The things the General wanted to do to this man were indescribable. He had, after all, auctioned his demise a long time ago. But wonder of wonders, the money remained unclaimed. It said a lot about his power and the state of the army. He spat a mouthful of soda in the grass near the Englishman’s shining shoes.
“It is people of very crude origins who do things like that,” Ashes said, inhaling a large volume of smoke from his cigar, as if to wipe away the insult. He looked disappointed. He saw how easy it was to destroy him. One word in the Marshal’s ear and he would be dead. He realized that these men received too much power too early in life, before they had learned iron discipline and proper detachment. It was the reason why the country had gone to the dogs; it was full of dogs. The very fact that he could come in and take over, and make millions of dollars, showed how rotten the structure was. He was sure of one thing though: he would not be around when the edifice collapsed on these people’s heads. He savoured his superior attitude with flair: this was the first time in his life that he worked with people he really despised. These men had given him little to respect them for. They were too predictable, the typical dumb soldiers who reached for the gun even if they only meant to take a piss.
He remembered the time that his wife’s house was razed to the ground. He had suspected General Fart, but he had kept his head and said nothing. On that day he just kissed his wife, and they spent the day on the island hunting parrots, roasting fish and later on making love. Now he regretted that it was not his men who had bombed Geneal Fart’s wife’s car. He would have savoured it more, and the woman would be dead as a doornail. For all the tough talk these men spouted, he knew they were afraid. Of the Marshal, of himself, of Dr. Ali, of the future. There was a rift of weakness in them. A general who allowed his wife to go out unprotected didn’t strike him as tough or sensible. In these times a general’s wife had to go out escorted by automatic rifles and Shark helicopters.
“One day you will regret this, I can assure you,” he heard the General, medals dancing, face swollen, eyes popping, say pathetically.
“We all have things to regret; it is the human condition, General. Maybe you more than I. I have one rule in life: I don’t look back. That is how I have survived to reach this age. Somebody blasts me, I blast back. If I don’t, I have myself to blame. If one day you become president, send a whole battalion of your sharp-shooters to arrest me. If you send boys, I will kill them all, and you wouldn’t want to begin your reign with burials, would you? Otherwise, I don’t give a bloody damn. If you do, then maybe you are in the wrong business, General.”
“One day you will see . . .” General Bazooka uttered, feeling constipated by hate and ire.
“I live by the day, General. If I wake up dead one day, I won’t regret it. I do my job chasing and burning smugglers on the lake. If you boys did your work on land, and in your ministries, this would indeed be the pearl of Africa.”
Unable to stand it any longer, General Bazooka stormed off, trailed by his entourage. Few people paid attention; hatred among the top brass was as common as fleas on a dog.
FOUR STINGERS STOPPED at the front and the back of Victoria’s block of flats, and soldiers rushed in to secure the corridors. People peeped through their windows to see who had arrived. Many suspected that somebody was being arrested by the Eunuchs, the Bureau or the Public Safety Unit. They waited in vain to see some subdued figure emerge caged in a phalanx of soldiers.
It was around eight o’clock. Victoria had just finished feeding her daughter, who was in a good mood. She was walking about pulling things, laughing, jabbering. She brought her mother a pink doll. She pulled her mother’s hair, as if to make it as straight as that of the doll. Victoria’s heart sank when she heard the crunching of the boots. The noise seemed to confirm her worst fears that somebody wanted to kill her. It did not help that she had had a big row with Bat. He had ordered her to stop bothering his wife. He had confirmed that their relationship was over. He had shown her the wedding ring. He had told her that he knew who she really was. He had made it clear that her dreams of salvation did not include him; at least not in the role she wanted. He had remained impervious to her offers of everlasting love. She had cried, begged, and tried to use the child as leverage, but failed.
“You don’t understand. You performed a miracle. This child is a big miracle. You don’t understand, but one day you will,” she had insisted. He had then marched out of the flat.
In the meantime, she had decided to reconcile with her mother and family. She had spent a month looking for them in the villages but had not found them. Every time she found a promising lead, it crumbled. Had they changed names? Had they been swallowed by the endless cattle-rearing plains? Had they fled to Tanzania and joined the guerrillas? Her mother too! Had they died of malaria? The one aunt she had managed to locate refused to cooperate. Sworn to secrecy. Infuriated, Victoria had threatened to kill her, and the woman had said: “You see? That is the reason why everybody deserted you. You wanted to kill them. Your man sent soldiers to them. If they had not bribed them, they would be dead now.” She had left with a heavy heart.
Now General Bazooka stood in front of her, medals glinting in the yellow light, swagger stick held stiffly in his left hand, gently tapping his right palm.
“I am very glad to see you, General.”
“You don’t look too happy.”
“I am extremely happy,” she said, kneeling down to greet him in the traditional way. A wench paying homage to her prince.
“Stand up, Vicki. I want to see your eyes.”
“Yes, General,” she replied, hardly able to stand straight.
“Did you hear what happened to my wife?”
“It was a very sad, cowardly act,” she said, echoing the national radio word for word.
“Are you the newsreader? Whatever happened to your brain?”
“I am very sorry to hear what happened to her.”
“As if you didn’t hate her.”
“I don’t, General.”
“Whatever happened to your sense of duty? I gave you an assignment, and instead of doing your job you fell in love with the goat-fucker. What does that say about you, eh?”
“It just happened, General.”
“Did that man know that I had fucked you?”
“No, General.”
“Stop calling me General as if I were a general store,” he screamed. “Why did you betray me, Vicki? Was it a bleeding southerner conspiracy?”
“I couldn’t get him to talk. He was too sophisticated for me.”
“You could fuck him to death but couldn’t make him open his mouth! Had he no family? Nobody of use? Where is your bloody brain? Is there nothing in that pumpkin on your bleeding neck?”
“You ordered me to focus on him. You said nothing about his family.”
“I have just been told that there was a man who used to make fireworks shows. Where did he go?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you know what all these negations mean? That we are paying people for nothing, that the Bureau is a smokescreen, a pile of shit. If the Bureau can’t find this man, why are we paying you? Why don’t we stage a firing squad and shoot you all in front of the public?” He was yelling and advancing towards her as if to ram the stick down her open mouth. “My wife lies in hospital blinded, burned, arm torn off, and nobody knows who did it. Dissidents are running free in the city, known to some of you, and you are helping them bring the government down.”
Victoria kept quiet and stood very still, praying, hoping.
“Do you love that child?”
“Very much.”
“Do you know whose child it is? It is mine. Next time I am going to rename it and introduce it to its true family.”
“Yes, General.”
“Start doing your duty, for the child’s sake. Do you hear me? I am keeping an eye on you. Unless you pay your dues, you won’t have any peace of mind. Not for one second. You know me well. I have spoken
,” he said, echoing the old kings. Dead kings. He suddenly asked himself why he was wasting precious time when he knew who the real enemy was. He would have peace of mind only when Reptile was dead. Without saying another word he turned around, collided with a bodyguard and left.
Victoria remained where she had been, near the thin sofa, the radio, the pot of artificial flowers. She had saved Bat’s life once again. She had a crushing conviction that he was rightfully hers, and she, his saviour. She had to act quickly to make him hers, hers alone. There was only one person standing between him and her, and that was Babit. She had to go. From now on there would be no more phone calls, no more threats, no more words of advice. She had to go. The General’s problems didn’t interest her in the least. She had hers and it was called Babit. She had to go.
IN THE MEANTIME, cars continued exploding in different towns. People did not know what to do about it. There was a general fear of cars, and of shops and of crowded places. Bat wondered what was going on. He had waited in vain to hear the pirate radio broadcasting. His sister had never heard of it. The Kalandas and the Professor thought he was pulling their leg. They called it Lake Radio, meaning that it was a fiction, like the failed lake Amin had tried to make.
“How many people did the pirates move in order to start their broadcasts?” the Professor ridiculed.
Bat kept quiet about his brother and the money he had supplied. Too sensitive a secret. He gave Babit the task of tracking the radio day and night. She scanned the waves, turning the dial round and round, watching the pointer slide past numbers back and forth, amidst explosions of claptrap and the occasional clear sound.
“Why all this interest in pirates?”
“Aren’t you eager to hear when the country will be liberated, and what kind of people are going to do it?”
“Do you know what I think? This radio station doesn’t exist and you are just teasing me.”
“Yes, indeed, but keep at it. I am tired of working for these idiots.”
“What do you think about these car bombings? I sometimes think that you should stop using that car.”
“My XJ10? You are joking. I keep it in the ministry garage. To get at it the bomber would have to shoot the guards first.”
“It is evident that he is bombing cars and shops belonging to security agents. But suppose he mistakes your car for the two belonging to the generals?”
“Don’t worry. Nothing will happen to me, dear.”
“Why doesn’t the group claim responsibility?”
“They want to keep Amin and his men on their toes.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“I am a very educated man, remember?” he said, chuckling.
“Yes, Professor.”
She was glad that things were going well. So often after marriage things cooled down and became boringly routine. She had had her fears, which had proved to be unfounded. She was glad that he had talked to Victoria and, as a result, there were no more threats. Twice a week he drove home for lunch. She enjoyed those days the most. They compensated for his absences and late homecoming. They were like two extra Sundays, days marked by anticipation and intense pleasure. She never fretted about money any more. It seemed he would never run out of work. All the ministries wanted him. They no longer interviewed him; they just hired him. One day the Englishman was bound to come. And maybe they would fly back with him, and sleep in the Grand Empire and eat all those strange foods.
Bat had hinted at visiting America. Babit noticed that he read more and more biographies of American sportsmen, film stars, politicians . . . She believed it was his form of gossip, a search for other people’s secrets . . . It would be nice to go there. Maybe by then they would have children. If not, maybe they would go to a specialist and get her checked. By then she would have completed her teaching course. For now though, on with the search for the elusive radio pirates.
Three
In Limbo
There were days so fine, so suffused with bright light falling from high-domed skies, the beauty of delicate clouds, the perfume of gentle winds, the gloss of exuberant vegetation, the sheer delight of living in a bubble of peace amidst an inferno, that Bat felt totally in tune with life. He was not a religious man, but once a month he accompanied his wife to church. She chose the best suit for him, the darkest shoes, the best tie. For herself she picked the finest midi- or maxi-gown, matching accessories and a subtle, expensive perfume. They would emerge from the house and stand on the steps surveying the flower bushes, red and purple bougainvilleas; the towering thousand-year-old trees, majestic, their branches spread high above; the lake, a broken marble surface linking them to neighbouring countries in a fraternity of water; and the XJ10, the crown jewel, shining, ready to go. They would descend the steps and drive away.
At church they would mingle with well-dressed men and women who worked in the beleaguered civil service, the diplomatic corps, the remnants of the aviation service, and the armed forces. In mufti, the soldiers and the spies tried to make themselves as invisible as possible. Bat liked the fact that these days the church had turned into a human rights podium. Priests spoke out directly or indirectly against the disappearances, the killings, the abuses. The clergy had felt the bite of the bayonet, the sting of the bullet, and it made a difference. The words rolled off the priest’s tongue with conviction, steeped in pain. Bat liked to sit there and think of good memories, his achievements, because his captivity had taught him how precious and luxurious the fine moments were.
On such days he liked to be surprised by uninvited guests who turned up to interrupt and enrich a day he had offered to the whims of time, to his wife, to leisure. If it happened to be his sister, they would talk about her son, her work, the state of the country. Living in a rural area, she would have a different view, a down-to-earth vision.
When his parents came, they talked about the past, who had lived where and done what. His father liked his job, a proper job, as he called it. He would mourn the fact that the coffee trade had been undermined by smuggling. His mother said little; she had always been a very reticent person. Your father talks for both of us, she used to say. His father had a bad memory now and he believed that everybody was ripping him off. Bat found it comical and would laugh.
“I always dreamed of seeing London and visiting the British Leyland plant,” he revealed one day.
“Why didn’t you say so before?”
“Where would you have got the money to take me and your mother?”
“Where there is a will, there is a way, Father.”
“It is a dream I wanted to keep. But when your wife said there were parts like Naguru and Bwaise, I believed it was better that I had not gone.”
When Babit’s people turned up, he would drive them round the town, to the zoo, to the airport, to the Botanical Gardens, to the landing point at Katabi where food and fish came in from the islands. Standing there always reminded him that Entebbe was a peninsula, almost choked by water, which in places was just a few metres from the road to the city. It was not hard to imagine floods rising out of the lake or crashing out of an angry sky, submerging the town for weeks, and receding to reveal a new island or clutch of small islands. It often made him curious about Robert Ashes’ island. During these visits Babit led the conversation, and Bat enjoyed watching her and her people interacting.
IN THE MEANTIME, the search for the bombers intensified. Numerous arrests had already been made by the Bureau, the Public Safety Unit and, not to be outdone, by the Eunuchs. The Ministry of Internal Affairs set up a team to hunt down and destroy these men. It was believed to be a big group organized into small cells. Bat heard about all these operations and wondered where his brother was. Why had he heard nothing from him for so long? He hoped that Tayari had nothing to do with the bombings, especially after General Bazooka’s wife got injured. He did not believe that the bombers were responsible for the General’s wife’s fate. He believed it was the result of infighting, possibly sanctioned by Amin to punish
the man for one reason or other. General Bazooka’s current low profile seemed to confirm the theory.
AT AROUND THIS TIME Victoria disappeared. She moved from her flat without informing Bat. He suspected that she wanted more money from him, which was fair since he had not seen her for some time now. At the Ministry of Works headquarters he was told that she had been transferred to Bombo, a town dominated by a military barracks on the way to the north. He decided to let her show her hand, as she eventually would.
Soon after, his brother’s fate became clear. As Bat was driving home one evening, a man waved him down at a road junction. He held a piece of paper out to him in the darkness. Bat lowered the window and took it, and the man walked away without saying a word. He parked by the roadside and read the note: “Abel, one of us killed. Radio failed. Sorry. Cain is alive and keeping watch.”
Bat’s suspicions were confirmed: his brother was involved in the bombings. He felt a jolt of fear. He felt exposed, open to attack from unknown forces. There were many questions he wanted to ask his brother, the biggest being whether he had targeted the General’s wife in order to extract revenge for him. And if he had thought about the possible consequences. He suddenly felt very angry with him. He regretted having given him the money. He wished there was something he could do to make him renounce his campaign of violence. The fact that he was the only family member who knew what Tayari was up to made him feel like an accomplice. By giving him the money he had become one, but what was he to do now? It had been exciting to hear about Bureau cars exploding, but where would it all end? And who was the dead boy? Where was Tayari hiding?
The news that his brother was keeping an eye on him did not reassure Bat. Nobody could be reassured when a government’s resources were turned to hunting somebody down. Luck always tended to run out. People tended to make mistakes as the pressure mounted.
Bat chewed the paper and threw it out the window. Did Tayari know where Victoria was? Where was his daughter now? In the barracks? He cursed himself and the circumstances for letting his child grow up in such an environment. Some mistakes seemed to carry incredibly harsh sentences, hurting everybody in the end, especially the innocent.
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