West with the Night

by Beryl Markham

A domesticated lion is only an unnatural lion — and whatever is unnatural is untrustworthy.

but Kibii and I did what children do when there are things abroad too big to understand; we stayed close to each other and played games that made no noise.

But they gave him a gun, so he left the spear and the shield behind him and took the courage, and went where they sent him because they said this was his duty and he believed in duty. He believed in duty and in the kind of justice that he knew, and in all the things that were of the earth

He was shot and killed by the other man, who also believed in duty, and he was buried where he fell. It was so simple and so unimportant.