Alexandria of Africa (20 page)

It rang a third time. This time it went on and on and on—and then stopped. There was silence, except for the humming of the generator and the chirping of crickets.

I waited for it to ring again, but there was nothing. Whatever it was, whoever it was, they’d gone away. I could get back to my book and my tea and my worries. I just wished I knew that everything was okay with Ruth.

An
askari
stepped out of the darkness right in front of me and nearly scared me out of my sandals. He was very young, not much older than me. Most of the
askari
, with the exception of some of the leaders like Nebala, were young.

“You need to come,” he said.

“Me? Why? What do you want?”

“Come.”

He started walking away into the darkness. I jumped up, slung my bag over my shoulder, and ran to catch up to him. He had that typical Maasai walk, a long, bouncy stride that covered a lot of ground.

“What’s wrong?” I demanded. “Where am I going?”

He didn’t answer. He led me around the dining hall, through the thicket, along the path. We rounded a corner and I could see the front gate—it was open. There were two other
askari
standing there. Alongside them were some people and … was that a wheelbarrow? There wasn’t enough light to see anybody very well. It looked like a man, dressed in Maasai red clothing, and a bunch of kids. Why would anybody be out so late with their … it was Ruth! Were those some of her brothers and sisters, and was that her father? Maybe she’d come to tell me that everything was fine. But why did they have a wheelbarrow with them? Then I saw why. There was a person in it! It was Ruth’s mother.

I rushed to their side. Her mother was lying there in the wheelbarrow, limp, unmoving, her eyes closed. Was she … was she …? Her eyes popped open and she screamed in pain, her face contorted and her whole body arching up! I felt my breath freeze in my throat.

Ruth’s father and the
askari
started frantically yelling at each other. Ruth bent down and took her mother’s hands, and the littlest of the children began sobbing.

I rushed to their side as the man began a frantic dialogue with the
askari
. I stood there, helpless, listening but not understanding. I knew it was desperate, it was bad, and that I needed to just keep my mouth shut. It had to do with the baby. Was she still in labour, was that what it was?

She closed her eyes again and her body went limp. Everybody else kept arguing and crying and—

“Everybody stop!” I screamed. I was shocked when everybody stopped talking and listened.

“I need to know what’s happening. I need to know what’s wrong.”

Ruth’s father started talking to me in rapid-fire Swahili.

“Hakuna … kizungu!”
I yelled, telling him I needed English.

He stopped, turned to Ruth, and spoke to her. She nodded.

“My mother … the baby can’t come out … she needs help.”

“But there’s nobody here but me! The others won’t be back for hours!”

“Not wait for hours. She needs to get to the clinic.”

“The clinic? Where’s the clinic?”

“By the market in Emali.”

I shook my head. “I don’t know where that is.”

“Twenty miles along the road.”

“That’s not too far. Maybe we can call for an ambu—” No phones. There were no phones. There probably wasn’t an ambulance, either.

Ruth’s mother shrieked in pain again and I felt it through my whole body.

“My mother will die without help … the baby will die.”

“But, but, I don’t know what to do,” I pleaded.

“The car,” Ruth said. “She needs to be driven.”

I turned around. Of course! They could borrow the car! There was nobody to ask, but who could object? This was an emergency, life and death, and he was a chief! I ran over to the car, just hoping that the keys were—yes, they were in the ignition!

“Come, come, quickly, get her in the car!” I ran to the back and lifted up the hatch. There was a flat spot where she could lie down. I saw a blanket draped over the back seat so I grabbed it and placed it on the floor. At least she’d have something soft to lie on … like that would soften the blows of a thousand bumps between here and where they had to go.

Ruth’s father started to move the wheelbarrow but the three
askari
blocked his way! They began arguing loudly, gesturing, screaming at each other.

“Ruth, what’s happening?”

“They say they can’t let the car go. They do not have permission!”

The argument got louder and Ruth’s father stepped back, pushed aside his tunic, and pulled out his
konga!

“Stop!” I screamed. I stepped between them and turned to face the
askari
.

“She is going into the car,” I said. “I am in charge here, they left me in charge, and I am giving them permission to take the car.”

They all looked confused, but nobody seemed convinced. Time for a good offence.

“Step aside immediately! I am ordering the two of you to leave! If you do not listen, you will be canned! Do you understand?”

They didn’t look like they understood.

I turned to Ruth. “I need a word. ‘Canned.’ “No, she
wouldn’t know what that meant. “ ‘Terminated’ … do you know ‘terminated’?”

She shook her head.

“Their jobs will
die!”

“Oh!
Itakufa
, “Ruth said.

“Good. Step aside right now, or I will
itakufa
all of you!” I shouted.

The eyes of all three widened in recognition. I’d obviously gotten their attention, but they still didn’t move. I needed to say something more.

“What’s the word for ‘fired’?” I asked Ruth.

“Moto.”

“All three of you listen to me or I—me—will make sure you all
itakufa!
Get out of the way, now, or I will
moto
all of you! Do you understand me?
Itakufa
—I will
moto
all of you!”

They practically jumped aside. Ruth’s father picked her mother up out of the wheelbarrow. She grimaced in pain and her whole body seemed to stiffen. He laid her down and put his face against her ear. He was whispering something. I couldn’t hear, and I wouldn’t have known what the words meant anyway, but I did know that he was offering her reassurance. He stood up and I closed the door.

“The keys are in the ignition,” I said to Ruth. “You can leave your brothers and sisters here and I’ll take care of them.”

“No,” Ruth said, shaking her head. “You must come along.”

“There’s not much I can do, and I really should be here to explain things to the staff when they get back.”

“You don’t understand. My father doesn’t know how to drive. You must drive us.”

“Me? I’m only fifteen … I don’t have a driver’s licence.”

“But can you drive? Do you know how?”

“Yes of course, technically, and I have driven, but surely somebody else knows how to drive.” I looked at the three
askari
. “Do any of you know how to drive?”

They all shook their heads. We had a car—a four-wheel-drive jeep—we had the keys, and the only person who knew how to drive was me. That was just plain crazy. But what were the choices?

“Get in!” I yelled. “Ruth, you get in the back seat, and your father should come up front so he can give me directions. The kids stay here. You three,” I said, pointing at the
askari
, “are going to babysit them. Ruth, what word am I looking for?”

“Angalia.”

“Take care of the children.
Angalia!
Understand?”

They all nodded obediently. That was more like it.

“Now, let’s get going.”

I almost got in on the wrong side of the car before I caught myself and climbed in behind the wheel. Ruth’s father got in beside me. He placed his spear on the floor of he car, angling it between the two seats. I turned the key and the engine came to life. So far so good.

I thought about my driving lessons. I was only two short of finishing the course. I’d just think of this as another lesson. The only differences were that I had a Maasai warrior beside me instead of an instructor, I was on the wrong side of the car getting ready to drive on the wrong side of the road, the road had more in common with a goat path than a paved road, I was in Africa, it was night, and I had a pregnant, possibly dying woman in the back. Almost exactly the same. I adjusted the rear-view
mirror, snapped on my seatbelt, and put it into drive.

The car rocketed forward. I’d given it too much gas and so I hit the brake, made the curve around the driveway, and drove for the gate. Wasn’t it wider than that? I aimed for the middle, well aware that touching either side would send electricity into the metal car. We slipped through the opening. I looked back through my rear-view mirror as the
askari
started to close the gate behind us.

The path out of the compound was rough, but I knew it was probably the best stretch of road we were going to be on for the whole trip. I skidded to a stop at the road.

“Which way?” I called out.

Ruth’s father gestured to the left, back toward their village, the opposite direction from where everybody had gone tonight. Somehow, for a split second, I had thought that we might be able to run into them and Renée would be able to take care of everything. No such luck.

We hit the first big bump and only my seatbelt stopped me from flying into the air. Ruth’s mother wasn’t so lucky and she cried out in pain as she landed again. I’d have to be careful. I couldn’t put her through extra pain. I also couldn’t risk putting us off the road or she’d never get there—or maybe all of us would have to be taken to the clinic. The headlights stretched out ahead of us, illuminating the road. It was like a little oasis of light in a gigantic desert. All around there was nothing but dark.

Ruth’s father turned around and said something to Ruth. She nodded.

“My father wants to know if you really would have done it, done what you said, to those
askari.”

“It was more like a threat, but I would have tried.”

“And how would you have done it?” she asked. “How would you have put them in a fire and killed them?”

“Killed them? Put them in a fire?”

“Yes, how would you have put them into a fire?”

“A fire … no … you don’t understand … there wasn’t anything about a fire. I was going to fire them from their jobs. I wasn’t going to kill them, I was going to get them fired, make them lose their jobs!”

“But that is not what you said to them. You told them you would make them die by putting them in a fire.”

“I didn’t know … I was just using the words you told me.”

“Yes. You told them you would make them die if they did not get out of the way.”

“But that wasn’t what I was trying to say … oh, who cares, it worked!”

She smiled. “I will not tell my father that you used the words wrong. He respected you very much that you would kill them. Besides, what you did, you saved their lives.”

“How did I do that?”

“If you had not made them move, my father
was
going to kill them.”

I looked back over the seat at her for just a split second and then back to the road and I jumped on the brakes! There was a gigantic gully in front of us. I brought us to a stop before we could bottom out. This was really something. Not only was I driving without a licence, but technically I’d stolen the car, or at least taken it without permission, and now I’d found out that I’d threatened to kill three people who were trying to stop me. I didn’t even want to think what was going to happen to me.

I inched the car down the gully and it bounced and Ruth’s mother screamed in pain. I didn’t have time to think about what was going to happen to me.

With each bump I braced myself. Not just for the flight but for the cry of pain it would bring. After a while I guess I was becoming desensitized because her cries didn’t cut as deeply into me. Then I realized that wasn’t it. Her cries weren’t as sharp, weren’t as strong. It could have been that she was becoming more used to the ride, or maybe she wasn’t in as much pain, but I didn’t think so. I thought she was getting weaker. My initial fear that she might give birth in the car was replaced by something even more traumatic. She might die in the car—right there before my eyes—and it would be my fault because I didn’t get her to the clinic soon enough.

“Can you go faster?” Ruth asked.

“I’m moving as quickly as I can. I can’t see the road in the dark. I’m doing the best I can. How is your mother doing?”

Ruth didn’t answer.

“Ruth, how is she doing?”

“I think you need to drive faster.”

“If I do, the ride will get rougher. It will be more difficult for her.”

“Please,” she said, “she needs to get help.”

I looked in the rear-view mirror and I could see Ruth. She looked scared. I wanted to say something to her, tell her that everything was fine, that it would all work out, that her mother would be okay. I couldn’t say any of that. I just didn’t know, and I wasn’t going to lie to her.

The engine growled as we picked up speed. Another bump was coming up, I was certain of that, but what choice was there? Driving slowly was just going to lead to
a slow death. The car rocked back and forth as I moved across the road, trying to find the best, smoothest course. We hit a bump and all of us caught air. She cried out in pain. I was almost grateful.