The White Father Read online

  Now independence was approaching for the colony, and the protection on which the Ngulu’s happy-go-lucky existence relied was in possible jeopardy. Few in numbers, rich in nothing but their infectious joy, their continued survival was in question. When the British arrived, before the birth of any living member of the tribe and therefore at a time which had no significance for them whatever, the Ngulu had been on the point of extinction. More advanced tribes, such as the Luagabu, had been pushing into the arid southern zone where they then precariously lived, and the Ngulu had been forced into a nomadic hand-to-mouth and day-to-day survival. By sheer and fortunate chance they happened to be moving through an area of rich arable land when the British arrived and imposed frontiers on the expansion of the less primitive and more aggressive peoples. Boundaries drawn several hundred miles away by men who knew nothing of their previous life gave them a long stretch of the north bank of a reliable river and enough room for them to wander about, should they wish to do so. A basically sedentary people, they established themselves by the river, grew, without undue effort, enough of their rather unappetising beans and other vegetables for their purposes, and only travelled into their hinterland on their seasonal hunting trips. Thus coddled and cosseted by a historical accident and the British principles of fair play and justice (so alien to the conditions in which they and their enemies had previously lived), secure at last from their better-armed and more ambitious neighbours (who were incensed by the boundaries and had to be put down by a small but vigorous expeditionary force), they dawdled away their time most agreeably. And yet, despite these favourable conditions, the numbers of the tribe had not increased. There had been eight hundred and fourteen Ngulu in 1877, and now there were eight hundred and six. Of these, nearly half were over fifty and had to be considered old and unfit for work.

  Shrieve believed that no matter what might happen to the Ngulu eventually, no matter if they did gradually die out, no matter if they should, probably, be considered an anthropological anomaly, they must continue to be granted the protection which enabled them to dawdle about their almost prehistoric business. He was absolutely clear about it: it was the duty, the pleasant duty, of the more advanced and the better equipped to aid the backward and primitive. Special safeguards should gladly be given to such people. We owe each other, he would say a little pompously, at least as much as we give ourselves. Some demand more: they should be given more. No one questioned that Hugh Shrieve gave his all.

  A constitutional conference was to be held in London in July. All the various interests in the colony were to be represented, including the Luagabu, who comprised nearly a third of the population. But there was no representative for the Ngulu, and Shrieve’s urgent appeals that someone should attend on their behalf, if only with a watching brief, had been ignored in the capital. Robbins had said that he’d do what he could, but there was a hell of a lot going on at the moment and he’d forward Shrieve’s request to the Colonial Office. Nothing had been heard of it since. Shrieve guessed that in the general turmoil of preparation for the conference the Ngulu would be forgotten, except, no doubt, by the Luagabu. So he had written directly to the Governor, who he knew would be sympathetic, and to a friend of his at the Colonial Office itself. James Weatherby was very much a man of Whitehall, but at least he could be relied on to advise how things were going and where and how it would be best to try and apply pressure. The Governor, somewhat to Shrieve’s disappointment, had agreed that the matter must not be overlooked but emphasised that there were any number of special interests clamouring for attention. Though the Ngulu were, of course, important, he implied, Shrieve must realise that they were only a very minor problem in an extremely complicated and delicate series of negotiations: he was sure that proper safeguards would be arranged.

  But would they? “Proper safeguards” might be guaranteed on pieces of paper signed by every chief in the colony, but pieces of paper weren’t going to stop the Luagabu crossing the river and simply massacring or enslaving the Ngulu if they took it into their heads to do so. The local police, supposing there would be any to function during the exciting days of first independence, would certainly be Luagabu, and the local Governor would, equally certainly, be a Luagabu chief. No, phrases like “Proper safeguards” wouldn’t help the Ngulu at all. What was needed was a straightforward system of protection such as they now enjoyed. It was simple enough, and effective enough. It needed only one man and an uncommitted local governor and police force. The Ngulu didn’t have to be fed or clothed, and the doctor fifteen miles down the river, a Scottish Presbyterian missionary who issued tracts with injections, was not going to leave. But Shrieve, even if he too stayed on, could not prevent an incursion of hostile Luagabu by himself. The protection depended on the threat of British military intervention between tribes: when the British rule ended, so would the threat. Some new threat must be devised to replace it. The best hope lay in some form of tribal coalition in the capital, where rivalries could be played off against each other to the advantage of minorities—there were other small tribes who were in danger of being engulfed, though none of them were so helpless as the Ngulu. The political leaders of the various factions were, too, all men of education and, with a few exceptions, humanity. None of them would wish to see genocide in their new country. But caught up, as they inevitably would be, in the passions and intrigues of independence and power, they were not going to notice until too late that somewhere in the back country a stone-age tribe seemed, somehow, to have vanished.

  Shrieve had good reason to fear the Luagabu. There had been, from time to time during British rule, raids across the river, whose right bank was Luagabu territory. On one early occasion the raiders had burned the Ngulu village and captured some dozen of the older people (the others had fled precipitately into the long grass) whom they subjected to elaborate and revolting tortures before decapitating them. On another occasion they had killed all the Ngulu cattle. The last raid, which had taken place just after Shrieve’s arrival, had been something of a flop: a large party of Luagabu had attempted to seize some cows which were being watered, but the Ngulu, warned in advance, had spiritedly counter-attacked while the enemy were trying to shoo the cattle into swimming the river. Some forty Luagabu had been captured. Shrieve returned them to the District Officer concerned, and they received severe prison sentences. For a dozen years there had been complete peace. But recently Shrieve had been warned by Mackenzie, the same District Officer, that the Luagabu had begun to boast about what they were going to do to those effete Ngulu as soon as the sentimental British had gone. Mackenzie had not gone into details, but Shrieve could guess: warfare was not conducted under the Geneva Convention in those parts, and such primitive weapons as the Ngulu had would be useless against the vastly superior numbers of the Luagabu, some of whom had illegal rifles. Nor would it help to try and equip the Ngulu for self-defence. An arms race could only lead to the quick extinction of the smaller power: the Ngulu could muster a hundred and fifty serious warriors at most, and their listless attitude towards warfare would hardly lend credibility to any policy of deterrence.

  It was, at least to Shrieve, a simple enough problem to which there should be an equally simple answer. The difficulty was to make busy men pause for long enough to see how simple the answer in fact was, and then to take the necessary steps.

  Amy came in with a cup of tea and said, “The postman is waiting.”

  “Oh yes,” said Shrieve. He looked at her hopefully. The postman, who came once a week, was a Luagabu, and relations between him and Amy consisted of the briefest exchanges and long haughty silences. Shrieve had tried to persuade her to be more generous, but her stony face told him he had failed yet again. “Tell him to wait a few minutes. I haven’t had time to read my letters yet. Give him a drink, Amy. Some tea or something.”

  She snorted, muttered the Ngulu equivalent of “Nigger” and flounced back into the kitchen.

  Shrieve shrugged and picked up The Illustrated London News, which his aunt
sent him. There were many sepia-tone photographs of various members of the royal family, a distant duchess of which had just had a baby. He reminded himself to show the picture to Amy, who doted on babies. She would be impressed, he hoped, by the very definite covering of the upper part of the duchess’s body. Amy believed it was particularly wrong for mothers to cover their breasts during the period they were nursing their children. Shrieve was entirely on her side, really, but English visitors were so easily surprised.

  He picked through the official mail. There was nothing urgent. Then he turned to the personal letters and found one from James Weatherby.

  “Dear Hugh,” (it began)

  “I have been sounding out as much as I can about the constitutional conference which begins in ten weeks time. As you have probably guessed by now, our initial reluctance to leave had various foreseeable effects, notably a hardening of native opposition followed by a desire on this side, not openly expressed to backbench MPs, to cut our losses and get out before anything too awful happened. Unlike Kenya, of course, there has been very little settlement outside the towns in your colony, and it doesn’t look as though the businessmen are going to be under any pressure from whatever African regime emerges. Thus it’s going to be a comparatively simple conference—sorting out the tribal areas of influence, deciding how much power is to be given to provincial governors, and so on. Comparatively simple, but not of course simple in fact, and the Minister is already looking pretty pale. We’ve had three of these exhausting things in the last eighteen months, as you’re no doubt aware.

  Your personal interest in the Ngulu is naturally known here, and it seems to be agreed that you have an excellent and important case. Beyond that everyone is vague. It’ll all have to be thrashed out round the conference table, I’m afraid, and the question is—as you said in your letter—how to stop the case disappearing under tons of other people’s bumf. As you also said, it won’t do any good to bring one of the Ngulu here. Your point is that this is modern politics and that these people aren’t up to coping with them. However, a discreet enquiry revealed that your own presence wouldn’t be considered amiss in the background, though you won’t perhaps be officially consulted except in committee, even if that.

  You’ve got a lot of leave due, haven’t you? Good heavens, we haven’t seen you for five or six years, have we? I’d say that now’s the time to show up. If you get here a month or two before things start, you might be able to do a lot of good. As I say, people are basically on your side here, whatever the native chaps may feel, and there’s a good chance that you would be able to pull something off. I’d try it, anyway. I’m sorry not to be more precise, but as you can imagine, my position is a little delicate.

  We’ve had a simply bloody winter—cold and slush and everybody down with flu. For a week in February we were reduced to a virtual skeleton staff. The spring’s two weeks late, I may add. Think about that down there in the sun! I expect you’ve forgotten what spring can be like in England.

  Let me know what you decide. And I hope very much to see you really quite soon. The sooner the better, in fact.

  All the best.

  James.”

  Shrieve frowned as he finished the letter. It was true that he had a lot of leave saved up, yet he wasn’t anxious to take it. He wasn’t at all sure, for one thing, that he was the best man to present the Ngulu case—he was too involved with it, he could too easily be dismissed as a man with a bee in his bonnet. And besides, he was so awkward in dealing with people. His fingers began to writhe in embarrassment.

  The Ngulu were preparing this evening for their spring hunt, and that meant the festival would be held in four or five days. He must remain for that, and for its aftermath of sick stomachs. Then it would take some days to explain to the chiefs that he would be going away for a longish time, but that they must not think he wasn’t coming back. Then there was the business of arranging a temporary substitute with Robbins. It would probably prove impossible to get anyone full-time, what with the general chaos in the capital, but a general weekly supervision was essential. Then there would have to be a period for the Ngulu to get used to the new man. Of course the substitute wouldn’t be able to understand half of what they said, since they spoke a highly idiosyncratic language, and he’d have even less idea of what was going on in their heads. But something could be arranged. Perhaps Mackenzie could come over a couple of days a week.

  With a sudden shock of relief Shrieve realised that he was planning for the time he would be away before he had consciously accepted that he was going. It was often like that with important problems, he found. It had certainly been like that with Amy, for instance. He would worry and wrangle over something, and become so involved in its ramifications that it would take him some hours, or even days, to wake up to the fact that he was already carrying out the decision of his subconscious. If one could only confuse one’s conscious mind with enough logic and reason and serious argument pro and con, he believed, the subconscious would always come up with the right answer. It was a matter of pushing the problem deep down into the mind.

  He got up and went into the kitchen to speak to the Luagabu postman. He was just putting down a bottle of the ubiquitous fizzy drink called Free. Amy, who didn’t trust him alone in her kitchen, was glowering at him from the back door, hands militantly on hips, her lower lip thrust out, like a customs officer ready to search him when he left.

  “Ah,” said Shrieve, smiling weakly at the postman. Though he spoke Luagabu fluently, he always addressed members of the tribe in English, which annoyed Amy. But unlike the Ngulu the Luagabu could be, and were to a certain extent, educated to a European level, and it was a matter of principle with Shrieve, independence or no independence, to make them talk in English—a language considerably richer in nuance, and containing, what Luagabu lacked, the important abstract words which made conceptual thinking possible. He found himself, though, and to his horror, frequently lapsing into a sort of pidgin English which helped no one.

  The postman smiled broadly. He was a tall, very black man, with an upper lip enlarged by the Luagabu practice of inserting pieces of wood. Splinters for very young children became quite impressive chunks in adults. The Ngulu referred contemptuously to the Luagabu as fit for nothing but kindling.

  “I’m afraid I want you to wait for half an hour or so. I have an important letter to write.”

  The postman looked sulky, but said, “Yes, sir.”

  Any looked as though she wasn’t sure whether to be glad that he was discomfited or cross that he would be staying longer than usual.

  “It won’t take very long,” Shrieve assured both of them. It annoyed him to have his vital problem reduced to kitchen squabbling and silences: but in essence that was what it came to. The Luagabu would never be content while the Ngulu held their rich piece of land, and the Ngulu by themselves would never be able to resist attacks. All they could do was what Amy was doing, glower and depend on the white man. And when the white man went away their glowering would turn to panic and tears, unless …

  “Give the postman another bottle of Free,” said Shrieve to Amy.

  He went back to the living-room and wrote a letter to Robbins explaining that he intended to go to England and asking for someone to keep a watching brief over the Ngulu at home while he held one for them abroad. Robbins, he knew, would approve of his decision. They might think in the capital that Shrieve was going a little bit too native for some tastes, but they knew a good man when they had one. And besides, which of them hadn’t, at one time or another, had a native woman? Only those who had seen Shrieve and Amy together wondered whether he wasn’t, perhaps, attempting something too precarious. What, they asked, was he going to do when independence came and he was shoved off home? And if he decided to stay, what kind of life would that be? Was he prepared to die in the country? For it was inconceivable that he should take Amy to England. These were questions that Shrieve avoided: when the time came, he hoped, he would find himself carrying out the
answers.

  He finished the letter, sealed it and took it into the kitchen.

  “Here you are,” he said to the postman. “You have plenty of time to reach the town before sunset.”

  “Yes, sir,” said the postman. He drained the last of his bottle of Free and stood up. His cap, which had lain on the kitchen table, was given a brisk rubbing, no doubt to remove any possible trace of decadent Ngulu influence. He put it on, saluted awkwardly and said, “Thank you, sir. Yes, sir.”

  “Goodbye,” said Shrieve affably.

  He saw the postman out of the door past the still menacing Amy and into his jeep. Whatever the relations between the tribes it was his business to treat all people with equal politeness.

  The postman flashed a malevolent glance at Amy, smiled widely and woodenly at Shrieve, then drove off. He seemed deliberately to choose the dustiest parts of the track, and the jeep was soon lost to view behind clouds of red dirt.

  “I think I’ll have a bottle of Free myself,” said Shrieve, coming up to Amy and patting her bottom affectionately.

  She went silently to the ice-box and brought him a bottle but no glass. She always took an hour or two to get over the postman’s visits. Shrieve smiled at her, but she didn’t respond, so he patted her again, only harder this time, and went back to the living-room, picked up the remaining letters and took them out to the veranda. He settled into a chair, and drank from the cold bottle.

  No one in England, he thought, could possibly imagine his contentment. No one could even imagine his sense of physical well-being as he sat on his veranda drinking the sweet fizzy drink and gazing up the dirty village street at the scruffy Ngulu huts. Raising his eyes a little he could see the distant mountains, ranged along the horizon like the permanent obsessions of man, rising from the miles of scrub and bush of the plain like death and consciousness and love and the nature of beauty and whether or not there is a god. One spent one’s life on the plain, managing as best one could, but always aware of the impassable mountains and the limits they set to human ambition, human thought, human achievement, defining the world in which man moves. Hazily purple now in the late afternoon sun, they offered neither threat nor encouragement, they simply were.