A Guide to the Birds of East Africa Page 9

  The ostrich fluffed its feathers once more, folded them, and returned to the nest. The monster would be back, he was sure of it, but he would be ready.

  As the early flight to Lamu turned at the bottom of the runway at Wilson Aerodrome ready for take-off, Harry Khan looked out of the window.

  ‘Hey, guys, look – an ostrich, there, just behind the fence. First bird of the day – got to be a good sign.’

  Harry Khan had spent the previous night at the bar of the Hilton with George and David planning the week’s itinerary.

  ‘The first thing we should do,’ said George, ‘is get the weather forecast. Right, Davo? It’s no good going to the hills if they’re covered in fog, and it’s no good going to the coast if there’s a hurricane blowing.’

  With David’s laptop tuned into the hotel’s wireless internet system they established that there was a nasty-looking low just off Madagascar and indeed a high possibility of strong winds on the coast early next week.

  ‘Better get down there asap,’ said David.

  ‘Yep,’ said George, ‘tick off the shore and seabirds first, then do the inland stuff.’

  ‘Makes sense to me,’ said Harry.

  From their Lonely Planet guidebook they discovered that the island of Lamu would probably be their best bet for a day trip. A flight left at dawn and the mid-afternoon flight back to Nairobi would give them plenty of time to get to the Asadi Club by eight o’clock.

  ‘It says here you can hire a boat to explore the island and the numerous nearby lagoons.’

  ‘Sounds like just the spot,’ said Harry and went over to the hotel travel desk to book the tickets. This should be fun. Shame about the early start.

  Unlike the ostrich, the yellow-crested woodpecker was showing no signs of alarm at the monstrous figure approaching. Born and bred in City Park, it had grown used to two-legged creatures like the one now walking towards its tree. These things, large as they were, were not half as much trouble as the monkeys – though this one did have rather large eyes. The woodpecker continued to peck wood; Mr Malik lowered his binoculars to record in his notebook the first new bird of the day.

  His surprise at the number of species that he had seen in his garden the previous afternoon had given Mr Malik an idea. Of course, what A.B. had said about diminishing returns was quite right. But, he reasoned, returns could also be diminished by spending time that might be spent birdwatching in travelling. Driving or flying here and there used up too much time in simply getting to places – especially when a condition of the competition was that both parties had to be back in Nairobi by eight o’clock every night, and even if he had had no other commitments. He therefore devised a strategy of minimum travel. Taking his house in Garden Lane as the centre he would move outwards in a rough spiral, over the week reaching more and more distant habitats. Though there were bound to be overlaps between each place he visited, this plan should optimize his chance of seeing the most species. He chose for his first visit City Park, only a mile or two from his house and a place he knew well.

  Like much of Nairobi, City Park has seen better days. Compared with the once handsome pleasure gardens of yesteryear with palm-lined avenues and well-tended shrubbery, where fountains splashed and the music of Sousa and Elgar wafted from the bandstand each Sunday afternoon from three to five, the park is down on its luck. But the park still gives pleasure to those of the city’s inhabitants who know of its existence, as well as giving food and shelter to numbers of squirrels and monkeys and even greater numbers of birds.

  If you want to identify birds the best time is usually dawn because that is when they are at their most vocal. According to modern Western ornithology they are singing to establish or maintain territories, attract mates, reinforce species recognition and social dominance patterns, or communicate feeding opportunities. According to local African tradition, they are singing to greet the sun. Listening to the screeches of orange-bellied and red-fronted parrots, the twitters of varied, purple-backed and crescent-billed sunbirds, the trills of canary finches and the warbles of olive thrushes, Mr Malik thought that probably these two explanations were both right. He had arrived at the main entrance to the park just as the gates were being unlocked and, looking and listening, began to wander down the path. At the fountain, dry these many years and now full of leaves and litter, he found his footsteps turning towards the row of pine trees that marked the edge of the old cemetery.

  Few people know about the old cemetery, screened off by the pine trees and a low wall. Behind it, tumbled stones mark the graves of the very first white settlers to Kenya – men and their memsahibs, and a disproportionate number of children who had fallen from horses or contracted malaria down at the coast and come to Nairobi for failed attempts at cures and convalescence. In the centre of the graveyard is a disused and now boarded-up chapel made of stone, and at the far end a caretaker’s cottage. Though rundown, the cottage is still occupied, and as Mr Malik approached the sound of a baby crying and a crow from one of the domestic fowl that pecked around the yard gave welcome life to this place of death. This was by no means the first time Mr Malik had been to the old cemetery. It was here that he had come on a wet Saturday morning in February nearly four years ago to scatter the ashes of his only son Raj.

  And he had come here so many Saturday mornings since to think about his son and to think about his sorrow, and his shame.

  21

  I have told you that Mr Malik does not talk much about his son Raj. I have not told you why. Raj was not a child when he died, and he did not die by falling from a horse or from a fever contracted among the mosquito-infested mangroves of the coast. He was thirty-three years old, and he died from AIDS. And as he lay dying, Mr Malik was feeling not love and compassion for his son, but shame and disgust.

  It had been some three years since his beautiful boy had told his father he was gay. And what had Mr Malik said when his brave and beautiful son, who he and his wife had always known was a little different from other boys, told him this? He told Raj to go, to leave, to disappear, to never darken his doors again. What kind of son was this, he thundered, what kind of man was this, who could admit to so unnatural, so perverted, so shameful a practice? Go, said Mr Malik in all his righteousness, you are not my son, my blood is not your blood, my name is not your name. You have brought shame on your family and disgrace to your mother’s memory. And he meant every word. Raj went away, but inside Mr Malik the rage and horror continued to burn. Oh, how sorry for himself he felt. What had he done to deserve this? Had he not already lost his wife? Now his son was lost to him, he told himself, and sons from his son. How could he hand on the business, as his father and grandfather had done before him? And he had lost face in the community, for Mr Malik was sure that although they said nothing, people knew.

  Perhaps Raj already had AIDS when he told his father that he was gay, perhaps he caught it sometime later. The next thing Mr Malik heard was that Raj was dead. And what happened then to all the anger and shame and self-pity that burned so fierce within him? They vanished like a candle flame in a puff of air. Mr Malik awoke to the dark realization of what he had done and the terrible knowledge that there was absolutely nothing he could do. His son was dead. What mattered it now whether Raj was homosexual or heterosexual, whether he loved men or women? It was too late. Too late to retract those words, too late to say come home, too late to ask forgiveness from those beautiful cold lips. He knew in sudden certainty that his wife would never have done so unloving a thing. So the shame that now made it difficult for Mr Malik to talk about Raj was not shame at his son but shame at himself. And the sorrow was not at his own loss, but at the losses he had made his son endure.

  It had been on that wet February day four days after the funeral, while scattering Raj’s ashes at the old cemetery, that Mr Malik had looked around at the graves and headstones and realized that though there was nothing he could do for his son there was something else he could do. How many young men and women were dying at that very momen
t, alone and rejected? The answer, he soon found, was more than he could have imagined.

  If it were influenza or smallpox that was carrying off people by the million, or even bubonic plague, perhaps people could have talked about it. But at that time in Kenya, AIDS was not talked about in polite society. This was mainly because of its association with homosexuality. In Kenya, as Mr Malik knew only too well, no one’s son or daughter is gay. But what is talked about is different from what is. A disease does not discriminate. Mr Malik found the place where his son had died, a long dark room at the back of the Aga Khan Hospital, full of rows of skeletal young men and women – gay, straight, single, married – lying on beds, on mattresses on the floor or just on bare floors. Perhaps one of them was someone that Raj had once loved and been loved by. Here care was minimal, visitors few. It did not take him much longer to discover that there was at least one such room in every hospital in Nairobi.

  Few of the dying even knew the name of the short, round, balding brown man who would come to sit beside them and smile and take their hand, or stroke their forehead and murmur sympathetic words. But even fewer would say that they did not feel better for his presence, and they would continue to feel just a little more at peace even after he had gone. And so the love he had denied his own son Raj found its way to many a forgotten son and daughter, though for Mr Malik it was never enough and never could be.

  But today he was not here to reminisce, he was here to see birds. Mr Malik left the cemetery and wandered back into the park. He sat down on a concrete bench beside the fountain, and within twenty minutes he had seen seventeen new species. Among them were a black-backed puffback, a red-cheeked cordon-bleu (looking very dashing in its plumage of lapis lazuli) and a small flock of cut-throats. Why, he mused, looking at the mixed group of male and females, should the species be so named if only the males had the splash of crimson across the throat? But then many birds were named after only one of the sexes and it was usually the male. It was the same for the cordon-bleu (for only the male has a red cheek) and a score of others. Among birds at least, the males do seem to be the fancier dressers. More enthusiastic singers too. He heard, then saw a small dark bird perched on a tall bamboo. Against the bright sky it looked jet black rather than dark blue but there was no mistaking those red legs. It was an indigo bird, and he knew that it must be a male for the female has completely different plumage, more like that of a female sparrow. An unusual whistle attracted his attention. Could that be the distinctive two-note call of a black-fronted bush-shrike? He’d never heard one of those in the city before.

  The call seemed to be coming from a low tree a short way down that overgrown path. Getting to his feet he made his way towards the sound. He had only gone a few steps down the path and had not yet spotted the source of the whistle when he noticed someone coming in the other direction. How annoying – the bird might be disturbed and fly off before he could identify it. And the path was really much too narrow to pass each other. Oh well, he hadn’t gone far, he would just have to turn around, let the person out and hope for the best. Mr Malik turned, only to find that someone else had just walked on to the path behind him – two people in fact. They appeared to be young men.

  It was best, he decided, not to make a fuss. The robbers might not hurt him, not unless he struggled or shouted. Without a word, Mr Malik reached into his pocket and handed over his wallet. Without a word, one of the young men took it.

  And those.’

  He was pointing to the binoculars around Mr Malik’s neck. Mr Malik sighed, and as he pulled the strap over his head felt the notebook being snatched from his hand. It was all he had to show what species he’d seen that morning and he couldn’t expect the Committee, let alone Harry Khan, to accept his memories of what he’d seen. And these species – seventeen of them – they might make all the difference.

  ‘I’m sure that book won’t be of interest to you,’ he said, reaching for it.

  The young man replied with a tight smile, handing the notebook to his accomplice.

  ‘Perhaps, Bwana’ – his mouth softened as he spoke the word though his eyes did not – ‘we will judge that. Now, what else is in your pockets?’

  Mr Malik pulled out a pen and a handkerchief, trying not to rattle his key ring. It would be such a nuisance if they took the car key and he had to get a locksmith out.

  ‘Did I hear something?’ said the youth now holding the notebook. ‘Did you hear something, brother?’

  ‘I think I heard a jingle-jangle.’

  Mr Malik put his hand back in his trouser pocket and pulled out the key ring.

  ‘Here. Now, can I have my notebook back please? It’s just a list of birds, that’s all. You can look at it if you want.’

  The young man looked carefully at the black eagle sketched on to the cover, then opened the notebook and inspected its contents, turning it upside down and back again.

  ‘Birds you say? Why you want a list of birds?’

  ‘It’s a… it’s my hobby. I like to look at birds. With those.’

  He pointed to the binoculars.

  The man looked at the notebook that was in one hand, and the key ring that was still in the other.

  ‘How bad you want this? How bad you want it back?’

  ‘I’d just like it. It’s not valuable, I’d just like it back.’

  ‘Suppose we make a deal, then, old man.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  The man dangled the keys in front of Mr Malik.

  ‘Suppose you show me where your car is right now. You show me where your car is, I give you back your book.’

  This was ridiculous. If he showed them where his car was they would steal it. Without his help it was just possible that they wouldn’t – as soon as they got away from this secluded path they would surely know he could call a policeman or an askari. Did they really imagine he would accept their ridiculous offer? Did they really imagine that he thought his notebook was worth more than his car? Mr Malik looked up at the robber, the key ring still dangling from the fingers of one hand, the notebook in the other.

  ‘All right,’ he said.

  The old green Mercedes was parked across from the main gate. The four of them left the City Park, crossed the road, and Mr Malik watched while the three robbers opened the car, got inside and started the engine.

  ‘My notebook, please.’

  And he watched his old green Mercedes take off towards the city, the three robbers laughing away like hyenas, one of them still waving his notebook from a wound-down window.

  22

  ‘I say,’ said Mr Patel when Mr Malik arrived that evening at the club, ‘was that a taxi I saw you arrive in?’

  Mr Malik had indeed taken a taxi to the club from the police station in Haare Thuku Road where he had spent a good part of his day. It had taken him half an hour to walk there and three hours to report the theft. He had little expectation that anything would be done – if there were no fine to be levied the police these days seemed to take little interest in criminal activity – but it was what a good citizen should do. He had then gone home to get his passport (a forty-minute walk – the police offered to let him make a phone call to his family but he didn’t want to bother Petula), then taken a taxi to his bank to report that his wallet and various cards had been stolen (a speedy two and a half hours). He then had to go back to the police station so that they could fill in on their forms the numbers on the cards that had been stolen (only two hours this time). There had been no time to go back home before he was due at the club.

  Mr Malik ordered a beer and gave a brief account of the doings of his day.

  ‘What I can’t see is why he went to the police,’ said Mr Gopez. ‘Damned robbers were probably off-duty constabulary.’

  ‘Ah well, it’s over now,’ said Mr Patel. ‘So, where’s the jolly notebook?’

  ‘They took that too,’ said Mr Malik.

  ‘But what about the birds?’ said Mr Patel.

  ‘Birds?’ said Mr Gopez.
‘Can’t you think about anything else? Poor chap’s been robbed blind, practically cleaned out – cash, cards and car – and all you can think about is birds?’

  ‘Sorry A.B., I didn’t mean to be… well, whatever I was being. Notebook stolen, though, eh? Never mind, I’m sure we can figure something out.’

  The small silence which descended was broken by the arrival of the Tiger.

  ‘Hello, Malik. What, no Khan yet?’ He looked at his watch. ‘Oh well, another fifteen minutes to go. So, how many scalps for our warrior today, Patel?’

  It took Mr Malik only a few minutes to explain to the Tiger the salient points of that day’s proceedings, the salientest being that his notebook had been stolen.

  ‘Well, think back. Aequam memento rebus in arduis servare mentem. How many do you think you saw?’

  ‘I’m pretty sure I’d counted seventeen new ones. But I can’t even remember now if I actually saw that black-fronted bush-shrike. I know I heard it, but…’

  ‘Hmm, tricky, very tricky. I’m trying to think what the rules have to say. Do the rules say anything about notebooks, Mr Patel?’

  ‘I don’t think so, Tiger. I’ll check.’

  And where’s Khan? If he doesn’t get here soon…’

  At that moment a screech of brakes from without followed by an excited buzz from within announced Harry’s arrival. He entered the bar waving several sheets of Hilton Hotel notepaper, heavily inscribed. Mr Malik’s situation was immediately explained, together with the difficulties that the loss of the notebook might entail.

  ‘Difficulties, what difficulties? If Malik says he saw seventeen new species, then that’s what he saw. I don’t see the problem.’

  ‘But we need the names, you see Khan,’ said Mr Patel. ‘We need the names to make it official, and so that we’ll know that he’s really seen them and that they haven’t already been seen. I need to record them, to write them down.’