A Fool's Knot (33 page)

But, as Daniel removed the last of the debris from the tables, the room apparently full to echo with the sound of clashing glass, slapping plates and clinking spoons, John, Michael and Janet shared a formal goodbye, complete with handshakes. She thought she heard him say, “I may see you later,” as he started his motorbike, but she was not sure, as the first engine fire drowned the end of the phrase. He had changed, she repeated to herself, as she and John watched him ride down the shallow hill and up the other side, his bike seemingly knowing its own way, as it made the slight deviation from straight to find the gap in the hedge and the entrance to the mission compound. A few moments later, her cards and messages collected, she said a final and tearful goodbye to Daniel, who was now ready to leave, to leave Janet for the last time to make his way home to his family. He would be someone else's employee from now on.

And so John and Janet were finally alone. They said nothing as they ambled the fifty yards down the gentle slope to Janet's house. Once inside, Janet locked the kitchen door behind them, an act so rarely done in the past that it seemed to start a new era, her new-found selfishness wanting nothing to trespass on their space, nothing to interrupt what she immediately initiated the moment she turned round to face him. She wanted him so much she ached, and they paused for nothing, neither food, nor drink, nor talk, their shared agenda comprising just one item, a single activity.

So it was with obvious disappointment, but probably not surprise, that Janet listened to John some hours later as he announced that he could not spend that night with her. People would talk. They would notice. Over the previous months they had been careful only to meet in Kitui. This had been the first time they had made love in Janet's house. To stay overnight would invite gossip. He also told her that he had already arranged to meet his father and he had thus already booked a night in a room behind the Safari Bar. He had to see his father. They had things to discuss. He would be alone in the room again from the early morning, of course, after the old man had set off to walk home. She could have a good night's sleep and then come early to the Safari, maybe around eight, and they could have two hours together in the hotel room, an anonymous space once the door was closed, the kind of place in which their relationship had been born. In a strange way, it was the almost communal nature of those places that provided an aspect that Janet had enjoyed. It was like playing with a fire you could control. Now that she was ready to leave Kenya, her two-year commitment almost complete, she was almost compelled to broadcast that she was sleeping with John Mwangangi, but then it was different for him. He would still have to come and go. And he was still married.

But it was with immense sadness that she watched him dress, saw him again become the suited, suave city gent, again in control of every aspect of his being. While naked, of course, she was the one with control, the one who could make him move, the one with the power to put him where she wanted. A simple move of her body, an offering, a widening, a contraction could provoke the precise response she both predicted and relished. He was infatuated with her and she with him, but as the months had passed she had started to recognise how easily she now held him where she wanted. She was surely in control.

And so it was with surprise and not a little challenge that he told her he was afraid that he might be detained in town and not get back to Nairobi in time to see her off at the airport. He did not tell her then of the present he hoped to give her. Hoped, that is, because he did not yet know if it would materialize. At ten o'clock, an hour after checking in to his hotel room, it was delivered.

John retired to his room which, typically for an August night, felt cold and just a little damp. Wind rattled the door. Only in August was Migwani cold enough to warrant a fire in the room. Only in August was a guest in the Safari supplied with a charcoal burner and fuel to warm the night. Today, however, the bar had run out of charcoal and John had been supplied, along with the floor-standing
jiko
, or stove, with several pieces of wood for fuel. He had left the fire unlit, however. He did not want to emerge the next morning with his clothes smelling of wood smoke, so he merely wrapped up in the sheet to keep out the cold.

He passed the hour reading background information on a couple of cases he was currently working on, as well as reviewing plans for the next phase of his farm's development. He had worked exceptionally hard since taking up his new post in the Nairobi law practice and was beginning to feel the strain caused by so much countrywide travelling. He was beginning to think that the jobs furthest from Nairobi were being pushed his way, allowing the other partners to avoid spending onerous time away from home. But he realised that the practice really was, as he had been promised, an elite operation, dealing with the very biggest cases. They were a selective company, but that meant being wherever the work was and, realistically, it suited him. He had been glad at times to render the distance he felt had developed between himself and Lesley into real, countable miles.

At precisely ten o'clock he heard the sound of a familiar voice in the courtyard outside asking the whereabouts of Bwana Mwangangi. On hearing this, John sprang to his feet and rushed to open the door. “Here,” he shouted. “I'm in here,” he confirmed in Kikamba.

John's father rushed into the room carrying a large parcel wrapped in newspaper under his arm. Having set this down carefully on the small table which stood in the far corner, he wrapped his jacket tight around his body and rubbed his hands together fiercely. “It is very cold tonight,” he said. “I set off very late because one of my cows broke its tether last night and your sister and I spent half the day trying to find it.”

“You did find it?” asked John, concerned.

“Yes. It had grown thirsty and had found its own way to the dam for a drink,” answered the old man, now stamping his feet for warmth. It was then that he noticed the small metal stove and the wood. “Can we make a fire in here?” he asked. Nodding towards the bar he continued, “Or are these people afraid of sooting up their walls?”

John smiled at his father. The man doesn't change, he thought. He still regards the Safari Bar as the height of ostentatious luxury. “I will go and get a
panga
to cut the wood,” said John, setting off to the bar.

Ten minutes later he had returned and chopped the wood into sticks with the heavy knife, which now lay on the table near the newspaper-wrapped parcel his father had brought. He built and lit the fire, which kindled easily in the small cylindrical fireplace. His father was already warming his hands. The flickering light of the fire filled the room and slowly, amid continued complaints about the cold, the old man grew warmer and retired to the comfort of the cane chair. He pointed to the parcel and said, “I have finished your gift for the teacher. It is not very good, but it's all I could do in the time I had.”

John went over to the table and peeled away the parcel's loose wrapping to reveal a carved wooden figure. It portrayed an old man with his eyes wide open. John studied the figure for a few moments, his great satisfaction momentarily overwhelming his words of thanks. At last he turned to face his father again and said, “It is very, very beautiful. Miss Rowlandson will be very pleased.” Smiling at his father, who still looked uncomfortably cold after his long walk, he continued, “It is very funny. I was with Miss Rowlandson and Father Michael earlier. They were both dressed in very light clothes and both of them complained at the heat!”

“Ah,” said the old man with a knowing air, “there is cold blood in white flesh.”

John smiled at his father with deep affection. For some minutes they did not speak, the old man's still chattering teeth providing the only sound above the breathing of the wind. John slowly peeled away the remaining wrappings from the carving and stood back to admire the quality of his father's work. Janet would surely treasure this, he thought.

“You seem very keen to impress this white woman, Mwangangi,” said Musyoka, slowly.

“She has been kind to me and my family,” answered John, without moving his gaze from the statue.

There was another silence. John could sense that his father was sifting through a whole series of issues, any of which he might raise, and any of which might cause serious disagreement between them. “And have I not been kind?” asked Musyoka, who had in fact come this evening determined to confront their long-running disagreement once and for all. His son's request had, in effect, brought things to a head. It was one thing for Mwangangi to be a Christian, another for him to speak English, to study, to live overseas and to marry a foreigner in Britain without his family's consent. But this woman was white, one more step further removed, and it was he, Musyoka, who was carving the present that his son would give her.

“You have, Father,” said John. Now leaning against the edge of the table, John eyed his father through the corner of his eye, again not turning to face him. He awaited the words he knew would follow.

“Then you have decided to do as I have advised.” Musyoka's voice was full of force and directness. His words asked many questions. “You have already wasted your chance to join this year's group. Next year your child will be a year older…” The old man allowed his words to fall to silence.

John took a deep breath before answering, as if he was giving himself time to compose his answer, though, when the words were spoken, they had a distinctly rehearsed air. Musyoka was perched expectantly on the very edge of his chair. “My daughter is also my wife's daughter and she says it cannot be done. It is contrary to their tradition.”

Musyoka was immediately angry. “What kind of a man are you? Are you Mwangangi, son of Musyoka? Or are you a woman married to a man? No son of mine would hide like that behind a woman's words. A man's flour is cooked how he likes it. If you say it must be done then your wife must accept it. Katuunge is also my granddaughter – or have you forgotten? And also any member of my family is also a member of my people. She is yours. You are mine and we are all part of something bigger, something which we have a responsibility to preserve.”

“Father, you must understand,” pleaded John. “Lesley is not one of our people. She is not even Kenyan. Her people do not circumcise either their men or their women…” The old man scoffed at such madness. “For Lesley the thought of Anna being circumcised is utterly revolting. She says that if it was done, then she would no longer feel that Anna was her own daughter.” And there was an unspoken extension to this that both men assumed, that Lesley would no longer be a wife.

“Then she is selfish,” shouted Musyoka, getting up from the chair and crossing the room. “And what is more, she knows how to control you. She is a devious woman, who does not tell the truth. Every monkey has a red arse,” he continued, waving his arms and making John smile a little, if reluctantly. “There must be customs amongst her own people which are not done here. What about them? I'd bet that your daughter is forced to honour them to the letter!”

“Lesley's people are not a people like we are,” said John impatiently.

“Rubbish,” replied his father. “If they are a people, then they are a people with customs, traditions, practices. Don't try to tell me that every person does exactly what they want!”

“Father,” said John in a voice that offered conciliation, as he took Musyoka's arm and led him back to the chair that his anger had left behind. “Lesley's people are not a tribe. They are very different from us and do not have duties like we have. In the Western world it is the individual that makes the rules that govern their lives. There are laws for everyone, of course, but there are no responsibilities held in common like our people have. The only rule is that one should not question another person's individuality.”

“Then they are heathens,” shouted the old man, swinging his arm free from his son's grasp and crossing the room.

“As I have said to you before,” continued John, desperately trying not to shout, “in the culture that Lesley and I share, it is vitally important that the child should make up her own mind when it comes to matters of religion, marriage and everything to do with her own future. As parents, it's our job to prepare the way, to support her in what she wants, never to make decisions on her behalf. When she is old enough she can decide for herself. It will be her decision. A parent cannot be a child's own heart.”

“But then it will be too late!” shouted Musyoka, his words imploring his son to see an obvious truth. “By then she will be a grown woman and well beyond marrying age. She will have a woman's body but still a child's mind. She needs the maturity that only formally and ceremonially joining the adult world can give. A cow cannot be killed by a branding iron,” he continued with growing impatience, “but the mark it receives gives it a known place in the world, a place that others can recognise and respect. Without its identity, it is nobody's cow, a rogue, isolated from the herd. She must be initiated into our world as soon as possible. It will not harm her. It never did any harm to your own mother or your sisters. If it is good enough for them then why is it not good enough for your own daughter? If you had married a Kamba woman there would have been no debate. Your daughters, your sons, all would have been circumcised when their time came without a second thought! Why should Anna Katuunge be treated any differently?”