Someone Wishes to Speak to You (29 page)

As soon as Huggins and Welensky saw Addie’s car pulling up in front of the homestead, there was the usual frenzy of excitable barks. After she had patted and hugged them both, she greeted her father with a similar degree of affection. Seeing Mathew walking towards her from the shade of a large mop-head acacia, she warmly kissed him on both cheeks. After the houseboy, Moses, had carried her suitcase to her room and she had taken a shower to freshen up, Addie returned to the fly-screened veranda in time for a sundowner. She gave Mathew the letters and the package.

Mathew was reluctant to open any of his mail while enjoying his whisky and soda, being brought up-to-date about how everything was going in Salisbury and whether the escalation of the Bush War was causing any additional problems in the capital. His reluctance had to be put aside after Addie mentioned that when Simon had come round to her office to give her his letter, he told her that it contained, as far as he was concerned, a most important and exciting offer which required a response at the earliest opportunity. Mathew had no alternative but to open the envelope in front of his hosts; after scanning through its three pages quickly, and then returning to read one part of it more carefully, he stood up to make an announcement. ‘Well, it seems that the University of Rhodesia have offered me a position as a Visiting Senior Lecturer at the university’s Department of Zoology. I think I may have to accept!’ The sundowner glasses were quickly refilled and clinked together, and father and daughter proposed their individual toasts of congratulations to their guest.

After the most convivial of evenings, Mathew recognised that through the excitement of the university offer, he had drunk too much. But when he returned to his room carrying the rest of his as yet unopened mail, he was determined to have a cursory look through before turning in for the night.
The letter from Sir Roger and Devra Willock said how very pleased they were to have learnt from Addie that he had now transferred his base from the Vumba to her father’s orchard estate in Inyanga. Also, as Sir Roger had heard that the terrorist attack on the Leopard Rock Hotel had been covered in the UK press, he had already cabled Mathew’s parents to let them know that their son was safe and sound and had now moved to another much safer location. The Willocks had ended their joint letter by saying how very much they looked forward to Mathew’s next visit to Salisbury, when they hoped that he would take the opportunity to stay with them once again. They were both very keen to hear about his recent experiences in the Vumba Mountains.

The package of letters that Anna had collected from his post office box, some of which had been there for some time, comprised of a good cross-section of correspondence from his parents and brother, from Antonia Clinton-Kemp, from some of his old school friends in England, a few from his university friends in Atlanta, and a long letter from Osman and Yvonne Hill. But it was an envelope with a postal cancellation stamp from Washington DC, written in Lucienne’s elaborate hand, which gave him the greatest surprise. Although he knew that her letter was in response to the one he had posted to her just over a year ago, mailed as she had requested to her old Atlanta address, he had not expected to receive any response from her.

Lucienne and Daniel had often thought about what the most appropriate age would be to inform Marcus that she was indeed his real mother, but Daniel was not his father, although he had adopted him as his son prior to Polly’s birth.

Lucienne also often weighed up the pros and cons of letting Mathew know that back in 1973, the abortion had not after all been carried out and that Marcus, whom she considered would undoubtedly develop into a fine, handsome young man, was the product of their own very first intense love affair. As such, he was a love-child whose life would always have to be both celebrated and cherished.

9

An Imire Rendezvous

Professor Tom Martin was a charismatic, highly motivated academic and a native of South Africa. He had studied at the Department of Zoology and Entomology at the University of Pretoria, where he had gained his BSc (Zoology) and MSc (Ecology), before embarking upon his detailed study of acarology for his doctorate thesis. During two years of research for his PhD, he had undertaken exhaustive field work studying ticks in the Transvaal and north-western Rhodesia.

The professor had seen Mathew’s presentation at the university the previous year and had been very impressed with his enthusiasm, depth of knowledge and communicate skills. He began the meeting by giving Mathew an overview of his responsibilities as Senior Visiting Lecturer.

‘It’s a great opportunity, Professor Martin. I’m really looking forward to working in the academic world again.’

‘For a start, you must call me Tom. Now, let me fill you in on the details of the position. Your first tutorial on the subject of animal communication will be during the first week of the forthcoming autumn term. In addition to your wages, the university will provide you with the use of a small flat on the campus if required, and an office within the department. I don’t know whether you’ve made any arrangements but when I first discussed the potential of you taking a post here with Dr Vaughan-Jones – Simon – he did say that he and Anna very much hoped that you would accept their invitation to lodge with them.’

After asking Tom Martin a comprehensive list of questions about his position, the department and the university, the productive meeting came to an end and a very up-beat Mathew left for Salisbury to have lunch with Addie at the Meikles Hotel.

‘The initial contract is for a year, and I start in four months’ time,’ he told her. ‘I’m happy to be returning to academic life – but if it’s still convenient for you and your father, I’m still keen to keep my base at your home in Inyanga in the meantime. I want to take the opportunity to carry out a preliminary study of the chacma baboons. Though, of course, that’s completely dependent on whether I can sufficiently habituate a baboon family to tolerate my presence. They don’t seem particularly keen on having me around at the moment.’

‘In that case Mathew, they don’t know what they’re missing. Of course we would love to have you – I’ll call Daddy later and tell him the good news. Now, I must get back to work or they’ll be sending out a search party. I’ll see you back in Inyanga.’ Addie gave Mathew the customary light farewell kiss on the cheek before rushing out of the door.

Soon after Mathew had accepted Tom Martin’s offer of a post, he was contacted by the President of the Zoological Society of Rhodesia to ask him if he would be willing to present a talk to its members on his views about the society’s ambition to establish a zoo in Salisbury. After accepting the invitation, he was taken to the large, picturesque Graniteside site. There were a series of flooded quarries where the Zoological Society considered some natural environments could be developed and Rhodesia’s first national zoo could be established. As Mathew knew little about zoos, other than remembering how saddened he had been to see the chimpanzees in cramped cages at the Lubumbashi Zoo, he asked Simon what his views were, and those of his Museum Board of
Governors. Their collective viewpoint was that they would support the zoo’s establishment, providing it could be used as an educational resource.

Before Mathew prepared his talk, he tried to reconcile his thoughts about animals being taken from their natural habitats into a captive and controlled environment. However, after reading a recently published book,
The Stationary Ark
by Gerald Durrell, which recorded the work of his Jersey Wildlife Preservation Trust, he had become more aware of how in recent years many of the world’s more conservation-minded zoos had changed significantly from museum collections of exotic species to important centres of education, research and conservation.

Mathew composed a presentation emphasising that although the country had an abundance of wild animals, the bulk of the urban population, especially Africans, had little or no opportunity to see them in the wild. He came to the conclusion that the development of a zoo at Graniteside, to exhibit only indigenous species in as naturalistic surroundings as possible, could be an effective way of helping people to realise the importance and urgency of conservation.

After he had given the lecture at the university, the President of the Zoological Society approached Mathew to congratulate him. ‘Well done – your address was very well received. You raised some very valuable points. There seems to be a default rejection of zoos in so many people’s eyes. Your words have really helped some members of the public to become more aware of the role of a modern zoo, so that they’re no longer in opposition to the planning permission being granted for a zoo here in Salisbury. Apart from my work here, I’m also the editor-in-chief of the
Rhodesia Science News
– I don’t suppose you would write us an article setting out the arguments that you made today?’

*    *    *

As Mathew had promised the Willocks that the next time he visited Salisbury he would spend at least one night with them, he accepted the invitation to be their guest on the Friday night. He arranged to stay with the Vaughan-Joneses for the rest of the weekend, before returning to Inyanga on Monday. The Willocks had arranged a small dinner party but before he joined the other guests, Mathew telephoned his parents in Yorkshire and his brother in Northern Ireland. They had all read about the mortar attack on the Leopard Rock Hotel in the British press, and were very relieved to hear that he had moved to a much safer environment. Since Mathew’s arrival in Rhodesia four years previously, he had only returned to Hartington Hall for a brief visit in 1976. He promised his parents that he would arrange another visit in mid-September before starting at the university.

Michael Lamb and his charming wife, Denise, were among the guests at the dinner party. Before going into dinner, Mathew was introduced to a Major Piet Erasmus who had recently taken up the post of military attaché to the South African Embassy in Salisbury. As had become commonplace at such social occasions, the majority of the conversation centred around the current political situation within Rhodesia, the Bush War and the damaging effect that the UN sanctions were having on the country. During one of these conversations, Mathew heard the unwelcome news from Sir Roger that in March, Cuban troops had marched into Zaire’s Katanga Province after fighting with UNITA forces in southern Angola. Mathew could not help worrying whether Zaire’s internal problems would escalate to Kivu Province, and thereby affect the security and welfare of his beloved eastern lowland gorilla population in the Kahuzi-Biega National Park.

‘Because of the presence of Cuban troops just across Zambia’s northern border,’ explained Sir Roger, ‘P.K. van der Byl has found an unlikely ally in Kenneth Kaunda, who referred to the Soviet-surrogate presence on his border as “a tiger with
its marauding cubs”. The British Government is troubled about Fidel Castro and Soviet President Podgorny’s tour of Southern Africa, and about Russia’s increased support of Robert Mugabe and his ZANU/PF party, as well as their increased supply of arms to the ZANLA freedom fighters in Mozambique. On top of all that, Britain’s Foreign Office is having to deal with the aftermath of Idi Amin’s ousting of Milton Obote, in Uganda. The latest figures estimate that more than 90,000 Africans have been killed in the ongoing genocide – worse still, if that’s possible, is that reports suggest Idi Amin participated personally in some of the slaughter.’

The conversation switched to the subject of Ian Smith seeking an internal settlement after the abandonment of the Geneva Conference proposals, a strategy that Piet Erasmus said his Pretoria Government had just given its full backing. Also, Mathew was pleased to learn that Smith’s government had recently announced the excellent news that the Land Tenure Act, which segregated certain areas of the country on racial lines, was soon to be scrapped.

‘I wholeheartedly welcome Ian Smith’s statement that his government is irrevocably committed to majority rule,’ said Sir Roger. ‘The British Government has been striving for this since the break-up of the Federation in the early 1960s. The problem is that Smith’s timetable for Rhodesia’s African majority to achieve political franchise is very much slower than the British Commonwealth is demanding, or will accept. I’m sorry to say that in my view, the current political impasse is still irrevocable.’

At the end of the dinner, when the female guests left the table to leave the men to enjoy their cigars and some Cockburn’s vintage port which Sir Roger had brought out from England, Mathew could not help feeling that both Michael Lamb and Piet Erasmus had started to quiz him too deeply about his Manyika tribal friends and, in particular, about his friendship with Chief Chidzikwee. Although he would have been happy
to talk about his relationship with his African friends, it appeared that they required the type of information that could have been of interest to international intelligence agencies or the security forces.