Guardian Read Online Free Page B

unable to see that the only difference between me and the people who surrounded me was that I had been forced to meet my supreme test too young. Too untried. And all in the glaring light of the inevitable publicity; not only that of my own community, but that of the furthest reaches of East Africa. Kenya’s one national newspaper had splashed a biased report and an awful photograph of me right across its front page, and then kept the story running for days. There was no escape. No way out of the private Hell in which I was forced to live. I guess my mother had an inkling of the time bomb ticking away in me. So did Rosalind. And apparently they both ached for me. Together, they loved me but, stupidly, I could neither understand nor tap into the support on offer.
    Mzee had brought me back as quickly as he could that night. I was barely conscious from the harrowing journey, with the bones of my broken leg grinding to the rhythm of the horse’s lurching, awkward gait. Nevertheless, the old man had pressed on, anxious to reach medical care. And I can remember thinking it would be a close run thing. Either he slowed up, or I wouldn’t make it anyway. At first, our approach had caused a collective sigh of relief amongst the assembled group because they had been waiting for news, any news, with growing apprehension. Several families had gathered swiftly, intuition and a well-developed and practiced sense of community drawing them to the Cryer homestead.
    My mother had driven over from Eldoret in a hurry, her sudden high-speed appearance in the old Peugeot van covering everyone in a thin coating of red dust. Old Joe Payne was there, patriarch to the sprawling Moiben community and appreciated for his fund of knowledge on all things African. Flanked by the new arrivals to the community, Ted Lescal and his daughter Rosalind, they made an attractive group. Within minutes the Weavers joined them, driving in from the next farm over to the west. Apparently Mother had barely recognised the Lescals, but she had heard they were pleasant enough, fitting in quickly with the often insular, sometimes taciturn farming community. Together with the Salters and a number of farmhands, they already made a sizeable support party. Everyone had been trying to keep Peta’s spirits up, but the conversation had grown desultory amidst the mounting anxiety, heightened by the swift onset of tropical darkness.
    Then had come the uneven beat of hooves and a general rush to the corral. Hastily seized paraffin pressure lamps cast warm pools of yellow light at their feet as they ran, compensating for the huge, malevolent shadows dancing counterpoint in the velvet blackness of the African night. As light and shadow mirrored the jerky swing of the hissing lanterns on their hooped metal handles, shouted enquiries brought no response from the two of us riding low in our saddles. Peta, running shoulder to shoulder with Lynn, bit back the sobs she could feel rising in her gullet as she saw who was and, more importantly, who was not there and how we sat our horses. Mzee with his normally ramrod straight back bowed and shoulders slumped. Me, barely holding on as I swayed drunkenly from side to side, throwing the horse’s natural rhythm.
    Peta had felt the rising panic and knew she was close to losing control, knew she had to hold on, if only for the sake of her friends. They had lifted me tenderly enough, responding to my sudden howl of pain with swift and efficient consideration, rushing me into the house to fill me with one of the morphine ampoules kept by every isolated homestead. And all the while Mzee had waited outside, waited quietly to unburden himself of every detail of his macabre story, yet in no hurry to condemn Peta to the living nightmare he knew would forever blight her sensitive mother’s soul. Even the men, for all their outward show of strength, would remember this night as perhaps no other. And so, with me temporarily knocked cold,