Johnny Mad Dog

by Emmanuel Dongala

  My brain, which always thinks more quickly than other people’s, understood right away that this officer from the so-called regular army was going to keep everything for himself and his men. The guy was a fox, but I was smarter. While the trucks were maneuvering to turn around, I jumped into my command vehicle with several of my men and hurried to set up a blockade a hundred meters farther along the convoy’s route. We made them get out at gunpoint and then we emptied the trucks of all the sacks of rice, all the boxes of powdered milk—every bit of food and medicine. We took not only the supplies but personal belongings. In this way I acquired a small but powerful shortwave radio with a broad range of frequencies. Little Pepper got a watch that showed local time and Greenwich time and had a stopwatch function. Unfortunately, the convoy personnel had little money. Still at gunpoint we let them leave, having stripped them of everything of value. We transferred our loot to a warehouse we found on the outskirts of Huambo. It took three or four trips with our vehicle under the direction of Lovelita, the only one I fully trusted. If nothing else, selling the food and medicine on the black market would bring us a fair amount of cash. The day had gotten off to a very good start.

  “The situation here is desperate. We could be killed at any moment. Yesterday the compound was invaded by a band of trigger-happy militiamen who were high on drugs. They were hunting for us, out to slaughter us. Fortunately, we were hidden in a spot where they couldn’t possibly have found us.”

  “Do you think the danger is over now?”

  “No, madam—they were extremely angry when they left. I saw them threaten an HCR employee at gunpoint, and I think they killed her before leaving the compound. Believe me, they’ll come back. Our governments must move with all possible speed to save us. Think of the women and children who are being terrorized!”

  “How many of you are there altogether?”

  “About fifty, perhaps a few more.”

  “Thank you. That was one of the European hostages, joining us by telephone. You’re listening to BBC Africa.”

  If I hadn’t had the radio on, I never would have known there were Europeans among the refugees at the HCR center. Where were they hiding? How had the BBC journalist managed to get their phone number? When we went back into the compound with our reinforcements, the Roaring Tigers would make it their absolute top priority to find those Europeans before anyone else could. It was always good to have white hostages. The Western embassies would pressure the HCR to give up the refugees so that no harm would come to their citizens.

  After the world news and the sports results, there was nothing more of interest. I flipped through the stations to see if I could find something else worth listening to but didn’t turn up anything, so I switched off the radio. There was nothing left to do but wait for 1500 hours. According to our ultimatum, that was when the refugees would begin leaving the compound, evicted by the HCR in exchange for the lives of the Europeans. Our plan couldn’t fail—the UN was bound to yield to pressure from the Western governments. Those governments attached greater importance to the lives of their citizens than our African governments attached to the lives of their own people. Giap was a genius to have thought of this! So we had more than two hours to wait.

  We waited barely half an hour. Three combat helicopters appeared on the horizon, and before we had time to realize what was happening they had dive-bombed us, and our two armored vehicles were nothing but a mass of flames. An attack! We’d been attacked! Panic all around.

  I threw myself into a ditch with Lovelita. Two soldiers with rocket launchers were cut down while they were trying frantically to aim their weapons at the helicopters. A third managed to fire a rocket but it missed the target, whereupon the brave fighter dropped his weapon and ran like hell for cover, along with his buddies. The two trucks were incinerated in turn. The three helicopters zigzagged once more above our heads, then headed toward the HCR compound. Two landed within the walls, while the third kept circling above the camp.

  We’d heard that the Chechens were being aided by Israeli mercenaries; I now knew that in fact they were Serbs. You didn’t have to be terribly smart to figure this out immediately. During the battle of Kisangani, in the last days of Mobutu’s reign, the planes that bombed the city had been piloted by Serbs. We even saw them on TV. Since the same things produce the same effects, the conclusion was obvious: these couldn’t be Israelis—they had to be Serbs from Kosovo. Whatever they were, the raid had taken our soldiers completely by surprise.

  Scarcely had the helicopters completed their assault when we heard a rumbling sound behind us. Turning around, we saw a column of military vehicles approaching, led by a tank. The tank didn’t give us a chance. It fired without warning on the fleeing soldiers, and then, swiveling the barrel of its gun toward my command vehicle, which had miraculously survived the aerial attack, it fired again. The vehicle exploded in a gigantic ball of flame! If Lovelita hadn’t restrained me, I would have leaped from the ditch to confront the tanks. After all, a lone man can stop a tank—I’m not saying anything absurd here. I once saw an old documentary on TV about a Chinese guy who single-handedly stopped an entire column. But Lovelita protested so strongly and gave me such imploring looks that I decided to stay put. Anyway, the battle was too one-sided. They were better armed than we were, and three-fourths of our men had been killed in that brief but violent exchange. The tank continued without stopping; it forced open the gate and entered the HCR compound, followed by the convoy of trucks loaded with soldiers. A second tank remained in front of the gate, preventing my commandos from rushing out of their hiding places and mounting a counterattack.

  I heard screams and gunfire coming from inside the compound, and in less than half an hour the trucks emerged with the white refugees. Then the helicopters flew off in the direction they’d come from. The operation had been extremely quick and highly effective. We hadn’t managed to kill a single enemy soldier.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Laokolé

  “What’s the matter, Laokolé?”

  My expression no doubt betrayed the countless fears and worries churning in my mind. She must have noticed the heaviness that slowed my movements and must have seen, from the way I sank down next to her, that I was bearing an additional burden, beyond my usual physical weight. We can’t hide things from our mother for very long—whatever our age, she can see right through us. After all, she’s the one who made us. So I decided to tell her the truth.

  “Someone stole our wheelbarrow.”

  Brief as a flash, the glimmer I saw in her eyes was not at all a look of dismay—far from it. It was more like the barely noticeable expression you see in the eyes of people who’ve been wandering in the dark for ages and who finally glimpse the end of the tunnel leading out. It was a glimmer of hope or solace. As if she’d always known this moment would come and had already prepared her response to it, she reacted to my admission without a moment’s hesitation.

  “So what are you waiting for? Get up! Get out of here! Run!”

  Though I wasn’t completely surprised by this—since she’d been reluctant from the outset to come with us, and Fofo and I had had to use blackmail to get her into the wheelbarrow—her words still threw me off balance, and for a moment I was speechless. She pressed her advantage:

  “I’m nothing but a dead weight. Don’t worry—no one will harm a crippled old woman like me. Go on! Move! If you save your own life, you can also save Fofo. See—it’s not just a question of you and me!”

  While she was speaking, people were rushing by us, jostling one another, almost trampling us in the dust that was rising all around—the familiar scene of a crowd of refugees once again taking to the road. Of course, I was silent only for a moment. Reviving my determination, I immediately focused all of my mental energy on getting her to accept the fact that from now on my back would replace the lost wheelbarrow and that there was nothing more to say on this point. I knew I could carry her on my back. I didn’t think she was terribly heavy—I’d born
e much heavier loads working on construction sites with Papa. She might have slowed us down if she’d still had her legs, for they would have dangled at my sides and made it more difficult for me to keep my balance as I walked. But her two stumps were shorter than a child’s legs, and she’d be no more of a bother than the large bundle I’d been carrying thus far in our flight. We had to act—talking was a waste of valuable time.

  I got to my feet. I emptied more than half the bundle, and told her she was going to carry what remained of it. She didn’t ask me why—quite the opposite. Quickly she offered her back so that I could position the bundle, and then she helped me tie it on. I understood perfectly why she was in such a hurry. She thought that, as a good daughter who always obeyed her parents, I was heeding her words and giving her a share of the provisions before making my escape. I don’t know if all mothers are like this, but mine could not get it through her head that her child would refuse to abandon her.

  I again slung my precious leather bag bandolier-style across my front, and automatically checked to make sure the purse hidden under my pants was still securely tied around my hips. The fateful moment had arrived.

  “Mama,” I said, “I’m going to carry you on my back. There’s no point in discussing it. Climb up and let’s get going. We’ve wasted enough time—the militias will be here soon.”

  I knelt down and bent over so she could climb onto my back.

  “What?” she gasped, as if I’d made the most outrageous proposal ever uttered by a child in her mother’s presence. “No—leave me here! I’d rather die than be carried on my daughter’s back! Don’t be stubborn, like a badly behaved child. Your mother is ordering you to flee without her—you must obey!”

  Naturally I wasn’t taken aback by these words, and had already prepared an unarguable response—the one Fofo had come up with when she’d refused to get into the wheelbarrow. But this time I deliberately and unfairly added a sting of cruelty.

  “Fine,” I said. “We’ll both stay here. I know you know I won’t leave without you, and your refusal is just a ruse to get me to stay with you because you don’t want to die alone. Yeah, you don’t want to die alone—you want us to be killed together. Okay, I’m staying. They can kill us both. The only difference is that they won’t rape you, but they’ll probably rape me before killing me.”

  It didn’t work. She stared at me in astonishment and horror when she heard these words, then burst out angrily:

  “How dare you speak to me like that, Lao! You’re wicked—wicked! My god, what has the world come to, that I should hear such words come from my daughter’s mouth! . . . She insults me! . . . You want to stay? All right, stay! I’ll kill myself before they come, and you’ll be my murderer! Keep watch over my body, if that’s what you want! I’ll be dead already, and won’t be here to see you get raped!”

  Frantically, she hitched herself away from me with the painful dragging movements of a legless cripple, accosting all the people in the tumult around us and calling on them to take her side.

  “Look at her! Look at that girl—she wants to die! She wants to stay here! . . . She’s my daughter, sir! Tell her to flee! If she doesn’t, the militias will kill her! . . . You’re a mother just like me, madam! I see you have your two children with you. Tell my idiot daughter to stop wasting time and to follow you out of here! . . . Miss, you’re the same age she is! You’re fleeing, but she wants to stay! Tell her she must go!”

  Using her arms as supports and jerking her hips, off she went, now here, now there, ignoring her swollen stump, which was scraped raw from being dragged over the rough ground. She began to laugh. She shouted appeals to everyone who passed. A man hurrying by shoved her out of the way with his foot when she tried to hold on to the leg of his pants. She fell on her side and laughed. My mother was going mad!

  A man with a bicycle paused when Mama dragged herself in front of him and blocked his path. I ran to him.

  “Please, sir! I’ll give you money! . . . Let my mother ride on your luggage rack. We have no way to get out of here!”

  The frown of anger that darkened his face disappeared—a miracle brought about by the desire for gain.

  “How much will you pay?”

  “Five thousand,” I said.

  “No.”

  “Ten thousand!”

  “Child, you don’t understand the situation! Hauling this old lady will slow me down and might get me killed. I could do it, but not for ten thousand CFA francs.”

  “Please! You know that nobody in this crowd fled with much money! Fifteen thousand is all I’ve got. I need to keep some to buy food!”

  “Give me the fifteen thousand and I’ll take your mother. If not, too bad for you.”

  “You’re heartless! You’re taking everything we have!”

  “So? Is it my fault you’re here in this camp? Decide—quick. Either give me fifteen thousand francs, or I’m on my way.”

  “Life is beyond price,” I said. “I’ll give you the money. It’s over there, where we were sitting,” I added, pointing to Mama’s mat.

  Actually, I didn’t want him to see me take the money out from under my clothes. I ran to the spot where our things were lying. Turning my back, I discreetly unzipped my pants, reached in for my purse, withdrew fifteen thousand from the forty thousand it contained, and zipped up again.

  I ran back to the man and handed him three five-thousandfranc bills. He grabbed them and stuffed them in his pocket.

  Mama was calmer now—her fit of hysteria had passed, and she’d realized I was negotiating with the man with the bicycle. I knelt beside her and hugged her.

  “I love you, Mama! I was only trying to get a reaction from you, to persuade you to come with me. You’re the most wonderful mother any child could have!”

  “Dear Lao—you and Fofo are all I have left in the world!”

  She didn’t break down, but two large tears glistened on her cheeks. She was ready for the torment of a mode of travel even more uncomfortable than the wheelbarrow.

  The man who had taken our fifteen thousand francs asked me to hold the bike while he untied his canvas suitcase from the luggage rack, which fortunately was about the same size as the passenger seat on a motor scooter. He lifted Mama and placed her sideways on the rack. She held tight to the bicycle seat. Since he obviously couldn’t abandon his suitcase, he asked me to carry it. I went to repack the bundle I’d half-emptied for Mama and tied it to my back. I returned to the bicycle, lifted the suitcase, and balanced it on my head. All set—we were ready to leave.

  He pushed the bike and its passenger as fast as he could, and I strove to follow as fast as I could. There was no pavement, and the sandy soil made walking difficult, especially for anyone like me who was carrying a double load—a bundle on my back and a suitcase on my head. Pushing the bicycle wasn’t easy, either. I found myself admiring the man’s strength, and my admiration almost turned to gratitude—gratitude for having saved Mama.

  But reason prevailed over my emotions. He wasn’t doing this out of the goodness of his heart, like the fellow who’d appeared out of nowhere to help me with the wheelbarrow near the embassies. He was doing it for the money. If he’d known I had forty thousand francs on me, he would have taken the entire sum. He was the type who’d bleed you dry. He’d said that transporting Mama would slow him down and put his life in danger. But he’d wound up agreeing to do it for fifteen thousand francs. I began to despise him for that—for having valued his life so cheaply: three five-thousand-franc bills. To me, life didn’t have a price. If he’d demanded all the money I had in return for taking Mama, I would have given it to him.

  Still, when I saw the sweat running down his brow and the care he took to avoid jostling Mama’s infected thigh more than necessary as we hurried along, my heart reasoned differently from my head. We were in a situation that benefited both of us—I had no cause to despise him. Without my money, he certainly wouldn’t have taken us. But without him, my money wouldn’t have saved Mama. I at least ow
ed him some respect.

  Getting through the gate was the hardest part. The HCR center had been designed to accommodate a diplomatic mission, not a great crowd of refugees. The massive wall that protected the compound had only one exit: the large double-winged gate through which we had entered. This was now the only way out. Imagine a giant soccer stadium during the finals for the Africa Cup, with panicked spectators rushing toward the only exit. We almost lost Mama in the crush as we tried to get through the opening—amid all the pushing and shoving, she momentarily lost her grip on the bicycle seat she was clinging to. Luckily she was able to regain her balance with a quick movement of her hips. If she hadn’t, she would have been trampled under the countless feet that were pounding the soil like a herd of stampeding elephants.

  At last we managed to get out. When we’d put some distance between us and the compound, I turned to look back. Waves of people were continuing to pour from the gate, as if expelled by violent spasms. But now we could walk much more easily, because once the people had gotten past that bottleneck, they spread out across the wide street that led to the Kandahar district (toward which we were all fleeing), and also because the route was paved. Pushing on the handlebars, the man who was transporting Mama walked steadily forward. He never looked hack, or even to the side—unlike me, who gazed at everything. I’d had no inkling of the battle that had taken place while we were in the compound. The landscape was littered with two burned-out tanks, the charred remains of a 4×4, and the corpses of a number of uniformed soldiers. Yet there was no trace of the militiamen who had pursued us and threatened the UN staff.