In the calm light of the following day, Sarah asked Annah again if she would choose a name for the baby that she had brought safely into the world. Michael made no objection, so Annah gladly agreed. After much consideration, she named the little girl Kate. Just Kate – not Katherine. There was no other ‘Kate’ in Annah’s mind, no link to some friend or famous person. She just liked the sound of the short, bright name.
The trauma of the Caesarian had left Sarah so weak and exhausted that it was clear she would need help looking after the baby. Ordena was asked to give up being housekeeper and take on the role of ayah. Though the African woman had never found the need for change tables, muslin nappies and bunny rugs while raising her own nine children, she carried out her new tasks with great care. She understood that the little white baby had been born in a foreign land, where the very air she breathed and the earth beneath her was unfamiliar and dangerous.
It was also decided that Annah should move up from her hut to help with Kate at night. She slept in the second bedroom of the Mission House, with the crib pulled up beside her bed. It was she who made sure that the mosquito net was always tucked in securely around the mattress and that the legs of the cot were standing in tins of kerosene so that the sleeping baby was protected from the silent approach of snakes, scorpions, ants and ticks.
When Kate woke for a feed, Annah would carry her into the master bedroom, and wait there while the baby fed hungrily at her sleepy mother’s breast. She grew used to being in the couple’s room. Breathing the smell of the warm, shared bed. Listening to the quiet suckling sounds. Seeing Michael asleep, his face nestled into his pillow, a hand under his cheek, as if he were still a child himself. She found it strangely comforting to sit in there on the old armchair, squashing the strewn clothes that were – these days – cast down, unfolded. She could feel, for a time, that she was truly a part of the intimate family closeness.
And, when the feed time was over, she didn’t mind pacing the quiet house with a wakeful baby dribbling on her shoulder. She enjoyed the touch of the downy head on her neck, and the little fingers that reached up and played over her face. She found herself talking to the baby, telling stories and singing songs from her own childhood that she didn’t even know she remembered. Things just swam out of her past, each one bringing shadowy memories with it. Images of Eleanor, bending over her daughter. Smiling. Touching. Or was it one of the nannies whose face Annah saw? She could never be completely certain.
The replacement of Ordena as housekeeper was difficult. Several village people were put forward for the job, but when Sarah heard that a young man had arrived, homeless and without family, from another area, she wanted to offer him the place. Michael said that it was impractical to take in a stranger who didn’t know their ways. But Sarah said that practicality wasn’t all that mattered. Somewhere this young man had a mother who loved him. If Sarah were her, she’d hope that another mother, far away, would step in to help her son. That he would not be left floundering. Michael was taken aback by this response, but said that it was ultimately Sarah’s choice.
So it was that Tefa, the newcomer, took over responsibility for running the Mission House. He belonged to a tribe of tall, thin people with loosely curled hair and skin so black that it looked like velvet. His gangly figure became a familiar sight in and around the House as he hurried from place to place, eager to learn everything as quickly as possible. Ordena did her best to train him, one arm cradling the white baby, the other waving and pointing as she gave directions. Even so, it was a long time before meals were served smoothly again.
It didn’t really matter, though, because as often as not Kate disrupted the schedule as well. She seemed to think she should eat and sleep and cry whenever she liked. Nothing was sacred. Not meal time, not prayer time, not even the thirty minutes in the evening when her father played his music.
Everyone knew that this was not the scenario that Sarah had envisaged. She’d prepared for motherhood by reading a well-thumbed volume that had been left behind by Sister Barbara. It was, the older nurse had said, like a mother’s Bible – it contained all the advice that Sarah would ever need. The author, Dr Trubi King, was a world-famous expert on babies. He believed in the value of a firm schedule with set times for measured doses of fresh air, exercise and good nutrition. A Trubi King baby was breastfed four-hourly from birth. There were no feeds allowed in between, and no feeds at all during the night. The book was hardly modern – it was written in the 1920s – but Sister Barbara had said that in her experience good sense didn’t go out of date. It was the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. Like God.
Sarah had planned to follow Dr King’s advice closely, but found herself unprepared for the wriggling, squalling reality of a newborn. Michael and Annah assisted her where they could, often taking turns at trying to distract the hungry baby until a feed time was reached. Ordena was openly puzzled by the procedures she was meant to follow, but she did her best to help too. Even so, Sarah met with little success in establishing the Trubi King regimes.
‘He makes it sound so much easier than it is,’ she complained to Annah. Her body was stiff with anxiety as she spoke, stress emanating from every muscle. ‘I feel like a failure.’
She and Annah were watching the baby lying on a rug on the living room floor, trying to get her toes into her mouth. It was meant to be her afternoon feed time, but she’d had the last one late and now wanted only to play.
Annah was unsure how to respond. She kept recalling the contents of a book on childcare that she’d read during her training. It was by an American writer, a Dr Spock. He advocated a completely new approach to raising children, one that stood against nearly all the accepted beliefs. Though Annah had found it interesting, she couldn’t imagine Dr Spock’s ideas would suit Sarah so she’d decided against saying that she had an alternative to offer.
But now she was reconsidering. Kate was obviously quite happy, playing on the floor. Yet her mother looked so uneasy, watching her. It made no sense.
‘There is another way,’ Annah found herself saying. ‘You don’t bother with rules and regulations. You just respect the child. And follow your own instincts.’
Instincts. The word sounded primitive and out of place.
But Sarah looked up at Annah, her lips parted with interest.
‘You mean,’ she said slowly. ‘You just do what you … feel … is right?’ Her voice was pitched barely above a whisper as she mouthed the unimaginable.
‘Yes,’ said Annah, frowning doubtfully. ‘That’s what I read. The book said mothers shouldn’t be so worried about what’s right and wrong. They should just relax and enjoy their babies. Do what they want to do.’
Sarah sat still, her head turned slightly to one side as if she was still listening carefully. Annah could see her letting the words sink in, fighting to accept them. That Sarah wanted to was obvious. But first she had to clear away so many barriers. She glanced guiltily across to the bookshelf, where Sister Barbara’s book lay beside Michael’s solid Concordance and the gilded box that contained his Study Bible.
Meanwhile, Kate had given up on her toes and put her thumb in her mouth. She’d closed her eyes and fallen asleep, completely contented with her place on the floor and the lulling sound of women’s voices meeting and blending above her, like the wind talking in the trees.
After this conversation, Sarah abandoned trying to make Kate fit into a fixed routine. She fed the baby when she seemed hungry and let her sleep whenever, and wherever, she seemed tired. Almost straight away, life became much easier for everyone. Before long, Kate became the laughing, amiable centre of attention in the Langali Mission House.
There were still some rules, though. When Sarah was strong enough, she returned to running her Mothers’ Club. She often took Kate with her to the classes and breastfed her in front of the African women, to set a good example. But Sarah always made sure, before undoing her blouse, that there were no men around to watch her. And in the Mission House she always fed her baby in the master bedroom. One day she asked Annah to come and sit with her, to keep her company.
‘Why not feed her out here?’ Annah queried. ‘There’s no-one to disturb her.’
‘I’m not worried about that,’ Sarah explained, leading the way into the bedroom. ‘It’s just that I don’t know when someone’s going to turn up here. Tefa’s always running in and out. Stanley comes looking for Michael. And the egg man – he just appears at the window without warning, shaking his money tin.’
Annah looked at her, mystified.
Sarah blushed. ‘You have to remember,’ she said, ‘that African men are still men.’
Annah frowned. ‘I don’t follow you …’
‘You may find it hard to believe,’ Sarah said, ‘but I was told that some of the Colonial Service wives deliberately taunt their houseboys. They have breakfast served in their bedrooms, while they’re wearing flimsy nightgowns!’ Sarah spoke in a hushed tone. ‘Some even ask their boys to help them wash their hair!’
Annah watched Sarah as she was speaking. The woman’s dark head was bent as she held her baby to her smooth full breast. Her skin was its usual pale cream, with her cheeks a warm pink and her lips the colour of roses. She looked like a delicate porcelain madonna. Annah couldn’t help smiling at the idea of her being a temptation to lust. It seemed ludicrous. Sarah glanced up and saw the look on her friend’s face. She blushed again, a deeper red.
‘I know it sounds silly,’ she said. There was a defensive note in her voice. But then a smile began, tugging at the corners of her mouth.
Annah began to laugh. Sarah hesitated for a moment, then joined in. They laughed together, long and loud. Kate let the nipple fall from her mouth and stared in surprise.
There was the sound of footsteps outside the door, then Michael came in.
‘What’s so funny?’ he asked as he crossed the room to pick up a clean shirt. He faltered, stopped by the sight of Sarah’s breast fully exposed. His eyes widened with surprise, as if he’d forgotten that there was a baby to be fed and had just stumbled in on his wife inexplicably disrobed.
‘Nothing,’ Sarah answered him, trying to compose herself.
Annah bent her head, hiding her face behind a screen of red hair. When she looked up, Michael was gone. Meeting Sarah’s gaze again, she dissolved into giggles. It was a silly schoolgirl’s response to a joke that barely had any substance, but the two women couldn’t control themselves. They both kept on laughing until tears ran down their cheeks. In the end, it was Kate who made them stop. Deciding that enough was enough, she opened her tiny cherry lips wide, and screamed with raw fury.
Ordena came hurrying in.
‘What is wrong?’ she asked accusingly. ‘What are you trying to make her do?’ She frowned as she took Kate from Sarah and held her over one well-padded shoulder. ‘I thought these white women had changed their ways,’ she said, pretending to address the baby, but raising her voice for all to hear. ‘They were going to let you be happy, like an African baby.’ She scowled at Sarah. ‘Don’t fall into backsliding,’ she said, using the Evangelist’s word. She narrowed her eyes in warning. ‘It is a sin.’
She carried the baby away, leaving the two women sitting there alone. The last of their laughter had been spent and they were content to sit in silence. Annah let her gaze wander around the now familiar room. She scanned the dressing table where Sarah’s lavender talc and face cream stood side by side. And the wardrobe where Michael’s pressed shirts hung in a neat row – stiff-shouldered soldiers without bodies. She saw the pairs of shoes lined up under the bed. Then she paused, noticing a tear-shaped stain on the rug at the end of the bed. It was blood, she realised – Sarah’s blood – left from the night when she had nearly died, right here in this room. Following the direction of Annah’s gaze, Sarah saw the mark too. She looked up, her eyes seeking Annah’s. Neither woman spoke. They didn’t need to, each knew what the other was thinking. That so much had changed since the moment when that blood had been spilled. It was just as Annah had predicted, while standing beside Sarah in the operating theatre. The birth of Kate had bound them inextricably together.
Annah looked across the room and out through the window to where she could see Sister Barbara’s gum trees standing in the compound. She smiled, recalling how the image of the Australian trees growing there had once made her feel so far away from home. All that had changed, too, she told herself. She now felt that she really belonged here. She felt loved, accepted. Happy.
A cardboard box stood open on the dining table. The sides of the carton were stained and dirty. Its flaps were dog-eared and the corners bruised and blunted. The remains of a label clung to the top. You could still read the words written there in a bold and careful hand.
A gift from the East Africa Mission Auxiliary.
To: Dr and Mrs Michael Carrington.
Langali Station.
Care of Mission Headquarters.
Dodoma.
Dodoma.
Annah looked at the name of the place where she had once so wanted to be. How right she had been, she reflected, to trust the Bishop’s choice. To trust God.
‘Just unpack everything,’ Sarah called from across the room. ‘And we’ll choose what we want.’ There was a note of excitement in her voice, an almost child-like anticipation.
Annah reached in and removed some tins and packages. She lined them up on the table, naming each as she placed it down. ‘Shrimp cocktail. Port wine-flavoured jelly. Potted beef. Sugared almonds. Sardines in tomato sauce. Tuna.’ Her mouth watered as she recalled the familiar flavours, so long untasted. ‘Water crackers. Fruit cake. Devilled ham spread.’
‘No cherries?’ Sarah asked. She was stirring cake mixture. Tefa was watching intently as if some secret could be learned from the way she moved the spoon. The night-black skin of his hands and forearms were dusted with white flour.
‘There doesn’t seem to be.’ Annah felt around in the box and pulled out some men’s underpants and a bundle of half-used coloured pencils. Then her fingers found something else. Something hard, but broken, sheathed inside a skin. She brought out a shattered Easter egg. Pieces of dark chocolate, mottled white with age, penetrated the golden foil.
‘I’ve found an Easter egg, though,’ she said.
‘Oh, yes,’ Sarah responded. ‘I’d forgotten about that. We didn’t eat it at Easter. I couldn’t face chocolate when I was pregnant.’
After handing the bowl of cake mixture to Tefa, Sarah joined Annah at the dining table. She rested one hand on the side of her face as she thought carefully.
‘Let’s begin with the shrimp cocktail,’ she suggested. ‘Followed by tuna mornay. With hardboiled egg on top. Then jelly and fruit cake.’ She smiled recklessly. ‘Devilled ham spread on crackers. Then Easter egg with coffee to finish off.’
‘All that?’ Annah queried. ‘There won’t be much left.’
‘Michael said we should celebrate properly,’ Sarah responded. ‘To show that we are in favour of it.’ She was referring to the marking of Tanganyika becoming – at last – a fully independent republic, completely free of colonial ties.
‘Anyway,’ Sarah added, ‘it’s a double celebration. It’s for Kate’s Christening as well.’
Annah raised her eyebrows in surprise.
‘You had to operate, remember?’ Sarah said.
Annah nodded. The Christening day had begun well, with Kate looking like a miniature bride in the white dress that Sarah had made from an old bedsheet. The sober-faced African Evangelist had led the service. Annah was the only godparent and he’d taken his time with the reading of her vows. When the moment had come for her to respond, Annah had raised her voice so that all could hear as she renounced the devil, on behalf of the baby, and affirmed her belief in the creed.
A lunch had been planned, but before the tins were opened and the table set, Annah and Michael had been called away to deal with an emergency. Weeks had passed since then, but the Christening lunch had never been re-staged.
‘It’ll be an even bigger event,’ Sarah called back over her shoulder as she scooped up the tins and carried them away to the kitchen. ‘A Christening and an Independence, rolled into one.’
Annah smiled to herself. For some time now she’d been looking forward to the celebration meal for reasons of her own. She had something in mind that she was planning to add to the occasion …
The Africans were busy with preparations too. The Outpatients’ Clinic was quieter than usual and several of the inpatients asked to be allowed to go home. The missionaries didn’t mind. They were glad that, for once, they might get the chance to finish work on time.
There was just a glimmer of daylight left in the sky when the three sat down to their dinner. The house was unusually peaceful. Kate was sleeping soundly in her crib and the kitchen was empty, all the staff having gone home early.
Sarah lit some candles – not the standard kind they used when the generator broke down, but elegantly tapered ones made of deep red wax. Annah poured mango juice into the water glasses and set one by each place. Then the two women sat still, waiting for Michael to say Grace.
Instead of just giving thanks for the food, he asked for God’s blessing on the new country and prayed that Independence would come peacefully to Tanganyika. There was a sombre tone to his voice and when he looked up there was a moment of silence, the bright atmosphere dampened. Then Sarah lifted her glass as if making a toast.
‘Here’s to the future,’ she said. ‘To the Republic of Tanganyika. And us.’
As the three chinked glasses, the feeling of celebration was restored. They began to eat, spearing the shrimps with cake forks and closing their eyes with pleasure as they tasted the delicacies. Sarah explained to Michael that this evening they were celebrating Kate’s Christening as well – the day when Annah had become a formal member of their family. Kate’s godmother.
Now was the time for her to speak, Annah thought. She put down her fork and raised her face.
‘I’ve decided that I want to give you a present,’ she said. ‘A Christening present. For all of you.’ Reaching into her pocket, she brought out a photograph and placed it on the table where it could be seen by everyone. It was a black and white image of a small Victorian terrace house, framed by fronds of a gum tree growing in the foreground. Sarah and Michael looked puzzled.
‘It’s a house, in Melbourne,’ Annah explained. ‘I’m giving it to you.’
There was a stunned silence.
‘My grandmother bought it for me, years ago. It’s next door to the Mason family home, where she lived by herself when she was old. She wanted to have me close by.’ Annah paused. Michael was already shaking his head. Sarah was staring at the photograph, her eyes wide with a blend of disbelief and bare, raw hunger. ‘I know you’ve got no relatives to inherit from, and no place to go when you leave the mission field. And now there’s Kate to think of too.’
‘But what about you?’ Sarah asked. ‘It’s your home.’
‘It’s a very generous offer,’ Michael broke in. ‘A wonderful thought. But we couldn’t possibly accept.’
Annah ignored him, addressing Sarah. ‘When my grandmother died, she left me the big house. So, you see, I don’t need this. I want you both to have it.’
There was another moment of stillness.
‘It’s not a whim,’ Annah added, her voice firm and clear. ‘I’ve given it a lot of thought. And …’ she searched for something more to say. ‘And prayer. I believe God wants you to have it.’
Sarah breathed out with mixed relief and joy. When she looked up at Annah, her eyes were bright with tears. ‘You don’t know what this means to me,’ she said, her voice trembling. ‘How can we thank you?’
‘I’m not doing it just for you,’ Annah said. ‘I’ve got selfish reasons.’ Michael looked at her, his eyebrows slightly raised. ‘When we’re old, and we’ve all finished our work, I want us to be neighbours.’
Michael smiled. ‘I can’t imagine you old,’ he said, his eyes on Annah’s red hair. ‘I just can’t.’
‘We will be,’ Annah insisted. ‘We’ll be talking over the fence, complaining about the younger generation. Kate and her friends …’
Sarah pushed her plate aside and reached across the table to take Annah’s hand in her own. Her other hand grasped Michael’s. ‘I never thought I could be so happy,’ she said. ‘I want it to stay like this forever. Us together.’
The three pairs of eyes met. Everyone knew that Sarah’s wish could never become a reality. They might end up neighbours, many years from now, in faraway Melbourne. But in the meantime, they were missionaries. Pawns in the Bishop’s chess game. They were probably safe for a few years, at least, but the time of parting would one day surely come.
‘I wish we were married,’ Sarah said suddenly. She smiled a moment later, to make it a joke. ‘You know, like the Africans do. I’d be the principal wife. Annah could be the second. Then we’d have to stay together.’
Everyone laughed. They had to. Her suggestion was too ridiculous – and yet tainted by something too serious – to allow any other response.
They ate then, without talking, except to comment on the food. Sarah’s eyes kept straying to the photograph on the table. Annah could see questions forming in her head. What is it like? How many bedrooms? Is there any garden behind?
‘I’ll describe it for you,’ Annah said. She got a pencil and paper and began by drawing a floor plan.
An hour passed while she described every detail of the little house. She paused eventually to let Sarah bring out the dessert. The cake had just been cut and they were laughing over the bowl of sloppy red jelly, when a sound disturbed the quiet. The dull, steady throb of drums, coming from the village. The three missionaries looked at one another. It was not the usual light rhythm of ordinary entertainment that they could hear. It was a loud, heavy beat – the deep-throated call of a whole company of drums.
No-one spoke. Annah’s thoughts turned back to the conversations they’d had in the weeks past – speculation about what changes Independence would bring. Michael had commented that the Africans he’d spoken to seemed vague about the meaning of the big event. They reported that songs were being practised in the village in readiness for the celebrations, but that many of them were hymns or Christmas carols or old initiation songs. There were no new ballads being composed, as there should have been at such a time, to tell people what was going on. They were left with a single word, which had been called out over and over.
Uhuru! Uhuru!
Freedom! Freedom!
The drums grew louder, the beat faster. Chanting voices joined in with the rhythm. No words could be heard, but there was an undercurrent of something wild, even menacing, in the tone, the pace, and the mad laughter that kept breaking through.
‘They wouldn’t be drinking, would they?’ Sarah asked, the first to voice her unease.
‘No, no,’ said Michael. ‘The Church elders would never allow it.’
He passed round the devilled ham crackers, but neither Sarah nor Annah took one.
‘Let’s lock the doors,’ Sarah suggested.
Michael shook his head. ‘I don’t think that’s necessary,’ he said. ‘This is Tanganyika. Not the Congo.’
Congo. The word hung in the air. No-one needed to mention the massacre of whites that had been carried out by the Congolese after Independence – the knowledge of the nightmare hovered between them, an almost tangible presence.
They left the table, abandoning the treats. Michael suggested that he play some music. While he chose a record, Sarah went to get Kate from her crib in the bedroom.
‘I heard her crying,’ she claimed. ‘The drums must have woken her.’ But when she reappeared, the child cradled in her arms seemed to be lost in a peaceful dream.
Michael placed the needle carefully down, then stepped away from the player as the blank crackle of the record gave way to the first bars of an old Welsh lullaby. Sarah looked across to him and smiled. Laying her cheek on her baby’s downy head, she began to sing along with the choir in her thin soprano voice.
Sleep my child let peace attend thee
All through the night.
Guardian angels watching o’er thee
All through the night.
For the second verse, Annah and Michael joined in. The amateur voices stood out from the perfect harmonies of the choir, a rougher strand, bravely woven from fear and uncertainty. The three found themselves drawing closer together. Sarah leant her head on her husband’s chest. She cradled Kate with one arm and reached the other towards Annah, drawing her friend in to make a close, safe circle. Michael put his arm around Annah’s shoulder. She felt it there, lean and strong, light fingers brushing the skin of her arm. The man’s big strong body linking hers and Sarah’s.
They stood together for a long time, listening to the music, feeling the warmth of the air trapped between them, breathing the clean powdery smell of the sleeping baby. Turning inwards, away from the world outside – the drumming darkness that closed them in.