I AM AN ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE.
MOTHER, DON’T WEEP FOR ME, I DESERVED TO DIE.
Dawit got out of the car and worked quickly, flinching each time the wind scattered small rocks and blew the sound of hurried footsteps past his ear.
“Hurry,” Sara said, glancing at her watch. “It’s late.” She focused past Dawit, towards the edge of a row of trees. “I’ll see if anything fell,” she added. Some nights, they’d found torn slips of paper with the victim’s name, hidden in pockets or clutched in tight fists. Simple gestures of rebellion by those who refused to have their lives extinguished in anonymity.
He lifted the boy into the back of the Volkswagen and gently laid him on an old, frayed blanket, careful not to smudge the car seat with blood. He forced himself to keep his gaze away from the body, away from more tangible evidence that there was no God, that all his life he and this boy had prayed to nothing.
Dawit and Sara drove uphill, towards Melaku.
“I’m so afraid of finding Berhane, or—” Sara stopped and pushed her hair back under her scarf. “What’s the point in saying anything?” she whispered. She slept less than he did during the day, and the exhaustion was showing. “There must have been a celebration that kept them busy, there’s only one tonight.” She rubbed her eyes, then sniffed her hands and grimaced. “The smell never comes out.”
Dawit squeezed her arm. “You’re so tired,” he said. “Maybe we’ll take a break tomorrow.”
She shook her head and looked out the window. “Stop,” she said.
There was another crumpled body in the grass. A naked man. He had a wide forehead and long lashes. His white hair was stained with bloody patches and his dried lips caved in where his front teeth should have been. His ears had been cut off, burnt flesh curled around his eardrums, and he had a bullet hole through his chest. He could have been an older uncle, his father’s colleague, an elder statesman. But in this city, on this road, he was nothing but another warning, a rotting message to the living.
Dawit bent to lift the dead man when bright headlights sprang behind him and threw tall shadows in his path. He stepped away from the body, hoping tall grass would hide it. Sara, further back from the road, dropped to her knees, then lay flat on the ground, hidden.
“Don’t come out,” Dawit hissed. “No matter what.” He ran his fingers along the seam of his shirt collar and felt the tiny vial of cyanide. Sara had hers on her necklace, behind a cross pendant on a gold chain long enough to reach her mouth.
A military truck crawled to a stop behind his car. Squinting against the harsh lights, Dawit walked to the Volkswagen as casually as he could, dusting off his hands and yawning with exaggerated stretches.
A slender man wearing a military-issued jacket approached with an AK-47 tucked under his arm. Dawit glanced at the truck to see if another soldier was inside. There was no one else. This was a soldier on his way home.
“What are you doing?” the soldier demanded. He was a few feet from Dawit but still hidden in the glare of headlights.
Dawit didn’t know how to respond.
The soldier lifted his rifle and aimed it at his chest as he walked closer. “Answer me! What are you doing?” he asked again.
Dawit tried to see the soldier’s face. He saw only a silhouetted figure blocking more of the glare as it got closer. The crooked outline of the soldier’s finger hung in the light, poised gently on the trigger.
“I’m collecting these bodies,” Dawit replied. He was surprised by how easy it was to admit the truth.
The soldier stopped. In the distance, Dawit heard the deep-throated breathing of a pack of hyenas. The soldier kept his AK-47 leveled on the center of his chest.
“It’s almost curfew,” the soldier said, as if he could think of nothing else to say. His voice cracked as he spoke and Dawit realized that he was young.
“I’ll go home after this.” Dawit made a mental note of the quietness that had crept back to them again. The hyenas were gone.
The soldier lowered his rifle and glanced into the backseat.
“It’s just a body,” Dawit said. He could smell the soldier’s sweat. “You must be on your way home.”
“He’s a traitor to the revolution. What are you going to do?” His finger still rested on the trigger.
“He needs to be buried. He’ll stink soon.”
The soldier shook his head. “No funerals for the enemy. Let the hyenas eat.”
“It’ll be just a burial. No funeral.” But soldier wasn’t going to leave him alone.
“Dump it out,” the soldier said. “Do it now or I’ll shoot.”
“Comrade,” Dawit said, holding his hands in front of him, “can a dead boy still be an enemy?”
“Get it out!”
They stared at each other until Dawit nodded. “Okay. I’ll need help. It’s heavy.”
The soldier nudged him with his rifle.
“Open the door and take the body out,” he said. “And then you’re going to jail.”
Dawit turned away quickly, hoping his face revealed nothing of the fear he felt. “All I wanted was to get it out of the way. The hyenas come here, then they disturb the area.” He opened the door to the backseat with shaking hands.
The soldier cleared his throat. “Hurry up.”
Dawit lifted the small body. “I can’t do it alone. Help me hold the other side. Don’t drop him.”
“What difference does it make?” the soldier grunted as he moved closer and grabbed the other half of the body.
The soldier strained with the weight of the boy. Dawit didn’t think, didn’t allow himself the luxury of doubt. He wrapped his arm around the soldier’s neck until the young man’s chin lifted and stiffened. The soldier arched and flailed, trying to keep his balance.
“Please,” the soldier said.
“Quiet,” Dawit whispered, his own knees weak.
He cupped the soldier’s chin in the center of his palm and pushed it hard into the curve of his elbow. The soldier’s neck was turned as far as it could go without snapping.
“Please,” Dawit said, his throat starting to hurt. He swallowed back the tears. “Please don’t fight.” Two owls cooed from high above a tree.
The soldier stilled for that split second, his Adam’s apple moving up and down against the inside of Dawit’s arm. Dawit closed his eyes and asked forgiveness from the mother he knew was waiting for her son to come home. With a deep breath, he twisted the soldier’s neck, surprised by its pliancy, its snap muffled by his own startled gasp. The soldier slumped to the ground with the boy in his arms. Dawit slid the AK-47 to the floor, pushed the boy back into the car, then stripped the soldier of his uniform. He shoved the clothes underneath the front seat and dragged the body into the grass.
“Help me get this body!” Dawit said to Sara. “Hurry.” Then he stopped when he saw her standing with her hands covering her mouth, her eyes filled with terror.
He went to her and held her, both of them shaking. “Mekonnen did this,” he said. “I did this. Not you.” He kissed her forehead, his heart pounding, his senses attuned to every noise in the night. “Don’t think. Push it away until this is all over.” He pulled her hands from her mouth. “Let’s go.”
They hurried to the old man and struggled to put him in the car, on top of the boy. Dawit grunted to mute the sound of bone on bone. Then they got into the Volkswagen and drove away.
—
SOLOMON SAT IN the dark storage room of a small shop in Mercato, paper and pen in hand. He nudged Dawit. “Don’t fall asleep. How many?” he asked. “We can’t stay here long.”
“Four since we talked. I know we missed some a few nights ago.” Dawit rested his head against the wall. Its hard coolness soothed his headache. “I’m hungry.”
He’d been with Sara and Melaku just hours earlier, the three of them afraid but resolute. Now, all he could think about was how hungry he was. He hadn’t slept yet.
“We have to finish this.” Solomon had the comp
osure of a secretary taking dictation. He surveyed the boxes of newsletters and ammunition tucked under blankets, then glanced back down. “Injuries.”
Dawit didn’t want to imagine the body of the girl he picked up tonight. The wounds on her stomach had made even Melaku cry out. He tried to close his mind to the face of the man who was close to his father’s age. “The usual,” he replied.
“I need specifics, there’s nothing different tonight.” Solomon dropped the pen and pulled out a cigarette. “Don’t get lazy.”
“She was maybe sixteen, broken bones. Burns from an iron on her stomach, deep cuts. The man, teeth pulled.” He grimaced and looked at Solomon. “Cigarette burns.”
Solomon nodded and wrote. “How many?” He waited, then snapped his fingers. “Mekonnen! How many?”
“What’s the point?”
“We’re building a case.” Solomon tightened his mouth around his cigarette. “One day there’ll be a trial, these people will be brought to justice, and everyone will know what really happened.” He paused and stared ahead. “Any news about the little newspaper boy you know?”
Dawit shook his head, his face clouding. “There was one more. A boy, maybe nineteen, in a soldier’s uniform. Not far from Kidane Mehret Church, the one on Entoto.”
Solomon stopped writing. “A soldier?”
“A boy on his way home.” Dawit drew circles on the dusty floor. “He was alone.”
Solomon stared straight ahead, his face expressionless. “Did you get his gun?”
“You should be writing this down.” Dawit pointed to the paper, to the spot where Solomon’s unfinished word vanished into an expanse of white.
Solomon tapped his cigarette case and shook out another. “Where’s his gun?”
“In the suitcase.” He pointed behind him to a corner in the room. Dawit stared at the stacks of boxes ahead of him which blocked any light from entering through the windows. “He looked scared. He begged me not to do it.”
“Do you think he would have let you go if you begged?” Solomon asked. “The only advantage you had was quickness, not compassion.”
“I don’t know anything about my father.” Dawit turned so Solomon wouldn’t see his quivering chin.
Solomon exhaled a large puff of smoke. “You’re doing something for him, what you did tonight helps them all.” He stood and picked up the suitcase. “After this soldier, I think we need to move you. Things might get too hot for a while.”
Dawit sighed.
“I’ll walk out first.” Solomon rubbed his head, his eyes red from fatigue. “Nothing happens overnight, but every act counts.” He gave Dawit a small salute before taking the suitcase and leaving.
FROM A FADING TEAHOUSE with plastered walls, a hushed name traveled like a current and grew into a tide of admiration: Mekonnen. Mekonnen collects the bodies. Mekonnen guides them to angels. Mekonnen, avenger of the weak, has heard our cries. And from mouths that whispered stories under candlelight and incense, Mekonnen, killer of soldiers, grew large and strong, more powerful than a thousand raging armies.
52.
AT FIRST, SARA thought she could get used to the sight of those lifeless bodies. She was sure that the deaths of so many she’d called hers had prepared her for the evidence that dying leaves behind. She was confident that she was ready to face the steady succession of corpses. She had enough anger, she’d told herself, to carry her through the risks of stepping into each long night. She was shielded from the ordinariness of nausea and shock. But Sara was beginning to feel the weight of tragedy and injustice. Her steps were slower, she held her daughter longer. She craved her husband’s strong arms but pushed him away, aware that his presence would only raise questions she couldn’t answer. She walked alone in the space created by her breached loyalty, caught between what couldn’t be said and what needed to be told. She knew that her husband was asking without words and she turned from him more often, hoping her love could one day bridge the distance that shouldered them now and ripped them further apart.
“I CAME TO TALK to you,” Mickey said, “I can’t talk to Dawit.”
Mickey and Sara were in the courtyard of the Ghion Hotel, its thatched-roof design a modernized version of the countryside huts that dotted Ethiopia. They were surrounded by blooming rosebushes and jacarandas, brilliant red hibiscus, and large, leafy trees. The staff, dressed in black and white, unobtrusively cleared plates and refilled teacups as hotel guests chatted discreetly. At one table, Russian and Cuban men pored over documents with Ethiopian officers. At another table, two young Ethiopian men and their female companions leaned in close to each other, their hands over their mouths, while stealing looks at the table of military officers.
“It’d be better if you tell him for me,” Mickey said.
Sara pushed her chair a little further from Mickey, her arms folded across her chest. “He’s been to your house looking for you,” she said. “You never even tried to contact him.”
“I didn’t know, my mother didn’t mention it.”
“Why didn’t you come see us once you found out Abbaye was in jail? You wait until now?” she asked. “You’ve known him since you were a boy, he’s been like a father to you.”
Mickey held up his hand. He stood up. “Let’s walk in the garden.” He’d lost weight around his face, though his stomach was bigger. His shoulders and arms seemed more muscular, but his walk, plodding and graceless, hadn’t changed.
They made their way to the back, where a lush, vibrant display of roses and bougainvillea drenched the courtyard in color. Mickey linked arms with her. “It’s for show,” he explained. He continued. “The minute they took Gash Hailu, they started watching me to see if I was connected.”
“Connected?” Sara took some pleasure in seeing her spit land on Mickey’s face. She knew he’d be too polite to wipe it away in front of her.
Mickey pushed his glasses up and blinked. He cleared his throat and pulled on the front of his shirt, then stopped. “It’s complicated …” he began.
“There’s nothing so complicated you can’t explain.”
“He’s alive,” Mickey said. “He’s kept away from the other prisoners, even most of the guards. I can’t get to him. I’ve tried.”
“Try harder,” Sara said. “If this were your own father, what would you do?”
Mickey shook his head. “He did something. He’s being accused of something big or else he wouldn’t be isolated like this.”
“What do you mean?”
Mickey wiped her spit off. “If he didn’t have information they needed, they’d have killed him already. I don’t know what it is.”
“Who’d know?” Sara asked. “You aren’t telling me anything.”
“The Colonel.” Mickey folded his arms over his round stomach. “He’s been the only one near him since his first week.”
“The Colonel?” An image of a thin-nosed, sharp-eyed man flashed in front of Sara. She’d heard about this Colonel, seen pictures of a man who stood so straight some said his spine had been replaced with a metal rod when he’d been injured fighting against Somalia. She’d heard rumors of his ruthlessness with prisoners of war, of his terrifying, methodical means of torture and murder. “Are they hurting him?”
“Most likely.” He lowered his eyes.
She shook his arm. “Can’t you do something?”
“I swear on my mother, I’ve tried. I love Gash Hailu.” Mickey swallowed hard. “You people who call yourselves revolutionaries, what do you know about politics?” he whispered. He squeezed Sara’s hand so hard she winced.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Sara said, pulling her hand out of his grip.
“You do what you need to do to feel good about yourselves, then you go home and turn your back on all the ugly details.” He was full of contempt. “You turn your backs on the rest of us.”
He smirked. “We’re the ones in the middle of the blood trying to turn the gun away from a brother so it points to a stranger. That’s the
war we’re in, it’s not this child’s game you’re playing.”
He took her hand again and caressed it, his touch gentle now. “You don’t know what you’re doing,” he said, the edges of his thick mouth curling. “I’m the one keeping you safe.”
Sara pulled away. She pushed up his sliding glasses and held the bridge of the frame tight against his forehead. “Earn the kindness he’s shown you,” she said, and left him.
53.
ON A GRASSY hillside road above the sounds of traffic, Yonas rolled his father’s Volkswagen to a stop and turned off the ignition. The soft churn of the dying engine settled into the nighttime calls of a distant bird. The air was chill and a sharp wind drilled through an open window in the backseat and Yonas wrapped his thick brown sweater tighter around him for warmth. This was the sixty-first day of his father’s imprisonment and he still hadn’t been able to get any word about charges. He knew about Dawit’s continued early treks to the jail. He understood his brother’s need to feel like he was doing something to get their father out. What he didn’t understand was Dawit’s secrecy, the self-imposed solitude of his grief. Sara, too, had become more withdrawn, more sullen and distant. Tizita shied away from him, clinging instead to her mother, constantly asking about her friend Berhane. There were hours when he felt nothing but waves of helplessness and fury. And as the days edged into a new month, he found himself longing for the comfort of Sara’s presence, for Dawit’s innate confidence and strength. He spent more and more time in the prayer room trying to drive out the questions of where his wife went with his brother at night.
“TELL ME FROM the beginning,” the Colonel said. He stared out of the tiny window in the small room. Threads of rain spiraled against the pane as thunder shook the sky outside. The light flickered, then shivered back on. “Tell me what she looked like.”
Hailu sat in a chair that was bolted to the ground, his hands tied behind his back, his bare feet roped together in front of him. Electric wires were clamped to his ears, the ringing in his head as loud as a thousand unleashed bells. He nudged his front teeth gently with his tongue; they were loose. What felt like an insect crawling down the side of his face was a drop of blood rolling from his mouth to his jaw. The punches the Colonel had pounded into him had been carefully aimed and precise. He was hit again and again on the jaw, just to the side of his mouth, and the impact forced the lower half of his face to buckle and snap against the swinging fist. It was after only the third punch that Hailu heard a splintering tree and knew his jaw was fractured. The crackle and brush of falling leaves deep inside his head told him his eardrum was damaged.
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