Jennie Read Free Page B

early. A few heavy drops slapped down through the leaves, the chimpanzee began screaming with displeasure (she hated rain), and soon it was as black as night. We arrived inLukemba in a warm downpour, the mud streets running with water. Steam and cooking smoke rose from the conical thatched roofs. A wet chicken strutted around, and a tethered goat with a swollen udder forlornly watched us.
    The peace lasted only a moment. Pouring out of the huts came the naked village children, their bellies swollen with
kwashiorkor
, their white teeth flashing, their pink throats showing behind their shouts. Incredibly enough, almost every child already had a dead specimen in hand, a toad, a spitted cane rat, a bird, a salamander, a big beetle, or splay-winged cricket. They hopped up and down and grabbed at my shirt, flapping and waving the dead animals in front of me, hollering out in Pidgin the most outrageous sums. Kwele immediately went into action, perhaps too enthusiastically, scolding, pushing the children back, waving about a big stick, grimacing and slapping down hands as they thrust dead specimens in my direction.
    â€œMasa no want dis beef! Ha! Masa gone be angry! No want dis beef! Dis bad beef! Whaaaa!”
    A group of men had gathered in the village square—a pool of mud surrounded by ancient
bala
trees—behind a large man in a white robe and embroidered skullcap, thatch umbrellas clustered over his head. He was the Mololo, the Lukemban chief. He met me with a large, wet hand and a brilliant smile, while his men rushed to shield me from the downpour, jostling each other and arguing as they held the umbrellas over my head.
    â€œNa foine!” said the Mololo, in his rich, rolling voice. “Na foine ting dis! Welcome!” The crowd echoed “Welcome!” and he linked his arm with mine and we proceeded toward the big house at the edge of the square.
    It was a welcome sight, an old colonial house with a large porch, a pitched roof, and an airy interior of small cool rooms opening one into the other. A heavy mass of bougainvillea twisted up the adzed tree trunks that supported the porch roof, and insidesat an enormous stone fireplace, an atavism of some turn-of-the-century colonial official.
    After we went inside, Kwele took a stand at the doorway, brandishing his stick, poking back the children, while the rest of the expedition filed inside and piled their gear and specimens in the back. As most of the skeletal material was still “dirty,” the house soon filled with the smell of decaying flesh, augmented by the odor of wet people. It was a smell I had grown accustomed to years ago.
    The Mololo seated himself opposite the fireplace and opened his palm toward a chair, giving me leave to sit. The officials stood in a respectful circle around us, steaming and dripping water. A bottle of Bombay gin appeared from underneath someone’s robe and was placed on the rattan table with a loud thump, along with two tumblers.
    â€œWe drink!” the Mololo said, filling each glass with care. While this was going on I had freed the chimpanzee from her carrying sling and she now climbed over my head and down my face, dropping into my lap.
    We drained our glasses, as courtesy required, and the Mololo refilled them.
    â€œWelcome!” he said again, immediately echoed by the men around him. “You get um good beef?”
    â€œYes, sir,” I said. “Lots of good beef. It’s been a good trip.”
    â€œNa foine! We got um many hunter mans here, get you all good beef you want. We done been waiting.”
    â€œThank you, sir.” The Mololo had been very helpful on my previous trips, encouraging his people to comb the forest for specimens.
    â€œNa whatee dis ting?” he said, leaning over at the chimpanzee. The animal sat up in my lap and peered at the Mololo.
    â€œWheee!” she said, and ducked down.
    â€œI found her in the forest,” I said. “Her mother was killed by