HUGH SIMPSON drew on an Embassy cigarette and glanced over a curry-stained menu in an outdoor Indian restaurant just down the road from Lake Naivasha. A rugged, sunburned sculptor and outdoorsman, Simpson is a third-generation Kenyan whose Irish grandfather settled on Lake Naivasha at the turn of the last century. Ten years older than Cholmondeley, he was something of a mentor to him in his youth, later hunted with him around Kenya, and was a frequent visitor to Jersey Hall. "I've known Tom since he was 12 years old," he said. "I've seen him close at hand, played sports with him. The image of him as a 'Kenyan cowboy' couldn't be farther from the truth."

Simpson looked me in the eye. "I don't care what people say," he said. "There's no racialism in Tom at all. He's considerate to others. He's the right sort of person for this country. When you compare Kenya to places like Zimbabwe, we [whites] have had a very happy passage, and people such as Tom are responsible for that. He's just been terribly unlucky."

My meeting with Simpson had come about after days of frustration. Cholmondeley's girlfriend, Sally Dudmesh, a British expatriate, socialite, and jewelry designer who lives in Karen at the Ngong Dairy Farm, a colonial villa featured in the film Out of Africa, had recently sent out a letter asking Cholmondeley's circle not to talk to the media. Access to Cholmondeley's friends had shut down almost totally, and only after pleading with intermediaries was I allowed a brief on-the-record encounter with the sculptor.

We hooked up at the Delamere Shopping Center on the Naivasha-Nakuru highway, a ramshackle collection of fast-food shops, produce stands, and a gas station that Cholmondeley started up about five years ago. It's a bustling place that attracts truckers, local white ranchers, tourists, and workers on the flower farms. Simpson told me that the shopping center was one of half a dozen innovations that Cholmondeley had brought to Soysambu. Another big improvement, he said, was his introduction of a pivot irrigation system, and he'd also encouraged his father to grow sweet baby corn, which the family now exports in large quantities to Europe, and to produce yogurt, one of Soysambu's most popular products. "Tom is a progressive thinker," Simpson told me. "He was always pushing to make the business more versatile."

Despite these innovations, Soysambu has had a troubled recent history. Delamere Camp shut down in 2002, partly as a result of the wider, temporary collapse of the tourism industry in Kenya following the 9/11 terror attacks. The ranch is reportedly not robust, either. After ole Sisina's death, Kenyan human-rights groups and other organizations called for a boycott of Delamere products, and revenues dropped by 50 percent between April and June 2005, according to The Daily Nation. Simon Cox insisted that the ranch is "profitable, but not easily profitable."

I asked Simpson to comment on Cholmondeley's behavior after his release from jail. One friend of Cholmondeley's had told me that the Delamere heir had quickly picked up his life again. "If I had just shot a man dead, I'd disappear into a Buddhist monastery in Nepal, but not Tom," he had told me. Another acquaintance said, "I met him at this party full of white Kenyans and he was completely the old Tom, well dressed, well spoken, abrasive, on the verge of arrogance. He said he was in touch every day with the Naivasha police, and he was happy with the way they were handling trespassers and poachers." This acquaintance was struck by his seeming obliviousness to the animosity the killing had stirred up. "I said, 'Don't you think some people want your land?' He acted like it had never crossed his mind. Finally, he said, 'Oh, maybe I should look into that.' He's protected by all that money he has. He lives in a bubble; he's a bit naive."

Simpson insisted that, deep down, he is a generous and compassionate man. "Look, we wouldn't be here in Kenya if we weren't all eccentrics," he said. "Everyone here is more flamboyant than the average person you'll meet on the streets of London. But we're all aware of our social responsibilities. I've sat here with Tom in this Indian restaurant, with black Kenyans, Indians, shooting the breeze, and he's totally comfortable with them. He is a believer in Kenya."