Kendall sat forward, hunched over the wheel, as he drove. The engine had a tinny whine; it reminded Anna of a lawn mower. She couldn’t imagine how she’d ever mistaken the noise for the low purr of the Jaguar. She averted her gaze as Kendall fought to change gear using a primitive-looking mechanism mounted on the dashboard.
‘This car is on its last legs!’ He raised his voice over the flapping of the torn canvas roof and the loud rattle that came from somewhere under the chassis. Glancing at Anna, he gave a rueful smile. ‘But then, so am I.’
She smiled back at him. His candour was disarming, and she was impressed by his sense of adventure. At his age, many old people rarely left their sitting rooms but the retired doctor seemed determined to make the most of whatever time he had left. Anna sensed he was a man who had led a life of his own choosing; he’d enjoyed the journey and didn’t want it to end. The noise of the car had prevented him from launching into any more stories. He’d have some interesting tales to tell, but Anna was grateful for the lack of conversation. If they were talking, he’d eventually want to know about her life as well – and that would bring up complexities she didn’t feel like trying to explain.
She shifted restlessly on the thinly padded upholstery. Then she tried leaning against the door, but the interior panel had been removed on this side and her arm pressed up against bare metal. In the end she gave up trying to be comfortable and just stared ahead, willing the journey to pass as quickly as possible.
There were no landmarks that Anna recognised – just the unending parade of trees and tangled vines. She knew more about the forest, now, than when she’d first come here. Harry had taught her the names of some of the trees and plants. He’d shown her the poisonous toadstools decked out in candy colours that grew right near the house. He’d pointed into the undergrowth identifying carnivorous plants and describing the various means they used to snare a meal: pitfall traps, flypaper traps and snap traps. Anna could see that breaking down the forest into its component parts was his approach to living at close quarters with such a dominating presence. She had started calling the place ‘the jungle’ like the Carlings did, but she didn’t think the word – with its soft sound, and the link with exotic stories – matched what she experienced: the shadows that moved; the noises, muffled and secret or piercingly loud; the pungent smells. During her weeks at the mission she’d never strayed from the path that led to the hospital or taken even a step beyond the perimeter of the clearings that surrounded the hospital and the house. She would be glad when they entered the open woodlands that bordered the main road. When she could see the horizon – hidden from her for weeks – she’d be able to breathe more freely again.
At the end of a long straight section of the track there was a sharp turn to the left. As the car swung round, Anna’s suitcase slid along the back seat. Now she could see it from the corner of her eye – a red blur. The image led her thoughts back to the scene at the mission house, when she’d run inside to get changed and collect some things to take with her. Lily had watched on as she removed the suitcase from the cupboard where it was kept. There was no need to spend time packing; Anna had been using the case like a wardrobe, keeping all her clothes folded away inside. Setting it down on the floor, she had hurried to the bathroom to grab her toothbrush. While she was there she’d stripped off an old skirt and blouse Rose had given her, and had a quick wash. Then she’d pulled on the smart red-and-white spotted dress she’d had on the day she arrived here: the one that she’d planned to wear when she went to Banya. As she smoothed the skirt over her hips she’d felt a flutter of excitement. Who could say where she might end up today? Who she might talk to?
When she’d returned to her suitcase, Lily had been sitting on the floor next to it. Tears were running down her face.
‘What’s wrong?’ Anna asked.
‘You’re going away.’ The girl’s lower lip quivered. ‘Everyone just goes away.’
‘It’s only for a few days. I’ll be back.’
‘That’s what Eliza said. She promised she’d come back and she never did. She doesn’t like us any more.’
Anna knelt down beside Lily. ‘That’s not true. She wants to be here. I know she does. She will come back. And so will I – very soon.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes. Nothing will stop me. I promise.’ Looking down into Lily’s face – the child’s wide clear eyes like watery ponds – Anna felt a shiver of fear. Uttering such bold words felt like tempting fate.
‘I’ll be really lonely.’ Lily bent her head, letting her tears drop onto the floor.
Anna smoothed a strand of hair from the child’s wet cheek. ‘I’ve got an idea.’ Opening her case, she took out her toy koala. In the dimly lit hallway, its one eye gleamed brightly. ‘I’m going to leave Koala with you, to keep you company.’
Lily took the toy, smoothing its sparse fur. ‘He sleeps with you,’ she stated. ‘I saw you cuddling him that time – remember?’
Anna smiled, nodding. Lily had come into the sitting room late one evening, when Anna was lying on her makeshift bed. It had been the end of a difficult day in the hospital; one of the babies had died. Anna couldn’t get the image of its tiny face, wizened with dehydration, out of her mind. She’d found comfort in hugging the soft toy against her chest. When Lily had appeared, looking for the book she was reading, she’d asked to see what Anna was holding. She’d examined the koala with interest.
‘Where is the other eye?’ she’d asked.
‘It was lost long ago,’ Anna had explained. ‘I’ve had him since I was a baby.’
‘Are you going to keep him forever?’
‘Yes. I hope so.’
Now, as Anna closed up her suitcase, Lily was rubbing the koala against her cheek. A wisp of loose fur drifted to the ground. She kissed its nose, then handed the toy back to Anna.
‘You won’t be able to sleep without him.’ She made the statement an unarguable fact. ‘But now I believe you. You’re coming back.’
Anna hugged Lily close, stroking her hair for a few moments. For reasons she couldn’t name, there was a mist of tears in her own eyes. ‘I have to go now.’
‘When will I see you?’ Lily asked.
‘Quite soon, Mr Baboon.’ Anna adopted one of Sam’s rhymes, trying to lighten Lily’s mood.
‘In a while, Crocodile,’ Lily responded, smiling through her tears. ‘See you later, Alligator.’
When Anna had tucked the koala back into the suitcase, Lily took her hand and held it tightly as they walked out to the sitting room.
Instead of typing the letter she’d planned – addressed to the Catholic mission and beginning ‘To whom it may concern’ – Anna had written a quick note to Rose and Harry explaining what she was doing. She’d shown it to Adina, and then put it on the table beside the manuscript. The ayah had agreed it was important for the Land Rover to be mobile again, and she could see the visitor hovering impatiently at his car. However, she was uneasy about Anna leaving without the Carlings knowing. She’d followed Anna to the door, a frown knitting her brow, bunching the neat line of her tribal scars. Sam had already seen his sister’s tears; now he picked up on Adina’s ambivalence as well. As Anna was about to step outside, he’d clung to her leg. She’d had to peel off his arms and push him away.
Thinking of the scene now, with the mission house slipping further and further behind her, Anna felt a lump in her throat. She was touched by the children’s reaction to her departure. It made her conscious of the fact that for the last three weeks she’d been a part of a real family. She’d grown to love the way the Carlings all held hands when they said grace before meals. She enjoyed the comforting sound of Harry and Rose talking together while she read her novel before bedtime. The couple were probably only ten years older than her, yet in their presence she felt, sometimes, more like one of the children than their peer. When she lay on her mattress, breathing the smell of wax crayons and pencil shavings that wafted from the school corner, she felt safe and at home in the mission house, cocooned from the jungle by the sturdy wire mesh.
But the sense of belonging was an illusion, Anna knew. She wasn’t really a part of the Carling family; she was just a visitor passing through – and an uninvited one, at that. She thought of her own home: the flat in Melbourne where she lived by herself. It would feel so quiet and empty compared with the busy Carling household. Just the thought of returning there made her feel lonely.
She pictured the suburban bungalow where she’d grown up –in some ways it still felt like her real home. But the idea of being back there was even less appealing. She didn’t want to see her mother. Regardless of Marilyn’s motivation, Anna couldn’t forgive her for concealing the very existence of her real father. Anna had been entitled to know the truth, especially once she became an adult. Yet even now, Marilyn was refusing to divulge any information about him. A deep gulf had formed between mother and daughter. Eventually, their relationship would have to be rebuilt, but for now, Anna didn’t want even to think about Marilyn. It only made her feel more isolated.
This time last year, thoughts about what kind of place she would call ‘home’ would have led Anna naturally to Gregory and the life they were planning together. They’d talked about moving to the outskirts of the city to create a family home with a big garden, ready for the children they would have. But that dream was gone. There was no point in Anna speculating about how her fiancé would have reacted to her going to the Congo. It wasn’t worth pondering whether he would have encouraged her or not. Whether he might even have come with her, and how that scenario would have played out . . .
As Anna stared out at the wall of greenery that draped each side of the track like a densely embroidered curtain, she wondered where Gregory was now. She pictured him walking along the esplanade in St Kilda, hand in hand with a new girlfriend. Or was he in London on business? Shopping in Harrods, perhaps; buying a gift to take home for someone special . . . Jealousy reared inside her, even though – after the conversation with Eliza at the Hôtel Royal Kivu – she was now more certain than before that ending the engagement had been the right decision. She couldn’t commit to spending her life with Gregory. But imagining him with another woman was a stark reminder of where her choice had left her. There was no one at her side.
Anna had plenty of friends – some were from secretarial school; others she’d met at Williams, Gordon & Sons – but her one longtime companion was Sally. The girls had met in primary school. Marilyn had always encouraged Anna’s link with the Jacobs family because she admired Sally’s father, who was an alderman. The friendship had survived years spent apart while Sally studied in Canberra and Anna stayed in Melbourne. Only last year, they’d been planning to travel to Queensland together. But then Michael had entered the picture, capturing all of Sally’s attention. Since the engagement the two friends had barely seen one another, except at events surrounding the wedding
Anna thought back to when the private investigator, Murphy, had first contacted her to deliver the message from Karl Emerson. She didn’t remember having been discontented with her life at the time – lonely or unhappy. Now, she understood that she must have been; why else had she been drawn to the Carling family, and to Eliza, so quickly and so deeply? This would explain why she couldn’t picture her old world in Australia with much clarity. Why her images of the place were fuzzy and vague. And why she had a sense that if she returned, it might all disappear like a mirage as she walked towards it. The truth was, her life back there had been lacking in substance.
In contrast, memories of recent events seemed vibrant and full of colour. Pictures paraded through Anna’s head: the mission house, the hospital, the clearing where the children played. Then she thought back to the journey from Albertville. The lakeside hotel. A meal for two cooked over an open fire.
Anna’s ribs seemed to tighten around her lungs as an image of Eliza came into her mind, clear and detailed. It was not the glamorous, perfectly made-up face that Anna saw – the one Eliza wore when she was going to meet Randall. Anna remembered her in the garden, the day the decision to take the journey to Banya had been made. Sitting alone on the swinging chair Eliza had looked so tense and worried. There had been something fragile about her as well.
Anna closed her eyes, swept by a wave of despair. But she knew she could not give in to it. She had to keep hoping for the best: that Eliza was safe and well. Wherever she was right now, whatever she was doing – she was with her Simba friends. And her secret lover. Anna replayed what Eliza had said, just before they parted: I’ll be looked after. She’d sounded so confident and sure. Whatever was happening, she would know exactly what to do.
Anna thought about what Eliza would say if she could see her now – setting off on her own like this, with Kendall. She felt a flash of pride at the knowledge that Eliza would approve. She’d understood from the beginning that it was vital for Anna to find out about her father. And Anna knew she’d made the right decision as well: she had to pursue her plan to reach Banya, and getting the Land Rover back on the road was the next step. Now, even more than before, there was no room for failure. Because when she considered the path she’d been on – where she’d come from and where she was now – she knew that the stakes had grown. She didn’t just want to learn information about her father. Even meeting him, getting to know him, would not be enough any more. She wanted him to lead her into a whole new world – his world. She didn’t want to go back to the life she had known.
It was crazy to have such a fantasy, she warned herself. She was doomed to disappointment. But a new dream had been born, and it was growing only stronger – bigger – with the passing of time. She could feel it there right now, living and breathing inside her . . .
Kendall braked as the car hit a pothole. Anna was thrown forwards, almost hitting her head on the dashboard.
‘Sorry – I didn’t see that!’ Kendall called out. ‘My eyes aren’t so good any more. Are you all right?’
‘Yes. I’m fine,’ Anna assured him. She sat up straight, bringing her thoughts back to the present, and keeping a watch on the track. It would be a disaster if they crashed into a fallen tree or had some other accident out here. There was no one to come to the rescue. And they were so vulnerable in this flimsy car. She couldn’t wait to be back on the main road.
The change seemed to come suddenly. One moment the track was enveloped by forest; the next, the canopy was thinning, letting in the sunlight. Soon, patches of sky became visible between the branches. At ground level the undergrowth retreated from the verges. Then at last, the junction came into view.
Kendall brought the car to a halt, pushing in the clutch and keeping the engine revved to avoid stalling. Anna searched the road. Part of her expected to see some military presence in the area: a convoy of dark green vehicles like the ones that clustered around the checkpoints back in Albertville; or even lines of marching soldiers. But the road was empty. The only sign of life was a crow, pecking at a long black snake that had been squashed into the gravel.
Kendall turned to the left, slowly accelerating. The noise inside the vehicle had diminished; whatever had been rattling underneath was now still – whether this was due to the smoother road, or if some part of the car had finally fallen off, Anna could not guess.
They passed a young boy herding a few goats. He smiled at the travellers while he used his stick to prod the animals out of their path. As Anna waved at him she felt a wash of relief. He looked completely at ease. He was even chewing on a piece of sugarcane. She let her muscles relax – neck, shoulders, back, hands. Then she flexed her fingers, before resting them in her lap. Only then did she realise how tense she had been.
Kendall began asking about Dr Carling’s work at the hospital. Anna was pleased with the amount of information she was able to give him. She described the clinic at the leper colony and explained how Harry and Rose were working on a book about the management of burnt-out cases.
‘In my day there was no cure, you know,’ Kendall told Anna. ‘The best we could do was give daily injections of chaulmoogra oil – subcutaneously or into the muscle. It was very painful and not very effective. The worst thing was that we had to remove all the babies who were born in the colony. Leprosy isn’t particularly infectious where adults are concerned – most people are more or less immune – but the young are much more susceptible.’ Kendall shook his head. ‘There were terrible scenes. Sometimes people hid their children and only brought them out when there were signs they’d been infected. A pale patch on the skin is usually the first thing you see. I can tell you, every time I saw one – especially on a young, perfect body – it used to make my blood run cold.’
Kendall slowed down as another figure appeared on the road ahead. It was a tribesman, marching along with a steady gait, a spear resting over his shoulder, angled to the sky. As the car approached he moved languidly to the side of the road.
‘I’ll ask him for directions to the Catholic mission,’ Kendall said, winding down his window. ‘To make sure we don’t miss it.’
Anna watched the two men as they talked in what she assumed was Swahili. The retired missionary sounded fluent – he must have used the language in Uganda; Eliza had explained that it was spoken, usually as a second tongue, throughout most of East Africa. The conversation seemed to take ages, but Anna knew by now that the greetings alone were lengthy. As the words flowed back and forth, she searched the African’s face for any sign of concern, but like the goatherd he looked perfectly relaxed.
Eventually, Kendall waved at the tribesman and drove on. ‘It’s just over this next hill. We look for a signpost to a big house owned by a European. Nyumba ya Chui, the fellow called it. House of the Leopard. Anyway, we take the next turn to the right.’
Anna spun around to him. ‘What did you say? Did he mean Leopard Hall?’
‘That sounds right – the Swahili translation isn’t always precise. Do you know the place?’
‘I lived there.’ Anna’s voice was faint. ‘When I was little.’
Kendall craned his neck, looking over at her. ‘It’s your family home?’
‘It was once.’
‘Ah, so you come from this area. I wondered where you fitted in. You don’t look like a missionary.’ He glanced at Anna’s hands with their red nails. Since she couldn’t remove the polish she’d been painting over the chips. The coating of lacquer was now thick, the colour even stronger. ‘Are they still living there, your parents? So many Europeans have left the Congo, now. Not the missionaries, of course . . .’
Anna shook her head. ‘There’s just a caretaker and some servants.’ She remembered Karl explaining that the local staff had been kept on after he left for Albertville, to watch over the house as well as the rest of his precious collection. The plantation had been leased to another landowner.
‘How long since you saw the place?’
‘I left when I was seven.’
Kendall’s eyes fixed on Anna, briefly but intently. She could see that his interest was piqued: he was not only a teller of stories; he collected them as well.
‘Is that why you’ve come back here?’ he asked. ‘Taking a trip down memory lane?’ When Anna gave no reply, he continued. ‘There’s nothing like visiting the house where you lived as a child – seeing all the special places, the secret corners, cubby houses . . .’
‘I don’t remember much about it.’ Anna’s hands twisted in her lap. She recalled the sudden fear that had come over her as she’d climbed the staircase in Eliza’s mansion – the chilling sense that something horrible awaited her upstairs. Then there was that time when she was walking towards the front steps of Eliza’s house: the pigeons flying down from the eaves had been transformed, in her mind, into a stream of bats.
Kendall smiled knowingly. ‘Memories will come flooding back to you. That always happens to me.’
Anna just shook her head. She didn’t want to know what visions of her childhood years, spent in that house, might rise up next.
‘But you could meet people who knew you! Some of the staff – or the local villagers. The Africans love it when Europeans make the effort to come back and say hello.’ Kendall spoke with growing excitement. He glanced at his watch. ‘We’ve got time to drop in – as long as it’s not too far off the main road.’
As he spoke, Anna turned to him, her eyes widening. She hadn’t thought of this . . . If people remembered her, they might remember other things as well. How Anna came to be living at Leopard Hall. Why Karl Emerson had adopted her as his daughter. All the things that Marilyn would not say.
‘We don’t have to go there, though,’ Kendall said. ‘I always like to revisit the past – but not everyone’s like me. We can just head straight to the mission. You decide.’
Anna didn’t answer straight away. Part of her didn’t want to go anywhere near Leopard Hall – but a stronger part couldn’t give up this chance of finding some clues to her past. What if the Lutherans were unable to help her – or unwilling?
When she finally spoke, she kept her tone casual. ‘We might as well drop in – since we’re here.’
‘Exactly,’ Kendall agreed. ‘What have we got to lose?’