The Mzungu Boy Read Free Page B

home,” I wailed.
    He studied me for a long moment. I was afraid he would order the other man to fling me into the river.
    â€œDo you know who we are?”
    â€œLet me go!”
    â€œDon’t be afraid,” he told me. “We are your friends.”
    They were not. They stole sheep and killed people. That was what everyone said. We were to report when we saw them.
    â€œIf you tell the soldiers about us they will come and kill us,” he said, “and you will not have friends in the forest anymore. You wouldn’t like that, would you?”
    There were more of them in the forest. I could not see them but I could smell them, and I heard them breathe.
    â€œBwana Ruin is a liar,” he told me. “All farmers are liars.”
    It was something I had not thought about. I had been taught to believe that grownups didn’t lie.
    â€œI want to send you,” the man told me.
    Then, taking an envelope from his pocket, he said, “Take this to Hari. And don’t show it to anyone else.”
    He folded it neatly and slipped it in the breast pocket of my shirt. He buttoned up the pocket himself, saying, “If you show it to anyone else I will know.”
    â€œThen we will come and get you,” said the one with the scar. “And get your mother and your father. Get your brother and sister too.”
    â€œI have no sisters.”
    â€œWe’ll get them too,” he said.
    â€œI won’t show it to anyone,” I promised.
    â€œAnd you must not tell anyone about us.”
    â€œI won’t.”
    â€œNot even your best friend.”
    â€œNot even my best friend.”
    The one with the scar exerted pressure on my neck. It was beginning to hurt.
    â€œWe’ll cut out your tongue,” he said. “How would you like that?”
    â€œNot,” I said.
    â€œGood,” said the one with the gun. “Don’t forget we are watching you.”
    I lingered only long enough to find my school bag in the bush where I had hidden it. Then I did not stop running until I got out of the forest.
    Three
    THE RIVER ENTERED Bwana Ruin’s farm from the east, in a more or less direct course from the mountains to the grasslands in the west. The laborers’ village was the first thing it touched. Then, glancing right, the river flowed past Bwana Ruin’s vast orchards and carried on into the plain.
    The village consisted of several dozen round mud and thatch huts flung over ten acres of banana trees and vegetable gardens. It was an old village, turned into a maze of winding footpaths among old huts, grain stores and broken latrines. Strangers easily got lost there. Bwana Ruin often promised to demolish it.
    My mother’s hut was on the far side of the village, close to Bwana Ruin’s farmhouse, where he lived alone with his old wife.
    I rushed home to find Hari and give him the letter from the people of the forest. As I came up to my mother’s hut, she came out with a bucket, thrust it in my hands and ordered me to go down to the river to fetch water.
    â€œWhere is Hari?” I asked her.
    Hari was still at work, she told me. I had forgotten it was a working day and Hari would be at the dairy skimming Bwana Ruin’s milk.
    â€œI have a letter for him,” I said.
    â€œA letter? A letter from where?”
    I hesitated.
    â€œGive it to me,” she said. “I’ll give it to Hari when he comes home.”
    â€œl can’t,” I said. “They said I must not talk to anyone about it.”
    â€œWho said?” she asked.
    â€œThe people who gave it to me.”
    â€œWhich people?”
    I thought about it. Surely “anyone” could not possibly include my own mother. After all, she gave them food when they came to our door at night.
    â€œGive it to me,” she said. “I’ll keep it for him.”
    â€œNo,” I said, deciding to play it safe. “I’ll give it to him