‘It is a strange and wonderful thing to watch these lads,’ Abdelkrim continued. ‘They have a big radio which they set on the sidewalk with the volume turned up really loud. They could be ten years old – they are very small, very skinny.
They could be fifteen… I don’t know. Victims of polio, I think. There are a lot of beggars in the city – and thieves… and other bastards! But these boys do not beg. Oh no! Instead, they dance! What a show they put on. Their legs may not work, but you should see them dance on their hands!’
‘They have no legs?’
‘They have legs, but they are wasted, thin, useless. They drape them over their shoulders like rags. Their feet wobble like a galloping mouton’s teats as they dance wildly to their music! They are excellent artistes. Every once in a while they will catapult themselves onto their feet. Their dead legs can hold them there – for just a second. Then they crumple. But as they do so they somersault themselves back onto their palms. It truly is an amazing sight!’
‘ Walayi! And people give them money?’
‘People give them money. Lots of money. They stand around and watch these boys perform and they marvel! It is sad that they cannot walk, and yet they do not seem unhappy.’
‘Where do they live?’ I asked. ‘Do they have a family?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Abdelkrim. ‘Perhaps. Perhaps not. A great many children in Niamey beg all day and receive only crusts from an adult for the privilege. I hope my twins get to keep their money.’
‘ Bakarka? But they are not beggars. They have earned this money. Why should they not keep it?’
He sighed. ‘Because that is the way things are, Little One.’
I was spellbound by his stories.
Abdelkrim placed the photograph of Katie and Hope on the floor again and tapped it with his forefinger. ‘ Toh. Thank you for showing me.’
Keen to impress, I picked up another photograph and handed it to him. ‘And these are their parents – and their dogs.’ Katie and Hope were also in this picture, kneeling on a grassy surface behind the two dogs with babies’ faces. The girls looked very happy. Katie was hugging one of the dogs, which was sitting upright and looking very proud to be there; as if it thought of itself as a human being, or at least an equal. The other dog was looking away from the camera and had its tongue hanging out. Hope was holding this one on a leash. The adults were also kneeling on the grass, behind their children and the dogs. The father – Noel Boyd – was leaning forward, protectively, towards the camera, a tight smile on his pale face.
His hair was cropped very short and he wore small, round sunglasses which, I thought, were not as nice as my brother’s. The girls’ mother was wearing a cap which cast a heavy shadow over her face. This was the only picture of Katie and Hope’s parents that I had, and it perplexed me a little that I was unable to see the eyes of either of them.
‘Strange dogs,’ Abdelkrim said.
I nodded. ‘Like babies.’
‘Hmm.’
‘You can’t real y see their mother’s face… ’
‘The sun has been high,’ Abdelkrim said, ‘and she is wearing a hat.’
‘Yes.’
‘It looks like they are somewhere very high – a mountain, perhaps?’
‘I don’t know.’ I took the photograph from him and turned it over. ‘ Downhil , 1997, it says on the back.’
‘Uhuh. And where is that?’
I shrugged.
We sat in silence for a few moments, just looking over the postcards and photographs before us.
‘It’s nice that you have these friends,’ Abdelkrim said.
‘Yes.’
‘And they write often?’
‘Every few months,’ I said. ‘Sometimes their father writes too.’
‘That’s good,’ he said. ‘Doesn’t the mother write?’
‘No.’
‘Perhaps she can’t,’ Abdelkrim said.
‘Oh,’ I said, ‘everyone can read and write there.’
Abdelkrim nodded slowly. ‘They must be very rich. What does the father do?’
‘He’s a teacher. I think their mother is too.’
‘That’s what you should do, Haoua,’ my brother said. ‘You should continue to study hard, get away from here. Travel. You’d make a good teacher. You are a bright girl.’
‘Perhaps,’ I said, ‘but Wadata is my home. And what about our mother? How would she cope?’
‘You could come back! Go to the USA. Or France. Learn all you can, then come back – and change things. Niger is a sick country! Make things better!’
‘How, Abdel?’
‘Somehow, Little One. We will find a way. I will help you, if I can.’
I knew that he meant it.
He smiled and put his hand in his pocket. ‘Look… I still have the little radio your friends sent.’
I took the radio and fiddled with its switches and dials and Abdelkrim showed me how to wear the tiny earphones. A barrage of music bombarded my ears until I moved the dial again. Then, voices. News from the capital. Something about the Paris-Dakar rally. I took the earphones off and handed the radio to my brother. I was a little envious. ‘I like it.’
‘I will get you one, Haoua,’ he promised. I knew that he meant that too.
I gathered up my belongings and put them back into the envelope, then placed it safely under my bedroll again. ‘Mother will be waiting for the rest of our washing,’ I told Abdelkrim. ‘I’ll finish my drawing later.’
He nodded. ‘Please give Katie and Hope and their family my greetings when you do.’
‘I shall,’ I said.
Abdelkrim stood up and stretched, then crossed the room to where his army issue kitbag was leaning against the wall. As he flipped it open to search for more cigarettes, I noticed the neck of a bottle protruding from one of its pockets.
‘What’s that?’ I asked, as I tied the remaining clothing into a bundle in preparation for the journey to the river.
‘Whiskey,’ he said. ‘Want some?’
‘No!’ I said, appalled.
He laughed and made to go outside.
‘Abdel!’ I called after him.
He stopped, turning to face me – an unlit cigarette in one hand, pink plastic lighter in the other. ‘Hmm?’
‘How long can you stay?’
‘Not long, Little One. A few more days, perhaps…’
‘Oh.’
‘…If I don’t murder Father first!’ he added, with a grin.
I lifted my bundle and walked towards the door. ‘Why do you squabble with Father?’ I asked, pretending that I had not overheard his discussion with our mother. ‘Is it because of the rumour?’
‘He is opposed to alcohol. That’s all. It’s nothing for you to worry about,’ he said, lighting his cigarette.
I searched his face, but it gave nothing away.
‘Kala a tonton. I’ll see you later, Little One,’ he said, and we parted company.
6
The sun beat down intensely as I walked to the river. The load I carried on my head was not a particularly heavy one. Mother had taken the majority of our garments but I was still tired from the long trek of the previous day.
I wondered what Miriam was doing – how difficult things had been for her with her father. I was reminded that I had yet to face my father.
As I neared the river, I could hear singing and my spirits began to lift. In all, there were about thirty people there, mainly women and girls, most of whom were scrubbing garments in the shallows. Draped over bushes and low branches, articles of clothing of every size, type, pattern and colour dried in the sun. A group of infants were amusing themselves on the riverbank. Some of the women had younger babies tied onto their backs as they worked.
Souley, a girl Adamou’s age, made a rude gesture at me when she was sure that no one else was paying much attention. Miriam and I had no time for Souley. She was a clever girl, but her parents did not send her to school and we were sure that she was jealous.I s
ucked my teeth at her, set my bundle down on the dry ground and waded through the silted water to join my mother. She was stooped over, her hands moving furiously back and forth over my father’s jel aba, as she sang the chorus of our working song.
Han kulu ay ga maa zanka jindey. Every day I hear children’s voices.
Han kulu ay ga ba aran. Every day I love you.
At first, she did not hear me hail her. ‘Mother!’ I called again. ‘Azara! Are you alright?’ For a moment, when she looked at me with weary eyes, I almost thought that it was Bunchie, my late grandmother, standing before me.
‘Haoua,’ my mother said, breathlessly. She stood upright and coughed a little, banging her chest with the flat of her wet hand. She nodded, then, frowning, she turned her head away to clear her throat.
The realisation that she was getting old, and that one day I would lose her too, suddenly filled me with dread.
‘Toh,’ she said, returning to both her work and her song.
7
It was mid afternoon by the time we got back to the village. We found Abdelkrim in our compound sitting on a plastic crate and surrounded by Adamou and his friends.
As usual the boys were in a great state of excitement. Abdelkrim was busily working at something with a rusty pair of pliers – I could not make out what – while, all around him, the boys shouted and jostled and pushed each other playfully.
‘We’re each going to have our own rally car!’ Adamou told us excitedly, as we approached them.
‘Dakar here I come!’ shouted one of his friends.
It was a favourite pastime for the boys of our village to make fantastic toys from wire coat hangers – mostly scrounged from Monsieur Letouye’s shop. Sushie, Richard and Monsieur Boubacar were also regularly pestered for coat hangers each time word got about that one of them might be travelling to the capital. The heavy wire would be used to create elaborate outline forms of all manner of vehicles – complete with moving wheels, axles, doors and even sometimes what the boys called ‘working suspension’. Some even had drivers – little see-through figurines, desperately clutching tiny steering wheels in see-through pick-ups, camions and Jeeps. One or two of the boys in particular were exceptionally skilled at creating detailed models; so much so that they were considered lieutenants in Adamou’s gang.
Attached to the rear of each of these truly impressive vehicles was a wire pusher and handle, allowing them to be raced competitively through the dusty alleys of Wadata.
As a child, Abdelkrim, like every boy in our village, had spent many hours making and racing his own creations – dreaming of one day owning a real vehicle, or of participating in the anasaras’ races even. We had often seen images of such races on Monsieur Letouye’s television set, but these mostly stirred up interest only among the boys. The craze for these toys was widespread across the country, and Abdelkrim said that the children of our capital were particularly fond of, and accomplished at, creating models of modern rally cars.
Miriam’s brother Dendi began to chase Adamou around the main throng, kicking up great clouds of dust as they passed Mother and me.
‘Yours is a pile of junk!’ he shouted.
‘No!’ Adamou protested, ‘Yours is!’
Abdelkrim looked up at my mother and beamed.
Mother shook her head and said, ‘ Walayi!’ She chastised the boys for wrestling too close to our water pots, but she too was smiling broadly.
For a moment I observed them both as if they were strangers, or actors in a movie; these two people whom I loved more than life itself, reflecting each other’s smiles in that way that only a mother and her child can. It was a moment I wish I could have captured somehow – frozen it in time forever: not as a photograph, but as a tiny, physical fragment; one to which I might actually have reached out and touched whenever I felt troubled. Would that I could have had such a talisman for the dark times that lay ahead of us.
The moment was shattered by the arrival of my father. ‘Get out of here! All of you!’ he bellowed.
8
‘Do you mind telling me exactly what you thought you were doing yesterday, Haoua?’ my father demanded, when things had quietened down in the compound.
‘Salim,’ my mother said, ‘I have already reprimanded the girl.’
I knew that it had been a mistake for her to speak at all.
My father glared at her, intensely, a sinewy vein bulging at his temple. ‘I did not ask you to interfere,’ he said, coldly, his hands wringing the staff of his hoe. ‘Why don’t you do something useful, Azara, and prepare some water for me. I must wash again before prayers.’
From the far side of the compound I heard Abdelkrim draw air in through his teeth. My father looked furiously towards him, but said nothing.
‘Come, Adamou,’ my mother beckoned to my brother. ‘You can help me.’ Adamou remained standing beside Abdelkrim’s crate. ‘But we have to finish my car, Mother!’ he protested.
‘ Walayi!’ She pointed towards the house.
Abdelkrim gave him a gentle push.
‘Boori arwasu. Good boy,’ my father said, patting Adamou’s shoulder as he stomped by sulkily. ‘I have to discuss this matter with your sister.’
‘I’m sorry I was so late, Father,’ I said, warily, when they had gone. ‘I wanted to send Katie and Hope a picture. Miriam and I wanted a magic picture – like Abdel’s…’
‘Katie and Hope! Katie and Hope!’ my father mimicked. ‘That’s all we ever hear from you these days! If the anasaras really want to help us, why don’t they send us money, eh? Real money! You’d do better to settle down and concentrate on your work, girl!’
I was stunned. ‘But, Father,’ I said, ‘I am concentrating on my work.
Monsieur Boubacar says…’
He cut me short. ‘Monsieur Boubacar says… pah! I mean your real work –
helping your family to put food in their bellies – not those fancy ideas from that school!’
‘I thought you liked it that I could read and write, Father,’ I said, quietly.
‘I’m beginning to wish that I’d never agreed to any of it!’ he snapped.
‘But I thought you wanted Adamou to start school too, Father?’
‘You see! You see how disrespectful you are!’
‘But…’
‘Silence! It is not your place to question my decisions, child. These days it is important for a young man to have an education. If it pleases God, Adamou shall go to the Koranic school. But there is much work to be done here and education is expensive.’
Abdelkrim, who was still sitting on his crate working at Adamou’s truck, let out a loud, exasperated ‘Aiee!’
‘Is there something you wish to say?’ my father asked Abdelkrim.
‘Yes, Father,’ my brother said, setting the model on the ground and standing up.
‘There are lots of things I’d like to say.’
My father snorted, noisily, then turned his face away to spit.
Abdelkrim dusted his hands off and stretched, his movements an attempt, perhaps, to hide his agitation. ‘First of all,’ he continued, ‘Adamou is eager to do his military service. Perhaps he will like the life and stay on – like me. He could do worse. The army educated me – in more than just the ways of the Koran.’
My father said nothing, but his glare caused me to shudder.
‘Secondly, you cannot have it both ways…’
‘What?’ my father snapped.
‘You are not paying for Haoua’s schooling. Vision Corps – that British NGO – pays. Isn’t that the way it works?’
‘You ought to mind your own business, boy!’ my father said.
Abdelkrim strode towards my father and looked down into his face. ‘Oh?’ he said.
‘I am not a boy, and this is my business. I don’t like your bullying, your lies and your deceit. I’ve witnessed plenty of that. Nobody likes it.’
By now my father was seething, and for the first time in my life I feared that something awful might h
appen between these two grown men, both of whom I loved dearly.‘Be mindful of what you say, soldier!’ Father said, his voice shaking and tinged with sarcasm.
‘I am mindful, Father,’ Abdelkrim replied. ‘I’ve thought about these matters very carefully over the last two days. I’ve watched what goes on here. You demand respect, but what respect do you show anyone other than your gambling friends?’
Father threw down the hoe that he had been holding and clenched his fists.
Abdelkrim looked down at the implement and then, glaring back at our father, he raised his eyebrows and tipped his hand forward, as if to say ‘Well? What?’
My father’s eyes narrowed, but he said nothing.
Abdelkrim nodded and gave a little smile. ‘You talk about putting food in your family’s bellies, yet you squander my money!’
‘Mind your business!’
‘You boast about taking another wife, yet you can’t support the one you have!’‘How dare you…’
‘You ought to thank Haoua, Father. In truth she puts food in your belly, but all you can do is scold her!’
‘She is forbidden to go near the river!’
‘She has apologised.’
‘I might have lost her!’
‘At least that would be one less mouth for you to have to feed!’
In a flash, the shouting was over. With a loud smack, my father brought his hand hard against Abdelkrim’s face. ‘I want you out of here!’ he hissed.
I stood, trembling, before them. My mother and Adamou were standing in the doorway of our house, looking shocked.
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