He had opened the bag, and was looking at the book with reverence. He read the label in the flyleaf silently, his lips moving over the words, and then saw what she had added in her own hand. Finally, when he looked up at her with a smile lighting his eyes and all of his face, she realised that she had never seen him smile before.

‘You are giving me such an important thing?’ he asked. His hands moved over the leather binding, and he fingered the gold embossed edges of the pages. ‘Why, Memsahib Sarah, are you doing this?’

‘Because I want you to have it and I know you will learn from it, as I did. And because you have worked hard for Bwana Piet. He depends on you now, to help him make the farm and the lodge into a place where all people can work together to make a good life. And it’s Christmas, too,’ she said.

He nodded and closed the book, and she saw that he had pressed his lips together and that he shut his eyes quickly as if to blink away tears.

‘You don’t have a family, do you?’ Sarah asked. ‘I think I can understand how that feels because this year my family is very far away, and I no longer see them. In a way I am alone too, without my family. So I know it is good when someone thinks about you.’

He was clearly battling with his emotions, and she wondered if she had said too much and embarrassed him. He had turned away from her, and was looking at the photograph. When he looked back, his eyes were bright with tears.

‘I have never had a present before,’ he said. ‘Madam Sarah is very kind.’

He stopped suddenly, his eyes darting away from her, and she turned to see Piet striding across the lawn towards her.

‘You’re up!’ he exclaimed, delighted. ‘Join me for breakfast?’ He kissed her and then put his hand beneath her elbow to lead her back to the house, calling out to Simon over his shoulder. ‘Get the gear into the Land Rover, Simon. Kipchoge will give you a hand.’ He looked at Sarah. ‘What’s he doing hanging around the front of the house?’

‘I asked him to wait for me on the lawn. I wanted to give him a book. He says he reads a lot.’

‘He’s a good fellow. But I don’t want him getting too familiar and doing things the other staff don’t do. He’s in enough trouble already because they’re jealous of him, and he needs to respect the boundaries. At times he can be too smart for his own good.’

She was disappointed at the criticism in his remark. ‘He’s having a hard time,’ she said. ‘He hasn’t any real friends, and he’s still an outsider through no real fault of his own.’