Assegai

Five days after their arrival at the village Ishmael brought the horses up the southern pathway from the plain below. It had taken him that long to circle the base of the mountain. He was appalled to find Eva barefoot and wearing a shuka. ‘A great and beautiful lady like you should not be dressed like one of these infidel savages,’ he reprimanded her sternly in French.

‘This shuka is so comfortable and, besides, my old clothes have fallen into rags,’ she told him.

He looked distraught. ‘At least, I will be able to feed you civilized food, not this swill that the Masai eat.’

The days flew by in such a dreamlike blur that they lost track of time. Like two children, they wandered hand in hand through the enchanted forests of Lonsonyo Mountain. With each small delight they came across – a tiny sunbird of brilliant plumage or a monstrous horned beetle whose armoured carapace clicked as it marched – the worries of the outside world receded further from their minds. When first Leon had met her she had hidden her true nature behind a mask of solemnity. She had seldom smiled and almost never laughed. But now that they were alone and safe on the mountain she doffed the mask and allowed her real self to shine through. For Leon the laughter and smiles enhanced her beauty a hundredfold. They spent every moment they could together. Even the briefest separation was painful to them both. Eva’s first waking thought each morning was, Otto is dead and nobody knows where we are hiding. We are safe and nobody can come between us.

Even when Ishmael’s carefully hoarded store of coffee was exhausted, they laughed when he told them the tragic news. ‘It is no fault of yours, O Beloved of the Prophet. It is a sin that shall not be written against your name in the golden book,’ Leon comforted him, but Ishmael went away muttering dolefully.

The people of the village watched them fondly, smiling when they passed, bringing Eva small presents, sticks of sugarcane, bouquets of wild orchid blooms, fans of pretty feathers or bead bracelets they had woven. Lusima revelled in their love almost as much as they did. She spent hours with them each day, sharing her wisdom and understanding of life.

The ‘little rains’ began and they lay in each other’s arms at night, listening to the drumming on the roof of their hut, whispering and laughing, warm and safe in their love. Then the rains ceased and Leon realized that almost two months had passed since they had climbed the pathway beside the waterfall to the summit. When he pointed this out to her she smiled comfortably. ‘Why do you bother to tell me, Badger? Time means nothing, just as long as we are together. What are we going to do today?’

‘Loikot knows where there is an eagles’ breeding site in the cliffs on the far side of the mountain not far from Sheba’s Falls. Generation after generation of the great birds have nested there since as far back as men can remember. At this season there will be chicks in the nest. Would you like to visit it and see the young ones?’

‘Oh, yes, please, Badger!’ She clapped her hands, as excited as a child at the promise of a birthday party. ‘Then on our way back we can go to the falls and swim once again in those enchanted waters.’

‘That will make it a long trek. We’ll be away for several days.’

‘We have all the time in the world.’

It took them three days of easy travel to cross the mountain at its widest point, for the gorges were deep and rugged, the forest was dense and there were delightful distractions at every turn of the path. But at last they sat on the brink of the precipice and watched a pair of eagles sailing in elegant flight far below them, circling their eyrie calling to each other and their young ones in the nest, bringing in the carcasses of their prey to feed them, hyrax and hares, monkeys and game birds dangling from their talons.

However, the eyrie was hidden by the overhang of the rocky buttress on which they sat. Eva was disappointed. ‘I wanted to see the chicks. Surely Loikot knows of a vantage-point from which we can see down into the nest. Won’t you ask him, Badger?’ She sat impatiently listening to the long discussion in Maa of which she understood not a single word.

At last Leon turned back to her with a shake of the head. ‘He says there is a way down the cliff, but it is hard and dangerous.’

‘Ask him to show it to us. He brought us all this way with a promise that we would see the chicks, and I’m going to hold him to his word.’ Loikot led them along the edge of the cliff to a crack in the rock. He laid aside his assegai and crept into it. The opening was just wide enough to admit Leon’s larger frame. He propped the Holland rifle against a tree-trunk and wriggled down into the opening. Eva tucked up the skirts of her shuka between her long legs and followed him.

In semi-darkness they descended an almost vertical natural shaft lit by only a feeble reflection of light from the surface, just enough for them to make out the hand and footholds. Then, gradually, light began to filter up from below, and at last they crawled through a narrow gap on to an open ledge. The shaft had brought them out below the overhang of the buttress. However, there was still no sight of the eyrie, but the eagles had seen them appear on the ledge above their nest and screeched with anger and alarm, flying in closer to glare at them with fierce yellow eyes.

The ledge was narrow and precarious, so they edged along it with their backs to the cliff wall until, suddenly, it widened. Loikot stretched out flat on the rock and peered over the edge, then grinned at Eva, beckoning her to join him. She crawled cautiously to his side and looked down. ‘There they are!’ she exclaimed with delight. ‘Oh, Badger, come and see them.’

He lay beside her and placed one arm around her shoulders. The nest was no more than thirty feet directly below, a massive platform of dried sticks wedged into a cleft in the rock. The top was dish-shaped and lined with green leaves and reeds. In the centre of the indentation two eaglets crouched on wobbly legs, so young they could barely hold their heads upright. Their huge beaks were out of proportion to their fluffy grey bodies, and they had not yet shed the hooks on the tips with which they had battered their way through the tough shell of the egg as they hatched.

‘They’re so adorably ugly. Look at those big milky eyes.’ Eva laughed, then ducked with alarm as the air around their heads was disrupted and filled with the sound of great wings. Shrieking with outrage, first the female and then the male eagle dived in at them, talons extended, ready to defend their nest and the young birds in it.

‘Keep your head down,’ Leon warned, ‘or those talons will take it off for you. Keep still. Don’t move.’ They pressed themselves to the rocky floor of the ledge. Gradually the fury and deadly intent of the eagles abated, as they realized there was no direct threat to their brood. At last the female returned to the nest and settled upon it, furling her wings and standing over her chicks protectively before tucking them away beneath her breast. On the ledge above them Leon and Eva lay patiently making no movement, and the birds relaxed further, until at last they ignored the human presence and resumed their natural behaviour.

It was a fascinating experience to be allowed so close to such magnificent wild creatures and observe them caring for and feeding their young. Leon and Eva spent the rest of the day on the ledge. When at last daylight was fading and it was time to go, they left reluctantly. In the rudimentary overnight shelter that Loikot and Manyoro had built for them they lay under a single blanket.

‘I will never forget this day,’ Eva whispered.

‘Every day we spend together is unforgettable.’

‘You will never take me away from Africa, will you?’

‘This is our home,’ he agreed.

‘When I watched those funny little eaglets I had the strangest sensation.’

‘It’s a common female affliction, known as becoming broody,’ he teased her.

‘We will have babies of our own, won’t we, Badger?’

‘Do you mean right this moment?’

‘Well, I don’t know about that,’ she conceded, ‘but perhaps we could start practising. What do you think?’

‘I think you’re a ruddy genius, woman. Let’s waste no more time in idle chatter.’