Softly Calls the Serengeti (35 page)

Kazlana returned to her bedroom and sank onto the bed. She had no energy to go to the office; no heart to pretend she could go on as she had. She felt as if she'd been in mourning during the days since she'd learnt the true details of her father's murder. The fact that a man like Koske had murdered him compounded her grief. It was as though he had died a second time. Even with her most determined efforts, how could she bring a man like Koske to justice? It was simply impossible.

The telephone rang. It would be her secretary again, trying to keep the office functioning in her absence. She was prepared to ignore it like she had many other calls, but in an effort to restore herself, she took the call.

The male voice on the other end of the line was unrecognisable. He was a foreigner with almost indecipherable Swahili.

‘English?' she asked in desperation.

‘English,
si
.' He used the Italian word, but he wasn't Italian. Perhaps an Arab, or a Somali.

‘Miss Kazlana?' he said.

‘Yes. Who is this?'

‘I am…I am Antonio's…friend.'

Her heart leapt in alarm. ‘Antonio? Is he all right? Who are you?'

Silence.

‘Can you hear me? Is Antonio safe?'

‘Antonio…' The voice cracked. ‘Antonio…he is finished.'

With her heart pounding, she listened as the foreigner told her the details in a mixture of stumbling English and Swahili.

Antonio had left Wajir, making haste towards the Somali border in his old truck. He was stopped just over the border by a contingent of the al-Awaab Resistance Army. He had no need to fear them, because of his friendship with Faraj Khalid Abukar. Unsuspecting, he had driven into a fusillade of bullets. The caller's brother had seen the assassination first-hand.

‘But why? Abukar had so many opportunities to deal with Antonio in the past…'

‘Maybe his love for Antonio is not so strong as his love for winning the war.'

Kazlana instinctively trusted the man. It was the way he'd hesitated before saying the word ‘friend' that gave her the impression that he was more than a friend to Antonio and therefore likely to be telling the truth. But she had to be sure and, as the tears streamed down her cheeks, she asked why she should believe him.

‘It not only Abukar who love Antonio. Antonio, he love me, but it finish even before he…' His voice broke and it was some time before he could resume. ‘I know he love you, Miss Kazlana. That is why I call.'

She thanked him.

Now she understood what was happening to the children, and Koske, who must have convinced Abukar to ensure Antonio remained silent, was now responsible for the deaths of the only two men she had ever loved.

Even before she replaced the handset, she knew what she had to do. Tears still rolling down her cheeks, she threw on her clothes, grabbed her car keys and in the space of five minutes was charging through the unusually light traffic in her red Audi R8.

She mounted the gutter outside her office and, to the consternation of the building's security guard, left it there and dashed inside. She ignored her secretary's pleas to take some urgent messages.

The office safe was secluded behind a fake set of shelves. She spun the dials and opened it. The handgun sat ominously in its velvet-lined case. It was an item from her father's Mombasa office.

Kazlana thought it ironic that it would be her father's gun that ended the life of the man who had killed him.

 

Riley's mobile phone rang. As he answered it, he noticed he'd missed a call from Charlotte.

‘Could I speak to Mr Mark Riley, please.' The words were clearly enunciated and the voice carried a slight accent.

‘This is Riley speaking.'

‘My name is Hoffman. Bernhard Hoffman. You left a message for me to call.'

‘Judge Hoffman! Thank you for calling back. It's about your committee hearings. I have some information that may help you in your investigations.'

‘Go on, Mr Riley.'

In a lowered voice, aware of the garage staff close by, Riley told Hoffman about Koske and the adoption racket he operated through the Circularian orphanage. He said that he had documents linking Koske to medical supplies delivered to a safe house in Nakuru from where he believed children were kept until taken to Wajir.

‘What happens to the children in Wajir?'

‘Actually, I don't know,' Riley said. ‘Although we believe they are taken into Somalia where they are sold to Arab and Middle Eastern families.'

‘Do you have evidence of this?'

Riley's heart sank. He could see where the judge was going. In his enthusiasm to get things moving, he'd overlooked a key fact. All he had so far was evidence that children were being moved around the country. If the committee were to take action
against Koske, it would have to have proof that the children were being sold, or that they were sent for adoption against their will.

‘No,' he said.

After a moment's silence, the judge said, ‘Well, thank you for your concern, Mr Riley. I will have the Circularian orphanage added to our interview list. However, while you obviously believe that children are being treated badly there, and I don't doubt your integrity, for the committee to take any action we must have substantiating evidence of abuse and preferably a first-hand witness.'

Riley thanked him for his time and hung up.

 

Kazlana sped down Kenyatta Avenue with the wind whipping her hair and without missing a traffic light. She had the riots to thank for the clear run.

On Valley Road she came upon pockets of angry young men carrying placards, heavy clubs and various home-made weapons. She avoided them by swerving to the opposite side of the road, narrowly missing a barricade of burning car tyres.

The billowing black smoke blinded her for a moment. As she blinked to clear her eyes, a rock flew from the black cloud and smashed into the side of her head.

As she fought to regain control of the car and her senses, an oncoming
matatu
side-swiped the R8, sending it spinning across Valley Road. It hit the kerb, pirouetted on a front wheel and, with a crack like a rifle shot, sheared off a white hardwood post at the edge of the pavement before finally coming to rest on its side in Uhuru Park.

The roof had been torn off. Kazlana, senseless, hung suspended by her seatbelt across the gear lever console.

 

The young man who had found the handgun in the Audi whooped with elation and, holding the pistol aloft like a sporting trophy, danced around the overturned car to the cheers and jeers of the marauding mob.

Minutes later, they had stripped everything portable from the vehicle, including the spare wheel and jack, and continued on their journey of destruction to the parliament buildings.

The teenage boy who had arrived late on the scene could not believe his appalling luck. Here was yet another opportunity lost because of bad timing. In hope born of desperation, and risking the imminent arrival of the authorities, he combed the vehicle in vain for valuables. He even lifted the woman's crumpled body so that he might check the small compartment between the front seats, but again without luck. The mob had stripped the car like a plague of locusts.

He was about to continue on into the city when he heard the woman moan—a soft sound like the mewing of a trapped kitten. It was an effort for her to turn her head, but when she did so, a tumble of dark brown hair fell from her face and she lifted her mist-blue, unseeing eyes to him. Her beautiful face became distorted with pain and she slipped back into unconsciousness.

A
wahindi
, he'd thought when he caught sight of the dark brown hair, typical of the people of the Indian subcontinent who had come to East Africa soon after the whites decided to build their railway. But, no, when she turned her face to him he realised he had no idea of her origin. She was different.

Somehow, her being different changed the way he thought about her. He had always felt he too was somehow outside the crowd, and knew that being different would make it difficult for this woman. She was a rarity even among the many different colours, customs and beliefs in their country. He suspected that in their land of huge diversity, her uniqueness and beauty would make her even more vulnerable.

He'd taken little notice of her inert figure until she'd moved.
Now he studied her more carefully. The terrible wound to the side of her head oozed blood, matting into her hair. He knew nothing of the prognosis following severe intracranial injury, but he believed an ambulance would soon arrive and therefore the beautiful young woman would have a good chance of surviving. But the head injury alone could not explain the blood pooling in the seat well, spilling over the console and falling in dark, clotting dollops onto the passenger-side door below her.

He reached over her and moved her arm, which had somehow become trapped against the driver's door. A split piece of white-painted hardwood projected from the jagged flesh on the woman's side. Pale, shattered ribs protruded. The boy, although accustomed to the sickening sights in the refuse dumps of Kibera, felt his stomach lurch.

Her right arm, now freed, fell across her chest, revealing a ring with a large solitaire stone set on the thick gold band. The stone was blue; bluer than the dry-season morning sky.

The ring would not budge at first. He tugged more forcefully. The woman stirred and uttered a faint sob. She clenched her fist with surprising strength, resisting his attempts to remove the ring from her hand. He had to prise her fingers open to claim it. He walked swiftly from the wrecked car, his trophy—the symbol of his changed luck—tucked safely away in his pocket.

The boy had crossed Uhuru Park before the image of the dark-haired woman became too much to carry any further. He pulled the ring from his pocket, turning it this way and that. The blueness flared. It was the most beautiful ring he'd ever seen, but it weighed heavily in his hand.

He peered back in the direction of Valley Road. The police had not yet arrived, but he could hear a siren approaching from beyond Nairobi Hill. He must hurry.

As he neared the wreck, he could see that the car was as he had left it. The traffic jam extended up the hill and beyond, but only a few of the morbidly curious had dared to come from their cars to study the victim. It was foolish to be found
loitering in the vicinity of a crime when the police arrived. They would crack a few heads and arrest a handful of ‘suspects' for looting, which was usually enough to appease their masters.

The sirens were quite close now and the bystanders had already begun to disperse. He had only a few precious minutes to do what he must. He'd hoped to find her alive so he could tell her of his error and ask for forgiveness, but as he lifted her right hand he knew she was already dead. The ring with the beautiful blue stone slid easily over the knuckle of her thin and cooling finger.

The sirens were almost upon him. He could see the police car picking its way through the traffic jam. The boy took one last look at the serene face, the cold grey-blue eyes staring through slightly parted lids. Perhaps a policeman would take the ring, but the crime would then lie in that person's heart and not his.

Riley was having a bad day. After spending most of the morning and too much money in the Land Rover repair centre, he now faced an impenetrable wall of traffic on Valley Road. Halfway up the hill, and blocking him from the Panafric's driveway, was a traffic accident. He could see the police cars and others banked up in both directions. It was too much. He drove the Defender up onto the footpath beside Uhuru Park and abandoned it.

Ten minutes later, he was abreast of the accident scene, forcing his way towards the hotel through a crowd of onlookers, TV cameramen and newspaper photographers.

At the top of the hotel driveway, the crash scene came into view. For a moment, he tried to convince himself that the red Audi R8 could belong to anyone, but Kazlana had told him it was one of a kind.
Like me
, she'd added.

Riley ran down the driveway and forged his way through the crowd until he was at the police lines, with the mangled Audi lying on its side in front of him.

Through the glare of TV camera lights, Riley watched grim City Mortuary staff remove the body from the wreck. A slender arm slowly slipped from beneath the grey shroud as it passed, and a ring set with a large blue stone glinted momentarily in the sunlight.

Riley pushed back through the crowd and walked up to the hotel, feeling empty. In the hotel garden he sat for some time, thinking about Kazlana and her mysterious, disturbing aura. Although she was an exciting woman, he knew the consequences of making love to her would have been remorse and emptiness. He had retreated from her because she was not someone who could engage the heart. As she herself had admitted, tragedy had
stifled that part of her emotional composition and she shunned love. The idea saddened him and he felt he should have had more compassion for her. He felt grief for her death, but only as he might grieve the loss of any young life. The admission troubled him and made him feel somehow unworthy.

 

Riley stood in the shower, his arms propped against the tiled wall and his head under the stream for a very long time. He stayed there when it ran out of hot water, and stayed even longer until he was chilled to the bone. When he eventually climbed out and buffed himself dry with the large, soft towel, his toes and fingers were white and wrinkled.

He rang Charlotte's mobile phone and was worried when she didn't answer. He decided to retrieve the Land Rover from its emergency parking space and risk another excursion into Kibera.

He was too involved in his own thoughts to notice the buzz of excitement among the taxi drivers outside. It was only when Henry, the doorman, intercepted him to say he was worried about Miss Charlotte that Riley paid attention.

‘She did what?' he asked.

‘She wanted to go to Kibera, but the drivers, they just refused. So she, she…stole one of the taxis, Mr Riley.'

Riley felt a sinking sensation in his gut. Why was he always so completely out of touch when he was needed? His mind went into a spin as he tried to think of a way to find Charlie in the enormous maze that was Kibera.

A taxi pulled up in the hotel driveway and the drivers gathered around it, yabbering in excitement. He saw Charlotte in the driver's seat with Joshua and two others in the back. She climbed out and gave him a tired smile.

Riley could only shake his head in disbelief and, in spite of his annoyance at her impetuous act, had to concede admiration.

 

While Simon and the taxi drivers engaged in a heated political debate, Joshua and Mayasa retreated to the stone steps to talk.

‘I feel bad that it was my fault this terrible thing happened,' she said.

‘It was my fault. If I had listened to Kwazi, I wouldn't have run into the room when I heard you scream. I would have…'

Mayasa placed her hand on his knee. ‘What would you have done?'

‘The same,' he said. ‘When I heard you scream, what else could I do?'

She leant over to kiss him gently on the cheek.

‘But it is still my fault,' he added. ‘If I hadn't worked for Koske, this would not have happened.'

‘How could you know?'

Mayasa was right. He'd had no way of knowing the consequences of his relationship with Koske. At the beginning, it was football boots and the excitement of helping Raila Odinga to victory. By the end of it, he had caused, directly and indirectly, the death of many of his followers and friends; his hands were soaked in the blood of innocents, no more so than that of his Kisii friend, Kwazi.

‘He refused to admit he was a Kisii,' he said to Mayasa, sitting with her knees pressed together on the step. ‘He would only say he was Kenyan.' Joshua smiled, remembering the arguments they'd had over tribal loyalties. They all seemed so trivial now. ‘And he would never admit to voting for anyone, although I know he voted for the ODM and Odinga. He said that all politicians were corrupt thieves.'

‘Everyone is talking about corruption these days,' Mayasa said. ‘Even I have to pay the postal people if I want them to search for a missing parcel. What do you think we should do about it, Joshua?'

He was about to offer his standard reply, that the ills of their society were always the fault of the other side, but it no longer had the ring of truth.

‘I'm not sure what I think,' he said. ‘All I know is that I am sick of this tea-money business, with people like the admin police putting their hand out so I can sell papers on Kenyatta Avenue. It always made Kwazi so angry.'

‘I think Kwazi was always angry.'

‘Not always. Before his accident on Uhuru Highway he was always happy. After that, his face made me feel bad because it was so ugly. I was ashamed for him when people stared. But then, after some time, I forgot he looked different to everybody else. He was just Kwazi. It never bothered me again, but I think it always bothered him. After Gabriel became Kwazi, I began to see his anger when people whispered behind his back.'

‘Gabriel?' Mayasa said. ‘I thought Kwazi was his real name.'

‘No, it was Gabriel Michael Maraga,' he replied. ‘I had almost forgotten it. Gabriel Michael Maraga. Kwazi was just his nickname.'

‘Gabriel…Isn't that an angel's name?'

‘It is,' he smiled, then added, ‘He was.'

‘Maybe he'll look after us,' she said wistfully.

Her words brought him back to the moment. Koske's threat was very real. He had to find a way to get out of Nairobi with Mayasa.

‘Mayasa, we can't go back to Kibera. Ever.'

‘But where can we go?'

‘Charlotte says she has a plan, but I have a better one.' He squeezed her hand. ‘You will come with me, wherever I go?'

She hesitated before saying, ‘Yes.'

‘Even if it's far, far away?'

‘Of course. My sister can care for Papa. But where are we going?'

‘To the Serengeti.'