‘No, there is no room.’
I remembered I had a small penknife and I got it out of my pocket and put it in his hand. He pushed it back in my hand.
‘No,’ he said. ‘No.’
He was quiet then and stood by the road. But when we started, he started to run after the car and I could hear him in the dark screaming,
‘B’wana! I want to go with B’wana!’
We went on up the road, the headlights making it seem like a boulevard after where we had been. We drove fifty-five miles on that road in the dark night without incident. I stayed awake until after we were through the bad part, a long plain of deeply rutted black cotton where the headlights picked out the trail through bushes and then, when the road was better, I went to sleep, waking occasionally to see the headlights shining on a wall of tall trees, or a naked bank, or when we ground in low gear up a steep place, the light slanting up ahead.
Finally, when the speedometer showed fifty miles, we stopped and woke a native in his hut and M’Cola asked about the camp. I slept again and then woke as we were turning off the road and on a track through trees with the fires of the camp showing ahead.
Then as we came to where our lights shone on the green tents I shouted and we all commenced to shout and blew the klaxon and I let the gun off, the flame cutting up into the dark and it making a great noise. Then we were stopped and out from Pop’s tent I saw him coming, thick and heavy in his dressing-gown, and then he had his arms around my shoulders and said, ‘You god damned bull fighter’, and I was clapping him on the back.
And I said, ‘Look at them, Pop’.
‘I saw them,’ he said. ‘The whole back of the car’s full of them.’
Then I was holding P.O.M, tight, she feeling very small inside the quilted bigness of the dressing-gown, and we were saying things to each other.
Then Karl came out and I said, ‘Hi, Karl’.
‘I’m so damned glad,’ he said. ‘They’re marvellous.’
M’Cola had the horns down by now and he and Kamau were holding them so they could all see them in the light of the fire.
‘What did you get?’ I asked Karl.
‘Just another one of those. What do you call them? Tendalla.’
‘Swell,’ I said. I knew I had one no one could beat and I hoped he had a good one too. ‘How big was he?’
‘Oh, fifty-seven,’ Karl said.
‘Let’s see him,’ I said, cold in the pit of my stomach.
‘He’s over there,’ Pop said, and we went over. They were the biggest, widest, darkest, longest-curling, heaviest, most unbelievable pair of kudu horns in the world. Suddenly, poisoned with envy, I did not want to see mine again; never, never.
‘That’s great,’ I said, the words coming out as cheerfully as a croak.
I tried it again. ‘That’s swell. How did you get him?’
‘There were three,’ Karl said. ‘They were all as big as that. I couldn’t tell which was the biggest. We had a hell of a time. I hit him four or five times.’
‘He’s a wonder,’ I said. I was getting so I could do it a little better but it would not fool anybody yet.
‘I’m awfully glad you got yours,’ Karl said. ‘They’re beauties. I want to hear all about them in the morning. I know you’re tired to-night. Good night.’
He went off, delicate as always, so we could talk about it if we wanted to.
‘Come on over and have a drink,’ I called.
‘No thanks, I think I better go to bed. I’ve got a sort of headache.’
‘Good night, Karl.’
‘Good night. Good night, Poor Old Mamma.’
‘Good night,’ we all said.
By the fire, with whisky and soda, we talked and I told them about it all.
‘Perhaps they’ll find the bull,’ Pop said. ‘We’ll offer a reward for the horns. Have them sent to the Game Department. How big is your biggest one?’
‘Fifty-two.’
‘Over the curve?’
‘Yes. Maybe he’s a little better.’
‘Inches don’t mean anything,’ Pop said. ‘They’re damned wonderful kudu.’
‘Sure. But why does he have to beat me so ‘bloody’ badly?’
‘He’s got the luck,’ Pop said. ‘God, what a kudu. I’ve only seen one head killed over fifty in my life before. That was up on Kalal.’
‘We knew he had it when we left the other camp. The lorry came in and told us,’ P.O.M, said. ‘I’ve spent all my time praying for you. Ask Mr. J. P.’
‘You’ll never know what it meant to see that car come into the firelight with those damned horns sticking out,’ Pop said. ‘You old bastard.’
‘It’s wonderful,’ P.O.M, said. ‘Let’s go and look at them again.’
‘You can always remember how you shot them. That’s what you really get out of it,’ Pop said. ‘They’re damned wonderful kudu.’
But I was bitter and I was bitter all night long. In the morning, though, it was gone. It was all gone and I have never had it again.
Pop and I were up and looking at the heads before breakfast. It was a grey, overcast morning and cold. The rains were coming.
‘They’re three marvellous kudu,’ he said.
‘They look all right with the big one this morning,’ I said. They did, too, strangely enough. I had accepted the big one now and was happy to see him and that Karl had him. When you put them side by side they looked all right. They really did. They all were big.
‘I’m glad you’re feeling better,’ Pop said. ‘I’m feeling better myself.’
‘I’m really glad he has him,’ I said truly. ‘Mine’ll hold me.’
‘We have very primitive emotions,’ he said. ‘It’s impossible not to be competitive. Spoils everything, though.’
‘I’m all through with that,’ I said. ‘I’m all right again. I had quite a trip, you know.’
‘Did you not,’ said Pop.
‘Pop, what does it mean when they shake hands and get hold of your thumb and pull it?’
‘It’s on the order of blood brotherhood but a little less formal. Who’s been doing that to you?’
‘Everybody but Kamau.’
‘You’re getting to be a hell of a fellow,’ Pop said. ‘You must be an old timer out here. Tell me, are you much of a tracker and bird shot?’
‘Go to hell.’
‘M’Cola has been doing that with you too?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, well,’ said Pop. ‘Let’s get the little Memsahib and have some breakfast. Not that I’m feeling up to it.’
‘I am,’ I said. ‘I haven’t eaten anything since day before yesterday.’
‘Drank some beer though, didn’t you?’
‘Ah, yes.’
‘Beer’s a food,’ Pop said.
We got the little Memsahib and old Karl and had a very jolly breakfast.
A month later P.O.M., Karl, and Karl’s wife who had come out and joined us at Haifa, were sitting in the sun against a stone wall by the Sea of Galilee eating some lunch and drinking a bottle of wine and watching the grebes out on the lake. The hills made shadows on the water, which was flat calm and rather stagnant looking. There were many grebes, making spreading wakes in the water as they swam, and I was counting them and wondering why they never were mentioned in the Bible. I decided that those people were not naturalists.
‘I’m not going to walk on it,’ Karl said, looking out at the dreary lake. ‘It’s been done already.’
‘You know,’ P.O.M, said, ‘I can’t remember it. I can’t remember Mr. J.P.’s face. And he’s beautiful. I think about him and think about him and I can’t see him. It’s terrible. He isn’t the way he looks in a photograph. In a little while I won’t be able to remember him at all. Already I can’t see him.’
‘You must remember him,’ Karl said to her.
‘I can remember him,’ I said. ‘I’ll write you a piece some time and put him in.’
THE END
