He eyed his gun, hanging on his bedpost, and reached for it. They were required to clean their AK-47’s every week, but Garnahweh preferred to clean it every day. These were times when no one knew when a gun, or any kind of force, might be required. After President Tolbert had detained the demonstrators, Master Sergeant Doe said that it would be anytime now that they would make their move, and they should be ready. Garnahweh removed the gun’s magazine and set it on the mattress. He moved the safety lever, pulled back the bolt carrier, and ejected a round from the chamber. He pushed the bolt carrier forward and then pressed the rear end receiver cover. He unrolled his brushes from the scrap of cloth where he stored them and lost himself in the work of making his weapon perfectly clean.
Garnahweh knew that he could take down and clean a gun better than any educated Congo man could even dream of doing. He smiled, disengaging the front receiver cover from the rear sight housing slot. His teachers in primary school—in truth, the only school he’d known—had always said that he had a gift for identifying plants, and even helping them grow. Especially the really important ones, like cassava. No, Garnahweh saw no reason why he would not be the logical choice for the new Minister of Agriculture. He expertly lifted the rod and spring backward from the bolt carrier, and set the rod beside the magazine, on the mattress. An image of himself behind the beautiful maple desk, two neat stacks of papers on either side of him. Garnahweh’s smile deepened as he welcomed the dream. There was no doubt about it: He was the man most fit for the job.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
April 11, 1980, Monrovia, Liberia
AFTER TIPPING A PAIR of baby scorpions from his shoes, Ujay put them on and stepped through the front doorway of his house. It was six in the morning, but West Point was already bustling. The street hawkers leaned from their kiosks, beckoning him with palm oil, cool bagged water, rice and soup, soap, bread, transistor radios, and everything in between.
“How the morning-oh?” Old Man Togbah asked him, his toothy smile on full display. He was the neighborhood mechanic and could fix anything. Ujay often reflected that he would have been a top army engineer, if he were born Congo.
“The morning fine-oh.” Ujay smiled—a gesture that never failed to surprise him with its ease.
Old Man Togbah nodded vigorously and handed Ujay the sugarcane stalk he had been munching on. “Fresh, fresh from the bush,” he said. “So sweet!”
Ujay took the stalk from the man and chomped down. Thick, sugary juice washed down his throat. Closing his eyes, he could almost believe he was back in Buchanan, where he had lived as a young child, in Grand Bassa County. There, the forest had carpeted his every step, and baboons and monkeys had been his playmates. His father had made them move to Monrovia when he was ten, believing that there would be far more opportunities for work here. Instead, all he had found were crowded slums and more questionable orders from Congo boss men. Ujay scowled. Even the fresh cane couldn’t cover the reek of the open sewer, the smell of dawn in West Point.
“Fat girl be looking for you. Nice, fat girl-oh,” Old Man Togbah continued.
Ujay laughed. He and Evelyn had agreed to meet at Mama Lulu’s for tea this morning. She had sounded elusive at school the other day, saying that she had to speak with him.
“Why you keep such fine women from me-menh? How you manage so many wives and deputies-oh, and your old man here still empty-handed?” He turned his palm upward. “You always be talking, ‘We must share this, share that. Unify together to fight the Congo,’ but why you not share your fine ladies, then?”
Still laughing, Ujay pulled Old Man Togbah’s elbow and moved them both in the direction of the tea shop. “Maybe if you let go the kola nut for one minute, your teeth not blacken and rot out, and the fine, fine, fat women be kissing you everywhere-oh,” he said.
“Eh-menh!” Old Man Togbah said, swatting Ujay’s arm. “Why you pain me so-ya?”
It irritated Ujay to hear to hear the old man exaggerate his success with women. In truth, Ujay’d never been to bed with anyone but Evelyn—and that only recently. He wished the old fool would find something else to rant about.
Ahead Ujay could now see Evelyn sitting at a small table in the tea shop, sipping a cup of something. He would never tell a living soul, but he collected images like this into a fantasy of sorts, in which he and Evelyn were married and woke up each morning to things like tea together, conversations of what the new day held, and, of course, morning sex. Ujay took another bite of the sugarcane stalk. It was sweet, but he knew that Evelyn was so much sweeter.
“Why you try to keep an old man lonely?” Old Man Togbah continued. “My bed cold-oh!”
They were almost to the tea shop, but Evelyn still hadn’t seen him. Maybe if he snuck around the back, he could surprise her.
“Boy, you don’t even listen to an old man complain no more,” said Old Man Togbah. He stopped in his tracks and smacked his hand on his thin trousers. “Ha! You thinking about taking a bite out of the fat girl, I see it in your eyes-menh!” He pointed at Ujay, his voice rising. “You not fooling an old man. I know what fever rises below.”
Ujay turned toward Old Man Togbah to shush him. He could not be quieted, of course, and Ujay’s plea only made him laugh louder. “Oh! The boy going to get him a second breakfast-oh!” he hollered.
Evelyn turned then and stared right at him. “Ujay Flomo! Why you sneaking up on me?”
She was wearing a purple skirt, which hugged her thick hips and would hug her full buttocks when she stood. She had tied a bright green scarf around her head, and he swore that it picked up tiny jade specks in her eyes. Ujay’s testicles ached.
“What?” she asked him. “What I got on my face-oh? Tea already?”
He shook his head; she really had no idea how beautiful she was. “No, nothing. Nothing, honey. You fine-oh.” He pulled out a chair and sat down across from her, pretending not to see Old Man Togbah gesticulating wildly at him out of the corner of his eye.
Evelyn eyed him suspiciously. “‘Honey’?” she asked. “How I become your honey-menh?”
Ujay’s face flushed red. The word came out before he’d had time to edit it. The best thing to do was change the subject. “How the body?”
“The body fine-oh,” Evelyn answered. She stirred her tea. “And the tea too. They know how to make it in West Point.”
Ujay signaled to the waitress. “That one thing they have over Sinkhor, eh?” He laughed at his own joke.
Evelyn’s face clouded for a moment, digesting the dig at her class, but then let it go. “It too early in the morning for that-oh.” She reached over and grabbed his forearm. “Let us simply have breakfast for once. Enjoy each other’s company.”
Ujay looked up at her sharply. Enjoy each other’s company? Where was Evelyn Kollie, and what had God done with her?
She sighed. “Yes, I’m trying to make nice-oh. You haven’t noticed, this country falling apart at the seams.” Lowering her voice, she peered at him sideways. “You might have heard people say war coming.”
He coughed. There were those who had mentioned such a thing at recent PAL meetings, but it was always in hushed tones and under cover of night. Certain things could not be spoken in daylight. He was about to tell her so when he saw her wipe a tear from the corner of her eye.
“I just need certain people to know they are important to me-oh.” She took a deep breath, and then swallowed. “Whatever happens.”
What was she talking about? His brow furrowed, and he leaned into her. “Evie,” he began, “is something going on-ya?”
“It not what is going on-menh,” she said. “It what I have seen-oh.” The tears were falling freely now, although she was trying to conceal them with her hanky.
His hand rose, almost of its own accord, to touch her cheek. He was amazed; she didn’t even flinch. The tears kept on falling. He felt like they were maybe in a dream—one of those h
e had as sleep engulfed him every night—and he didn’t want the spell to be broken. He did want her to stop crying, though. “What you see?” He whispered. If they were alone, he would have kissed her.
She covered her mouth with her hand and began to sob. “I cannot say-oh.”
His thumb rubbed her cheek—the skin was so soft! “Tell me,” he said. “You can trust me-oh.” He wished she could love him.
“I have always trusted you,” she said, sniffling.
This surprised him. He studied her long eyelashes, her strong nose. He believed her.
“In my dream the other night . . . I saw death,” she said. “I saw Tolbert killed.” She wiped away more tears.
Ujay looked at her, uncomprehending. “Killed?”
Evelyn nodded, exhausted from her confession. “By a group of men in army fatigues. They came late in the night, after he fell asleep working-oh. They . . . cut him . . .” Her voice trailed to a whisper, and the tears started up again.
Ujay had never seen Evelyn like this—couldn’t have imagined it. How many times had he fantasized about what it might be like to see her when she was not in complete control? Even the handful of times they’d made love had been in her bed, on her terms. But now that the moment of weakness was really here, he wanted it to end. He couldn’t stand to see her like this. It brought him back to their first time, after he’d climaxed. He’d expected that when he had finally been with a woman, whatever it was inside him that created this inescapable longing might finally let him have some peace and quiet. Instead, he found only a new reserve of worry, a new depth of exhaustion.
Skipping on sandals made from old tires, Old Man Togbah came right up to the table and leaned in between them. The thin odor of palm wine hung in the air. “This man want to bed you-oh,” he said, as if he were announcing the coming of a storm.
In the lengthening moment afterward, Evelyn pulled her hand from Ujay’s arm, and her eyes, which had been so clear the instant before, regained their usual glassy armor.
“Togbah!” Ujay cried. “Leave us, now, you old beast!”
Pulling her purse strap tightly around her shoulder, Evelyn stood up. “I have to go,” she said icily.
“Sorry, sorry,” Old Man Togbah said—more to Ujay than Evelyn. “I only meant to say that you should be his wife-oh.”
Evelyn turned away from both of them and strode down the stairs, toward the taxi stop.
Ujay leapt up and ran after her. “Pay him no mind—he just a crazy old papi.”
Evelyn kept on walking.
He took hold of her arm and faced her. “Take this,” he said, grasping the worn brass clasp around his neck. His grandfather Togar had given him it when he was a boy, had told him that it was a good-luck charm, and that it had gotten him out of many dangerous situations. The old man said it had been in their family for some time but would not elaborate.
As he pulled the thin chain over his head, Evelyn shook her head. “I can’t—”
Ujay placed it carefully in her palm. “Take it-oh,” he said more firmly.
Evelyn sighed, and he saw the tears fill up in her eyes again. “All right,” she whispered. She closed her fingers around the tiny brass clasp, met his glance one last time, and then strode away. She took exactly thirty-three steps before she rounded the corner and was out of sight. He lifted his hand up to his neck and felt the hollow of his clavicle, where the charm used to be.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
April 12, 1980, Monrovia, Liberia
“I HAD NO BODY—only eyes and ears.”
Blessing expertly navigated the throngs of hawkers who swarmed the cars stopped in traffic, trying to reach the Big Man who anxiously snapped his fingers at her, hissing. He had bought her bags of groundnuts before, although she was sure he would not remember her. Why would he, when she was just another anonymous small girl on the street? The Big Man leaned out of the window of his shiny black BMW. Perspiration dotted his brow, and he wiped it with a hanky. After a moment, he grabbed a bag from the center of her plate, and then gave her a twenty-five-cent piece. Blessing dug around in her lappa for the change, as the line of cars inched forward. She had only been out here for an hour this morning, since five, and already she was tired. It would be a long day. Her task was to walk from Broad Street down to Old Road, back and forth, until she sold all the groundnuts. She sometimes finished in the late morning, but more often by the early afternoon. Then she would head back to her uncle’s house and give all the money to her aunt.
She had been living with her uncle and his family in town for three months now, but she still couldn’t seem to get used to it. Surveying their thirteen children, and the impossible task of feeding them all at their small village in Bomi County, Blessing’s parents had decided it would be better for her to stay with her father’s younger brother, an assistant to the postmaster general. You work small-small, he pay your school fees-oh, her father had said. Make yourself useful in the house. Get educated-ya? Learn Congo people ways. Get yourself a future-menh, her father told her one evening. But she hadn’t heard anything about school since she had come to her uncle’s house, as her days were filled with a steady stream of hawking groundnuts, preparing food for the family, cleaning the house, and doing the wash. The promise of school was becoming dimmer to her with each passing day.
“Eh-menh!” the Big Man snapped, hissing in her face. “Where my money-oh?”
Blessing frowned, her line of thought severed. She shoved a five-cent piece she had found in her lappa into the man’s hand, and he harrumphed a kind of acknowledgment. Then he shooed her away, as one might a fly, and his car shot forward toward the junction.
A sigh escaped her lips, and Blessing imagined what would happen if she refused to put the plate of groundnuts back on her head again, and instead began walking the long journey back to her village by foot. It would take days, and she didn’t really know the way. She had no money, except the few coins she had managed to come by through selling this morning. And if by some miracle she actually managed to reach home, her parents would just send her right back here, convinced as all country people were that life would be better in every way in the city, and that whoever was caring for their children was doing so lovingly and responsibly. No one would believe a lowly girl-child.
“Cold water!” a boy of about five yelled beside her, and she winced. A wooden case of water bags and ice balanced on his head, steadied by his tiny arms.
“Water, yes!” a woman in an African suit yelled farther up the road.
The small boy grinned at her and then scampered toward her.
Blessing grimaced, then got her plate of groundnuts back on top of her head.
After about an hour she had passed the University of Liberia campus, and was maybe halfway to where she had picked up the groundnuts in the dark of morning, downtown. She had sold another ten packs by this time, which wasn’t what she had hoped for, but wasn’t bad either. As she passed onto Camp Johnson Road, the Ministry of Internal Affairs loomed large on her left. Taxis packed with civil servants heading into work sped past her, as did the huge jeeps and trucks of NGO workers. She turned a few times to see if anyone inside might be hailing her for groundnuts, but saw only clouds of exhaust. About twenty minutes later, she found herself staring at the back of the massive executive mansion just as a band of soldiers began crossing the lawn, toward the back doors. Their crouched, youthful bodies were tense and their guns gleamed surprisingly, as though they’d just been lovingly cleaned and polished.
The plate on top of Blessing’s head fell to the ground, the sound of plastic on pavement clanging loud in her ears.
* * *
—
Garnahweh grimaced, signaling to the men behind him to flank left. Their sources on the inside said that Tolbert had worked late as usual and dragged himself into bed a few hours before. His security detail was playing draughts downstairs. Most of t
hem were sympathetic to the struggle anyway and would support the rising new country even if they would not pull the trigger themselves. They knew it was time. Had known it was time for years now. The only thing left to do was commit the act once and for all, the violent sacrifice ushering in an unprecedented era of peace and prosperity for the real people who had built this country and suffered silently for it for generations: the indigenous. The only thing Garnahweh could do was become the man he was always meant to be.
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