“When I was in America several years ago, I tried to find an America beer that tasted like real beer. There was one with a man on the label, a revolutionary. It was good, the rest not very, I’m afraid. America is a strange country. You have much, a lot, is that right?” Hanley nodded.
“And it is beautiful, what I saw of it. I have seen pictures of the western states, Utah, you know. And your government works well, well compared to most. But your people lack passion, it seems to me,” Dr Dzyak said. “I don’t mean to offend you, my friend. I mean, I am drinking your good whiskey. But Americans seem to always be sleepwalking or sleep-driving.” With his legs pulled up and his arms resting on his knees, the doctor sat, leaning against the wall of the barracks, looking up into the evening sky. Wiping his nose with the back of his hand, he said, “It’s dusty here, always much dust.”
Hanley said, “America has grown lazy, I’m afraid. We have enough to live our lives very comfortably, at least until we get older. Some Americans have way too much, more than they’ll ever need. We have lost our balance and certainly our sense of urgency. When our lifetimes were shorter, we valued our time more. When our children wanted, we wanted to give them more, we fought to give them more. Now, we spoil them and teach them that owning a car is more important than learning the rhythms of poetry. We’ve lost touch with ourselves, with what is truly meaningful in our lives. I’m sorry, I’m getting drunk.” Hanley’s head rested against the side of the building.
“Don’t apologize, I like Americans drunk, they’re more like the rest of us that way,” the doctor said.
Hanley’s first month at the mission in Mapuordit passed quickly with the flying and the other work he was taking on. Watching the daily operation gave Hanley a sense there was order to the work being done, but not efficiency. Knowing he could and should not involve himself in the medical or spiritual side, Hanley thought he might help with the planning and scheduling. A little order in a life never hurts, his aunt would say to him at some point each summer. It was one of those sayings heard in childhood that people carried to their graves. Perhaps he could be the mission’s efficiency expert. Many hospitals use them, he reasoned, why not a medical mission in Sudan. He though the whiskey might be getting to him.
“Doctor, I have the impression Sister Marie Claire runs this mission. I know that Father Robineau is the actual manager of the school and the clinic, but it sure seems to me she is in charge of most of the activities here,” Hanley said. He watched the doctor who was tilting the glass to his lips. The glass came away, leaving a drop of the brown liquid hanging on the edge of his lower lip, which he quickly and quite deftly, Hanley thought, pushed back into his mouth with the forefinger of his left hand.
“In some ways, she does run things, but not all,” the doctor said. “It has to do with Father Robineau’s age, some with the time they have spent together. He relies on her because he trusts her to help manage. I have only been here a few weeks, but I know of this. I belong to a network of physicians in Europe, a group that donates our services to the Fathers of Notre Dame. We talk, you know, we share our experiences. The situation here is known to us. It’s not gossip, Mr Martin, it’s preparation.” Another sip and the doctor sighed, saying, “The diocese in Rumbek is not as trusting of the nun as the good Father is. But even he worries about the other issue.”
“Other issue?”
“The children. The good sister has an obsession of sorts. Over the years, it seems, she has watched the devastation this war has taken on the people of Sudan and she is angered. The pain and suffering of the children, which affects us all, has affected Sister Marie Claire more. That pain has caused her pain and has become intolerable. Rumor has it she has become part of a movement, no that’s not right. She has joined a group, an underground, that helps children. Gathering them up and moving them to safety, giving them shelter, food and medical treatment when needed. I have noticed that sometimes we will see children at the clinic in groups, brought by one or two adults. Sometimes the same adults. No one says anything, no one asks questions. The children are cared for and Sister Marie Claire always talks to them and the adults that bring them. There is something there, we know this. Exactly what that is, we don’t ask,” the doctor explained.
From somewhere came the sound of a vehicle, Jumma and his companion returning with the water. Hanley pulled down his pant leg and pushed himself from the box. Stretching, he walked to the corner of the building, leaning against the weathered plywood sheeting, the chipped edge biting into his shoulder. Still holding the glass, he judged by its weight there was a sip or two remaining. Swirling the whiskey around with a barely perceptible rotation of his hand, Hanley thought about his granddaughter, wondered if there would be anyone who would care for her under such circumstances as now existed here in Sudan. Looking into the glass, he thought of her, ached for her a bit. Turning back to the doctor, Hanley asked, “Does the diocese try to stop her from helping the children?”
“I have heard they have ordered her not to be involved. I do know she ignores those orders. Father Robineau does not intervene, allowing the nun to deal directly with the bishop in Rumbek. Father Robineau’s relationship with the head of the order shields him from the diocese, who are left to fight the nun on their own. It is not a fair fight, as they say,” the doctor said. Swinging his legs over the side of the box and onto the grass, Dr Dzyak stood, twisting his upper body in a swiveling motion to stretch and then he turned to face the American. Taking his pursed lips between his fingers, he looked at the ground, seeming to Hanley he was contemplating what he was about to say. Looking up, he smiled and said, “As I am sure you are starting to see, things are done differently in Sudan. A place like this has no rules, the rules are made up as needed. Otherwise, people would not survive. Sister Marie Claire knows this. She knows there are no limits. And she appears to be willing to go to any limit to help these children. Their needs are unlimited and so is her desire to help them.”
“One more thing, doctor, please. If the diocese is not helping her, who is? Is she doing this alone?” Hanley asked.
Shaking his head, Dr Dyzak said, “I don’t know, really. I hear things, we all do. Supposedly there are others involved. Who, again, I don’t know. Perhaps you should ask her. I do know she does not talk about it, at least not here.”
“Maybe I will. Thank you,” Hanley said. Dr Dyzak walked away toward the clinic. Darkness was on the mission now, the night clear and warm. Looking up, Hanley searched the sky for the constellations he knew, which would be difficult. Here in Mapuordit, he was close to the equator. Here, his point of view was different.
***
Jumma walked along the road to the mission, a spiral-bound notebook in his hand, watching the group of children and two adults ahead of him as they neared the compound. The adults, a man and a woman, were perhaps thirty, maybe a bit older, the children were all very young. No one in the group spoke, their pace was brisk. All the children were dressed in bright colored tee shirts and beige shorts, with rubber sandals on their feet. Jumma followed behind, monitoring their progress but also watching the road behind them for dust or listening for the sounds of a vehicle. Seeing dust might give him more time to get the group off the road and hidden in the brush, if need be.
They were a half-mile from the mission, another twenty minutes, Jumma estimated. This was the first group in over a month. In the three months before that, there had been seven groups, almost forty children, all led by two adults, almost always couples, but twice just men. Over the years, the pattern was much the same, sporadic in the sense that there was no set schedule, but the effort apparently constant. The network was in place, the people involved dedicated to their purpose. They stayed at the mission for a few days, then moved on. Each time, a truck came to the mission and took the group, including the adults, away, heading south to Kenya and the refugee camps. Jumma knew this because it was his job to know. Jumma was helping Sister Marie Claire with the children. It was how he came to Mapuordit. He
had been rescued while still separated from his family. Now he helped. It was what he could do for the nun, for having saved him. She would always have his help for as long as she needed. Forever if necessary.
***
He saw her coming from across the road, from where the lepers received treatment, a white cloth in her hand, her face rigid, showing stress, he thought. He was beginning to understand. There was now a mission for her beyond the administration of medicine, beyond the simple act of healing those fortunate enough to reach Mapuordit. Hanley wondered if her commitment to the children was now stronger than her commitment to the order she served. He wondered if Sudan was now the alter she stood before, the violence its sin, its children the souls to be saved.
Hanley saw his first group of small souls the day before. Children, some barely older than his granddaughter, led by two adults, a part of Sister Marie Claire’s network, he supposed. There was a quiet tension that surrounded them as they were guided to tents, the care for the children beginning immediately. The young Irish doctor and a nurse examined the children while the nun spoke with the adults. He also saw Jumma, standing at some distance, watching the group and those tending to them. He did not appear to be involved, but watched intently as the examinations continued and the children were fed. Jumma sat watching and then writing in his notebook. What is he writing, Hanley wondered.
As the nun approached, Hanley waited by a small bush near the edge of the roadway. Nearing the bush, Sister Marie Claire looked up, saw the American and smiled. Wiping her forehead with the back of her hand, she asked, “Have you been waiting long?”
“No, not really. You’ve been working early enough. The sun’s just rising,” he said.
“If we see the sun in the morning, then we are the fortunate ones, no?” she asked
Each day at the mission started at dawn. By the time the sun had crawled above the hills enough to be seen, the compound was up and moving, fires in the outlying camps glowing brighter as the chilled people added wood, the children huddled near the heat, hoping for something to eat. The mission’s kitchen fed as many people as it had food with which to feed.
“Have you had breakfast?” he asked.
“No, I’m not hungry,” she said.
“Where are you going now?”
“It’s a bit early to be so inquisitive, is it not?” she asked. Her head was down, the look on her face unchanged. He noticed her grip on the white cloth caused the knuckles on her hand to whiten, the tendons visible through her thin skin, the hand shook. She was trembling.
“Are you all right? Let’s stop for a second. We can sit here and talk,” he said.
They stopped, Hanley looking for a spot, dry with enough grass to be comfortable. He offered his hand to help her sit.
She said, “Are you worried I might collapse or do you want to draw me into another conversation about you and your cosmic obligations?”
Hanley, now more prepared for his conversations with the nun, smiled and said, “I was a boy scout, you know. Helping old ladies cross the street was beat into us as a thing we must always do. So, it may surprise you, I still have the urge to help whenever the occasion presents itself.”
She smiled, took his hand and sat, her movements fluid, like a dancer. Hanley sat beside her, legs bent at the knee, wrapping his arms around them. He wore an old faded khaki-colored jacket, a field coat, adorned with pockets of various sizes and purpose. His boots bore a mosaic of scratches from walking through the bush, covered by a thin layer of dust. He looked at the boots, trying to remember the day he bought them, where it had been. He couldn’t.
“I saw Jumma yesterday, watching a group of children who had just arrived at the mission. He was taking notes as he watched them. Why would he do that?” Hanley asked.
“I don’t know. Did you ask him?”
Hanley looked at her, at her face, now more relaxed, the cloth hanging loosely in her hand. So, it will be like this, he thought. Always like this. “No, I just thought it was curious, you know. Maybe he is conducting a study of sorts, noting their condition, how they behaved. I just wondered why he did it from a distance and not closer where he could observe more, talk to them. It just seemed odd,” he said.
They sat for a moment more, then the nun stood, brushing grass and dirt from the back of her skirt. She raised a hand to her brow to block the rising sun, turned to the American and said, “Jumma believes the mission helps the people of this country and it’s his desire to help. Perhaps he is writing their stories so that the world will remember a country it has already forgotten.” She walked away, leaving the American sitting alone.
“I don’t think so,” Hanley said to her as she walked toward the mission.
13
The ride to Juba took a long two hours. The road was graveled and relatively smooth, mostly straight, occasionally rough. As they were about to leave that morning, Hanley asked to drive, telling Sister Marie Claire he needed to learn the routes and the terrain. Looking at the Land Rover, she said, “You should do well, this is the easiest of all the vehicles to drive. If you show promise, we will teach you to drive the big truck.” Getting in, she smiled and said, “Jumma said you do not watch where you’re going when you fly. It worried him. He thinks you believe God will watch over you as you fly. I think you will need to watch where you’re going today if we are to get to Juba.”
As he slid in behind the wheel, Hanley said, “You know, I’ve never been a ‘God is my co-pilot’ kind of person. If God will let a jetliner full of people auger itself into the ground, why worry about me? I hate these seatbelts, you know?” From the corner of his eye, he saw the nun smoothly extend her seatbelt, heard the sharp click of it fastening. He struggled for a moment more, then fastened his own.
The nun said, “Let’s not waste any more time, I have much to do today.”
It was still early in the morning, the dim gray dulling the image of the distant hills. The light would soon be bright; Africa seemed to awaken quickly each day, Hanley thought. Driving away from the mission, he watched as a woman and two children, a boy and a girl, gathered wood from an area just beyond the old clinic, with its collapsed walls and exposed beams. The children were throwing small stones into the air, trying to hit them with sticks, cutting arcs in the air the way baseball players do, their faces stern with the effort. Connecting with her swing, the crack of the stick meeting the stone brought a grin to the girl’s face, a thin white line in the faint light of the early morning. Good, Hanley thought, you probably need something to smile about. The boy was not happy and swung harder at the stones.
With a small dark green zippered notebook open in her lap, the nun read from handwritten notes, tracking the words with her finger. The sentences appeared written in French. The writing was small and neat, precise, garnished with numbers and drawings, maps, he thought.
“Don’t you find it hard to read while driving?” he asked.
“I’m not driving, you are,” she said.
Hanley’s lips compressed to a straight line across his jaw. He could feel the pressure rising inside him, her remark setting off a chain of reactions inside his head, none good, he knew. He always found it curious that, when angered, he could see, feel his anger coming on, knew he should control it, but could not. It was like a tide rising within him. Nothing could stop it, he would deal with it after it had stopped. Pushing the clutch to the floor, he let the Land Rover roll to a stop in the road. Looking at the nun, seeing her eyes closed, her hands spread over her notebook, he was about to speak when she said, “What is it? We cannot afford to waste time. I have a schedule to keep. Please, let’s continue.”
A count to three and he said, “Look, I understand you’ve been here forever and that you’re in charge. Or at least in charge of a number of things at the mission. And I know it’s not easy. We all recognize that, trust me. I can guess that you have had a multitude of obstacles to overcome, that progress has been slow and hard won and that most people you deal with need to have their as
ses kicked, but for God’s sake, try to be at least civil to someone you hardly even know.” He felt better and worse at the same time. Knowing he may have damaged what little relationship they had, he was immediately worried. Standing his ground and establishing boundaries were necessary. While having taken a measured approach to dealing with matters, he seldom allowed himself to be pushed around by anyone. Finding first gear, he started off again, the whine of the transmission filling the void between them. Sister Marie Claire closed the notebook, rolled down the door window, resting her forearm on the sill. She looked over the Savannah, greening now, the new sprouts highlighted by the taller brown grasses, the canopies of the acacia trees budding. There were clouds in the distance; more rain coming, late for the season. The rain was a bother, a necessary bother. It always came hard, making a mess of the roads, traveling even more difficult than normal, the creases and ruts not worn away enough to make driving tolerable until it was time for the rains to come again.
“Do you see those clouds in the distance, Mr Martin, yes? The troubles of Sudan are like the clouds. You know they are coming, but you cannot stop them. The rain they bring is necessary, even though it is sometimes destructive. This war has been here eleven years and only brings destruction. We must prepare before it arrives. Some people do not believe it will ever arrive here in this part of Sudan, but it already started. Perhaps not like Darfur and I pray it never does, but it is here. So, if I am, what is it, short with you, I’m sorry, I have much on my mind. And, besides, I was in fact not driving, as you said,” she said.
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