Various Flavors of Coffee (32 page)

Silence fell as they waited for Kiku to speak. She gathered her thoughts: it was important that the whole village understood exactly why this mattered.

“
Saafu
has been lost,” she said.“First the forest was violated.You have heard some of the men round the fire saying that this is a good thing, that the white men can show us how to control the trees with their axes. But how will that restore
saafu
?
Saafu
means us and the forest living together, with neither having the upper hand.”

Some of her audience were nodding, but outside her immediate circle of women, Kiku could tell the younger men were not convinced. “Now my sister Alaya has been attacked,” she continued.“Today it was Alaya: tomorrow it will be the wives or daughters of any of you. And that is why you must say to the white man that we will not work for him anymore. Instead of teaching us his bad ways, he must let us teach him the way of
saafu.
Until then, the women are going to cross the water.”

“Crossing the water”—that was ritual language. It meant that the women were going to withdraw from the life of the village. There would be no childcare, no cooking and no family life until peace and order were re-established.

Kiku led the women away, into the jungle. As they passed the men Tahomen stood up and said formally, “Without women the fire will go out.We men must do what we need to restore
saafu.
”

I returned
from Harar to find the plantation in a state of uproar. It seemed the African workers had called some kind of strike. It did not affect the Tamils, so there was no real threat to the smooth running of the farm, but Hector was keen to restore order as quickly as possible.

“That man should not have done what he did, of course, but it’s actually quite timely.We need to show these people that their obligation is what matters, not their own feelings.”

A court was assembled.A shamefaced Tamil was brought before it, and with all the villagers watching he readily confessed what he had done. For this he was fined ten rupees.

“So,” Hector said, looking round at the villagers,“this matter is settled.You can all get back to your work.”

Even when this had been translated, the villagers did not move. “What’s the blether now, Jimo?” Hector demanded.

After some conferring, Jimo reported that the villagers wanted the fine to be paid to them, rather than to the court.

“Absolutely not,” Hector said, shaking his head. “That is not how justice works.”

“And they want the man sent away, sah,” Jimo said softly. “What? Out of the question. He has paid his fine. Don’t they

understand that this is an end to it?”

It seemed they did not understand. Even when Hector angrily dismissed the court, the villagers refused to return to work.

“Find me the lassie,” Hector said impatiently. Eventually Alaya was brought before him and ordered to shake the Tamil’s hand, to show there were no hard feelings. The girl stood there, eyes lowered, refusing to do any such thing, and although the man took her

limp hand and shook it, the watching villagers looked, if anything, more mutinous than before.

“This has gone far enough.” Hector got to his feet and strode angrily into the circle of villagers. He raised his voice. “Justice has been done. If you do not work, you will be in breach of your contracts.” He took a hoe and thrust it into the girl’s hand.“Here, take it.” She took it without looking at it.“Now go. Back to work.”

No one moved.

“Jimo—beat her,” Hector snapped. “Sah?”

“Twelve lashes with the whip.Then choose one of the men and give him the same.”

Jimo motioned to two of the Tamils, who came and held Alaya while he struck her across the shoulders and back. She wailed but made no attempt to move.When she was released she sank to her knees. The Tamils pulled a man from the watchers, dragging him into the circle by his wrists, as if persuading a reluctant dancer to join in with the festivities. He too was given a dozen strokes with the whip.Then another villager was seized—

“Hector,” I said, repulsed. “For God’s sake, man.You can’t beat them all.”

“Of course I can.” He turned to me.“Robert, this is your plantation. If you can’t maintain discipline, you might as well go home. How will you keep order after I’m away, if you won’t show them who’s in charge?”

Jimo, sensing our disagreement, looked from one to the other of us, waiting for orders.

“Well, Robert? What’s it to be? Will you thrash them? Or d’you have a better notion?” Hector demanded.

I hesitated. Emily, I knew, would have said that she did have a better idea—would have thrown herself between the beater and his victim if necessary. But what did I know of plantation work?

Hector clearly thought any scruples I might have were just lily-livered squeamishness.And the truth was that I was relying on him to show me how it was done.

“Very well,” I said heavily. “If you have to beat the wretched brutes, then beat them.”

“Carry on, Jimo.”

Jimo raised his stick and brought it down on the man’s back, whipping him without expression until the allotted number of blows had been given.When he went to the next man the villager raised his hands in a gesture of submission and muttered something.

“He says he will work, sah,” the overseer reported.

There was an audible gasp from the watchers—a strange sound, more of horror than anger, I thought.

“Good.” Hector turned to the villagers. “Who’s next? You— will you work? You? And you? Excellent.”

There was no more resistance. It was as if the villagers were shocked to discover that their feeble insurrection would not stand up to Hector’s determined assault on it. I felt almost sorry for them.

In two weeks,
I thought,
I will be back in Harar.
It was all I could think about.
Fikre.

After the breaking
of the strike, Hector instituted some changes. The villagers’ round huts were taken down, and the flat area on which they had previously stood was cleared for use as a drying floor.The villagers were installed in long wooden buildings like the Tamils’, the men in one hut and the women in another; so that, as Hector said, there were no Africans and Indians anymore, only plantation workers.

A few days afterwards I found a little shape made of grass on the

floor of our hut. It reminded me of the corn dolls that field workers used to weave at harvest time when I was a child. But this fig-ure had one of Hector’s shoelaces woven through it. Pushed right through the middle of the body was a tiny piece of wood, like the broken sliver of a whip.

s soon as I could I returned to Harar. But when

Fikre came to the merchant’s house her face was clouded with fear.

“Bey is here,” she said as soon as she had slipped through the door.

“Can you stay?”

“No. It is too dangerous. But I had to see you. He means to sell me.”

“What?”

“He lost money on his last shipment. Now he cannot afford to pay for the coffee he has bought. He has been thinking about it as he crossed the desert, he said—thinking and crying. He was weeping when he told me; he said he loved me, that he cannot bear to sell me, but he says he has no choice.”

“What did you say?”

“I said I do not care who owns me.” She spoke scornfully. “A slave is a slave.”

“I’m not sure it’s wise to anger him just now, Fikre.”

“He wants to pretend he is not a bad man.Why should I give him that satisfaction?”

“But this means you’ll be sent away—” She laughed hollowly.“No, it doesn’t.” “It must.”

“Listen, Robert,” she said, as if explaining to a child. “Before I am sold, I will be examined by a midwife.Any buyer will insist on that. So I will be discovered. And then they will certainly kill me, unless I can do it myself first.”

“You’re not to kill yourself.”

“It will be better than the alternative. At least I will be free to choose the moment of my death. Now I must go.Will you kiss me?” “You’re not to die,” I said, pulling away and holding her. “No

one is going to die. I promise I’ll think of something.”

“Muddy”—a dull indistinct and thickish flavour. Can be due to the grounds being agitated.

lingle,
The Coffee Cupper’s Handbook

*

ector steps silently through the jungle, his rifle

raised. In front of him Bayanna raises his hand. Both men freeze.

“There, sah,” Bayanna breathes.

Hector peers into the trees.The stripes of brilliant sunshine and deep shadow are very like a leopard’s coat—so like it, in fact, that it is impossible to say for certain whether there is anything there. He thinks he sees a flicker of movement, but it might be no more than a leaf twisting in the wind.

“This way, sah,” Bayanna whispers, moving forward on silent feet.

Hector has not yet told Wallis that, when the other man goes off on his jaunts to Harar, he is hunting a leopard. For one thing, he can imagine Wallis’s sneering comments if he fails. No: the

proper way, the manly way, is to shoot the thing first, then leave the animal’s skin on the floor of their hut to await Wallis’s return, its magnificent head and snarling jaws all the comment that is needed.“Oh, aye,” he’ll say casually.“Thought I might as well have a little sport while I’m here.”

Behind them a twig snaps. Kuma the cook pads to Hector’s side. He is carrying the second gun and a box of bullets.

“I don’t think it dere, sah,” he says, peering ahead of them. “Quiet, Kuma.”

“Yes, sah. Sorry, sah.”

If only it were not so dark, here under the canopy. The three men advance a little further. There is a small stream, and then a cluster of rocks. It is, Hector thinks, just the sort of place which, if he were a leopard, he would choose to—

There is a sound like a huge chain rattling. A shape hurls at them, curving through the air, claws slashing. Hector brings the gun to his shoulder and fires in one smooth, practiced movement. The leopard falls to the forest floor, writhing. Hector watches: it is a magnificent beast, and the fewer bullets he uses, the less damage will be suffered by the pelt.

Finally the animal stiffens and is still.

“By God,” Hector says, approaching it warily. “The brute’s enormous.” He feels a surge of excitement.The beast is dead, and he has killed it. Wallis can sneer all he likes—this victory, and the spoils, are his alone. He might even—

There is a screech, another roar, and something else flies through the air.The second leopard is smaller, but it is also fiercer. Although Hector reaches back for his second gun, Kuma has recoiled involuntarily, and Hector’s hand finds only air before the creature is on him.The powerful jaws lock into his neck, tugging. He hears someone yell. Bayanna hits it with his stick, and then Kuma too is pounding it with the base of the rifle. As the animal

opens its jaws to snarl, Hector struggles free. The leopard snaps at his face twice more, and Hector’s vision seems to shrink into a tiny dot.

On my return
I found him in our hut, still in his bush clothes, the camp-bed stained with his blood. While Kuma unwound the bandages I opened up our medicine chest.

“Here, sah,” Kuma said softly. I turned. One side of Hector’s face looked as if it had been sliced open with a filleting knife. His left cheek was laid quite bare, so that I could see his teeth through the wound: the other side bore three deep gouges from the ani-mal’s claws, from the bloody ear all the way down his neck. It was quite dreadful, and probably hopeless.

As I was looking at the damage Hector opened his eyes. One of them was filled with blood.

“Oh, Robber’. It’s ye.”

“I’m here, Hector. I’m going to patch you up and fetch a doctor.”

He chuckled—or rather, tried to: a thin wheeze was all that escaped his lips.“Wha’ doctor, man? Nearest doctor’s in Aden.”

“I’ll think of something.”

“Aye.” He closed his eyes.“Dinnae let them eat me.” “What?”

“After I’m dead.Ye promise, now? Make sure I’m . . . properly buried.”

“Talk of burial is somewhat premature, since you’re not going to die.”

He tried to smile.“Aren’t I?” “No.”

“You’re a foolish pup,Wallish.”

“Hector, I find it quite extraordinary that even on your—” I

almost said “deathbed,” but caught myself in time, “sickbed, you are insulting me. Surely you know it’s bad form to anger your sur-geon.”

“Surgeon, is it?”

“It looks,” I said, “as if surgery might be required. And in the absence of a Harley Street physician, the resident locum is one Dr. R.Wallis.”

A faint sigh escaped his lips.

“I’ll patch you up as best I can,” I added. “And then we’ll get you to Harar.There’s bound to be someone there who can help.” I turned to Jimo, and said more confidently than I felt, “I’ll need some boiled water, Jimo, and the waxed thread and needles.”

I got four spoonfuls of the Chlorodyne down his throat and got to work. It quickly became apparent that even that potent mixture of laudanum, tincture of cannabis, chloroform and alcohol was incapable of entirely dulling the sensations of my needlework, and I had to get Jimo and Kuma to hold him down, one on the shoulders and one on the legs.The screaming made it hard to concentrate, and the job was not one I would want to boast about.When I was finished his face resembled a badly darned pair of trousers, with a ragged corkscrew of waxed thread holding his cheek together, but at least it was done.

I am not ashamed to say that afterwards I took a long draught of Chlorodyne myself. I fell immediately into a multicolored sleep, in which I dreamt that I was back in Limehouse, analyzing coffee with Emily, Ada and the Frog. In my dream Emily turned to Ada and said,“What is the next liquid we must cup?” to which her sis-ter replied, “Oh, blood, I think”: I was then served three tiny porcelain dishes of dark red liquid, which I cupped daintily with a spoon. No sooner had I pronounced on the flavors it contained— meat broth, copper, vegetation—than Emily turned to me and said, in a voice that was Ibrahim Bey’s, “Now I know you will never betray me.”