‘It is interesting what you say. Naturally I do not agree with everything.’
‘Naturally.’
‘What about a gimlet?’ Pop asked. ‘Don’t you think a gimlet might help?’
‘Tell me first what are the things, the actual, concrete things that harm a writer?’
I was tired of the conversation which was becoming an interview. So I would make it an interview and finish it. The necessity to put a thousand intangibles into a sentence, now, before lunch, was too bloody.
‘Politics, women, drink, money, ambition. And the lack of politics, women, drink, money and ambition,’ I said profoundly.
‘He’s getting much too easy now,’ Pop said.
‘But drink. I do not understand about that. That has always seemed silly to me. I understand it as a weakness.’
‘It is a way of ending a day. It has great benefits. Don’t you ever want to change your ideas?’
‘Let’s have one,’ Pop said. ‘M’Wendi!’
Pop never drank before lunch except as a mistake and I knew he was trying to help me out.
‘Let’s all have a gimlet,’ I said.
‘I never drink,’ Kandisky said. ‘I will go to the lorry and fetch some fresh butter for lunch. It is fresh from Kandoa, unsalted. Very good. To-night we will have a special dish of Viennese dessert. My cook has learned to make it very well.’
He went off and my wife said: ‘You were getting awfully profound. What was that about all these women?’
‘What women?’
‘When you were talking about women.’
‘The hell with them,’ I said. ‘Those are the ones you get involved with when you’re drunk.’
‘So that’s what you do.’
‘No.’
‘I don’t get involved with people when I’m drunk.’
‘Come, come,’ said Pop. ‘We’re none of us ever drunk. My God, that man can talk.’
‘He didn’t have a chance to talk after B’wana M’Kumba started.’
‘I did have verbal dysentery,’ I said.
‘What about his lorry? Can we tow it in without ruining ours?’
‘I think so,’ Pop said. ‘When ours comes back from Handeni.’
At lunch under the green fly of the dining-tent, in the shade of a big tree, the wind blowing, the fresh butter much admired, Grant’s gazelle chops, mashed potatoes, green corn, and then mixed fruit for dessert, Kandisky told us why the East Indians were taking the country over.
‘You see, during the war they sent the Indian troops to fight here. To keep them out of India because they feared another mutiny. They promised the Aga Khan that because they fought in Africa, Indians could come freely to settle and for business afterwards. They cannot break that promise and now the Indians have taken the country over from the Europeans. They live on nothing and they send all the money back to India. When they have made enough to go home they leave, bringing out their poor relations to take over from them and continue to exploit the country.’
Pop said nothing. He would not argue with a guest at table.
‘It is the Aga Khan,’ Kandisky said. ‘You are an American. You know nothing of these combinations.’
‘Were you with Von Lettow?’ Pop asked him. ‘From the start,’ Kandisky said. ‘Until the end.’
‘He was a great fighter,’ Pop said. ‘I have great admiration for him.’
‘You fought?’ Kandisky asked.
‘Yes.’
‘I do not care for Lettow,’ Kandisky said. ‘He fought, yes. No one ever better. When we wanted quinine he would order it captured. All supplies the same. But afterwards he cared nothing for his men. After the war I am in Germany. I go to see about indemnification for my property. “You are an Austrian,” they say. “You must go through Austrian channels.” So I go to Austria. “But why did you fight?” they ask me. “You cannot hold us responsible. Suppose you go to fight in China. That is your own affair. We cannot do anything for you.”
‘ “But I went as a patriot,” I say, very foolishly. “I fight where I can because I am an Austrian and I know my duty.” “Yes,” they say. “That is very beautiful. But you cannot hold us responsible for your noble sentiments.” So they passed me from one to the other and nothing. Still I love the country very much. I have lost everything here but I have more than anyone has in Europe. To me it is always interesting. The natives and the language. I have many books of notes on them. Then too, in reality, I am a king here. It is very pleasant. Waking in the morning I extend one foot and the boy places the sock on it. When I am ready I extend the other foot and he adjusts the other sock. I step from under the mosquito bar into my drawers which are held for me. Don’t you think that is very marvellous?’