Card Sharks

The Crooked Man

No amount of money will make up for a physiology which can't fit in the seats, or enter one of those broom closets that pass for restrooms aboard your average 747. So there I was making the long flight from Los Angeles, to New York, to Rome, to Nairobi on one of those big freight jobbies designed to carry horses, cattle, other varieties of prize livestock … and jokers.

The grooms, men truly without any kind of a country, had the usual reaction to a palomino pony centaur, but when they realized I had money to spare, and an addict's fever about poker, they loosened up. I lost enough initially to get them friendly, and the rest of the tedious journey passed in reasonable comfort and companionship. Actually, I'll let you in on a little secret — flying freight beats the hell out of more traditional modes of travel. Plenty of room to walk around, and when you get tired you bed down on the bales of hay and straw.

In my case, Skully, an unprepossessing wisp of humanity though he had a magician's gift with horses (maybe that's why I liked him so well), broke open one of the bales of hay, and built me a centaur's nest.

As I folded my legs beneath me and went lurching in a groundward direction, he said in his thick Irish brogue, "Don't go eatin' all that hay now. We've got a lot of miles and hours to Africa."

I reached for my travel bag, and dug out a handful of Snickers, pears and grapes, an Edam cheese, crackers, a tin of sardines, and a ham sandwich prepared and lovingly wrapped by my sweet, indulgent momma who would have packed the same gargantuan Care package if I'd been flying first class on Delta airlines. My mother doesn't believe that anybody save herself can cook.

"Skully," I said. "I'm not a hay burner. Nor am I likely to go nuts and mount that attractive little thoroughbred mare either, so relax and go to sleep."

He grinned rather sheepishly (after this many years I'm virtually as telepathic as Tachyon when it comes to people's weird assed ideas about jokers — our manners, morals and tastes. I was right; he had been contemplating my sex life), and settled back to squat on his heels.

"So why are you heading to the dark continent?" he asked.

"I'm a doctor, and a Peace Corps volunteer." (You can tell from the order in which I placed those two conditions which one most pleased me.) "I'm going to be working with the joker community outside of Nairobi."

"Won't real people let you work on them?" he asked. There wasn't any malice in the phrasing, just an honest curiosity, and that almost endearing lack of sensitivity which typifies most nats.

"Not real willingly," I said. "But that really isn't the reason. Jokers offer a fascinating range of physiological and epidemiological problems. That's candy to a doctor." I paused, wondering how to phrase this so I wouldn't sound like a sanctimonious asshole. I couldn't think of one so I shrugged and just said it. "And I am one hell of a lucky joker so I feel like I ought be giving a little back."

Skully shook his head. "Not me. If I had the brains and education I'd be making money…." His voice rose to accentuate the final word, then trailed away into sadness.

I smiled at him. "There's plenty of time for that."

"For you, Doc." He pulled the piece of hay from his mouth, and tossed it away. He rose, and followed it.

Again I felt that gulf — not because I was a joker, but because I carried around the curse (or blessing) of my family's wealth like a camel carries humps. I decided I couldn't solve the financial inequalities of the world right then, so arranging my tail across my flank, (it gets cold in those planes) I pillowed my head on my arm, and went to sleep.

***

Nairobi wasn't what I'd expected. Africa had always been this place of wonderful mystery for me. Tarzan movies (the good ones with Johnny Weissmuller, not Jack Braun), H. Rider Haggard, lost cities; all the usual WASP bullshit.

So, imagine my surprise and chagrin when I fetched up in this modern city with skyscrapers, traffic jams, people in business suits and tailored dresses. I shook my head over my own silliness, and grabbing my tote, suitcase and medical bag, I approached a policeman, and asked directions to my hotel. He told me in elegantly accented English, and I started jogging away, only to be arrested by his soft, "Sir."

I slewed around, and stared back across my hindquarters at him. "Yes?"

"Kenya … is an Islamic nation … primarily."

"Yeah, so?" (And yeah, I was very stupid, what can I say.)

"According to the teachings of Islam, victims of the wild card are considered cursed of Allah."

It was great; I had found probably the only politically correct cop in all of Nairobi, but I could tell from the expression in his dark eyes that he thought the teachings were spot on the money.

"I appreciate the warning," I said. "But I really do need to reach my hotel. I'll keep my head down, and move fast." We nodded politely to one another, and I headed on my way.

In addition to traveling fast I can also travel light. Shirts, ties, and a couple of jackets, that's the entirety of my wardrobe. One nun at the parochial school I attended sent me home on the grounds I was indecent, and insisting that Mom and Dad fit me out with a pair of trousers. I can still remember Dad's bellow — he said I'd look like a bad vaudeville act — and that was my last day in parochial school … thank God. (Sorry I'm losing the thread here.)

This being Africa it was warm, and the suitcase began to hang like an anvil off my right hand. I briefly regretted not phoning ahead, and arranging for my version of a limo — guy with a truck and horse trailer — but I'm not an animal, and resent being treated like one. I also have this weird recurring nightmare where they get me in one of those enclosed horse vans like the Brits use, and they trundle me away to the knackers. Not a nice dream.

As I trotted, I considered priorities. I needed to get to Kilango Cha Jaha, the village where many of Kenya's jokers were now squatting, and report to my superior, Dr. Etienne Faneuil. Now, while I'm a robust boy, and enjoy an aerobic workout as much as the next fellow, I didn't really want to travel around Nairobi and environs at the steady 4.2 miles an hour I can maintain when jogging, nor did I want to reduce travel time by running. The sight of a pony centaur galloping through city streets generally causes comment, and I'm always worried some asshole's going to decide it's round-up time and he's a cowboy.

So, the bottom line was I needed wheels; a custom jobbie, a van with handicapped controls on the steering wheel, a sliding side door, and the seats ripped out. Correction, all but one seat ripped out. I do occasionally have passengers, and pretty ladies don't like to sit on the floor, or stand like commuters on a subway.

I had been so deeply engrossed in my own ruminations that I didn't notice the cars which had fallen in behind me like a secret service escort. By the time I did notice one had jumped the curb, and angled across the sidewalk in front of me. Another was in the process of completing the trap to my rear.

I had a strong sensation their motives weren't friendly, so I let fly with both hind feet, and caught the opening car door just below the handle. One of my kicks generates a lot of power. I heard a yell and a curse in something that sounded suspiciously like raghead chatter from the driver of car number two as the door slammed back and caught his leg and hand as he tried to exit. That still left me with two assailants. And there was no doubt now they were assailants. They were brandishing tire irons, and I sure as hell knew I didn't have a flat.

There was a high fence on my right, and beyond those walls I could see the tops of trees. I clumsily threw my suitcase at the two men in front of me. They easily dodged, and I felt a strong sense of ill use. This kind of thing always works in the movies my dad produces. My attempt at Rambo having failed, I opted for flight, and bolted across the hood of their Mazda. My hooves didn't do much for either the body work or the paint job. My agility seemed to surprise one guy. He just gaped as I went clattering past. His partner was less impressed. He swung the iron, and caught me high on the left shoulder. It hurt like a motherfucker, but I was down on the sidewalk again, and with the width of a car between them and me.

Grimly clutching my tote and my medical bag I galloped for the gate some fifty yards ahead with the two guys running and shouting in pursuit. I heard a lot of Allah's and Nur al Allah's going past as I yanked open the latch, and raced through. It was a park. Beautiful, pristine, peaceful. Later I found out I'd entered the Nairobi National Park. One hundred and ten kilometers of virgin wilderness almost completely within the confines of a major metropolitan center.

Wilderness … complete with wild animals.

Like lions.

It was not a good afternoon. I dislike being regarded as lunch almost as much as I resent being regarded as a monster. Let's just say I finally reached the peaceful shores of that paean to modern civilization — the Hilton Hotel.

***

My welcoming committee in Nairobi should have prepared me for the realities of Kilango Cha Jaha, but as I was waved through the gates by a pair of Kenyan military guards I couldn't help but wonder if the fences were to keep the jokers in as much to keep the fanatics out.

Kilango was your usual third world shit hole, and as I drove I ruminated bitterly on the irony of the village's name — Kilango Cha Jaha, Gate of Paradise — yeah, right. There was a small river meandering through the mud and thatch huts, and a pall of cook smoke hung like a memory of a bad hangover across the entire village. Children, many of them completely normal, frolicked in the dusty streets, or paddled in the river. Somewhere a radio was blasting out Somali rock and roll.

I wondered at the lack of adult jokers. Were they all hiding shyly in their huts venturing out only at night when darkness could disguise their deformities? Did they all have jobs (unlikely), and were at work? Jokers tend to fall into two categories — the ashamed, who keep so low a profile as to be almost invisible, and the flaunters, who delight in shocking the normal world which surrounds them. I'm unusual (or at least I pride myself that I am) because I don't fall into either category. I just do my thing, and hope things don't get too uncomfortable in return. Still, I was bothered by the missing jokers.

Easing the van to a stop I called out in my halting Swahili to a nearby urchin. I must have picked one of the forty other ethnic groups which inhabit the country because I might as well have been speaking, well … Swahili, for all the good it did me. Fortunately another child understood, and ran up, and chinned himself on the van window. I repeated my request for directions to the health clinic.

"Sure, boss," he said. "Gimme a ride and I'll show you."

I nodded my assent, and he raced around, and clambered in the passenger side. From this position of moral and physical superiority he gazed down on his fellows. Now that he was closer I wasn't liking what I was seeing. His lymph nodes seemed enlarged, and there was a swelling in his joints.

"You sick, boss?" he asked after indicating the direction with an errant flip of the hand.

"No," I said.

"Yes, you are. You're a mwenye kombo."

My mind supplied the translation: crooked person, i.e., joker. "That doesn't mean I'm sick," I explained patiently. "It just means I'm different." My guide seemed unconvinced. "I'm a doctor," I added. That got him, but it wasn't the reaction I'd hoped for. His eyes became suspicious slits, he stiffened, yanked open the van door, and hopped out. I jammed on the brakes, terrified he'd fall, and my first act at Kilango would be squashing a hapless urchin.

Backing slowly away from the van he called out to me, "Just keep going that way, boss, you'll find it," and he was gone, vanishing in a twinkling of bare brown legs among the bare brown huts.

***

The clinic was what you'd expect from a public health facility in a joker village in the third world. It was a squat, ugly cinder block construction on the western outskirts of the village. Its position, huddled against the barb wire fence, seemed totally appropriate. It looked less like a place of healing than a sound proofed barracks where state enemies recant their sins. I parked, backed the length of the van until I could slide open the door, and jumped down. Medical bag firmly in hand, I pushed open the glass doors ready to begin my first stint as a real live doctor.

The tiny lobby was filled with squalling babies and their tired mothers. In one small corner a group of elderly jokers had carved out turf for themselves. There was one old guy with human faces covering his body. The sibilant whispers from all those mouths set an odd contrapuntal line to the soprano baby wails.

It's an odd quirk of the wild card virus, or maybe of the human psyche, that we end up with so many fuzzy animal jokers. I tease my mom occasionally that she shouldn't have had Dad take her to that re-release of Fantasia just before my birth, but I realize that ultimately my condition was selected and molded by me.

The next largest joker variety are the warping of normal human physiology. Finally, we have the monsters from the id — shapes so grotesque and disturbing that you have no idea where the fuck they came from. This room was mostly sporting the fuzzy animal variety, which wasn't surprising given the cultural importance of animal spirits in African mythology.

There was a Clairol red-head, crisp in nurse's whites, behind the desk. She looked up at the sound of my hooves on the stained linoleum floor. Once I got a good look at her face, and mentally scraped away a couple of hundred pounds of make-up, I put her around fifty-five. She still had a pretty good body, but this was clearly one of those beautiful women who cannot accept the judgment of nature, years and gravity.

"Yes?" she asked, and I was surprised to discover she was an American. I figured Faneuil would have a French staff. As a sub-species of humanity the French take the cake for arrogance and xenophobia. Then I realized Faneuil had hired me, and my mental French-bashing went by the wayside.

"Doctor Bradley Finn," I hurried to say. "I'm the new Peace Corps …" There was something in her ironic smile that had the words dying in my throat.

"Ah, yes, we have been expecting you … since yesterday."

I felt like a ten year old caught playing hooky. I shuffled my feet, which is a lot of shufflin', and muttered my excuse about needing a car.

"Of course, you are an American."

The tone in which that was said made me want to start singing the "Star Spangled Banner." I resisted the impulse because my singing voice sounds a lot like frogs fornicating.

"Uh, yeah, well, you might want to get home, get your passport punched, eat a cheeseburger, go to a ball game, remember what it's like." Her face had gone red in that mottled way that only true red-heads can achieve, which told me the color wasn't wishful thinking, it was just fond remembrance. "Now, could you tell Doctor Faneuil I'm here?" I added in my best Doctor Voice.

"I will inform Doctor," she replied in her best Great Man's Assistant Voice. I was pleased at my acuity, but depressed by the prospect. Great Men's Assistants are always unmarried ladies who have devoted their lives to "doctor," and always referred to him without the buffering article. They are always a pain in the ass to any other doctor who happens around. "Doctor is presently with a patient," she concluded as if fearful I'd think he was out on the links.

"Yeah, I sorta figured. Well, could I wait in … Doctor's office? I'd like to get with a patient as soon as possible."

She didn't miss my hesitation before I said the word doctor. She gave me a look, and I had a feeling my smart mouth had just shoveled me out another hole, but she did lead me though the doors to the right of the desk, and down the hall lined with examination rooms. I conconcluded (correctly as I later found out), that the doors to the left led to the small fifty bed hospital.

As we walked I realized that what I'd taken for stains on the linoleum was actually dirt. It bugged me so I said, sharper than I should have, "Doesn't anybody know how to use a mop around here?"

"It is long rain season, we are understaffed, and Doctor thinks it best if we concentrate our energies on patient care."

"I didn't mean to imply that one of us health care professionals should sully our hands with menial labor. I was thinking about some kid. Pay him a little each week. That sort of thing." Her flat, implacable stare was starting to get to me. I shut up.

"You have a lot to learn about Africa, Dr. Finn," she said as she opened the door to Faneiul's office, and gestured me in.

She shut the door so fast and hard she almost caught my tail.

***

It took the French Schweitzer forty-five minutes to get around to me. By then I'd read all of his diplomas and citations three times, and perused the out of date medical journals twice, and decided I couldn't bear to look at pictures of him shaking hands with famous assholes again. Not that he didn't deserve all the kudos. His professional life had been an example of service and self-sacrifice spanning three continents. It was why I wanted to work with him. I'm just a typical American, and I hate to be kept waiting.

He wasn't what I'd expected even though I'd just finished looking at photos. He was much taller in person, an improbably long and lanky figure whose thin legs scissored along like a wading heron. A shaggy mop of grey brown hair, a small, receding chin that combined with thin, almost transparent eyebrows to give his face a naked look. That made the jutting beak of a nose all the more incongruous on that unfinished face.

His smile, however, was warmth itself. A big relief after the popsicle out front. He strode across the room with that sharp, jerking walk, his hand aggressively outthrust.

"Doctor Finn, how pleased I am to meet you at last."

"And I you, sir." He had a good shake, and there was none of that almost imperceptible withdrawal which you get from most nats.

"You have met Margaret?" I correctly gleaned that he meant the nurse, and nodded. "Invaluable, but terrifying woman. She keeps me straightly in line," he concluded with a laugh.

My response was the epitome of tact and diplomacy. "I can see how she might," I said, and then added. "Well, I'm eager to get started." I let my voice trail away suggestively.

"You don't want to see your, how do you American's put it, your digs first?"

"Digs is British, actually, but thanks no. They'll still be there tonight, and I've got the whole afternoon ahead of me. I'd rather work, check out the clinic, get acquainted with our patients."

He laughed, a high whinnying sound. "Good, an 'eager beaver' and that is an American idiom, yes?"

"Absolutely."

"We will put you to work."

"Good."

So I began my life at Kilango Cha Jaha. Southwest of Nairobi our village was close enough to the city to obtain supplies with relative ease, but far enough away that the nats didn't have to look at us, and it was a real effort for Fundies to come out and raid the ghetto for fun.

My home was a traditionally shaped African hut, a rondavel. I bedded down on a mattress thrown on the dirt floor, and surrounded by mosquito netting. Thatch roofs are imminently practical, but unfortunately they are also great homesteads for bugs of every kind, shape and variety. And they grow them big in Africa. Mosquitoes the size of B-52's, bedbugs the size of bisons, roaches like touring limousines. I was especially tormented by critters with too many legs because I have a lot of hide, and it's naked to their assaults. I went through gallons of bug repellent, but I always managed to miss a place because it's tough to maneuver back across the entire length of my back and hindquarters. I considered trying the rhino's approach — find a big mud hole, wallow, and cake myself — but I didn't think the AMA would approve.

Housing might lack even the simplest of amenities, poverty and disease were rampant, but God, did we have scenery! Our setting was magnificent; rising up almost directly from the western edge of Kilango were the Ngong Hills. "Hills" don't really do them justice; while the incline on the west was relatively gentle, when you reached the ridge top you were gazing down several thousand feet into the Great Rift Valley. Slither and skitter down this escarpment to the floor of the valley, and you were in the Ololkisalie Game Reserve.

It was there I met J.D. and Mosi. I had been mooching about the reserve when I came across the startling sight of a small herd of elephants calmly breaking down trees and masticating them. These were the first elephants I'd managed to find, and I quickly hid in the brush to watch. About a quarter of an hour later I was returned to my surroundings by a gun barrel being screwed into my left ear. I jumped, hollered, the elephants went pounding away, ears flying like sails, and trunks upraised, and a disgusted voice with a pronounced Aussie accent said, "Well, I guess you aren't a poacher, but I'm damned if I know what you are."

I risked a glance, and observed a stocky man of indeterminate years, a bush hat crammed down over his thinning fair hair, and a face so seamed and lined with wrinkles and old scars that he looked as if he'd been tied to the tracks, and toy trains had been run back and forth across his phiz for, oh, six or seven years.

Another man arose like a waking god from the brush off to my right. Well over six feet tall, he looked as if he'd been carved from a single block of obsidian.

"J.D.," said the God of the Night. "You are such an ignorant sod, I am sometimes ashamed to work with you." J.D.'s response to this was to seize his left buttock, and shake it at his partner.

Eventually introductions were made. The elegant Zulu with the Oxford accent was Mosi Jomo, and the Aussie J.D. Snopes. They escorted me back to Kilango, and stayed for dinner and a few hands of poker. As they were leaving J.D. peered between my hind legs at my equipment, and said with a snort that I might want to stay out of Ololkisalie. I didn't understand so he carefully explained that with huevos like mine I might get shot so my parts could delight the palates of Arab or Chinese gourmands, or be ground up and fed to some Japanese businessman to improve his potency. When I refused to curtail my rambles, Mosi mildly suggested that I might want to fly an American flag off my tail, and be very, very careful. I said I would, we parted, and I'd made my first friends in Kenya.

Thereafter it became a weekly ritual to gather at either my hut or the wardens house in Ololkisalie for dinner and poker. I learned that Mosi played classical clarinet, and read Proust for fun. J.D. introduced me to Australian Rules Football, and proved to be a working man's philosopher. His comments on governments in general, and third world governments in particular, I have shamelessly incorporated as my own. They also consistently beat the … er … pants off me in poker.

During those first months my admiration for Dr. Faneuil grew until I was like some kind off primitive worshiper at the altar of a loving and mournful god. I had never seen a man work so tirelessly to ease the passing of the dying. If I came in to make late rounds I would hear his deep voice murmuring in Swahili or Kikuyu, and never platitudes. His bedside manner left his patients feeling valued and respected; not jokers, not dying meat, but human beings. When the struggle for another breath ended, he would walk away to weep alone. I ached to comfort him, to help him, to ease his and their pain. The only way I could think of was to stop the hemorrhage, and I didn't have a clue how to accomplish that. My first day I'd thought I'd be vaccinating happy babies, caring for minor injuries encountered in the fields, assisting Faneuil in surgery; in short, being a healer. Instead I had joined him as a ticket taker for Erebus. Death reveled in Kilango despite our best efforts.

I knew we were taking all possible precautions given the lack of funds, but I had done my residency at Cedar Sinai hospital in Los Angeles, and I was used to practicing medicine with the best that money could buy. Medicine in the third world is a whole other ball game. I'm convinced it was some doctor in Uganda, or Belize, or Cambodia who coined the phrase about necessity and mothers of invention.

The first time I vaccinated a child I was in worse shape than the screaming kid. See, nobody makes reusable needles anymore, and even if they did no one knows how to use a whetstone and sharpen them. We use disposable needles which are sharper than sons a bitches — once. The second, third time, fourth time around, the patient feels like we're excavating with a pick ax. It hurts, kids cry, and I get crazy. I also assumed I had solved the mystery of the resentful, suspicious urchin from my first day. I was wrong, and it just goes to show you that kids can be a hell of a lot smarter than so called adults.

But we had to re-use needles because there wasn't money to keep us supplied in disposables. Don't misunderstand me, we weren't (or at least I wasn't) a bunch of quacks and incompetents preying on the hapless natives. We took all possible precautions to avoid contamination, but if it's a choice between re-using a sterilized needle, and not getting a kid vaccinated against diptheria — well, you try to make that choice.

Our procedure was elaborate. The used needles were first placed in a steel tray with tiny prongs over which we slid the base of the needle. The tray was then immersed in a bath of soap and scalding water. Next it went into a bath of hot water and Clorox, and finally into a special dip which had been concocted by Dr. Faneuil, which Margaret was quite brayingly insistent that we use. I thought it was probably overkill, but living saints have a tendency to be just full of funny quirks; you make allowances because they're living saints.

Anyway, three months into my tenure, I finally couldn't stand it anymore, so I hauled ass into Faneuil's office for the obligatory Young Whippersnapper Doctor to Older, Wiser Doctor talk. Faneuil was making notations in a file. When I entered he capped his fountain pen, closed the file, and folded his hands atop it as if protecting something precious.

"Sir, it's this needle situation … and the blood plasma situation, and the three in one vaccine — we're almost out, and half the kids in the village haven't received it. And can't the government get us a decent anesthesia unit? Sometimes I think it'd be safer to just hit 'em on the head with a brick bat. And our x-ray equipment…." I made a disgusted sound. "I'm surprised the nuclear regulatory commission hasn't waded in, and declared us a nuclear power."

Faneuil bestowed a soft, kindly smile on me, but there was a waggish light in his pale eyes. "Bradley, as long as you're listing wants how about a CAT scanner, or an MRI, or a dialysis machine? Money, Bradley, money, all those things cost money, and we haven't got any."

I licked my lips nervously, and plunged in. "Well, that's the thing, sir. My dad's a rich Hollywood producer. He's got a lot of friends who are other kinds of rich Hollywood parasites. They just love to get together over rubber chicken at some benefit dinner and raise the money. They do that real well. So, how about I get my dad to put together a plane load of goodies for us?"

"Sounds lovely, Bradley. You must coordinate it with the Kenyan government, the International Red Cross, and the World Health Organization."

"Why?" I blurted. "I mean, would I have to involve the U N if I wanted a box of chocolate and condoms for me?"

"Ah, but this isn't just for you, Bradley. Bureaucracies must fiddle, it's a law of nature."

"More like the jungle," I muttered, but I surrendered to the realities. "Okay."

I turned to leave, but was arrested before I exited by him saying, "Bradley, you have a good heart."

I felt myself blush. "Thank you, sir." Recovering I added, "It's just the rest of me that's a little weird."

So, I had managed to impress Faneuil, and I was hangin' with J.D. and Mosi, but friends inside Kilango continued to elude me. There is enormous distrust of whites by Africans (understandable). Enormous distrust of hospitals and doctors by native people. (Also understandable. Hospitals are where you go to die.) The fact I was a joker helped, but one out of three ain't so good. I decided the kids were where I needed to apply the wedge, and I proceeded in my usual shameless manner — I bribed 'em.

A call to Mom, and I soon had a supply of frisbees, soccer balls, baseballs, bats and gloves, dolls, crayons and coloring books. Ironically these were a lot easier to obtain then my plane full of vaccines and needles. Dad was whacking through a jungle of red tape, but it was all taking a lot longer than I wanted. But you know Americans — if there's one thing we don't do well, it's wait.

Anyway, once I got the toys, I organized teams and started a scout troop. I'd hoped Margaret Durand would handle the girls, but she gave me that "you must be kidding" smile, told me she was too busy (and implied I ought to be too busy), and declined. I combined the boys and the girls, and figured what the parent organization didn't know wouldn't hurt them. Faneuil laughingly called my kids the Pony Tail Irregulars, which I admit bugged me a little, and made some crack about Americans and our unnatural appetite for sports. I got him back by referring to Frenchies and their unnatural appetite for snails.

You like to think that a group of people to which you belong, whether it be based on race, religion, nationality, profession, whatever, are good and decent people. That the flaws you see in Them, we never have. Unfortunately that ain't the case. Underneath it all we're human, and not too long out of the trees.

I had been invited up to Faneuil's for lunch, but I had a broken arm to set, and it was twenty past one before I folded my stethoscope into the pocket of my lab coat, and checked my watch. When I saw the time I put it in overdrive. My hooves rang hollowly on the hard packed earth, and dust rose behind me as I galloped up the winding road toward the farmhouse that Faneuil called home.

Back in the nineteen twenties the land that currently cradled Kilango had been a not-very-successful coffee plantation. All that now remained was a dilapidated irrigation system and the colonial owner's home. It was a low, rambling wood affair, with a screened veranda, and a cupola on one corner. In my wilder moments I could picture the ghost of the imperialistic asshole who built the structure standing in that cupola, binoculars raised, watching the happy darkies toiling in the fields below. Now it was happy jokers who were singin' and workin' in the sun.

As I ran I suddenly heard the shrill voices of children in the underbrush off to my left, and my stomach formed a tight, hard ball, for I know that hunting pack ululation. I had heard it enough when I was a kid. I hung a looie, and followed the noise.

In a dusty depression eight children were flinging stones and beating with sticks a ninth child who huddled inside this circle of torment. He had flung long skinny arms across his head, and there were already a few smears of blood on the boy's dark skin. All eight of the tormentors were jokers, and five of them were in my scout troop. It depressed the shit out of me that some of my kids were involved. I went flying through them like a bowling ball through nine pins, and they fell back before my furious onslaught.

The ringleader of this little gang of journeymen torturers was Dalila, an impossibly tall figure with a two foot long neck, and ear lobes which brushed at her breasts. At fifteen she had scorned my overtures, and dismissed our activities as "childish." There was a lot of anger in this girl, and she viewed any kind of accommodation with nat society a sell out. She gestured at someone, then indicated me, and a child whose form was basically human came hissing and undulating across the dirt toward me. His body was twisted sharply into curves, and his legs were fused into a single limb, and when he opened his mouth I saw a single big tooth which looked suspiciously hollow to me. I reared, and brought my forefeet down near his head. He got the hint, and withdrew.

The bleeding boy lifted his head to look at me, and I realized he wasn't a nat — he had eyes like a chameleon — and I had an explanation for the impromptu torture. Kenyans hate and fear chameleons.

I assumed my best daddy attitude, and daddy voice, and asked in my somewhat stilted Swahili,

"Okay, now what's going on here?"

Tube Neck stepped forward, and indicated the shivering boy with a flick of a hand. "He's ugly — "

"Well, there aren't any of us who are going to win any beauty contests," I interrupted. "You're pretty damn funny looking too, Dalila."

"He is evil," lisped Snake Boy. His palate had also been warped by the virus, and it was really hard to understand him.

"To have him here will bring bad luck on all of us," Dalila added piously, and I could have slapped her. She wasn't a superstitious rustic, she had been born in Mombasa. This was just a way to reassert control over her peers.

"There's death and evil everywhere — I'm looking at a little of it right now. Now listen up, you leave this kid alone, or I'll come by and stomp your intolerant and ugly joker asses into the ground." I turned to the kid on the ground, and held out a hand. "Come on, let's do lunch."

He scrambled to his feet, ducked his head in terror, and ran. I turned back to the kids. My five were shuffling uncomfortably. "I mean it now," I said severely. "Any more of this shit, and all privileges are revoked." They looked confused. I put it in perspective by ennunciating carefully. "No more baseball."

They ducked their heads, and slithered for the trees. I decided some lessons in tolerance were definitely in order, and I also decided I had to find the chameleon-eyed kid and get him into the Irregulars. I also needed to locate his folks, and find out if he'd been immunized. He was obviously new to the village, and we didn't want anybody carrying in any diseases from outside.

His name was Daudi, which is Swahili for "Beloved One," and I think it showed a lot of class on the part of his parents to name him such, and keep him, and love him when most of their countrymen viewed him as evil and a monster.

The day after the attack I came calling. An older man was perched precariously on a step ladder, thatching the roof of the hut. There was the sharp smell of newly hewn wood, and the walls were smooth with fresh mud wattling. Each week the flow of refugees out of Ethiopia, Uganda, and Tanzania swelled our numbers. Housing was at a premium so there was nothing strange about the family building their own hut. It was the placement that was strange — huddled against the barb wire and chain link fence well away from the rest of the village. It depressed me that these people had come seeking a refuge, and as shitty as Kilango was treating them it was still obviously better than what they'd left. If it wasn't they wouldn't have stayed.

I called out in as friendly and welcoming a voice as I could muster. It didn't seem to help. The man jerked around so fast that he almost pitched off the ladder. He relaxed when he saw me, but his dark eyes were still wary as he descended to the ground.

He stood before me, his eyes on the ground between us. I thrust out my hand. "Bradley Finn."

He hesitantly shook. "Our son told us … what you did." There was another long pause. "Thank you," he finally said.

I shrugged uncomfortably. "Hey, no problem. I wanted to come by, say welcome, tell you a little about the village — activities, services, that kind of thing. I'm a sort of Peace Corps Welcome Wagon." He didn't get it, and I winced at my feeble attempt at humor.

He raised wise and knowing eyes to meet mine. "My name is Jonathan wa Phonda. You are welcome at our home, but I wish you would tell me what you really want."

I could feel myself blushing. "Okay, I was worried about your son. I wanted to invite him into the Scout Troop — " He opened his mouth to interrupt, and I forestalled him with upraised palms. "Please. This village is about not having to hide. I'll look out for him." (As I recall those pompous words all these years later I could fucking cry.)

"I also need to make certain your family has been immunized. We're getting really crowded here, and we've got to be really careful about infection."

Jonathan was back looking at the ground. "Doctors are not a thing I trust."

"I can understand that. Will you at least give me a chance?" I asked.

We were interrupted by a child's voice lifting in song. It was a beautiful boy soprano singing a hymn.

"My son," Jonathan said simply.

"Uh, wow," was my brilliant response.

"He sings for the comfort of his mother," Jonathan continued. The final notes seemed to waft away on the wind, and Jonathan suddenly indicated the door of the hut. "Won't you come in?"

"I'd love to, thanks." I started forward only to be arrested by him saying.

"My wife … well, do not be too shocked. The disease … devours her."

I thought he was being poetical. No such luck. The woman who lay upon the cot was a lovely face with a misshapen torso. No legs. No arms. And the wild card had begun its inroads on her body. It's hard to describe what was happening to her. It was as if her blood had been replaced with acid, and it was slowly eating at her from the extremities in. The pain must have been indescribable, but she still managed to smile at me. The boy looked up in surprise at my entrance.

"My son, Daudi," Jonathan said with that father's pride that I hope to feel for my own son some day.

It took five months before Dad's rubber chicken act was cleared to fly. And my pop and I looked like we were communicating with Mars from the size of his phone bills. And actually that's not true. We'd been cleared to fly three times before, but each time some new bureaucratic objection was raised. One time it was a challenge to the registration and ownership of the plane. Somebody claimed it was South African, and it took two weeks to straighten that out. Then some moron got the idea we were pawning off outdated vaccine on the long suffering natives of Africa, and Dad had to get affidavits from all the pharmaceutical companies. I forget the third crisis, but eventually all the bureaucratic drones were finished pissing in the soup, and a C-111 cargo plane was sitting on the tarmac at LAX slowly being loaded. I had wet dreams at night imagining all those cases and cases of lovely disposable needles that we could well … dispose.

In the village I continued to doctor, but I was fighting an uphill battle trying to get Daudi into the clinic for his vaccinations. He might have been only ten, but he was real mature for his age, and he kept asking me the unanswerable question — "if you can't save my mother why should I trust you?"

At first this was an ego thing with me. I was by God going to get this kid to trust me, and get him vaccinated so he would be protected. Then I grew to like him. Then love him. He adored music, and his passion for new sounds led me into creating an ad hoc music appreciation course to satisfy his cravings. I initially tried rock and roll, the music I enjoy, but I think the wild card had affected Daudi's ears, making him hyper-sensitive. He couldn't take the decibels of rock, so I begged Mom for classical music tapes. Then for my old guitar and sheet music. And it wasn't all one way; by walking this small Kenyan boy through a history of music I found an appreciation for, and an understanding of, classical music that had eluded me as a youth.

It was my wont once a month to enjoy a weekend of liberty in a suite in one of Nairobi's best hotels. One thing Africa taught me; I'm not cut out for sainthood. I'll work hard, I'll volunteer, I'll get down, and I'll get dirty, but God had seen fit to bless me with wealthy parents who loved me (despite my jokerdom), and I enjoyed, and continue to enjoy, the freedom and pleasures money can buy. I make no apologies.

This time I'd brought Daudi with me. He was going to experience his first opera, and I was going to suffer for the good of this kid's soul, and the improvement of his mind. I also sensed I was getting real close to the victory, and it made me glad that when Daudi finally did consent to be immunized I would be doing it with fresh and sharp needles. I wanted as little pain as possible for this child because it was clear that it was only a matter of days before his mother lost her battle with death.

Daudi was out on the balcony, gazing in wonder at the city laid out beneath him, and I was preparing to wash the bod. This requires four rubber boots to keep from slipping in the shower, and I was just forcing a hoof into the last one when the phone rang. It was Dad.

"Hey, Pop!" I trilled.

"Don't sound so happy," came his gravely voice across the thousands of miles.

I dropped back awkwardly onto my haunches. "It's my plane, isn't it?"

"Yes."

"It ain't flyin, is it?" I asked.

"No, and your old man is getting his ass audited by the IRS. Along with most of the people who donated money."

My tail flicked along my left side. I caught it, and began to nervously pull tangles from the silky white hairs. "I don't get it."

"They're claiming this is a bogus charity, and that we really intend to sell the supplies, launder the money in Europe, and quietly return a profit to our contributors. Until we can prove this is a paranoid fantasy they've grounded the plane. Brad, they want to talk to you."

"I'm in Africa! What the fuck am I supposed to do? I'm doctoring. I've got patients …" Words failed me.

"I've tried to explain this to them."

"What are you going to do?" I asked miserably. I had heard the weariness in his voice, and I was afraid he was going to give up on it. This wasn't his problem. He had a new movie beginning production in three weeks, and he didn't need this kind of aggravation.

"I'm going to get that goddam plane to Africa if I have to put it on a raft, put a rope in my teeth, and tow the sonofabitch!" I held the phone away from my ear. "Somebody with a lot of power doesn't want your plane to fly. Damned if I know why, and damned if I know who, but … well, you be careful, Bradley."

He never calls me Bradley unless he's really worried, and not much worries my dad. It was then I felt the first presentiment of danger. I shivered.

"Pop, I love you," I said. He grunted; overt emotionalism always embarrasses him, and I had the nasal buzz of the dial tone.

I hung up the phone, and stood staring blindly down at the carpet. Suddenly I felt small warm hands sliding around my waist. I looked back over my shoulder. Daudi hugged me tighter. It's a wonderful thing with children. They never try to analyze, they just offer comfort in their simple, visceral way. I laughed, and hooked a thumb over my shoulder.

"Hop aboard. I'll give you a ride." He smiled shyly, and climbed on. I cantered once around the bedroom, took careful aim, gave a hitch of my hindquarters, and bucked him onto the bed. His giggles followed me into the shower.

Three days after our return to Kilango his mother died. The next morning I found Daudi waiting for me on the steps of the clinic when I arrived for work. He didn't even cry when I administered the shots.

One night, late, as I lay on my mattress and read by the light of a kerosene lantern, I experienced a hideous epiphany. I was perusing the latest issue of the Harvard Medical Review (latest is a relative term. It was actually several months out of date, but my professional mail was getting forwarded through my parents, and then to a P.O. Box in Nairobi, and all of this took time. I also wasn't exactly overloaded with spare time to read) when I hit the article on the new antibody test for the HTLV–III virus — more commonly known as AIDS.

This was 1985, and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome was not well understood. I was losing people to a whole host of gastrointestinal parasites, the most common opportunistic infections in our region, and about as unusual in Africa as fleas on dogs. So while I grieved and cursed, I initially didn't think too much about it.

Now this article had burst across the old brain pan, and I got a cold prickly feeling all along my scalp. Scrambling awkwardly to my feet, I dug like a frenzied dog in search of a prize bone through back issues of the review for anything I could find on AIDS. It wasn't much. The traditional medical establishment was leery about writing much about the "gay disease," and Rock Hudson hadn't collapsed yet in a hotel lobby in Paris and been forced to shed his square-jawed leading man image.

I read until three A.M. I then drove to Nairobi, and called Dad. I wanted a lot of those antibody kits. I wanted them fast. And I sure as fuck wasn't going to tell the International Red Cross and WHO, so they could tell me how careful we all had to be.

No, my antibody kits would come in with a Care package of Mom's chocolate chip, raisin and oatmeal cookies, and the lastest Ed McBain novel.

***

The final chemical solution washed across my tray of tiny, dainty beads. They turned a lovely purple. I stared at them, and began to cry. Of the fifty people I had tested, all carried the HTLV–III antibody in their twisted bodies. And now the significance of all those patients dying from what the Africans had dubbed the "slimming disease" came clear. AIDS had invaded Kilango like the Germans entering Poland.

Our new deep water well, all the vaccinations against diptheria, and typhoid, measles, weren't going to make a damn bit of difference. Death had become a permanent resident in the village.

A part of me, the heedless, spoiled kid from Hollywood, didn't want to know the extent of the infection. The wiser part, the doctor, had to know so we could plot strategies to control the spread of the disease. I hadn't told Faneuil what I had done, what I was continuing to do. I figured I'd give him the bad news all in one dose. There were times when I cursed him, and named him a fool. How could he not have seen the virological evidence before him? But I had missed it during the first five months of my tenure at Kilango.

But he's been here years!

Great men can have their little blind spots, my small excusatory voice whined.

Pretty fucking big blind spot!

Because of the seven thousand two hundred and forty-nine people living in Kilango five thousand fifty-six were infected, or displaying the symptoms of full blown AIDS.

I went to Faneuil. He was at the house, resting during the worst heat of the day. I had sweat patches on my chest and flanks, partly from nerves, partly from the stultifying heat which seemed to run like warm syrup across the body.

He offered me a lemonade saying, "Only mad dogs and Englishmen — " He broke off abruptly once he took a good look at my face. "Bradley, what is wrong? What is it? Are you ill?"

Suddenly I was in tears, my hands pressed hard against my face as if the pressure of my fingers could hold back this unmanly display. He got an arm around my shoulders, maneuvered me under the big ceiling fan which was turning lazily. A few minutes, and the gulping sobs had been reduced to sniffles. Faneuil pressed a handkerchief into my hands.

"Here, Bradley child, here. Now what is wrong?"

I told him. He sat very still, a wax effigy on the sofa, then his anger broke across me.

"How dare you! How dare you take this action without consulting me! I deny this test. I deny its validity. I have never heard of this test!"

Rage propelled him to his feet, and his long legs scissored as he paced the length of the room, and back.

My first shock and chagrin was giving way to an anger every bit as white hot as his. It was Old Fart Doctor Syndrome. If they haven't heard of it, it's not worth shit, and of course they never hear of it because they stop studying.

"You're like fucking King Canute and the waves," I bellowed back. "You can rant and rail, and deny all you want, but they're still going to die, and a word from the mighty Faneuil isn't going to prevent it! You don't want to believe me … fine! Try the CDC, the NIH, talk to some other Froggies. Montagnier at the Pasteur Institute, they isolated the goddam virus! The test has been designed as a screening mechanism for world blood banks. I used it, maybe wrongly, as a diagnostic tool, but God, we had to know. We've got to do something."

He was trembling, his nostrils pinched tight as he said, "The first thing I am going to do is get you out of my hospital. Out of my village. You have no ethics."

"I love nats. Your village? This is a joker village. And I'm a joker, and I think I have more fucking right to be here than you do. You contact the Peace Corps. I'll reveal what I've discovered here. You got lazy. You got complacent. That's bad, but it's not criminal. You ignore this, and it will be criminal."

He collapsed onto the sofa, and he began to cry. My anger cooled as if doused by the rain of his grief. I felt sick … for his pain and guilt, for our dying patients. "I'm sorry, Etienne."

He lifted a tear-streaked face, shook his head, and waved a hand helplessly. "No, no, Bradley, you were right to shout. I was being a stubborn old fool. But the time for tears is past. Now we must act."

***

They were fine words, but they were just words. For those already infected or into full blown AIDS all we could do was ease their deaths, and try to educate them to keep them from passing the disease to the few healthy members of our community.

The question which tormented me in those dark weeks was the how? How had the disease ran with such ease through the community? Even assuming ten or twelve infected jokers arriving in the village, it could not have spread this comprehensively. Each night I continued my research.

Blood transfusion? Unlikely. We didn't do that much surgery at the clinic, we weren't equipped for it, and certainly no procedure that would require a large amount of blood. We sure as hell didn't have a large gay population, and heterosexual infection, while it is a growing phenomenon, was not as easy as the media would like people to believe. No IV drug users -

My thoughts tumbled to a halt like cars in an L.A. freeway pileup. But we sterilize our needles! I told myself, laying aside that worry. We are careful.

I tried to put it out of my mind. I quizzed Margaret again and again about our sterilization techniques, and maybe it was the hostile shuttered look in her pale, pale eyes that finally led me to add a new skill to my list of credits — breaking and entering. Maybe it was also the relaxed attitude which seemed to grip the medical staff of Kilango. Having now realized that he had a bunch of dying jokers, Fanueil didn't seem to care about preventing any further spread of the disease. I felt like a wild eyed, tangled haired prophet crying to the heavens about condoms and safe sex. And like most wild eyed and tangled haired prophets I was unsung in my own country.

Anyway, it was late one night. I was coming off rounds, but instead of heading back to my hut I cruised across the lobby and down the hall to Faneuil's office. It wasn't locked, which surprised me at first (I'm a white boy from L.A. — we lock everything), and suddenly I felt very foolish. An unlocked door wasn't very sinister. Still, I'd come this far, and vilified Faneuil's image in my own mind, so I entered.

Moving quickly, I flipped through the filing cabinets. Minutes went crawling past. In my own fevered imagination I had been in the office for days. I kept having visions of myself caught by Faneuil and Margaret. His eyes sad and hurt as I tried to stammer out apologies. I almost quit, but there was only one more drawer to go. I yanked it open. Began a cursory search. An icy footed, long legged insect seemed to go stalking down my spine. I collapsed back onto my hindquarters like a trick circus pony, and read quickly through the collection of articles in my hands.

They were all from the 1970s, and they dealt with things like needle transmission of infectious hepatitis. The number of viral particles necessary on a needle to cause serum transmission. Virus survivability rates at room temperatures.

There's a logical explanation for this, my mind yammered as it ran in circles around the confines of my skull. We're sterilizing disposable needles. He's just worried and concerned. Making certain our system is as foolproof as man and science can make it.

Because if we weren't, and if there was something unthinkable occurring I … I thought of Daudi, and I couldn't finish the thought.

I replaced the articles, and slipped out of the office.

Down the hallway to the storeroom where supplies were stored, linens washed, and needles sterilized. I had never paid much attention to the sterilization process — doctor's arrogance, that. After all, Margaret handled it. Now, I was about to educate myself. I wanted to know the make-up of our final needle wash. If all was well I could release this paranoid fantasy about Faneuil.

It was hot in the storeroom. Through the south facing window I could see a line of monsoon clouds billowing purple, black and grey against the moon lit sky. Occasionally lightning shot jagged and orange from the belly of the clouds. A sharp gust of wind sent sand rattling against the dingy glass. Alarmed by the sharp reports, the flies sleeping like fat black raisins on the ceiling let out a crescendo drone, and stirred nervously. Flies are a constant in Africa. You stop noticing them after a while. I almost didn't notice this batch.

Instead I flipped on the light. Crossed to the solution. Awakened by the light the flies came spiraling down drawn by the scent of sweat and hide from my centaur body. One big motherfucker landed on my withers, and bit down hard. Grunting in pain and annoyance I cranked my torso around, and smashed the fucker. Blood squished against my palm. Disgusted, I turned back to look for a towel, and froze.

The flies were hovering over Doctor's special solution.

Sterilizing solutions all have one thing in common — they contain detergent. Flies don't like detergent. Whatever was in Doctor's Special Needle Dip, it wasn't detergent.

Suddenly paranoid, I closed the door to the storeroom behind me, and approached the tray. The needles looked like tiny deadly missiles as their points glittered beneath the surface of the fluid. I removed the tray, and set it aside. I then used the tried and true doctor approach to anything unknown. I dipped the tip of my little finger in the solution, and tasted it.

It wasn't soap, or Clorox, or alcohol. It was dilute human serum. For a second the room took on the quality of a merry-go-round. I closed my eyes, and backed up so abruptly that I drove my ass into the far wall. It bruised the dock of my tail, and hurt like a motherfucker. The pain counteracted the faintness.

All the old spy movies of my youth rose up and clamored for attention. I knew I had to hide my presence in the room, and I knew I had to have a sample of the solution. I quickly filled and corked a pipette with the liquid. I was just returning the needles to the solution when I smelled smoke. Terrified, I threw open the door, and slammed it immediately shut again at the sight of flames belching from Faneuil's office. Frantically I searched for escape. There was no way I was going to get my fat horse butt out that window. In my case it literally was out of the frying pan and into the fire.

Snatching up a towel from the linen cabinet, I wet it with tap water, then tied it across my face. I remembered clips from one of Dad's stirring firefighter dramas, so I stood to the side of the door as I opened it. Fire belched in as if shot by a small dragon. Once that initial billow passed I held my breath, and jumped through into the hall. My tail ignited as I vaulted over the fire, and boy did that serve as an incentive! If the ASPCA wouldn't get on you, I have a great way to encourage race horses.

I turned right, and was running like a motherfucker for the lobby and the hospital. We had sixteen patients occupying beds in that ward, and I had to get them out. As I approached the lobby I could hear shrill cries of terror, and the racking coughs of people who are dying from smoke inhalation. The doorway leading to the hospital was a sheet of flame. I'm as brave as the next man, but I'm not suicidal. It was clear a second fire had been started in the ward, and if I tried to save them I would only succeed in joining them in death.

The fire was advancing from both fronts now, about to capture me in Hell's own pincer. The sounds of agony faded from the hospital. I turned and raced for the front doors.

They were locked.

Panic was hammering in my throat. Sixteen people had died because someone was trying to murder me. My knuckles were white as I gripped the push handle, and rattled it impotently. But they had not considered one fact. I'm a joker with the body of a pony. Pit ponies in the mines in Britain can pull up to three times their own weight. I'm strong.

Whirling, I lined up my ass with the thick glass, and let fly with both hind feet. The glass starred and cracked. One more kick, and glass formed a crystal waterfall. I had to jump the access bar. It was a little like threading a needle. I caught my hindfeet, and fell into an ungainly heap on the steps of the clinic.

As I lay there panting, and hurting (my burned tail hurt like hell), a bullet sprayed concrete dust into my face. I was on my feet and running in an instant.

I don't know how I thought of this in my terror and pain, but I found my hand going to the pocket of my lab coat, and the precious pipette of serum. Amazingly it was still intact. There was a mind numbing crash of thunder from directly overhead, and the heavens opened up. Within seconds the dusty streets of Kilango had become rivers of sticky mud. I was slogging for my van. I had to get out. Get to Nairobi.

And do what? I wondered. In an instant a lifetime of loving support from friends and family had vanished. I was a joker and I distrusted all nats. I reached the van. Yanked open the side door, and clambered in. My hooves sounded like a chorus of castanets on the metal floor. Trembling I pulled the keys from the ashtray, thrust them into the ignition, and turned.

Silence.

These assholes thought of everything. I was out of the van, and running for the steep incline of the Ngong Hills. The high wire fence which surrounded Kilango looked intact, but there was a place where the kids had clipped out an opening, and then carefully folded the wire back into place to hide their sin. I had used it myself, and had kept the secret. There was the sharp report of a high powered rifle being fired, and an angry supersonic bee ripped along my hip. I shrieked, bucked, and resumed running.

Where were those fucking guards? I wondered. Of course, there were only two of them, and they might be drugged or dead, or maybe just not give a shit because I was a joker, and someone had just declared open season.

My lungs were laboring, and my legs felt like four pillars of jelly by the time I reached the ridgeback. I thought about heading north along the ridge toward Nairboi, then realized that my hunters had probably thought of that. Machakos, Konza, Kajiado — all were too distant for a tired centaur to reach. I stared down into the shadow well of the Rift Valley. The game preserve was below. I'd take my chances among the flora and fauna of Africa. Hide out until the heat was off, make my way cautiously north, then climb back over the Ngong to Nairobi. I again reassured myself of the safety of my precious pipette.

I stood dithering on the edge of eternity — literally in my case — and wished for a flashlight. My pursuers threw some light on matters. If you've never seen a high powered rifle fired at night it is a sight designed to stand your hair on end. A tongue of flame several feet long gouts from the barrel of the rifle. Macho military types are always telling you how great this is because it pinpoints the bad guys for you. Well, that's swell if you're a macho military type, and you also have a gun, but I was a terrified doctor who'd never fired a gun in his life, and I fucking knew where the bad guys were — they were chasing me!

I dove off the crest of the hill, and in a shower of pebbles and dirt began my skittering descent into the Great Rift Valley.

***

By ten o'clock I was a wreck. The sun looked like a polished bronze disk in the sky. Heat and dust hazed the horizon. I had no water. No sun screen. No lip balm. My face and scalp were cooked, my lips blistering. The burned dock of my tail was agony, and without a tail I was tormented by flies.

Occasionally I had passed a watering hole, but the film-encrusted, muddy water looked awful. I'm also a doctor. I knew it was the little gollywogs swimming around in that ugly water that were going to tap dance in my bowels. But sooner or later I was going to have to drink, and then the real fun would start.

My grand plan about hiding wasn't working out so great. The Rift Valley is pretty sparse. Expanses of grassland are occasionally dotted with spreading, flat-topped trees which sprout like desiccated mushrooms. Despite the Long Rain season there was a lot of dust, and that was what kept me running. My hunters were in vehicles, and the dust rose like a peacock's plume from the spinning wheels, pinpointing their location and warning me that despite my best hopes they were not giving up. The pursuit continued.

I was nearing the end of my strength, so I sank down in the sparse shade of a Jacaranda tree, tried to regulate my breathing. I closed my eyes trying to relieve their burning, and wished for dark glasses. A Snickers bar. A Coke. A miracle.

Like a half-remembered song I could now faintly hear the drone of the jeep engines. Wearily I unfolded my legs, and lurched to my feet. I had to grab for support from a low hanging branch as a wave of dizziness took me. The agonizing run continued.

Thankfully God looks out for fools, little children, the United States of America, and jokers. My miracle occurred. As I trotted through a stand of thorn trees I struck gold. The grasslands on the other side were dotted with impala. I hesitated just under the branches of the final tree. Compared. Our hides were an almost perfect match. I gave an experimental sniff to my armpits. Very much a human scent. Rubbed a hand across my side. Sniffed again. Not human. Not animal. Something different — joker scent. Would the impala accept me?

Bending at the waist, I dropped my head as close to the ground as possible, attempting to present the profile of a grazing impala, and edged toward the herd. A big buck lifted his head, snorted, and shook those lyrate horns. The entire herd tensed for a moment. The buck and I regarded each other. With the highlight of white over his liquid brown eyes he had the quality of a lovely and frightened girl. I tried to appear non-threatening. It worked better on the impala then it's worked on most women I've tried to date. The buck snorted a final time, and resumed grazing.

I slipped into the center of the herd, and cast about for any shed or broken horns. Yes, I know, it was a dumb idea, but I wasn't thinking too clearly at that point. Needless to say I didn't find any.

The droning of jeep engines began to break up the quiet of the afternoon. The impala herd came to quivering alertness, and then I saw the inherent flaw in my plan. The hunters would come. Spook the impala. The impala would run. If I couldn't keep pace with them Finn would die.

The great stampede began. Within minutes my lungs were close to bursting, each exhalation like fire across my throat. I was falling farther and farther back in the herd — back where the sick and the young were running.

I started to cry. Decided I wouldn't be shot in the back. I plunged to a halt, and whirled to face them. There were two jeeps bouncing and jouncing across the veldt. In one a man stood upright, one foot balanced on the dashboard, the other in the seat, and his knee locked against the back of the car seat for support. There was a rifle at his shoulder. He called out something, and the jeep began to slow. My skin was crawling, looking for cover. Tears and snot gouged slimy trails through my dust encrusted face.

There was the ear-splitting crack of gun fire. The shooter in the jeep flung away his rifle, his arms wind-milled, and he collapsed backwards off the jeep. I looked around wildly. It was a silly reaction, but I suddenly realized that I was patting myself all over my chest as if to ascertain I really wasn't shot.

My pursuers spun their jeeps in tight U-turns, and began to haul ass out of there. There were two more shots, and another guy in the first jeep and one in the second jerked from the impact. There was the gnashing and grinding of gears, the squeak from too old brakes, and a mud and dust covered Mercedes truck pulled up next to me.

"He's not on the endangered list, Mosi, guess we should have let 'em shoot him," said J.D. "And now you've gone and killed that guy." J.D. shook his head piously, and tisked.

There was a flash of ivory in ebony as Mosi grinned at me, tossed up his rifle, and caught it by the barrel. He slid the rifle into the truck, and then maneuvered himself back through the window. When he thrust his arm back out he was holding a wad of Kleenex.

I blew my nose, wiped the moisture from my face. The kleenex was mud-caked trash in my hands. "How … how…." I stammered.

"One of our scout planes spotted the vehicles. We figured poachers, and came out to check," Mosi said.

It suddenly all struck me as hilarious, and I began to whoop with laughter. They were staring at me, J.D. with some consternation, and Mosi with fatherly understanding.

"No, no poachers," I finally managed to gasp out. "'Cause somebody just declared open season on jokers."

***

The tie up of this sordid little story took only a day. Mosi and J.D. got me back to Nairobi. The solution in the pipette proved to be AIDS-infected human serum. The posse saddled up, and headed out to Kilango, only to find Faneuil and Margaret had already split.

Of the three gunmen who were shot, two were dead, and all the survivor could tell us was that he had been hired by Faneuil to torch the clinic and kill me.

Two men had been assigned to head the medical investigation; Pan Rudo, a doctor with the World Health Organization, and Philip Baron von Herzenhagen of the Red Cross. Rudo was an elderly, elegant man with an almost terrifying brilliance. Herzenhagen was a fat, blond white guy who looked like a stuffed tomato after a few hours in the African sun. It was Herzenhagen who had the bad taste to ask me how I felt — after all, I'd been "administering vaccinations to the children of Kilango for months. Infecting them with AIDS. Inadvertently … of course." As if that little addendum made it all okay. He ended the interrogation with the solicitous suggestion that I might want to seek counseling, but the show of concern didn't fool me. He had wanted to make me fed bad. I eyed him, and said in a level voice, "I bet you wet the bed, set fires, and tortured animals when you were a kid." I then turned my back on him, and walked out. I remember there was a little choke of sound from Rudo. Whether laughter or outrage I never knew. As for Herzenhagen, I never saw him again until he waltzed across my television screen as a special advisor to the Vice-President in charge of eradicating jokers on the Rox. It seemed a perfect role for him.

The Kenyan authorities and I searched through Faneuil's and Margaret's personal effects seeking some explanation for the horror they had perpetrated. We found none. I really hadn't expected to.

The cops tried to see if I could shed any light on the motive. After all, this man was a doctor. All I could tell them is that doctors are people too with the same hates and fears and biases as the rest of our tribe. And unfortunately, the list of healers who had turned to murder is a long and honored one. Faneuil had been a psychopathic bigot — end of story.

Still, it bothers me how he got out of Kenya. Out of Africa. He must have had help in high places. Which scares me, and sometimes keeps me awake at night. Memories of a young boy with a sweet voice also return to haunt me occasionally. In 1990 Jonathan wrote to tell me Daudi had died. And all I could think was that I'd killed him. It was Tachyon, or rather his example, who helped me get past it. I looked at him, and remembered how guilt had nearly destroyed his life.

I have a lot of people left to heal. I'm not going to blow it on guilt. Yes, I have been an unwitting accomplice to Faneuil's murders, but my conscience is clean. I just wonder if the same can be said for Faneuil — wherever he hides?

Yes, I'm afraid it can. The world has said it's okay to hate us. Maybe next they'll say it's okay to kill us. Faneuil is just waiting for vindication. He's sleeping the sleep of the righteous.