Mortals

“What do you mean?”

“If you look over there, where the light is, Kevin is in there. We can’t go in there. They told me. It’s the cadres, talking. They said we had to stay away until we get a sign. That’s what they said.”

“I need a hatchet or a crowbar or something hard I can gouge with and I need Kevin. I mean it. I’ll tell them.”

“Then go ahead and ask. You want me to stay here, I’ll stay here.” Morel was dealing warily with him.

The blackness around them felt irregular, like a fabric being shaken. It was bats at work, swerving and fluttering their ugly wings.

Ray wandered toward the light and the food and the murmurs.

An armed man came out to stop him.

He saw where the cadres were. Tarpaulins had been thrown over the crests of two low thorn trees growing in the midst of an isolated group of tall boulders, making a false cave. There was a Coleman lantern burning and there was also a small bright fire and meat of some kind roasting over it. There were sleeping bags on the ground. It was cozy, in there. He could see Kerekang. He thought, They have no idea how hungry I am. There were others in the faux cave.

Ray said, “Kea batla Kevin.”

The armed man said “Nyah.”

Ray raised his voice. “Kea batla Kevin. Kevin can you come and help? Kevin.”

Kevin appeared.

Ray said, “I’ll need a hatchet, rra. And can you come with me and point out Rra Wemberg’s grave?”

Kevin was hesitant.

“Just tell me which one it is, of the three.”

“He was put in the middle.”

“Good. Thank you.”

“I think it will be okay. I think it is deep enough. I think so, rra.”

That meant he was doubtful if it was deep enough and that some beast of the wild could come and dig the body up. The picture filled Ray with horror and a renewed exhaustion. The task of exhuming Wemberg and putting him in a deeper hole was beyond him and it was something he couldn’t ask for help with. People were doing their best. He had to think.

Kevin was chewing.

I need to eat immediately, Ray thought. The need was connected to what he had to do next while there was time, which was to make a cairn over Wemberg, collect stray stones and pack them over the grave to create a good-faith impediment to the beasts of the wild. He would do it himself to the best of his ability, after he’d eaten. And whoever wanted to join in could. And he would put stones on the plots of the men buried on either side of Wemberg, too. He was ashamed that he was only thinking of that now, that he hadn’t inquired who they were, their names, paid attention, any kind of attention, to them.

It was meat he needed. There was something ultimate about meat on an open fire. Barbecuing was supposed to be bad, and it was possible Iris was right and it was, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t ultimate. There was the story by Jack London about a Mexican revolutionary who came to the United States to raise money for the revolution by fighting for prizes, prizefighting. And the Mexican had somehow been unable to get a steak to eat before the fight. He hadn’t been able to afford it. The title of the story was blunt, “A Piece of Meat.” And then the fight had taken place and the Mexican had fought like a demon as hard as he could and had almost won, then he had lost because he hadn’t been able to get his piece of meat. Rex had been a fan of Jack London’s stories. And there was the one about the guy struggling to build a fire to save his life someplace in the Arctic and getting the fire going and the fire melting snow stuck in the branches of a tree overhead and killing the fire, and him. Rex seemed to love stories where you struggle with all your might and then at the end you lose.

Ray said, “I am interrupting your supper.”

“Nyah, gosiame.” Kevin sent the armed man away. Kevin was using more Setswana, becoming more Tswana, it seemed to Ray. That was called acclimating. His comrades were bush Tswana, a lot of them. There had to be other students, people of Kevin’s type, somewhere in this madness. A number of them had left the university to join up with Kerekang. He was curious about them. He wanted to know where they were, but he couldn’t ask without looking like a spy. He was not a spy.

Kevin was chewing and pulling strings of tough, unchewable meat out of his mouth and throwing it away. Ray thought, When I say ultimate about meat and fire, I mean ultimate in the same way a woman’s breasts are ultimate, an ultimate thing you want to see and touch, a fact that will never change. When he was old he would still want to touch her breasts, assuming he was in the position to do so, Iris’s breasts, which was not likely, to say the least.

He wanted to go into the faux cave and eat with the others and he wanted to escape from the feeling that the blackness around them was shuddering because of the bats engaging in their activities.

“What are you eating?” Ray asked.

“Rra, you can come to have some. It is noga.”

That was a word Ray knew. It meant snake.

Kevin said, “You see when we put you for sleeping in that place we first took some snakes. Now you can come and enjoy them.”

Snakes had been in the place they had slipped him into to recuperate in. It had been a good idea, except for sand flea bites on his wrists and so on. They had gotten the snakes and were eating them for dinner.

The idea of eating a snake made him want to be able to be the one human being in history who could fly, a human bird, fly to Gaborone and land in his patio and see his wife and see what she would say, seeing him. Here I am, he would say, and what do you say?

His tasks were mounting up too rapidly. There was getting Strange News, his packet, for one. And then there were all the others. But to get Strange News he would need help, he would have to be boosted up. He didn’t like asking for help. He had asked for help too much already. And in fact if his entire life picture could be put up on a screen he wondered if anyone here, around here, would say he deserved help.

Kevin was pulling him toward the fire, the faux cave.

“We are cooking tea,” Kevin said.

“I would like some.”

There was a small, hot, resinous fire, and on a grill over the fire, coils of white ribbons of meat, snake meat. Mokopa the one-eyed chief was tending the ribbons with a knife, tossing them.

Kerekang was looking better. He stood up and held his hand out to Ray.

“Gosiame,” Ray said. He had a strong desire to apologize for his absence during the time it had taken to get to the point they had all reached, this faux cave, full of men. This was something he wanted to enter and not go away from until he had to. It was a feeling between men that he wanted to have, not that he ever could, not with these men, because he was white, and for other reasons. Everyone around the fire was serious. They didn’t know that was remarkable.

Kerekang ushered Ray in, conducting him to a place near the fire. Ray squatted down. He had done it with bearable discomfort, which was an improvement. He began shivering. He had been holding his reaction to the cold in abeyance. Now he was letting himself be cold and at the same time letting his bites itch and sting to their heart’s content.

Mokopa was skillful with his knife. He was able to maneuver the whole tangle of snake flesh with just the one blade, one or two thrusts, turning it. Mokopa was salting the ribbons of flesh. Three large snakes had been killed. There was a good bit of meat. Two Basarwa were there, to the back, eating. Mokopa put a pot, mouth down, over the snake meat. The meat would be smoky. He would eat it however it tasted. He was getting the impression that to Mokopa grilling snake meat was a commonplace, a skill he happened to have. An eye patch would make a nice gift for Mokopa.

He found a tin mug full of hot tea in his hands. Sugar was being poured into it, too much sugar. But the calories would be good for him. It was black tea, very strong.

He looked around. He didn’t know who to thank.

He thanked Kerekang, who was reclining now and smoking a rude cigarette, hand-rolled cigarette, and not