in India and plunked down in the middle of the African savannah. The streets of Nairobi were teeming gently with people bent on the business of civilisation. There were people of every description – purposeful Indian clerks jostling with the darker–skinned native Africans who moved with slow grace through the throng. Here and there were white faces, most meticulously guarded from the equatorial sun by double terais or sola topees. The white folks were the only ones who strode freely, keeping to the fitful shade of the blue gum trees that lined the street, as the Indians and Africans all stepped quickly out of their way to walk in the sun. It was nothing new to me. I had spent too much time in Louisiana watching the black folks carefully keeping out of the way of the whites.
The streets were paved and there were electric wires hanging high overhead where colourful birds perched and monkeys swung hand over hand. There were plenty of motorcars, but the streets were choked with oxcarts as well, and rickshaws scuttled by, leaving the pushcarts to trundle in their wake, slogging through mule dung and rotting fruit. The air was pungent with both, and they combined with woodsmoke and the gum leaves and the sunburned red soil to give Africa its own unique perfume. I inhaled it deeply until Dora dragged me back from the window, scolding that I would make a spectacle of myself.
I combed out my hair and powdered my nose and lacquered on a fresh coat of lipstick as we pulled into the station. I could hear a commotion on the platform, and Dodo darted a glance at me, her eyeballs rolling white.
“There can’t be reporters here waiting,” she muttered. “There just can’t.”
“There can and there probably are,” I retorted. “Oh, Dodo, I know they’re a misery, but just put your head down and carry on. They’ll stop when they get a picture.”
I handed off everything except my handbag to her and smoothed out my silk skirt. I had decided upon white for my arrival in Nairobi and everything was the same arctic shade, from my suede shoes to the fur stole I draped over my arm. It was far too warm to wear it, but the fur was simply too sweet to pack away. I straightened my stockings and squared my shoulders as I stepped from the train, bracing myself for the onslaught of cameras and reporters.
Just as I set foot on the platform, Mr. Wickenden also emerged from the train. He gave me a cool smile.
“Miss Drummond.” He lifted his hat.
“Mr. Wickenden. I hope the invitation to visit still stands. I would hate to think we couldn’t be friends.”
I arched a brow, and he hesitated, then grinned. “Africa’s a big place, Miss Drummond, but it’s entirely too small for grudges. We shall be neighbours, after all, and we must stick together out here.”
He lifted his hat again and moved to offer his hand.
Before I could take it, I heard a roar over the gathered throng. It must have been a hell of a roar, too, for me to hear it over the chaos of the Nairobi station, but in that moment everything stopped. The shouts of the porters, the wailing babies, the cries of the vendors – everything went silent and heads swivelled to the end of the platform where a pirate stood, booted feet planted wide as he surveyed the scene, hands fisted at his hips.
He wasn’t a pirate of course, but that’s the first impression I ever had of him and first impressions die hard. He was dressed haphazardly, with a filthy shirt tucked into even filthier trousers that were themselves tucked into a high pair of scuffed leather riding boots. His sleeves were rolled back and his collar was open, and every muscle seemed to vibrate with rage. He wore a beaten leather Stetson jammed down on his head, throwing his face into shadow. He strode straight to one of the native fellows and said something unintelligible in the native lingo. The man promptly handed over a long, slender whip. The pirate took it and walked directly to where Anthony Wickenden was still reaching for my hand. He didn’t even pause before he reached out and grasped Wickenden by the shoulders and lifted him clean off his feet. He threw Wickenden to the platform. Then he raised the whip, and the first crack of it was so loud the sound echoed straight down to the base of my spine.
What commenced was the bloodiest thrashing I had ever seen in my life, and when it was done, Wickenden was rolling on the platform, spitting blood and testing his loosened teeth.
“Goddamn you, White,” he managed to say before he rolled over and heaved out his stomach.
His assailant had lost his hat in the fray, and he bent to pick it up, leaning close over Mr. Wickenden as he did so. He pitched his voice low, but I heard him quite distinctly. “I saw the bruises, Tony. If you ever so much as think about touching her again, I will kill you – so slowly you will beg me to finish you off. Do you understand me?”
Wickenden spat out another mouthful of blood and gave a short groan by way of reply.
The pirate clapped his hat back onto his head and strode off, tossing the whip back to its owner without even breaking stride. There was a moment of sustained silence, and then the crowd began to move again, shouting and pushing as porters hurried to the injured man and the rest began to spread the story of what they’d just seen. A flashbulb went off in my face and some ferrety fellow asked me for a story, but before I could give him a piece of my mind, a slender gentleman appeared at my elbow.
“Miss Drummond, I presume? I’m Bates, Government House. I am afraid I must ask you to come with me.” I didn’t bother to protest. He had tucked my hand through his arm and towed me swiftly away.
“Delilah! Where are you going?” Dodo shrieked from behind me. I shrugged, but the gentleman turned and called over his shoulder.
“Government