TOE HOME FROM HOME 49

roaring past the barracks (the guardroom emptied at
sight of a car on to the grass and everyone stood to
attention in the green under-water light), up a muddy
track off the road, coming to a halt against a bank.
"You poor innocents," he said. We were stranded
like criminals in a small lit cage above Freetown.
"Have you ever been in Africa before? Have you ever
been on trek? What on earth made you choose to
go There?" 'There/ it appeared, was quite unspeak-
able, though, of course, he knew it only from hearsay;
he would never dream. . . . Had we any idea of
what we were up against? Had we any reliable maps?
No, I said. There weren't any to be got. Had we any
boys? No. Had we let the D.C.s up the line know of
our coming and engaged rest-houses? No, I hadn't
known it was necessary. When we crossed the border,
how were we going to sleep? In native huts.

"You poor innocents," he said. He nearly wept
over the wheel. Had we ever considered what a native
hut meant? The rats, the lice, the bugs. What would
happen if we got malaria, dysentery? "Something's
got to be done," he said, reversing, driving rapidly
backwards downhill. His mind switched over to the
alternate theme: "Everyone here knows Daddy." He
stopped the car in Krutown beside a policeman and
thrust his head out of the window. "Who am I?"
The policeman approached nervously and shook his
head. "No. Come here. Come close. Tell me; who
am I?" The policeman shook his head and tried to
smile; he was scared; he supposed it was a game, but
he didn't know how to play. "Who am I, you black
varmint?" A young girl tried to slip through tie
zone of headlight back into the dark: she had no