But he ignores her, he rushes on by. “And then Metheus has to defend himself, and defend, you know, the creative spark, so he gets a knife, and kills the eagle.”
It is out. He looks at her, sweating, triumphant. “Do you like the way I have rounded it off?”
Some of them are totally unteachable. And yet he is a little too worked up for her liking. Vanessa decides she had better be tactful. “Derrick, I have said you must broaden your palette.”
“You didn’t like Metheus. You thought it was shit.” He is rummaging compulsively in his bag. Oh God, she thinks, he’s going to take it out and read it. Instead he drags out something big and heavy, wrapped in a cloth and puts it on the floor, beside the futon. “I’m serious,” he says, and unwraps a knife. It makes a heavy, clunking sound on the floorboards, a serious knife that could cut through bones, a butchery knife, a killing knife, not a silly knife in an invented story. The blade is long and very shiny. “I’m a serious artist. This inspires me. Remember you wanted us to show you the things that were important to our creativity.”
“I don’t like knives. Please put it away. And I think you should write another story.” Vanessa can hear herself talking on empty. What do you say to a boy with a knife? “I mean, this one has verve, and pace, and you have a beginning, middle and end—”
“You think I’m stupid, don’t you?” he says. He moves forward on the futon so his knees touch her calves. His eyes are darting all round the room, his lips are working, smiling, nervous. And there is something strange about his breath.
“You’re like everyone else. You think I am mad. You’re just too cowardly to say so. It was obvious, when I read you my story about the chickens. You didn’t really like it at all. You didn’t understand the metaphor. You just pretended to encourage me. I trusted you. I respected you.”
“Let’s talk about this,” she says, but it’s hard, her breath is short, the words don’t sound right. “I do want to help you with your writing. First you must put that knife away. Perhaps I was a little too negative.”
“Well, are you sorry?” he demands, voice breaking, of everyone who has ever upset him, parents, policemen, therapists, teachers — stupid, lying, greasing teachers—
“Sorry, sorry,” Vanessa breathes.
And before she can react, he is kissing her, his large wet tongue pushing into her mouth and his thin hard hands grabbing her shoulders, and she falls sideways off the chair, so for a moment her mouth is uncovered, and she gasps, “Derrick, will you stop being silly,” before his fingers cover her face, he puts his whole hand over her face — They struggle, unsuccessfully, clumsily. Vanessa is fit from her exercises, her arms are sinewy, her calves are strong, but she is no match for a fit young man. He is saying, “What’s the matter, I just want to kiss you, I love you, you know, I really love you—” His mouth tastes horrible, of metal.
Then Vanessa thinks she hears a sound in the hall. Derrick has his back to the doorway of her study, but she’s facing it, and with a lurch of the heart, between the bars of his fingers, through her stretched, hurt lids, she sees the front door opening, a lifetime away, and the dark, solid figure of Mary coming through it—
Agonized, she watches it disappear again, Mary’s tired, everyday, unfrightened face, carrying her bags through into the kitchen, and at least it seems the boy has heard nothing, for he’s busy, dragging off his jacket with one hand while he holds her down on the floor with the other — but what really makes her cry out with pain is the moment he tries to change position and places one knee on top of her thigh, so his whole young weight bears down on her femur, and she grunts a stifled “No!” because she feels it is breaking—
And then her door bangs hard against a pile of books which knocks over another pile beside it, and they fall like thunder on the struggling couple as Mary pounds into the room. Derrick’s hand relaxes and the fingers peel off. Oh Mary, Mary, nostrils flared with fury—
“What are you doing?” Mary shouts like a man, her voice hoarse and strong, but she sees in an instant, she snatches up the knife and flings it hard across the room, out of reach, then hits the boy with the flat of her hand, a hand made hard by decades of work, once, twice across his bony temple, and he staggers off Vanessa, stunned, and then Mary punches him hard on the nose, and a rose of blood bursts out of the nostril, and then with a furious cry in Luganda, she knees him with brutal force in the balls.
He collapses forwards on to the carpet. Mary is holding him down by the neck. Vanessa staggers to her feet, but the leg Derrick knelt on does not seem to be working.
“We will call the police! Ono mubbi! Mutemul Stinking thief and murderer!” says Mary, panting. “You will sit on him, Vanessa, while I call the police. Did you steal my money?” she shouts at Derrick, but the blood is pouring from his nose, he is gathering himself, one hand over his face, and he pushes her off him and staggers from the room, no longer human, a wounded hyena, yelping angry, inaudible swear words, with Mary after him, she has him by one shoulder, she shouts, “Villain, villain!” and pulls his hair, but seconds later, he is through the front door while she aims one last kick at his legs, his bottom, and he crouches for a moment, winded, on the porch, with the garden path sunlit and ordinary behind him, framed by the door, which is gaping open on an everyday, astounded morning, and the rose leaves bob towards his face, his blood-stained, sorrowful, hurt child’s face.
“Leave him, Mary,” Vanessa gasps. “Just let him go.”
“But he is a thief. In Kampala, we deal with them! Every week, the crowd catches someone on the street. Next day they report a death in the papers!” Mary is shouting this at Derrick. “Villain, I will kill you if you take my money.”
“He hasn’t taken anything.”
Now he is limping away down the path. Mary is torn between following him and running upstairs to check on her money. But she sees the outside broom in the porch and snatches it up and throws it after him, whirling the head like an Olympic hammer-thrower, and hits her mark, and he yelps again, and then he is gone, and the tall hedge hides him.
Vanessa has crumpled on to the floor, and sits in the hall, her head in her hands. Mary is erect, regal and glowing, full of the passion of the fight.
“Thank you, Mary, I don’t know how to thank you—”
“Are you all right, Vanessa? You are not bleeding?” Mary crouches, briefly, and looks her over. “Now, Vanessa, I will check my money.” Mary goes upstairs two at a time, faster than Vanessa’s ever heard her move. Indeed she did not know that Mary could run, but she returns in her normal leisurely fashion. “I was in time, he did not take my money.” When Mary tries to lift her, Vanessa collapses.
The rest of the day passes in a dream-like fashion. The police, Trevor, Justin all come. Mary is heard giving stirring descriptions that always end with the rescue of her money. Everyone is full of praise for Mary. Vanessa is taken off to hospital for an X-ray on her painful leg, not in an ambulance, as she had expected, but in Trevor’s van, which is white with plaster dust, and she is not too ill to complain. “Sorry, old girl, no one gave me notice.” But Trevor is loving, worried, kind, and Justin is almost too upset to talk.
Still Vanessa is left with a puzzled feeling that somehow Mary is the centre of all this, that the heroic role, which was surely hers, the stoical, plucky victim of attack, has passed to Mary, and will not come back, however much she tells her own story.
The police pick up Derrick not far from his lodgings. He turns out to have a history of violence, and has been seeing a psychiatrist since he was eleven.