Listening for Lions (12 page)

“I wish he had had his way.”

“Do you really wish that, Rachel? If you have a good head on your shoulders, why shouldn't you use it? You have Stagsway now, but your grandfather is not well, and one day the estate will belong to the Royal Bird Society. What will you do then? Would you be happy in a flat in London?”

“Oh, no.” I could not keep myself from blurting out, “I'd find a way to go back to Tumaini.”

“I thought so. It's why I went to the mission society. You told me how unhappy you were that the hospital has been closed. Unfortunately I was told by the society that the hospital at Tumaini is not a priority for the society. They have other missions that they feel have greater needs, and there is a shortage of doctors just now. ‘Perhaps one day when a doctor is trained,' they said.”

I shook my head. “It's hopeless. They'll never find a doctor. I'd have to turn myself into one before they agreed to reopen Tumaini.”

“Could you do that?”

I stared at her. When I had uttered the words, I had not taken then seriously, but now I asked myself, “Why shouldn't I be a doctor?” My heart was pounding; my thoughts flew everywhere. All these months I had told myself that I would never see Tumaini again. Now there might be a way. I asked, “Frieda, is there such a thing as a woman doctor?”

“Yes, indeed. Women are certainly training to be doctors. There is even a school for women doctors.”

I thought of what was ahead of me: three more years of Ditchley and then medical school. It seemed impossible, yet I knew something of hospitals and doctoring, and against expectations I had done well in science at school. “What would Grandfather say?”

Frieda shook her head. “It would be best if you said nothing about this to your grandfather for the time being. Like my dear brother, your grandfather is not a modern man. He might not understand a woman wanting to be a doctor.”

“I couldn't deceive him again.”

“I don't suggest you deceive him. We all have secrets in our hearts. That will be your secret. It will take nothing from your grandfather, and the idea of it will help you to
endure school, and to do well there.”

At first I thought my idea of becoming a doctor was an impossible dream. The doctor who cared for Grandfather was a towering, gruff, elderly man with a beard and a commanding voice. I was a young, stupid girl who could barely manage a simple Latin sentence, much less pronounce the fearsome Latin names of diseases. But the longing to return to Tumaini was strong. If learning to be a doctor would make it possible, I would learn to be a doctor if it killed me.

S
ummer had come to Stagsway. The rooks had built their nests, and already their young were hungry for crawly things. I pushed my dream of returning to Tumaini to one side, though I devoured all the scientific books I could find in Grandfather's library and Frieda gave me a book about Marie Curie's discovery of radium. I tried to improve my Latin and kept a list of irregular verbs in my pocket. While gathering raspberries for Mrs. Nessel, I frightened the grosbeaks from the brambles with my conjugating. I spent long days wandering over the grounds taking notes for Grandfather, who was putting the final touches on his inventory of all the birds that had been seen at Stagsway. He was delighted when I reported a Dartford warbler, a rare bird, seen only once before at Stagsway and that time by Grandfather himself when he was a young man. And always he asked about
Hylocichla
guttata pritchardi.
He was still sending letters to Mr. Pernick, but as yet the Royal Bird Society was not convinced. At Mr. Pernick's suggestion I began to keep my own diary and description of the little thrush. “It may be,” Mr. Pernick said, “that a second set of observations will help convince the society.”

As the crow flies we were close to the sea, and there was always the excitement of some seabird wandering off its course. Herring gulls came often and once I saw a puffin, but the most exciting day came toward summer's end. Stagsway was on the edge of the New Forest, an ancient woods where William the Conqueror once hunted and where his two sons were killed, one prince by a stag and one by an arrow. There were thousands of acres of fields and trees, with beeches and oaks so large my arms wouldn't stretch a quarter way around them. There were tiny, hidden streams where I took off my shoes and cooled myself on hot days. Sometimes I had a lunch of cheese and apples I had stuffed into my pockets along with the Latin verbs. Loosestrife and grass-of-parnassus and bog myrtle grew along the rivulets, and dragonflies and hummingbirds buzzed around me. There were fields of heather visited by tortoiseshell and red admiral butterflies. In the deserted parts of the New Forest I could almost feel I was back in the bush around Tumaini.

One day, walking through the heather, I came upon a wild pony. My heart stood still. I knew there were
hundreds of wild ponies in the New Forest. I had seen them trotting along in the villages or stretching their necks over a fence to graze on someone's flower bed, but a wild pony nibbling a flower in a village is not the same as coming face-to-face with one all alone in a deserted field. I don't know which of us was the more surprised. It was plump, well-fed, and all white except for a reddish brown mane. Its ears were twitching, and it gazed at me coyly from under its forelock. I dug an apple out of my pocket and held it out. After a minute it extended its neck gracefully and plucked the apple from my hand with its soft lips. A moment later it was cantering away across the field, and though I had seen it for only a few minutes, I felt a terrible loss at its leaving. I don't know what it was, but there was something about the ghostly pony's appearance that reminded me of Valerie, as if she had come to tell me she had forgiven me for taking her place. I was pleased thinking of her carefree and happy.

I came to the same spot every day. Some days the pony was there and other days, though I waited, it never appeared. Mrs. Nessel remarked about all the apples and carrots that were disappearing from the storage room, but I never mentioned the pony, not even to Grandfather. Something in the wildness of the pony, something in its independence, attracted me. It was as if Valerie had a message for me. The wild pony did as it liked, went where it wished; why shouldn't I?

Once when Grandfather spoke of my schooling being over in three years, I said, “Then would I go to university?”

“Whatever for? You have books in the library if you have a mind for that kind of thing. It's not healthy to be shut up inside.”

“There's so much I don't know. Languages and history and science.”

“Nonsense. That's all very well for a scholar or a man who has to make his way in the world, but you will be well provided for. You have no need to lift a finger.”

“I wouldn't want to be useless all my life.”

“Useless! I should think not. You have shown a great aptness for the scientific study of birds. When the society moves here, you will be of the greatest importance.”

Much as I loved the birds of Stagsway, I did not want to spend the rest of my days in their study. I shuddered to think that the only thing I would have to look forward to would be long walks with Mr. Pernick. Before I could stop myself I said, “Women are doing all sorts of things; they are even becoming doctors.”

“Doctors! Petticoat surgeons! I'd turn up my toes and die any day before I let a woman try out her doctoring on me.”

Only the thought of the wild pony cantering freely in the fields kept me from losing heart. It was as if I lived in two places, at Stagsway and far away at Tumaini. I said nothing more of attending university to Grandfather, for I
didn't want to worry him. He was growing weaker. I found him more often in his bed than in his chair. Though I did all I could to interest him in the discoveries I made on my walks, I would look up to find he had dozed off. Only his interest in
Hylocichla guttata pritchardi
remained. For Grandfather the world burned with a small flickering flame, but
Hylocichla guttata pritchardi
burned with a bright fire. My notebook listed three occasions on which I had seen the bird during the summer: first in Mrs. Nessel's herb garden, again in the boxwood maze, and then pecking at a blackberry. Each time Grandfather would ask, “There was no eye ring?”

I would assure him there was not. “There can be no doubt,” he said, and sent off another letter to Mr. Pernick.

When autumn came, I returned to school. I was sorry to leave Grandfather, but now I had a goal. I resolved to do the best I could at school. I took physical science and chemistry. When the time came, I would be ready for medical school.

In my last year at Ditchley Nora played Katherina in the school production of
The Taming of the Shrew
and urged me to try out for the part of Bianca. Since the cast practiced the play for hours and hours, we got to know one another, and by the time we put on the play, I found I had close friends. I did well in my exams, and early in the spring of my final year Miss Ethelward asked, “To what university will you go, Rachel?”

On my last visit to Stagsway, I had seen that even lifting a cup of tea was a great effort for Grandfather. “My grandfather isn't well,” I said. “I don't see how I can leave him.”

“What! Give up your education?”

But I had already made up my mind. I had years ahead of me. I was determined to be a doctor, and if I didn't go to university this year, there would be another year. I tried not to be bitter when the other girls sat for scholarships and were accepted at universities. On the last day of school I received prizes in physical science as well as literature. Frieda was there and tried to persuade me to go on to medical school, but nothing she could say would change my mind. I owed so much to Grandfather, I could not leave him when he most needed me. I had my goal, and now I had only to wait.

It was a sad summer and a sadder autumn and winter. I was reluctant to leave Grandfather for more than a few minutes. Often he slept the day away; sometimes he seemed not to recognize me. Even the magic words
Hylocichla guttata pritchardi
would not rouse him, but still I sent my notes of sightings of the little thrush on to the society.

I spent my days curled up in a chair in Grandfather's room, a book in my hands to pass away the hours. I was reading Virgil.
“Durate, et vosmet rebus servate secondis,”
he wrote. “Endure for a while, and live for a happier day.”

When Grandfather was awake, he would ask me to tell him stories of Tumaini. It was a bittersweet time, for I longed to speak of all the things I loved, our little house with the rain beating on our metal roof, visiting the Kikuyu
shamba
s, calming the fears of the mothers when they brought their children in to be inoculated, the thrill of hearing the roar of a lion at night when I was safe inside our house. All the while I was describing my life at Tumaini, I longed for the day to come when I would return as a doctor and there would be a hospital once again.

Perhaps he guessed, for one day when he was more alert than usual, he said, “I think, Rachel, you will not be happy until you have returned to Tumaini.”

I did not think it was a time for anything but the truth. “Right now I only want to be here with you, but I do want to return to Africa.”

“And will you spend your time there looking at birds?”

“Would you hate it very much if I went to Tumaini as a doctor?”

Grandfather's eyebrows flew up. After a moment he gave me a weak smile. “If I know my Rachel, she will do what she wants to do. And perhaps that is best.”

So at last I had no secrets from Grandfather.

It was an April morning, Saint George's day, when Grandfather died. He opened his eyes and tried to sit up in bed. “I can hear my thrush, my
Hylocichla guttata
pritchardi
,” he said, and then he quoted his favorite poet, Robert Burns: “‘Sing on, sweet thrush, upon the leafless bough.'” There was a dreadful strangling sound in his throat. He fell back onto the pillow. A moment later he was gone.

A fog, so thick it felt as if you were looking at the world through gauze curtains, lay over the countryside. All of Stagsway had disappeared into the fog. I couldn't find my bearings. Everything I had depended upon had suddenly vanished. I remember Mrs. Bittery and me comforting each other. I remember Burker bringing in hot tea, his hands shaking so that the cups and saucers danced upon the tray. I called Mr. Grumbloch, and he and Frieda came at once. The house was cold, for the servants were so upset no one had thought to lay fires. Frieda set about with kindling and matches and logs. When she learned I had not had anything to eat all day, she sent Arthur to the kitchen for sandwiches. Mr. Grumbloch made arrangements for Grandfather's funeral.

“He left instructions, you know,” Mr. Grumbloch said. “He wants to be buried among the beech trees, just where the land rises.”

A notice of Grandfather's death was printed in the London
Times
, and the next day Mr. Pernick hurried down from London. “The moment I heard, I went at once to the society with a request to recognize your grandfather's discovery. You will be pleased,” he said, “to find
your careful notes substantiated your grandfather's sightings and made the difference. We voted.
Hylocichla guttata pritchardi
is quite official now. It will go down in the books.” Mr. Pernick was kindness itself and assured me that there would always be a room kept specially for me at Stagsway.

“You must think of Stagsway as your home,” he said. “We are moving the society headquarters here from London, and of course I will be in residence. Anything that can be done to make you comfortable will be done.” He gave me a rather coy smile and added, “It would give me so much pleasure to have you here in Stagsway.”

There was another call. The Pritchards had seen the notice of Grandfather's death as well. Mr. Grumbloch had not wanted them. “They will be provided for. Surely that is enough. There is no need to inflict them upon us.”

But I pleaded that they be allowed to come to the funeral. I could imagine how I would have felt if I had been kept from the funerals of my parents. They came dressed in the darkest black and stood silently in the back of the church like two rooks. When the service was over, they turned quickly and hurried away. I never saw them again.

That spring and summer passed as if the fog had never lifted. My memory of those months is vague. I woke in the morning and went to bed at night. My days were taken up with all the details of turning Stagsway over to the Royal
Bird Society. Mr. Duggen, Mrs. Bittery, Arthur, and Ellie were all to stay on to see to the house for the Society. Grandfather had provided for the rest of the servants and had willed Burker and Mrs. Nessel enough money to retire comfortably. Grandfather had left me money, as well, a great deal of money; some of it I had the use of, the rest I would receive in three years when I turned twenty-one.

“And what will you do now?” Frieda asked. It was late August. The last flowers of autumn were blooming. The fields were orange with hawkweed and lavender with knapweed.

“At the end Grandfather knew I wished to be a doctor. Now there is nothing to stop me.”

One morning, without saying a word to anyone, I asked Nivers to drive me into London, and I went at once to the mission society. I had pictured the society as a gloomy place governed by serious and stern men and women, but it was very different than I had imagined.

Miss Lothrop, the director, greeted me warmly. She was tall, six feet if she was an inch, and generously built; she would have been intimidating but for her wide smile and girlish clothes, ruffles and bows everywhere.

“So you are Rachel Sheridan! Let me correct myself, for we have had correspondence with Mr. Grumbloch and of course we talked with Miss Grumbloch. You are Rachel Pritchard now. You were very fortunate to have fallen among such good and generous people. Rachel, how we
admired your dear mother and father. What a fine doctor your father was, and what a splendid teacher your mother was. Let people say what they will of orphanages, but then let them hear the story of your parents. We were all saddened by their deaths. It was a great disappointment to have to close Tumaini.”

“I came to see if there is a possibility of opening the hospital again.”

“Unfortunately, no. I explained it all to your friend Miss Grumbloch. These are difficult times. Money is scarce, and committed as we are to India and China, we are stretched very thin. I'm afraid we have no doctor to send.” Miss Lothrop tidied a bow that had come undone.