Assegai

Graf Otto von Meerbach’s open day at the airfield gradually grew in status until it seemed to overshadow almost any other event in the history of the colony, including the arrival of the first train from the coast or even the visit of Theodore Roosevelt, former President of the United States of America.

As one of the wags at the long bar of the Muthaiga Country Club remarked, the Colonel Teddy had not been dishing out free rides in an aeroplane.

By sunrise of the great day a small city of tents surrounded the polo ground. Most housed the settler families who had come in from the surrounding countryside, but the others were refreshment booths from which Lord Delamere dispensed free beer and lemonade, and the Women’s Institute handed out chocolate cakes and apple pies.

The chef from the Norfolk Hotel was supervising the roasting of the oxen on spits over live coals. The KAR band was tuning its instruments in readiness for the arrival of the governor. Gangs of small boys and pariah dogs roamed the field looking for titbits and mischief. The refreshment booths were doing a roaring trade, and the betting was three to one that the shipment of beer would be insufficient to last the day. Gustav Kilmer’s mechanics were busy fine-tuning the aircraft engines and topping up the fuel tanks. Lines of excited children were queuing for the promised flights, squealing with excitement every time one of the engines bellowed.

By this time Leon had flown a total of twelve hours in the Bumble Bee and Graf Otto assured anxious parents that their offspring would be quite safe with such an experienced pilot at the controls. Eva assumed responsibility for controlling the hordes of children. She press-ganged their mothers and the members of the Polo Club committee to act as her marshals. Some had a little German or French, and they all seemed to understand each other well enough. Every time Leon glimpsed her during the morning she had a small child on her hip and half a dozen others hanging on to her arms or skirts.

This was a different woman from Graf Otto’s beautiful enigmatic consort. Her maternal instincts had been aroused, her face was radiant and her eyes shone. Her laughter was quick and unrestrained, as she passed little ones up into the cockpit of the Bumble Bee, where Leon and Hennie du Rand strapped them on to the benches. When the cockpit was filled almost to overflowing with tiny humanity Leon started the engines and the children squeaked in delicious terror. From the sidelines the KAR band struck up a rousing military march. Then the Bumble Bee taxied out on to the field, following Graf Otto in the Butterfly with his more dignified and illustrious passengers. The two aircraft took off in formation and circled the town twice, then returned to the field for landing. Eva was at the Bumble Bee’s ladder, helping the children back to the ground. Hennie and Max Rosenthal handed out the model aircraft, and the next band of little passengers was lifted aboard.

Leon was fascinated by this new manifestation of Eva. She had raised the shutters to allow her inner warmth and her womanly capacity for kindness and affection to shine out. The children saw this in her and were drawn to her like ants to a sugar bowl. It seemed to Leon that Eva had become a child herself, totally happy and natural. As the day wore on and the lines of children seemed never to grow shorter, most of her assistants were flagging in the heat, but Eva was indefatigable. Leon watched as she knelt in the dust, sweat-damp strands of her hair coming down over her eyes so that she had to purse her lips and blow them aside while she cleaned up a small girl who had been airsick. Her boots were dusty and her skirts bore the marks of grubby fingers, but her face shone with perspiration and happiness.

Leon glanced around. Graf Otto had taken off in the Butterfly for his next circuit, carrying with him Brigadier General Penrod Ballantyne and the manager of Barclays Bank. Gustav Kilmer was by the hangar, his back turned to them as he removed the bung from another drum of fuel. For the moment they were not under surveillance.

‘Eva!’ he called.

She returned the child to her mother and came to the side of the aircraft where she pretended to fuss with those who were waiting. She spoke to Leon without looking at him. ‘You like to live dangerously, Badger. You know we should not talk in public.’

‘I must seize every chance to have you alone.’

‘What did you want to tell me?’ Her expression had softened, but she looked away quickly.

‘You’re very good with the babies,’ he told her. ‘I didn’t expect that of such a grand lady as you.’

Again she looked at him, smiling, her eyes bright and candid, concealing nothing. ‘If you think I’m a grand lady, you don’t know me very well.’

‘I think you know how I feel for you.’

‘Yes, Badger. I know. You’re not good at keeping secrets.’ She laughed.

‘Is there no way we can ever be alone together? There is so much I want to say to you.’

‘Gustav is watching us. We have already spoken too long. I must go.’

By mid-afternoon the waiting lines of children were almost exhausted, and so was Leon. He had lost count of the number of take-offs and landings he had executed. Not all had been perfect but he had done no obvious damage to the Bumble Bee, and he had received no complaints from his small customers. Now he eyed the queue wearily. There were five children remaining so this would be his last flight of the day.

Then something caught his attention. Somebody was waving at him from beyond the boundary fence. It took him a moment to recognize the face, and might have taken longer, were it not for the line of small girls in bright saris who stood behind him.

‘My solemn oath!’ Leon perked up immediately. ‘It’s Mr Goolam Vilabjhi Esquire and his cherubs.’ Then he saw that the smallest cherub was weeping and the others looked as though their hearts were about to break. He stood up in the cockpit and beckoned them to him. They started for the gate into the field in a compact family group, but one of the committee members of the Polo Club, who was acting as a marshal, was guarding it to keep out undesirable elements. He was a large, beefy man, with a beer-barrel belly and a very red, sunburned face. Leon knew him as a recent settler who had come out from the Old Country to take up his four-thousand-acre grant. Clearly he had availed himself unstintingly of Lord Delamere’s free beer. He intercepted Mr Vilabjhi with shaking head. The dismay on the faces of the children was pathetic.

Leon jumped down from the cockpit and started for the gate, but he was too late: Eva had beaten him to it. She flew at the marshal like a Jack Russell terrier at a rat, and he retreated hastily before her onslaught. She grabbed two of the Vilabjhi girls by their hands and Leon ran to gather up the rest. He spoke to her over their heads: ‘When will we have a chance to be alone?’

‘Be patient, Badger. Please. No more now. Gustav is watching us again.’ She pushed the last child up the ladder into the cockpit and went to where Mr Vilabjhi was watching anxiously from the gate. When Leon brought the Bumble Bee back into the field after the flight she was still standing at the gate in earnest conversation with him.

Every man in the colony is fascinated by her and I am right at the back of the queue. Leon was surprised by the strength of his own jealousy.