Read Online West with the Night by Beryl Markham - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Beryl Markham
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father, Jim Elkington, Mrs. Elkington, and one or two other settlers sat and talked with what to my mind was always unreasonable solemnity.
There were drinks, but beyond that there was a tea-table lavishly spread, as only the English can spread them. I have sometimes thought since of the Elkingtons’ tea-table — round, capacious, and white, standing with sturdy legs against the green vines of the garden, a thousand miles of Africa receding from its edge.
It was a mark of sanity, I suppose, less than of luxury. It was evidence of the double debt England still owes to ancient China for her two gifts that made expansion possible — tea and gunpowder.
But cakes and muffins were no fit bribery for me. I had pleasures of my own then, or constant expectations. I made what niggardly salutations I could bring forth from a disinterested memory and left the house at a gait rather faster than a trot.
As I scampered past the square hay shed a hundred yards or so behind the Elkington house, I caught sight of Bishon Singh whom my father had sent ahead to tend our horses.
I think the Sikh must have been less than forty years old then, but his face was never any indication of his age. On some days he looked thirty and on others he looked fifty, depending on the weather, the time of day, his mood, or the tilt of his turban. If he had ever disengaged his beard from his hair and shaved the one and clipped the other, he might have astonished us all by looking like one of Kipling’s elephant boys, but he never did either, and so, to me at least, he remained a man of mystery, without age or youth, but burdened with experience, like the wandering Jew.
He raised his arm and greeted me in Swahili as I ran through the Elkington farmyard and out toward the open country.
Why I ran at all or with what purpose in mind is beyond my answering, but when I had no specific destination I always ran as fast as I could in the hope of finding one — and I always found it.
I was within twenty yards of the Elkington lion before I saw him. He lay sprawled in the morning sun, huge, black-maned, and gleaming with life. His tail moved slowly, stroking the rough grass like a knotted rope end. His body was sleek and easy, making a mould where he lay, a cool mould, that would be there when he had gone. He was not asleep; he was only idle. He was rusty-red, and soft, like a strokable cat.
I stopped and he lifted his head with magnificent ease and stared at me out of yellow eyes.
I stood there staring back, scuffling my bare toes in the dust, pursing my lips to make a noiseless whistle — a very small girl who knew about lions.
Paddy raised himself then, emitting a little sigh, and began to contemplate me with a kind of quiet premeditation, like that of a slow-witted man fondling an unaccustomed thought.
I cannot say that there was any menace in his eyes, because there wasn’t, or that his ‘frightful jowls’ were drooling, because they were handsome jowls and very tidy. He did sniff the air, though, with what impressed me as being close to audible satisfaction. And he did not lie down again.
I remembered the rules that one remembers. I did not run. I walked very slowly, and I began to sing a defiant song.
‘Kali coma Simba sisi,’ I sang, ‘Asikari yoti ni udari! — Fierce like the lion are we, Asikari all are brave!’
I went in a straight line past Paddy when I sang it, seeing his eyes shine in the thick rass, watching his tail beat time to the metre of my ditty.
‘Twendi, twendi — ku pigana — piga aduoi — pig asana! — Let us go, let us go — to fight — to beat down the enemy! Beat hard, beat hard!’
What lion would be unimpressed with the marching song of the King’s African Rifles?
Singing it still, I took up my trot toward the rim of the low hill which might, if I were lucky, have Cape gooseberry bushes on its slopes. The country was grey-green and dry, and the sun lay on it closely, making the ground hot under my bare feet.
There were drinks, but beyond that there was a tea-table lavishly spread, as only the English can spread them. I have sometimes thought since of the Elkingtons’ tea-table — round, capacious, and white, standing with sturdy legs against the green vines of the garden, a thousand miles of Africa receding from its edge.
It was a mark of sanity, I suppose, less than of luxury. It was evidence of the double debt England still owes to ancient China for her two gifts that made expansion possible — tea and gunpowder.
But cakes and muffins were no fit bribery for me. I had pleasures of my own then, or constant expectations. I made what niggardly salutations I could bring forth from a disinterested memory and left the house at a gait rather faster than a trot.
As I scampered past the square hay shed a hundred yards or so behind the Elkington house, I caught sight of Bishon Singh whom my father had sent ahead to tend our horses.
I think the Sikh must have been less than forty years old then, but his face was never any indication of his age. On some days he looked thirty and on others he looked fifty, depending on the weather, the time of day, his mood, or the tilt of his turban. If he had ever disengaged his beard from his hair and shaved the one and clipped the other, he might have astonished us all by looking like one of Kipling’s elephant boys, but he never did either, and so, to me at least, he remained a man of mystery, without age or youth, but burdened with experience, like the wandering Jew.
He raised his arm and greeted me in Swahili as I ran through the Elkington farmyard and out toward the open country.
Why I ran at all or with what purpose in mind is beyond my answering, but when I had no specific destination I always ran as fast as I could in the hope of finding one — and I always found it.
I was within twenty yards of the Elkington lion before I saw him. He lay sprawled in the morning sun, huge, black-maned, and gleaming with life. His tail moved slowly, stroking the rough grass like a knotted rope end. His body was sleek and easy, making a mould where he lay, a cool mould, that would be there when he had gone. He was not asleep; he was only idle. He was rusty-red, and soft, like a strokable cat.
I stopped and he lifted his head with magnificent ease and stared at me out of yellow eyes.
I stood there staring back, scuffling my bare toes in the dust, pursing my lips to make a noiseless whistle — a very small girl who knew about lions.
Paddy raised himself then, emitting a little sigh, and began to contemplate me with a kind of quiet premeditation, like that of a slow-witted man fondling an unaccustomed thought.
I cannot say that there was any menace in his eyes, because there wasn’t, or that his ‘frightful jowls’ were drooling, because they were handsome jowls and very tidy. He did sniff the air, though, with what impressed me as being close to audible satisfaction. And he did not lie down again.
I remembered the rules that one remembers. I did not run. I walked very slowly, and I began to sing a defiant song.
‘Kali coma Simba sisi,’ I sang, ‘Asikari yoti ni udari! — Fierce like the lion are we, Asikari all are brave!’
I went in a straight line past Paddy when I sang it, seeing his eyes shine in the thick rass, watching his tail beat time to the metre of my ditty.
‘Twendi, twendi — ku pigana — piga aduoi — pig asana! — Let us go, let us go — to fight — to beat down the enemy! Beat hard, beat hard!’
What lion would be unimpressed with the marching song of the King’s African Rifles?
Singing it still, I took up my trot toward the rim of the low hill which might, if I were lucky, have Cape gooseberry bushes on its slopes. The country was grey-green and dry, and the sun lay on it closely, making the ground hot under my bare feet.
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