Echoes From a Distant Land (42 page)

Emerald couldn't decide what she wanted to do about her friendship with Raph. He had an exciting if dominating personality; he was amusing when he wanted to be; and he could be a lot of fun, such as when they fled the police on the day of the protest march, but he had an unpleasant side to his nature that she'd only just started to see. She wondered if she was attracted more to the idea of Raph rather than to Raph himself.

When she could get away from her mother in the afternoons, she would go to him, full of excitement and expectations, but as soon as they'd made love, he became remote. She wanted to hold him afterwards, to feel his body close to hers. And she wanted him to hold her, but he became restless and irritable. He was uninterested in her thoughts and feelings and plans. Recently, he'd been making more of those snide remarks about her friendship with Jelani; and their petty arguments were becoming increasingly nasty. She wanted to put a little distance between them while she untangled her thoughts. In spite of that, when he rang her at the Algonquin, she again agreed to have lunch with him.

They met in the restaurant near NYU they'd chosen as their regular meeting place.

‘Where've you been, dressed like that?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘That blouse. Leaves nothing to the imagination. Every guy in town can see your tits.'

‘I thought you'd like it,' she said, looking down at the blouse.

‘It's not what I like to see my girl wearing when she's out on her own.'

‘I've only been to my photojournalist class.'

‘And that's another thing. What a fucking waste of time that is.'

‘It is not!'

‘In that whole roll of film at the march — no, two rolls of film — you only had one lousy photo that was worth anything. Why bother?'

‘I bother because one day I'm going to earn my living at it.'

‘Don't make me laugh. You have no need to make a living. All you have to do is put out your hand and take whatever Mummy and Daddy give you.'

Emerald was about to retaliate again, but held back. She didn't like the way the conversation was going — or the way he seemed to think he could now take control of her life.

‘Why are you acting so mean?' she asked.

‘Am I? Well, life's like that. A struggle. Rich against poor. Workers against bosses. Privileged against the underprivileged. But you, little Miss Moneybucks, wouldn't know. And probably wouldn't care.'

Emerald had heard enough. She pushed her chair back and stood, blinking the tears of humiliation and anger away.

‘You have no right to speak to me that way, Raph,' she said. ‘I'm sorry I can't live up to your socialist ideals. You make me feel like a traitor to the human race because my family has money. Perhaps we shouldn't see each other until I'm able to overcome the sin of coming from a privileged background.'

 

Jelani sat with Emerald in the rotunda by the lake in Central Park. It was late afternoon, and they had the popular picnicking spot to themselves.

‘It made me happy when you called,' he said. ‘How did you know where I'm staying?'

‘I went to the Longshoremen's offices,' she said. ‘I couldn't think of any other way to contact you.' She smiled. ‘If my mother knew I'd gone there she'd have a fit.'

‘Why?'

‘She doesn't approve of unions. Actually, it's my stepfather who doesn't approve and she just goes along with him. Anyway,
someone else was looking for you too. The man in your office said a black man wanted to speak with you.'

‘Really? Maybe it was Randolph.'

‘No, Randolph was the one I spoke to.'

Jelani puzzled over this. He hardly knew anyone in New York. And Randolph was the only black man who knew him.

‘Well, I'm glad you called. Raph's coming too.'

‘Oh?'

‘After we spoke, I called him, and he said he'd love to come.'

Emerald said nothing.

‘I didn't think you'd mind,' Jelani said, seeing her uneasiness.

‘Yes, of course it's OK. It's just that I didn't know.'

Her response was not as he expected and made Jelani think again about his conversation with Raph. The Englishman had actually said: ‘Then I'd better be there.' Jelani thought it was his unfamiliarity with the English idiom, but the conversation became a little strained after that.

‘Tell me about Kenya,' she asked him, interrupting his thoughts.

‘Why? It is only a small country, so far away,' he said.

‘I'm interested. I was born in Kenya. I think it was somewhere near the capital … what's its name?'

‘Nairobi. Then you are close to my homeland. I grew up near Embu, not far from Nairobi.'

He told her of his childhood, and it emerged that they'd been born in the same year.

‘Eleventh of January, 1932,' she said.

‘I don't know the month,' Jelani said, a little embarrassed at his ignorance. ‘The Kikuyu don't take much notice of birthdays.'

‘I'd love to go there someday. Tell me about where you lived.'

‘Ah, now you are asking me something,' Jelani began, smiling. ‘It is such a small village. Nobody knows we are there.'

‘Tell me anyway.'

‘Well … my home is called Kobogi. It's in the big forest, high in the hills …'

He could see the little village with its huts of mud and daub and thatched roofs. Drying racks for the hides. The kids and lambs
bleating in their staked enclosure. Children running about, laughing. The wood smoke from cooking fires. Dry dung and damp earth.

‘You can see the Aberdare Ranges from the village,' he continued, ‘and on a clear day, if you climb the ridge to the north, you can see Kirinyaga. Emma, I tell you, it is so beautiful.'

‘Kirinyaga?'

‘It means mountain of brightness. The Kikuyu people believe that God lives there. The white people call it Mt Kenya, but oh, it is so beautiful. You must see it if you come to my country.'

‘I will, if you take me there.'

He laughed, not sure if she was joking.

‘My mother had a maize garden near the stream. And we had many goats. When I was a boy I had to tend them during the day and lock them in the pens at night in case of leopards.'

Then he remembered Kobogi didn't exist any more. His whole extended family now lived on Cook's farm except for those, like Jelani, who'd left to find work in the cities.

‘What does your name, Jelani, mean?' she asked.

‘It means
mighty
in Swahili.' He smiled self-consciously. ‘Maybe everyone thought I was going to grow tall.'

He remembered the fat Ugandan clerk at the administration office and his joke about his first given name, Zesiro — first born of twins. It had never left his mind that he might somewhere have a twin, possibly someone as light-skinned as he.

‘But you
are
tall. And very handsome, of course.'

He laughed to cover his embarrassment. Emerald was always teasing him about his appearance.

‘Do you have a girlfriend in Kenya?'

‘I do.'

‘Tell me about her.'

‘We met when I was about thirteen or fourteen,' Jelani said. ‘Beth was a little younger. Then something happened and she went away.'

‘Oh, how sad. What happened?'

Jelani wondered how Emerald, or any white girl for that matter, could ever understand the Kikuyu culture. She would think all
Kikuyu were savages if he told her about the old chief's desire to have his Beth as a wife. Sitting in a park in New York made the whole matter of his culture too exotic — too strange for that day and that place. Such stories could only be understood in their homeland.

‘It was nothing. Her family … moved away, that's all. But we're together again now.'

‘Wonderful. Have you had a letter from her?'

‘No. I don't think it would reach me before I leave.'

‘Are you in love?'

He thought about it. He had no doubt that his feelings for Beth were different from those he had for any other girl. ‘I'm not sure,' he said. ‘How can you know?'

Emerald shrugged. ‘If you're not sure I suppose it's not real love. Aren't you supposed to feel something really special about that person when you're in love?'

Jelani shrugged. ‘Maybe. Yes, I think so.'

‘When you see her, does your heart jump?'

He nodded. ‘Yes … I think it does. Like a gazelle.'

‘And when she smiles at you, does it make you feel special?'

‘… Yes.'

His thoughts carried him into Beth's arms. And even when I just touch her hand, I want to make love to her, he thought. His heart thumped inside his chest and at that moment he wanted to be home in Kenya with her. ‘I miss her very much,' he said.

‘That's another sign,' Emerald added. ‘It certainly
sounds
like you're in love.'

He hesitated before asking, ‘Do you love Raph?'

‘Hmm … I'm not sure.'

Jelani smiled. Emerald had failed her own test. He liked her, but Raph could be difficult at times. Jelani admired Raph's commitment to the union movement, but he didn't like the way he talked to Emerald. He was very demanding of her, and Jelani sensed she didn't like it, although she said nothing. He would have liked to ask her more about her feelings for Raph because in Jelani's view, he was not good for her.

They sipped their drinks in silence.

‘When was the last time you went back home to see your family?' she asked.

‘I've not been back for so many years, I've almost forgotten them.'

‘Don't you miss them?'

He thought again about his family. Every time he'd done so in recent years he resolved to go back to visit them, but then he found reasons or excuses to defer it again. Cook's farm was not Kobogi, which would have made it easier for him, but that, he realised now, was yet another excuse.

‘I do miss them,' he said. ‘And being here in this great big city makes me miss them more.'

She reached across the table, and put her hand on his arm. ‘Oh, Jelani, when you go back to Kenya, you must visit your home again.'

The warmth of her hand on his arm made the skin beneath glow.

‘Well … isn't this a cosy little scene?' It was Raph, who was now standing at the rotunda steps. ‘Making a move on my girl, are you, Jelani?' He was smiling, but the smile hadn't quite reached his eyes.

Jelani could see a flash of annoyance in Emerald's expression, and he had his answer about her feelings for Raph.

 

‘Raph, don't be silly,' Emerald said, withdrawing her hand from Jelani's arm. ‘We're just talking.'

‘Oh, yeah … talking about what?' Raph said.

‘Well, if you must know, I told Jelani I was going to visit Kenya one day, and he was telling me about it.'

‘Kenya? Huh! Another example of Mother England's fucking imperialism.'

‘There's no need for that kind of language.'

‘Oh, really? Listen to Lady Emerald Northcote-fucking-Middlebridge.'

‘Raph,' Jelani said softly. ‘You heard Emerald. Please be quiet. She doesn't like to hear you talk that way.'

‘She didn't seem to mind it the other day in my bed — did you, sweetheart?'

Emerald coloured; she snatched her hat from the table. Tears of anger welled in her eyes. She blinked them back, determined to be strong. She'd had enough of his crudity and his domineering attitude.

‘I'm going,' she said.

‘Not until I'm finished,' Raph said, grabbing her by the arm as she swept past him.

‘Raph!
Let go
. You're hurting me.'

‘Leave her alone,' Jelani said, this time with a hint of threat in his voice.

‘This is none of your business, nigger,' he snarled.

Jelani was on his feet in an instant, spinning Raph about and simultaneously landing a roundhouse punch to his jaw.

Raph, stunned, hurled himself at Jelani, who sprang aside, swinging a wild punch that missed Raph by a foot as he went by.

Jelani's slim build gave him the edge in speed and agility over Raph, who was slightly heavier. They sparred; Jelani dropped into a crouch, circling. Raph swung a kick at his legs. Jelani caught his ankle and spun him, throwing him to the ground and then leaping onto his back. He slipped an arm around Raph's neck and tightened his grip. Even Emerald could see that in a few seconds, Raph would be either unconscious or dead, depending on how long and how tight Jelani kept the hold.

‘
No!
' Emerald screamed. ‘Jelani, stop. You'll kill him!'

He hesitated a moment and then let Raph go.

Raph coughed and choked, spluttering obscenities and threats.

‘Come on, Jelani,' she said, dragging him by the arm. ‘Let's go.'

She almost ran, dragging Jelani behind her by the hand. He followed reluctantly. His chest rose and fell with deep breaths, as if he was trying to get his rage under control. She'd never seen him in such a state. The young man — normally so shy and quiet — had become a frightening sight. A potential killer.

When they were some distance away from the incident, she drew him to a quiet bench seat away from the path.

‘Are you hurt?' she asked.

He looked at his scraped knuckles. ‘No,' he said.

‘Thank you for defending me. You won't have to worry about Raph any more. That's the last I'll see of him.'

He nodded.

‘Mother and I are leaving for Niagara Falls the day after tomorrow, and she's decided that we should leave New York immediately we come back.'

He nodded again. It was hard to read his emotions.

‘So, I may not see you after tomorrow …'

Again he remained silent, studying his clenched fist.

‘Unless you can come to see me off at Grand Central. Would you do that for me … Please?'