Madagascar

by Stephen Holgate

  John settles into a wooden armchair. An open Bible lies on the armrest next to a tall glass of beer. Barrow follows my gaze and gives me a sidelong glance. “Can I get …?”

  “It’s all right, John. I think I’ve quit.”

  The tall man smiles and gently places his beer on the floor, out of my line of sight. “I’m glad to hear it, Robert. I’ve prayed for it many times. Maybe I could fetch you a mango juice?”

  “No. I’m fine. I’m only here for a few minutes.” It feels good to speak to someone with whom I can come to the point. “The embassy has sent me down here to check out some talk of unrest. I was in town today talking to the mayor and the police chief. They tell me that nothing is happening, nothing has happened, and nothing will happen.”

  John clasps his big hands before him and leans forward in his chair. The strength of his faith and his deep commitment to the truth make him a blunt-spoken man. “They’re lying,” he tells me. “Ravalisona, the mayor, isn’t a bad sort. He’s trying, though the government doesn’t give him any resources to work with, no real budget, and he’s going mad with frustration. In public, though, or with visiting dignitaries such as yourself, he toes the government line. The police captain, Andriamana, is another story. An evil man. I say that without hesitation. Smart. Capable. More complicated than he seems. I’ve been in a few meetings with him over the last year and I’ve never sounded his depth. But I believe he’s capable of anything.”

  “Tell me what’s going on.”

  For half an hour the churchman describes the coastal people’s growing resentment toward their government, the impoverishment of the local farmers and their abandonment of the fields. He draws a clear picture of his demoralized congregation, adding that policemen have broken up peaceful demonstrations in town and arrested several of his parishioners. “After that, gangs of young men took to looting. Some of them see it as a form of protest. That makes it easy for Andriamana’s goons to deflect them into attacking foreign merchants, take the heat off the government. The Indian’s are everyone’s favorite enemy, and there’s no one to stand up for them. The Malagasy are generally the most peaceful people, but they store up their anger—against their government, against their poverty, against their ancestors—and when they reach the breaking point they explode. You’re taking quite a risk just being out tonight.”

  “Yeah, I think my driver was trying to tell me the same thing.” I shift a little uneasily on the sofa. “These gangs come out after dark?”

  Barrow nods. “And the police, too. They may have uniforms, but they’re undisciplined and untrained. They see everyone as their enemy. They’re very dangerous.”

  “Do you think this sort of thing is happening in other areas of the country?”

  Barrow spreads his hands wide. “How could it not?”

  He’s made things clear for me and I thank him for it. We speak for a couple of minutes of life in the capital. Barrow asks after a couple of mutual acquaintances and I rise to go.

  “You might do better to spend the night here, Robert,” John says. “I don’t like the idea of you out on the road at this hour.”

  “Thanks, but I’ve got to leave early and my things are at the hotel. I’ll be fine.”

  He gives me a penetrating look. “How are you doing these days?”

  “I’m okay.”

  “Your face tells a different story. It looks like five miles of bad road. Do you want to tell me about it?”

  “Too long a tale. Another time.”

  “Have you spoken to your daughter lately?”

  “A few days ago. She’s fine.”

  “And you’ve been working on your resentment toward her?”

  “Resentment? Why should I feel resentment toward her?”

  “Because you’re so angry with yourself—and your love for her is so strong.”

  Like I say, the man goes straight to the point and speaks the truth. “I’m—We’re fine.”

  “I’m glad.” He stands and looks at me, waiting for more. When I say nothing, he doesn’t insist, but grips my hand. “Do you want to take a moment to join me in prayer before you go?”

  I smile, embarrassed. “Have I ever?”

  “No. But I keep asking.”

  “Say one for me.”

  “I will, you know.”

  “You don’t know how I count on it.”

  We walk together out to the embassy car. The heavy night air hasn’t let go of the day’s heat and I feel a prickle of sweat on my back and arms. As we walk past the church I notice masonry has fallen from the building. Cracks line the mortar between the bricks.

  John Barrow reads my thoughts. “I look around me,” he says, “and I don’t know whether I’m seeing an ancient way of life crumbling to a sad end, or a new and better one being born.”

  I want to tell him that I wonder the same thing about myself.

  Barrow looks at the car. “You don’t have a driver?”

  “He’s lying in the back seat. Says he’s not feeling well.”

  At the sound of our voices Samuel sits up, his eyes dull and his shoulders sagging. Barrow leans into the car and speaks with him for a few moments in Malagasy. He puts a hand to Samuel’s forehead and frowns. “He’s burning with fever,” Barrow tells me. “Says it’s malaria. Comes and goes. I tried to convince him to stay the night. I have a little clinic. The Bible Society gives us a bit of medical training before we go overseas. He says he can’t stay. He has to take care of you.” He lets that sink in for a moment. “I have some pills I could give him. It should start bringing the fever down.”

  Barrow goes back to the house and returns with the pills, which Samuel swallows. The tall preacher turns to me. “If you insist on going back to Tamatave tonight, I think you’d better drive. Be careful.”

  “You know me.”

  When it all goes wrong, it goes wrong very quickly. Though I can’t remember passing through any villages on the way out of Tamatave, I find myself coming into one, and am sure I’ve taken the wrong road. At the edge of the village a signpost indicates the route to Tamatave lies somewhere behind us. Unable to make a U-turn on the narrow dirt road, I take a rutted track that appears to loop back and should point us again toward Tamatave.

  It doesn’t. After twisting around, it brings me back into the same village from another direction.

  I turn to Samuel lying in the back seat. “I think I’ve gotten us lost.”

  The Malagasy props himself up and peers out at the village. Its few dark lanes appear deserted. No life shows from any of the buildings along the road.

  “Where are we?”

  It seems to take him a long time to decipher the question. “I think we are in Adilazana, sir.”

  “Is that good or bad?”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I see dark forms flitting between two buildings. When I turn to look, they are gone.

  “It depends, sir.”

  It would. “Which way do I go?”

  From a dark side street I hear shouting and the pounding of running feet, like the sound of heavy rain.

  “I’m not sure, sir.” Samuel pauses, his mind working slowly against the fever. “I think we should turn around and go the other way.”

  “That’s the way to Tamatave?”

  Samuel shakes his head. He looks very uneasy. “I don’t know, patron, but I think we should leave this town.”

  From somewhere in front of us comes the crash of shattering glass and a loud whoof. I look up to see blue flames burst against a row of shacks, the fire flowing like a waterfall down the wooden walls. Silhouetted against the flames, a group of young men run down the street toward our car.

  “Turn around, Mr. Knott! We need to leave this place.”

  I try to make a quick U-turn, but the dirt lane is too narrow for the Peugeot and I hit a wooden post I hadn’t seen. I back up, the steering wheel shuddering in my hands. The right front wheel whirs loudly against its crumpled fender. Another shack bursts into flames in front of me. Half
a dozen young men throw their hands in the air, shouting in triumph.

  Out of the darkness comes a flat pop-pop-pop. The young men scatter.

  “That is gunfire, sir,” Samuel says from the back seat, his voice tight. “Get out of this town, Monsieur Knott.”

  “I’m doing the best I can.” Fighting the balky steering wheel, I manage to back the car around and point it down the street.

  I realize later that the police must have been waiting in the shadows for the fire bombs to explode, ready to crack down against the violence they knew was coming and had probably provoked. Now they run into the unpaved street, dragging two metal barriers after them, and set up a roadblock. One of them lights a couple of flares and throws them into the road, illuminating the scene in an intense red light that give the policemen the lurid appearance of apprentice fiends.

  I drive slowly toward the barriers and hope I appear to be exactly what I am, a befuddled vazaha who has taken a disastrously wrong turn.

  Two policemen, one with sergeant’s stripes on his arm, stand at the barricade. As I drive toward them the one who isn’t a sergeant fires a burst into the air from his AK-47, orange flame flaring from the muzzle.

  I involuntarily duck my head but continue to creep forward. My hands are slippery with sweat. My foot hovers over the accelerator then the brake and back to the accelerator. I’m afraid that if I stop the car they won’t let me pass. I’m equally afraid that if I don’t stop they’ll shoot me.

  As we approach the roadblock, the sergeant spots the car’s diplomatic plate. After a moment of hesitation, he waves me through.

  I roll into the narrow gap between the metal barriers. As I do, a movement in the rear-view mirror catches my eye.

  Two policemen are running toward us in the dark, shouting and waving their guns. One of them stops, pulls back the bolt on his assault rifle and braces to fire.

  With my car blocking their view of the barricade, these two apparently haven’t seen the sergeant wave me through. They think I’m running the barricade.

  From the back seat Samuel lets out a cry. “Patron, they’re going to shoot!”

  The chatter of the rifle, the crash of the breaking glass, and the whir of the bullets passing through the car come in one single, terrifying roar. I stand on the accelerator and the car jumps through the barricades, scattering the policemen in front of us.

  They jump out of the way and bring their weapons up to fire. I turn sharply down a narrow dirt lane. The rattle of automatic rifles breaks through the chaos of burning buildings and running men.

  I curse as the unpaved lane quickly ends in a T formed by an intersecting footpath. My foot falls off the clutch as I slam on the brakes and the car dies. That’s when I hear Samuel groan.

  Shouts and the thud of approaching boots come from the direction of the roadblock. I doubt they’re running up to apologize.

  I jump out of the car, throw open the back door, put my hands under Samuel’s arms and drag him out of the car. “Are you hit, Samuel? Samuel?” I feel something warm and sticky on my hands and hear him groan.

  Half-dragging, half-carrying Samuel, I stumble down the footpath, which runs along the back of a row of wooden shacks. I look up an alley that opens to my left. I see the glow of burning buildings and hear the popping of gunfire.

  Where the path and the alley intersect, I lay Samuel in a sitting position against the wall of a hut. A dark stain has spread over his shirt.

  “You’ve been hit.”

  Samuel rolls his head back. “Yes, sir,” he says, his voice thick with shock.

  I tear his shirt open, but can’t see much in the dark. When I draw my hand back it’s covered in blood. “Where are you hit?”

  “My arm, I think, sir. I am sorry, sir. I did not mean to get hurt.” He blinks like a man warding off sleep.

  I hear someone approaching along the alley. Against the light of the flames I see two women running toward us. Behind them, a policeman stops maybe fifty yards away and raises his rifle. Flame sputters from the barrel. The report echoes off the walls of the wooden huts.

  The women scream. One of them falls to the ground. The other turns away from us down the footpath and hides behind a hut. From its shelter, she peers back at her fallen companion, who now jumps to her feet and, shouting unintelligibly, gets to the end of the lane and runs up the footpath in the opposite direction, going by without seeing us. The first woman starts to run after her. When she comes into the open, the policeman fires again.

  Bullets whiz around us. I hug the ground, pulling Samuel down after me. The woman has stopped in the middle of the lane, frozen in fear.

  “Get down!” I shout in French and grab her by the arm. She falls in a heap across Samuel and me.

  Crying out in Malagasy, she tries to scramble to her feet.

  “Stay down!” I yell at her.

  I hear the running boots growing closer. A flashlight plays off the walls of the wooden shacks. Again, the woman tries to get up. I’m sure the policeman will fire again if she runs, and at this range he won’t miss. So I hug her close, try to keep her from getting up.

  The wandering beam of the flashlight falls across her face for an instant, and I see her clearly for the first time.

  “My God!”

  Nirina stops struggling, her eyes wide in astonishment.

  The shadow of the gunman falls across us. I see a silhouette pulling back a rifle bolt and bracing to fire. I put an arm around Nirina’s shoulders as she buries her head against my chest. Eerily calm, I close my eyes and wait for the man to shoot us dead.

  “Non!” The voice comes out of the distance.

  Over the distant cries of running men and the crackling of flames from the main street, I hear a heavy tread advancing up the lane.

  “Put a light on them,” the voice orders. The flashlight shines in our faces, and I can’t see anything against its glare.

  He must see the blood on my hands, because he says, “You’ve been shot.” Something about the voice sounds familiar.

  “No,” I tell him. “It’s my driver.”

  “Get on your feet.”

  Holding my hands away from my body, I let Nirina slide to the ground as I get to my feet.

  “That one is your driver?”

  “Yes.”

  I sense the mind behind the voice, feel it assessing the situation, making a decision.

  “Bon. Get out of here and take him to a doctor.”

  “He’s bleeding. Don’t you have a medic with—”

  “This isn’t a medical mission.” He says something to the group of policemen around him. Two of them grab Samuel and pull him to his feet. He screams in pain.

  “They will get him to your car,” the voice tells me.

  “My car’s all shot up.”

  “You shouldn’t have tried to flee. You think as a Westerner you are above the law.”

  Now I’ve got it, the voice.

  “I was lost, Captain Andriamana. One of your men waved us through the barricade, but when I drove through, others started shooting at us.”

  The Captain grunts in scorn. He appears even taller than I remember and looks at me like Death its own self. “Now I understand why you sneered at me when I told you it was the foreigners causing our troubles. You’re one of them.”

  I want to tell him that I wasn’t the one sneering during our meeting with the mayor, but decide it’s wiser not to bring that up. As with most bullies, there’s something defensive, an insecurity in Andriamana. It makes him sense disdain in anything said to him by a Westerner. I remember the look the Captain gave me when I mentioned the Zebu Room. I have no idea what that was about, and this doesn’t seem like the moment to ask. Right now, I’m hoping that even he doesn’t have the nerve to shoot a diplomat in cold blood, at least with witnesses present.

  Lowering my hands slowly, I tell him, “I didn’t come here to cause trouble. I told you, I was lost. I turned up here by mistake.”

  Andriamana snorts in disbelie
f, then gives a long, appraising look at Nirina, still lying on the ground.

  “The girl comes with me,” he says.

  Nirina rises, her face slack with fear. She looks at the captain and his men and senses her fate.

  “No. She stays with me.” I struggle to breathe normally. The Captain could still shoot me and call it an accident.

  Andriamana pauses surprised. “You know her?”

  “Yes.” I take Nirina’s arm and speak quietly into her ear, “My car is in the next lane. Find it and get in.”

  She starts to walk away, but it will require her to walk past Andriamana, and I can see her lose her nerve. She stops and backs into me.

  A twitch of uncertainty clouds the policeman’s gaze. He looks at me, looks at the girl. Makes some calculation of risk and reward. Then he laughs to cover his retreat. “You’re a lucky man, Monsieur Knott. I promise you, the next time, I will not see you so clearly in the dark. Now get out. Both of you.” With a soft exhalation of contempt, Captain Andriamana turns on his heel and walks away. Before he’s taken two strides, he stops. “I wouldn’t go toward Tamatave, if I were you. The roads are full of trouble tonight. It would grieve me to hear you were hurt.”

  What he means is that it would be a nuisance he doesn’t need if one of his men should kill me.

  Two policemen drag Samuel by his arms, the driver groaning as he struggles to stay on his feet. Nirina and I follow.

  Out of the sight of their captain and in the presence of an evidently important vazaha the soldiers are happy to help when I ask them to pull the fender off the front tire. They lay Samuel across the back seat. One opens the door for Nirina, like a valet. I think of tipping him, but figure he’d shoot me. You can only push things so far.

  Broken glass litters the car’s interior and the smell of blood turns my stomach. The back window is blown out, the front one starred and cracked. Bullets have punched holes in the trunk and rear fenders, but apparently not the gas tank. To my surprise, the car starts at the first turn of the key. Heeding the Captain’s advice, I take the road leading away from Tamatave. I ask Nirina, “You know the American church near Panandrana?”