It’s another hour before they move again and Kiama feels his stomach growl, yet doesn’t dare voice it. Finally, the city falls away and the roads become more rural; it looks more like the Kenya he remembers, the one he used to explore on weekends with Mum. There was a man back then who would drive them out to places like this and they would walk until his legs felt wobbly. Mum used to make fun of how little energy he had when the activity involved doing something outdoors. ‘I’m doing you a favour,’ she’d say, ‘helping you burn off some of that energy.’ Cynthia was always making comments about him needing ‘fresh air’ and ‘a walk’, like he was a pet. He wonders if Mum missed their pre-Kenya weekends as much as he did, the ones spent entirely inside, lying on her bed watching TV or sitting on the sofa filling reams of paper with sketches, while she chatted on the phone.

They pass a small night market full of stalls lit by oil lamps and bars with corrugated iron roofs. As they pass through the centre of Kikuyu the roads switch to smooth then to completely unpaved as they drive up a blackened hill. Joe stops the car at a set of duck-egg-coloured metal gates and honks the horn.

‘Is this the house?’ Yvonne asks. ‘I’m desperate for the toilet.’

Kiama crosses his fingers, hoping for the best.

Joe gets out and tries the gate, but it’s locked, although the house is ablaze with lights. ‘Are they expecting you?’ he asks through Yvonne’s open window.

‘No,’ she says, raising her eyebrows at Kiama, ‘they’re not.’

Joe bangs on the gate several more times, but there’s still no movement.

‘Let’s get out,’ Yvonne says, ‘I’ll go behind a bush if I have to.’

‘Classy,’ Kiama says following her. Then the gate flies open.

‘Hi,’ a girl, probably not much older than him says. ‘Sorry, we didn’t know more people were arriving tonight.’ She’s got some sort of accent, Irish or Scottish. He can never tell.

‘Hi. We’re here to see Purity Collins?’ he says.

‘Purity? She’s at the hospital. One of the volunteers has malaria so she’s sticking with him.’

Another young white woman comes into the yard, this time English. ‘Alice? What are you doing? Close the gate.’

‘No, it’s fine, he’s a westerner,’ she whispers to her friend. Noticing Kiama shift she explains, ‘I only saw your driver and got a little scared, you know how it is.’

‘Do you know when Purity’s going to be back?’ he asks.

‘Not tonight, that’s for sure.’

‘Where is the hospital? Is it far?’

Yvonne takes him by the arm. ‘No way,’ she says, ‘wherever it is, we’re not going.’