Flyaway / Windfall (36 page)

A waiter was stooping over a loaded tray which he had just set down. He straightened and said, with a wide grin, ‘Breakfast, sah; guaranteed finest English breakfast.’

Hardin tipped him and he left. ‘The refrigerator is full of booze.’

Stafford shuddered. ‘Too early in the morning.’

‘Tell me something,’ said Hardin. ‘What’s with you and the Sergeant? I thought you had the class system in England. It doesn’t show with you two.’

‘I don’t happen to believe in the class system,’ said Stafford, uncovering a dish to reveal bacon and eggs. He picked up a glass of orange juice and sipped it, noting appreciatively that it was freshly squeezed. ‘Have you anything more to tell me before I demolish this lot and fall on that bed?’

‘Yeah. The name of the Foundation. Ol Njorowa is the name of a place near Naivasha. It’s Masai. I don’t know what the translation into English would be but the British settlers call it Hell’s Gate. When do you want to be wakened?’

‘Twelve-thirty.’

Stafford had breakfast and went to bed thinking of Hell’s Gate. It was a hell of a name to give to a charitable foundation.

Hardin woke Stafford on time. He felt hot and sticky but a shower washed away the sweat. As he came out of the bathroom Hardin said, ‘The Sergeant is back—with friends.’

‘What friends?’

‘You’ll see them in the Delamere Bar.’

Stafford dressed and they went downstairs. As they crossed the courtyard in the midday sun Stafford felt the sweat break out again, and made a note to ask Curtis about his tailor.

The Delamere Bar was a large patio at the front of the hotel scattered with tables, each individually shaded, from which one could survey the passing throng. It was crowded, but the Sergeant had secured a table. He stood up as they approached, ‘I would like the Colonel to meet Pete Chipende and Nair Singh.’

They shook hands. Chipende was a black African who offered a grin full of white teeth. ‘Call me Chip; everyone does.’ His English was almost accentless; just a hint of East African sing-song. Nair Singh was a turbanned Sikh with a ferocious black beard and a gentle smile.

As Stafford sat down Hardin said, ‘The beer’s not bad; cold and not too alcoholic.’

‘Okay, a beer.’ Stafford noted that it was probably too alcoholic for the Sikh who sat in front of a soft drink. He looked at Curtis and raised his eyebrows.

Curtis said, ‘Back in London I thought we might need friends who know the territory and the language, so I made a few enquiries and got an address.’

‘Our address,’ said Chip. ‘We work well; turn our hands to anything.’

Stafford kept his eye on Curtis. ‘Where did you get the address?’

He shrugged. ‘Friends, and friends of friends,’ he said carelessly.

‘You have useful friends.’ Curtis was playing the old soldier, and Stafford knew he would get nothing more out of him—not then. He turned to the others. ‘Do you know the score?’

Nair said, ‘You want people watched.’

‘Unobtrusively,’ added Chip. He paused. ‘And maybe you’ll want more.’

‘Maybe.’ A waiter put down glasses and beer bottles. ‘All right. A man arrives tomorrow from London. Gunnarsson, an American. I want to know where he goes and what he does.’

Chip poured himself some beer. ‘Can be done.’

‘There’ll be two others; Hendrix, another American; and Farrar, an Englishman. Hendrix is important—Farrar less so. And there’ll be another man—also Hendriks, but spelled differently.’ He explained the difference.

Hardin said, ‘You want Dirk tailed?’ His voice held mild surprise.

‘Why not?’ Stafford poured beer, tasted it and found it refreshingly cold. ‘Does anyone know anything about the Ol Njorowa Foundation?’

‘Ol Njorowa?’ said Chip. The name slipped more smoothly off his tongue than it had off Stafford’s. ‘That’s near Naivasha.’

‘An agricultural college,’ said Nair. ‘Doing good work, so I hear. I know someone there; a scientist called Hunt.’

That interested Stafford. ‘How well do you know him?’

‘We were at university together.’ Nair pointed. ‘Across the road there. We drank too much beer in this place.’ He smiled. ‘That was before I returned to my religion. I see him from time to time.’

‘Could you introduce me? In an unobtrusive way?’

Nair thought for a moment, ‘It’s possible. When?’

‘Today, if you can. I’d like to find out more about the Foundation before Gunnarsson arrives.’

‘It will have to be at Naivasha. Who will be going apart from you?’

‘Ben will be along. The Sergeant and Chip will stay to look after Gunnarsson tomorrow morning.’

Nair nodded and stood up. ‘I’ll make the arrangements. Be back soon.’

Stafford took a bigger sample of beer. ‘Sergeant; I need suitable clothing or I’ll melt away.’

He said, ‘I’ll see that the Colonel is fitted out.’

‘You want a safari suit like this,’ said Chip, fingering his own jacket. He smiled. ‘You’d better go with Nair after lunch. You look too much the tourist. He’ll get you a better price.’

Hardin handed Stafford a menu. ‘Talking about lunch…’

They ordered lunch and another beer all round—a soft drink for Nair. When he came back he said, ‘Everything fixed. We’ll have dinner with Alan Hunt and his sister at the Lake Naivasha Hotel. It’s part of the same chain as the Norfolk so I booked rooms for tonight. Is that all right?’

‘That’s fine.’

Lunch arrived and they got down to it.

That afternoon Stafford was fitted out with a safari suit in less than an hour in one of the Indian shops near the market. Nair did the chaffering and brought the price down to a remarkably low level. Stafford ordered two more suits,
then they set out for Naivasha, Nair driving and Hardin sitting in the back of the Nissan.

Outside town the road deteriorated, becoming pot-holed with badly repaired patches. When Stafford commented on this Nair said ruefully, ‘It is not good. You would not think that this is an arterial highway—the main road to Uganda. The government should repair it properly and stop the big trucks.’

‘Yeah,’ said Hardin. ‘The main liquids in this country seem to be beer and gasoline.’

Stafford found what he meant when they passed Limuru and started the descent of the escarpment into the Rift Valley. The drop was precipitous and the road wound tortuously round hairpin bends. They were stuck behind a petrol tanker and in front of that was a big truck and trailer loaded with Tusker beer. The Nissan ground down in low gear, unable to overtake in safety, until Nair made a sound of exasperation and pulled off the road.

‘We’ll let them get ahead,’ he said. ‘This low gear work makes the engine overheat.’ He opened the door of the car. ‘I will show you something spectacular.’

Stafford and Hardin followed him through trees to the edge of a cliff. He waved. ‘The Rift!’

It was a tremendous gash in the earth’s surface as though a giant had struck with a cleaver. Stafford estimated a width of twenty miles or more. In the distance the waters of a lake glinted. Nair pointed to the hills on the other side. ‘The Mau Escarpment—and that is Lake Naivasha. The mountain there is Longonot, a volcano, and the Ol Njorowa College is just the other side. You can’t see the buildings from this angle.’

‘How far does the Rift stretch?’ asked Hardin.

Nair laughed. ‘A long way. Four thousand miles, from the Lebanon to Mozambique. It’s the biggest geological scar on the face of the earth. Gregory, the first white man to
identify it, said it would be visible from the moon. Neil Armstrong proved it. Here, at this place, Africa is being torn in two.’ He caught Stafford eyeing him speculatively. ‘I studied geology at university,’ he said dryly.

‘And what do you do now, Nair?’

‘I’m a courier, showing tourists around Kenya.’ He turned. ‘The road should be clear now.’

As Stafford walked back to the car he wondered about that courier bit. Perhaps it was true, perhaps not. And perhaps it was true but not the entire truth. This friend of a friend of Sergeant Curtis was a shade too enigmatic for his liking. ‘And Chip? Is he a courier, too?’

‘Why, yes,’ said Nair.

They got to the floor of the Rift Valley unhampered by beer trucks, although a steady procession was grinding up the hill, going the other way. Once on the level Nair increased speed. They passed a road going off to the left across the valley. Nair said, ‘That’s the road to Narok and the Masai Mara. You ought to go there—many animals.’

Stafford grunted. ‘I’m not here for sightseeing.’ Thereafter Nair was silent until they arrived at the hotel.

It was a low-slung building, painted white with a red, tiled roof and, but for the row of rooms set to one side, it could have been a gentleman’s country house. They registered and found their rooms. Stafford shared with Hardin and, as soon as they were alone, he said, ‘What do you know about this pair—Chip and Nair?’

Hardin shrugged. ‘No more than you. The Sergeant was tight-mouthed.’

‘He said he had connections here, but that was a long time ago, during the Mau-Mau business. At that time Chip and Nair wouldn’t have been long out of kindergarten. I think I’ll have to have a serious talk with him when we get back to Nairobi.’

Stafford had a quick shower before they assembled on the lawn in front of the hotel. It was six o’clock, the cocktail hour, and groups of guests were sitting at tables knocking back the pre-prandial booze while watching the sun dip below the Mau Escarpment beyond the lake. He ordered gin and tonic, Hardin had a Seagram’s, while Nair stuck to his lemon squash.

A dachshund was chasing large black and white birds quite unsuccessfully; they avoided his mad rushes contemptuously. Nair said, ‘Those are ibis; quite a lot of them around here. There are also pelicans, marabou storks and cormorants all around the lake.’ He pointed at an incredibly multi-coloured bird, gleaming iridescently in blues, greens and reds, which was hopping among the tables. ‘And that’s a superb starling.’

‘You seem to know a lot about birds,’ Stafford said. ‘For a geologist.’

‘A courier must know a lot if he’s to please his clients,’ Nair said blandly. ‘Will you need a cover story for Alan Hunt?’

The switch in subject matter was startling. Stafford looked at him thoughtfully, and said, ‘I thought Hunt was your friend. Would you con him?’

Nair shrugged. ‘As I said, I try to please my clients. I told him you were about to visit the geo-thermal project at Ol Karia; that’s about two kilometres the other side of Hell’s Gate.’

‘But I know damn-all about it.’

‘You don’t have to know anything. You’re going there as a vaguely interested visitor. They’re drilling for steam to power an electricity generating plant. It’s very interesting.’

‘No doubt. Tell me, Nair; why are you doing this for me? Why are you playing along?’

He toyed with the iron bangle he wore on his wrist. ‘Because I was asked,’ he said. ‘By a good friend in England.’

Stafford looked at Hardin. ‘What do you think of that?’

He grinned. ‘Not much.’

Nair said earnestly, ‘Just be thankful that we’re here to help you, Mr Stafford.’

Stafford sighed. ‘Since we’re on first name terms you’d better call me Max.’ He added something pungent in Punjabi. Nair lit up and responded with Punjabi in full flow. Stafford said, ‘Whoa, there! I wasn’t in the Punjab long enough to learn more than the swear words. I was there for a short time as a boy just after the war; my father was in the Army. It was at the time of Partition.’

‘That must have been a bad time,’ Nair said seriously. ‘But I’ve never been to India; I was born in Kenya.’ He looked over Stafford’s shoulder. ‘Here is Alan Hunt now.’

Hunt was a tall, tanned man, blond with hair bleached almost white by the sun. He was accompanied by his sister, a shade darker but not much. Nair made the introductions and Stafford found her name was Judy. A hovering waiter took the order for another round of drinks.

‘Is this your first visit to Kenya?’ asked Judy, launching into the inevitable introductory smalltalk.

‘Yes.’ Stafford looked at his watch. ‘I’ve been here about ten hours.’

‘You get around quickly.’

‘The car is a great invention.’ Alan Hunt was talking to Nair. ‘Are you with your brother at the Ol Njorowa College?’

‘Yes; I’m an agronomist and Alan is a soil scientist. I suppose we complement each other. What do you do, Mr Stafford?’

‘Max, please. I’m your original City of London businessman.’ He tugged at the sleeve of his jacket. ‘When I’m not wearing this I’m kitted out in a black suit, bowler hat and umbrella.’

She laughed, ‘I don’t believe it.’

‘Take my word for it. It’s still
de rigueur
.’

‘I’ve never been to England,’ she said a little wistfully.

‘It’s cold and wet,’ Stafford said. ‘You’re better off here. Tell me something. I’ve been hearing about Hell’s Gate—that’s Ol Njorowa, isn’t it?’

‘In a way. It’s what the English call it.’

‘It sounds like the entrance to Dante’s Inferno. What is it really?’

‘It’s a pass which runs along the western flank of Longonot; that’s the big volcano near here. There are a lot of hot springs and steam vents which gave it its name, I suppose. But really it used to be an outlet for Lake Naivasha when the lake was a lot bigger than it is now.’

‘How long ago was that?’

She smiled. She had a good smile. ‘I wouldn’t know. Maybe a million years.’

Nair stood up. ‘We’d better go inside. The lake flies will be coming out now the sun has set.’

‘Bad?’ asked Hardin.

‘Definitely not good,’ said Hunt.

Over dinner Stafford got to know something about Hunt—and the Foundation. Hunt told about his work as a soil scientist. ‘Jack of all trades,’ he said. ‘Something of geology, something of botany, something of microbiology, a smidgin of chemistry. It’s a wide field.’ He had been with the Foundation for two years and was enthusiastic about it. ‘We’re doing good work, but it’s slow. You can’t transform a people in a generation.’

When Stafford asked what he meant he said, ‘Well, the tribes here were subsistence farmers; the growing of cash crops is a different matter. It demands better land management and a touch of science. But they’re learning.’

Stafford looked across at Judy. ‘Don’t they object to being taught by a woman?’

Hunt laughed. ‘Just the opposite. You see, the Kikuyu women are traditionally the cultivators of land and Judy gets on well with them. Her problem is that she loses her young, unmarried women too fast.’

‘How come?’

‘They marry Masai men. The Masai are to the south of here—nomadic cattle breeders. Their women won’t cultivate so the men like to marry Kikuyu women who will take care of their patches of maize and millet.’

Stafford smiled. ‘An unexpected problem.’

‘There are many problems,’ Hunt said seriously. ‘But we’re licking them. The Commonwealth Development Corporation and the World Bank are funding projects. Up near Baringo there’s a CDC outfit doing the same thing among the Njemps. It’s a matter of finding the right crops to suit the soil. Our Foundation is more of a home grown project and we’re a bit squeezed for cash, although there’s a rumour going around that the Foundation has been left a bit of money.’

Not for long, Stafford thought. He said, ‘When was the Foundation started?’