Weep Not Child (18 page)

‘Are you sleeping?’

‘No! no!’ she said quickly.

‘The sun goes down. We should go home.’

They rose to go. When parting she looked at him and firmly said, ‘You will do well.’

Njoroge felt a heaviness in his heart and for a time was ashamed of having thought Mwihaki jealous. He said, ‘Thank you, Mwihaki. You have been like a true sister to me.’

She whispered, ‘Thank you’. She watched him go and then turned away her head. She took out her handkerchief and rubbed something wet on her cheeks while she ran towards her home faster and faster.

Siriana Secondary School was a well-known centre of learning. Being one of the earliest schools to be started in the colony, it had expanded much due mainly to the efforts of its missionary founders.

To Njoroge, coming here was nearly the realisation of his dreams. He would for the first time be taught by white men. And this was what confused him. Though he had never come into real contact with white men, if one had met him and had abused him or tried to put him in his place, Njoroge would have understood. He would have even known how to react. But not when he met some who could smile and laugh. Not when he met some who made friends with him and tried to help him in his Christian progress.

Here again, he met boys from many tribes. Again, if these boys had met him and had tried to practise dangerous witchcraft on him, he would have understood. But instead he met boys from other black communities who were like him in every way. He made friends and worked with Nandi, Luo, Wakamba, and Giriama. They were boys who had hopes and fears, loves and hatreds. If he quarrelled with any or if he hated any, he did so as he would have done with any other boy from his village.

The school itself was an abode of peace in a turbulent country. Here it was possible to meet with God, not only in the cool shelter of the chapel, where he spent many hours, but also in the quietness of the library. For the first time he felt he would escape the watchful eyes of misery and hardship that had for a long time stared at him in his home. Here he would
zorganise his thoughts and make definite plans for the future. He was sure that, with patience and hard work, his desire to have learning would be fulfilled. Maybe the sun would soon rise to announce a new day.

Siriana Secondary School took part in interschool sports meetings at which some Asian and European schools took part. The Hill School was a famous school for European boys.

The Hill School sent a team of boys to Siriana for football. It was four o’clock. Along with the eleven players were some who were mere spectators. Njoroge did not play football and it happened that he fell into conversation with one of the visitors not actively engaged in playing. But as soon as Njoroge spoke to the boy, he felt that he must have seen him somewhere else. The boy was tall, with long brown hair that kept on being blown into his face by the wind. He had to keep on swinging his head to make the threads of hair return to their proper places.

‘I think I’ve seen you before,’ Njoroge at last said as he took the boy round.

‘Have you?’ The boy looked up at Njoroge full in the eyes. At first he seemed puzzled. Then his face brightened up. He said, ‘Oh, do you come from Kipanga?’

‘Yes. That’s where I’ve seen you before.’

‘I remember. You are the son of Ngotho who–’ The boy suddenly stopped. ‘My name is Stephen. Stephen Howlands.’

‘I am Njoroge.’

They walked on in silence. Njoroge saw he was not afraid of Stephen. Here in school Stephen was a boy. Njoroge could not be afraid of a boy.

‘When did you come here?’

‘At the beginning of this year. And you?’

‘Been in Hill School for two years.’

‘Which school did you go to before you came here?’

‘Nairobi. What about you?’

‘I went to Kamahou Intermediate School.’

‘Is that the school you went to when you passed near our home?’

‘No. That one was Kamae Primary School and went up to Standard IV. Did you see me?’

‘Yes.’ Stephen could easily recall the many times he had hidden in the hedge near his home with the object of speaking to Njoroge or any other of the children. Yet whenever they came near, he felt afraid.

‘We didn’t see you.’

‘I used to hide near the road. I wanted to speak with some of you.’ Stephen was losing his shyness.

‘Why didn’t you?’

‘I was afraid.’

‘Afraid?’

‘Yes. I was afraid that you might not speak to me or you might not need my company.’

‘Was it all that bad?’

‘Not so much.’ He did not want sympathy.

‘I am sorry I ran away from you. I too was afraid.’

‘Afraid?’ It was Stephen’s turn to wonder.

‘Yes. I too was afraid of you.’

‘But I meant no harm.’

‘All the same, I was. How could I tell what you meant to do?’

‘Strange.’

‘Yes. It’s strange. It’s strange how you do fear something because your heart is already prepared to fear because maybe you were brought up to fear that something, or simply because you found others fearing…That’s how it’s with me. When my brothers went to Nairobi and walked in the streets, they came home and said that they didn’t like the way Europeans looked at them.’

‘I suppose it’s the same everywhere. I have heard many friends say they didn’t like the way Africans looked at them. And when you are walking in Nairobi or in the country, though the sky may be clear and the sun is smiling, you are still not free to enjoy the friendliness of the sky because you are aware of an electric tension in the air…You cannot touch it…you cannot see it…but you are aware of it all the time.’

‘Yes. Till sometimes it can be maddening. You are afraid of it, and if you try to run away from it, you know it’s all futile because wherever you go it’s there before you.’

‘It’s bad.’

‘It’s bad,’ agreed Njoroge.

They felt close together, united by a common experience of insecurity and fear no one could escape.

‘Yes the country is so cool and so absorbing…’

‘It’s a land of sunshine and rain and wind, mountains and valleys and plains. Oh – but the sunshine–’

‘But so dark now.’

‘Yes – so dark, but things will be all right.’

Njoroge still believed in the future. Hope of a better day was the only comfort he could give to a weeping child. He did not know that this faith in the future could be a form of escape from the reality of the present.

The two had moved away from the crowd and were standing together under a black wattle tree.

‘I’ll be away from home soon.’

‘Where will you go?’

‘To England.’

‘But that’s your home?’

‘No. It isn’t. I was born here and I have never been to England. I don’t even want to go there.’

‘Do you have to go?’

‘Yes. Father did not want to, but my mother wanted us to go.’

‘When will you go.’

‘Next month.’

‘I hope you’ll come back.’

A wave of pity for this young man who had to do what he did not want to do filled Njoroge. At least he, Njoroge, would rise and fall with his country. He had nowhere else to go.

‘I want to come back.’

‘Is your father going with you?’

‘No. He’ll remain here. But – but – you sometimes get a feeling that you’re going away from someone forever…That’s how I feel, and that’s what makes it all so awful.’

Again silence settled between them. Njoroge wanted to change the subject.

‘They have changed sides.’

‘Let’s go and cheer.’

The two moved back to the field, again shy with each other. They moved into two different directions as if they were afraid of another contact.

Mwihaki wrote frequently. Njoroge could remember her first letter just before she went to the teacher training school.

Njoroge wondered what changes he would find at home when the end of the year came. Did he really want to go home? If he went, misery would gnaw at his peace of mind. He did not want to go back. He thought it would be a more worthwhile homecoming if he stayed here till he had equipped himself with learning.

It was a cold Monday morning. Njoroge had gone through the first two terms and now was in his third. It would soon end. He woke up as usual, said his prayers and prepared himself for the morning parade. It was such a pleasant morning in spite of the cold. After the roll call he went to the chapel for a communion with God and then to the dining hall for breakfast; that was always the daily routine. He ate his breakfast quickly for he had not yet finished the preparation for the previous night.

The first class was English. Njoroge loved English literature.

‘Why, you look happy today,’ a boy teased him.

‘But I’m always happy,’ he said.

‘Not when we’re doing maths,’ another boy put in.

They laughed. Njoroge’s laughter rang in the class. The first boy who had spoken said, ‘See, see how he’s laughing. He is happy because this is an English class.’

‘Do you want me to cry?’ Njoroge asked. He felt buoyant.

‘No. It’s only that my mother tells me that a man should not be too happy in the morning. It’s an ill omen.’

‘Don’t be superstitious.’

Yet Njoroge did not like the last observation. All through the week that had passed he had been assailed by bad dreams. The dreams had affected him so much that he had been unable to write to Mwihaki. Tonight, however, he would write to her. He wanted to tell her that Stephen had gone back to England and his sister had accompanied them. She would however come back to
continue her missionary work. When he first met Stephen he had written to her, telling her about his own impression of Stephen. ‘He looked lonely and sad’ he had finished.

There was a lot of shouting in the room. Then one boy whispered: ‘Teacher. Hush!’ There was silence in the room. The teacher came in. He was always on time. Njoroge was often surprised by these missionaries’ apparent devotion to their work. One might have thought that teaching was to them life and death. Yet they were white men. They never talked of colour; they never talked down to Africans; and they could work closely, joke, and laugh with their black colleagues who came from different tribes. Njoroge at times wished the whole country was like this. This seemed a little like paradise, a paradise where children from all walks of life and of different religious faiths could work together without any consciousness.

Many people believed the harmony in the school came because the headmaster was a strange man who was severe with everyone, black and white alike. If he was quick to praise what was good, he was equally quick to suppress what he thought was evil. He tried to bring out the good qualities in all, making them work for the good name of the school. But he believed that the best, the really excellent, could come only from the white man. He brought up his boys to copy and cherish the white man’s civilisation as the only hope of mankind and especially of the black races. He was automatically against all black politicians who in any way made people feel discontented with the white man’s rule and civilising mission.

Njoroge was in the middle of answering a question when the headmaster came to the door. The teacher went out to see what the headmaster wanted. When he came back, he looked at Njoroge and told him that he was wanted outside.

His heart beat hard. He did not know what the headmaster could have to say to him. A black car stood outside the office. But it was only when Njoroge entered the office and saw two police officers that he knew that the car outside had something to do with him. Njoroge’s heart pounded with fear.