Then phase two of what Aids Report called 'The Catastrophe in Henan' came into operation. A team of doctors turned up in one of the villages. They offered the afflicted a new type of drug called BGB-2, a treatment patented by Cresco, a company in Arizona that was developing various forms of antiviral drugs. The doctors offered the poor peasants this drug free of charge, and promised that they would be restored to health. But BGB-2 had not been approved by the Chinese health authorities. They did not even know about its existence, nor did they know anything about the doctors and nurses who had travelled to Henan province. In fact, nobody knew if BGB-2 was effective or not, or what the side effects might be.
A few months later the peasants who had been treated began to deteriorate. Some had a very high temperature, lost all their strength, started bleeding from the eyes and acquired rashes that refused to go away. More and more of them died. All the doctors and nurses suddenly disappeared. The company in Arizona denied knowing anything about what had happened, changed its name and rose phoenix-like from the ashes in England. The only person to be arrested and punished was a man who had travelled from village to village, buying blood. He was convicted of serious tax fraud and was executed after a people's court condemned him to death.
Louise stretched.
'Have you finished reading? Henrik was most upset. We both had the same thought.'
'That it could happen here as well?'
Lucinda nodded.
'Desperate people always react in the same way. Why shouldn't they?'
Louise tried to gather her thoughts. She was tired, hungry, thirsty and, most of all, confused. All the time she found herself trying to block out Umbi's head, almost severed from his body.
'Had Henrik been in contact with Christian Holloway in Xai-Xai when you came to the café?'
'No, that was a long time afterwards.'
'Was it before he started to change?'
'It was at about the same time. He came to my house one morning – he was staying at Lars Håkansson's place – and asked me to take him to an Internet café. It was urgent. Just for once he was impatient.'
'Why didn't he use Lars Håkansson's computer?'
'He didn't say. But I do remember asking him that.'
'What did he say?'
'He just shook his head and urged me to hurry up.'
'Is that all he said? Think carefully! It's important.'
'We came to this café which had only just opened. I remember that it was drizzling. We could hear thunder in the distance. I remember saying that there might be a power cut if the thunderstorm drifted in over Maputo.'
Lucinda paused. Louise could see that she was thinking hard. For her part, she was plagued by the image of Umbi, a poverty-stricken peasant in the midst of all those patients dying of Aids, who had something important to say to her. Louise shuddered, despite the heat and dampness of the Internet café. It seemed to her that she stank of impurity.
'He kept checking his back as we walked down the street. I remember now. Twice he stopped dead and looked round. I was so surprised that I forgot to ask him what was the matter.'
'Did he say anything?'
'I don't know. We just resumed walking. He stopped and turned round one more time. That was all.'
'Was he afraid?'
'Hard to say. He might have been worried without my noticing it.'
'Do you remember anything else?'
'He spent less than an hour on the computer. He seemed to know exactly what he was doing.'
Louise tried to picture what had happened. The pair of them had been sitting at a table in a corner. From there, if he had looked up, Henrik would have been able to see what was going on in the street. But he was hidden behind the computer.
He had chosen an Internet café because he didn't want to leave any trace in Lars Håkansson's computer.
'Can you remember if anybody came into the café while he was working at the computer?'
'I was tired and hungry. I drank something and ate a sticky sandwich. Of course people kept coming and going. I don't recall any particular faces.'
'What happened next?'
'He copied the article. We left. It started raining just as we got to my house.'
'Did he turn round at all as you were walking home?'
'I don't remember.'
'Think!'
'I am thinking! I don't remember. We ran most of the way in the hope of beating the rain. It poured down for several hours, once it started. The streets were flooded. Naturally, there was a power cut that lasted until the afternoon.'
'Did he stay at your place?'
'I don't think you understand what pouring rain means in Africa. It's like hosepipes aimed onto our heads. Nobody goes out if they don't have to.'
'Did he say anything about the article? Why did he want to read it? How had he heard about it? What did it have to do with Christian Holloway?'
'When we got to my place he asked if I minded if he had a nap. He lay down on my bed. I told my brothers and sisters to be quiet. They weren't, of course, but he did get some sleep. I thought he must be ill. He slept as if he'd been deprived of sleep for a very long time. It was afternoon before he woke up, just after it stopped raining. We went out after the clouds moved on. The air was nice and fresh. We went for a walk along the beach.'
'Did he still not say anything?'
'He told me about something he'd heard once. A story he'd never been able to forget. I think it took place in Greece, or maybe Turkey. It had happened a very long time ago. A group of people hid from enemy insurgents by withdrawing into a cave. They had enough food with them to last for several months, and they had access to water from the dripping roof. But they were discovered. The enemy bricked up the cave opening. Some years later the cave was found and the wall broken down, but they were long dead of course. But the most remarkable thing was a ceramic jug standing on the ground. It had been used to collect water dripping from the roof. As the years went by, the dripping water crystallised and was transformed into a stalagmite that included the jug. Henrik said that was how he imagined patience to be. The jug and the water coalescing into each other. I don't know who told him the story in the first place.'
'It was me. It was a sensation when the cave was discovered on Peloponnisos in Greece. I was actually there when the discovery was made.'
'What were you doing in Greece?'
'I was working there as an archaeologist.'
'I don't know what that is.'
'I search for the past. Traces of people. Graves, caves, ancient palaces, manuscripts. I dig down looking for things that existed a long time ago.'
'I've never heard about any archaeologists existing in this country.'
'Maybe not very many, but there are some. Did Henrik really not tell you where he got the story from?'
'No.'
'Did he never say anything about me?'
'Never.'
'Did he never say anything about his family at all?'
'He said he had a grandfather on his mother's side who was a very well-known artist. World-famous. And he spoke quite a lot about his sister Felicia.'
'He doesn't have a sister. He was my only child.'
'I know that. He said he had a sister on his father's side.'
Just for a moment Louise thought that could be right. Aron could have had a child with another woman without mentioning it. In that case it would have been the most awful insult possible, telling Henrik about it but not her.
But it could not be true. Henrik would never have been able to keep a secret like that, even if Aron had begged him to be discreet about it.
There was no sister. Henrik had invented her. She had no memory of Henrik complaining about not having any brothers or sisters. She would have remembered if he had.
'Did he ever show you a photograph of his sister?'
'Yes. I still have it.'
Louise thought she was going out of her mind. There was no sister, no such person as Felicia. Why had Henrik made he
r up?
She stood up.
'I can't stay here a moment longer. I need something to eat, I need some sleep.'
They left the Internet café and walked through the streets in the stifling heat.
'Could Henrik cope with the heat?'
'He loved it, but I don't know if he could cope with it.'
Lucinda invited Louise into the cramped house. Louise shook hands with Lucinda's mother, an elderly woman with a stoop, strong hands, a wrinkled face and friendly eyes. There were children everywhere, of all ages. Lucinda said something and they all ran off immediately through the open door, where a curtain was flapping in the breeze.
Lucinda disappeared behind another curtain. A crackly radio could be heard from inside the room. She reappeared, carrying a photograph.
'I was given this by Henrik. Him and his sister, Felicia.'
Louise took the photograph to one of the windows. It was a picture of Henrik and Nazrin. She tried to understand what Henrik had said. Thoughts were buzzing round her head, but nothing stuck. Why had he done that? Why had he fooled Lucinda into thinking that he had a sister?
She gave the photograph back.
'That's not his sister. It's a good friend of his.'
'I don't believe you.'
'He didn't have a sister.'
'Why should he tell me a lie?'
'I don't know. But you mark my words. This is a good friend of his, by the name of Nazrin.'
Lucinda had stopped protesting. She put the photograph on a table.
'I don't like people who tell lies.'
'I can't understand why he told you he had a sister called Felicia.'
'My mother has never told a single lie in all her life. For her there is nothing but the truth. My father has always told her lies, about other women he claimed didn't exist, about money he'd earned but lost. He's lied about everything apart from the fact that he would never have survived if she hadn't been there by his side. Men tell lies.'
'So do women.'
'They do it in self-defence. Men have declared war on women in so many ways. One of their most common weapons is lies. Lars Håkansson even wanted me to change my name, to become a Julieta instead of a Lucinda. I still wonder about what the difference is. Does Julieta open her legs in a different way from me?'
'I don't like the way you talk about yourself.'
Lucinda withdrew into her shell. Louise stood up. Lucinda accompanied her to the car. They made no arrangements for a next meeting.
* * *
Louise got lost several times before eventually finding her way to Lars Håkansson's house. The guard at the gate was half asleep in the heat. He leapt to his feet, saluted and let her in. Celina was busy hanging up washing. Louise said she was hungry. An hour later, shortly before eleven in the morning, she had washed and eaten. She lay down on the bed in the cool breeze from the air conditioning, and fell asleep.
It was dusk by the time she woke up. Six o'clock. She had slept for many hours. The sheet beneath her was damp. She had been dreaming.
Aron had stood on the peak of a distant mountain. She had been trudging around some never-ending swamp somewhere in Härjedalen. In her dream they had been very far apart. Henrik had been sitting on a rocky outcrop next to a tall fir tree, reading a book. When she asked what he was reading, he explained that it was a photo album. She failed to recognise any of the people in the pictures.
Louise gathered together her dirty linen. She felt a distinct twinge of bad conscience as she left them on the floor for washing. Then she opened the door slightly, and listened. Not a sound from the kitchen. The house seemed to be empty.
She took a shower, got dressed and went downstairs. On all sides she could hear the whining noise from the air conditioning. There was a half-full bottle of wine on the table. She poured herself a glass and sat down in the living room. The security guards were conversing loudly outside. The curtains were drawn. She took a sip of wine and wondered what had happened after she had left Xai-Xai. Who had found Umbi? Had anybody associated her with what had happened? Who had been hiding in the darkness?
It was only now, after she had caught up on sleep, that panic seized her. A man who wanted to tell me something in secret is murdered in bestial fashion. It could have been Aron lying there with his throat cut.
She felt sick, ran to the toilet and threw up. Then she collapsed in a heap on the bathroom floor. She felt as if she was being dragged down by a whirlpool. Perhaps now, at last, she was on her way down into Artur's bottomless tarn with its black water?
She remained lying on the floor and paid no attention to the cockroaches that scuttled past and disappeared down a hole in the tiles behind the water pipes.
I must start piecing together the fragments. There are several patterns that I ought to be able to make out. I must do what I usually do with old vases: feel my way forward with stalagmite-like patience.
The picture she pieced together was unbearable. First of all Henrik discovers that he is HIV-positive. Then he discovers that ruthless experiments are being carried out on human beings in order to find a vaccine or some kind of cure for the virus. In addition, he is involved in some way or other in blackmailing Christian Holloway's son, who commits suicide.
She tried fitting the fragments together in various different ways, leaving gaps where shards as yet undiscovered might be able to fall into place. But the pieces simply refused to interlock.
She tried another approach. A blackmailer would hardly assume that his victim would commit suicide. The whole point is that the money paid is a guarantee for the victim that everything will be kept secret.
If Henrik had not anticipated that the blackmail would lead to Steve Nichols' death, how did he react when he heard what had happened? Was he resigned? Or ashamed?
The fragments were silent. They offered no answer.
She tried to take a step further. Could Henrik have been blackmailing a blackmailer? Had Steve Nichols been his friend? Was it through him that Henrik had heard about Christian Holloway's activities in Africa? Did Nichols know what really went on in Xai-Xai, behind the façade of loving charity?
Everything ground to a halt when she came to the final link in the chain: was Umbi's death a sign of something that could be compared with what had happened in distant Henan?
She was half lying on the bathroom floor, her head leaning against the lavatory. The sound of the air conditioning drowned out all other noise, but she suddenly had the feeling that somebody was standing behind her. She turned her head sharply.
Lars Håkansson was watching her.
'Are you ill?'
'No.'
'Then what the hell are you doing lying on a lavatory floor? If you'll allow me to ask?'
'I was sick. I didn't have the strength to stand up.'
Kennedy's Brain Page 32