If I fell, if I sat down, if I paused to rest, I would never get up again. Walk, keep moving, put one foot in front of the other, repeat this ad infinitum. Logging trails would certainly lead me to a road somewhere, since the timber had to be hauled out of the forest. And in fact I was on one of those trails. Walk, keep moving, put one foot in front of the other. Stagger but don’t fall. Keep moving . . .
Chapter Twenty-seven
Johnny, Known as Mad Dog
We hung around for three or four days, strolling through our neighborhood with nothing to do. Our aimless existence was made even more unbearable by the savage storm that hit the city and kept us indoors for nearly two days. It had begun at midday and lasted all night, bringing great sheets of rain that transformed the streets into raging torrents. I was glad I didn’t live in the Kandahar district. With the violent downpour inundating areas undrained by any sewer system, gouging out gullies, ripping roofs off buildings, and causing mud-brick houses to collapse, there was no doubt that many hastily buried bodies had been uncovered and were floating around in the water like dead dogs. The streets and yards were probably littered with corpses.
The end of the storm did not automatically mean the end of our confinement indoors. It was another day before we could go out. Deep pools and huge puddles of stagnant water prevented people from walking or driving around the city, and we had to wait until these had evaporated under the tropical sun.
I set out to look for Giap as soon as the streets were passable, because we needed new orders and I didn’t know where else to get them. Most of the commando units had broken into smaller groups, which often wound up fighting one another. I attempted to bring the Roaring Tigers back together, but without success. It wasn’t for lack of trying. When I began the effort to reunite my men, the first one I came across was Stud. I asked him to let bygones be bygones and join up with me. He replied scornfully that he was now his own boss and that he wasn’t about to take orders from anyone, least of all me. As I was turning to leave, he said mockingly:
“So tell me—where’s the famous Lovelita? The chick you nearly killed me for? Where is she these days, huh?”
I don’t know how he’d learned of her death, but I suspected everyone in the district knew that Mad Dog’s girl had been shot. Stud’s words made me furious, and I told him his mother was a whore. I wanted to kill him right then and there, but he wasn’t alone. He was surrounded by four heavily armed goons—probably members of his new gang. I swallowed my anger. He’d have to wait a while, but eventually he’d get what was coming to him.
I was able to find only two loyal members of the unit—Piston and Little Pepper. I invited them out for a beer, so we could discuss future operations. For me, there was no question about the first item on the agenda: destroy the bar where Lovelita had discovered me on that godawful evening, and ruin its owner. This was being generous on my part—I could have just blown the guy’s head off. Because if the bar hadn’t been there, I wouldn’t have snuck off with that whore Abissélékou, Lovelita wouldn’t have caught me by surprise, and she wouldn’t have gotten herself killed.
We were sitting there knocking back a few cool beers in that open-air bar when a truck filled with about twenty soldiers pulled up. It stopped and they all got out. Of course they didn’t wait to be served. Brandishing guns, they seized entire cases of beer, which they loaded into their vehicle. The owner begged them to pay, but they beat him with the butts of their weapons and told him he was making a contribution to the war effort, and that if he didn’t like it he could go complain to the president of the republic. It was hilarious. Inspired by this, my buddies and I decided we were going to contribute to the war effort, too, by not paying for our drinks.
Just as the soldiers were climbing back into their truck, I caught sight of Idi Amin. We’d heard he’d been captured, tortured, and killed by the Chechens—in fact, that was one of the reasons we had attacked Kandahar! He was holding a U.S.-made assault rifle, an M-16, and tied around his head was a scarf patterned after the American flag. Where had he gotten all that stuff?
“Idi Amin!” I shouted.
He saw me and wheeled his muscular bulk around, smiling broadly. We greeted each other like long-lost kin.
“Matiti Mabé! Great to see you!”
“I’ve changed my name to Mad Dog.”
“Okay! Me, too. I’m no longer Idi Amin—that was a stupid name. Now I’m Chuck.”
“Chuck?”
“Yeah, Chuck Norris.”
“Okay. What’s happening, Chuck?”
“We’re on a mission. We’re rounding up refugees and bringing them to the camps.”
“Yeah? I’m coming with you.”
Little Pepper and Piston joined me, and we climbed into the truck. Idi Amin, alias Chuck Norris, told us what he’d been up to, and then I understood why there were so many Russianmade MI-8 and MI-24 helicopters flying back and forth over the city. They were strafing villages they suspected of harboring Chechen traitors. After an intense four-day barrage, the villagers were streaming toward the city. We were to guarantee their safety in the humanitarian corridor that had been set up for them.
It was a spectacular reversal of the mass outflow of refugees who had fled into the forest. The crowds heading for the city consisted of long columns of gaunt women and children ravaged by hunger and disease, with a handful of men here and there. It’s true these people were coming out of the forest because our new government had publicly assured the HCR and other NGOs that their safety was guaranteed, but this didn’t mean we were no longer responsible for neutralizing the terrorists hiding among them. So we set up roadblocks along the route, to screen the new arrivals. We stopped all young people whose gait, posture, or rough hands betrayed the fact that they were used to handling guns. We’d shove them a few meters into the underbrush, and blam!—happy trails. We had to maintain national security. Some of them were let through because their parents offered us money and pleaded with us, but mostly we took both their money and the lives of their precious kids, if these young people looked or walked like terrorists. Others assumed we were idiots and told us they weren’t Mayi-Dogos, but one glance at their ID card was enough to show that their names began with an A, an X, or a T—typical of the inhabitants of that region. We took care of them pretty quick.
We continued our work for two days, and then foreign radio stations, the international press, and local organizations claiming to be human rights groups but allied with the defeated factions began telling all sorts of lies about us—in particular, that we were terrorizing the civilians, holding them for ransom, and carrying out summary executions. With a little effort they would have learned that we were executing only Mayi-Dogo bandits, to prevent them from reestablishing their militias, and that the young men we were accused of frequently kidnapping from the refugee centers were all terrorists. But under the pressure of those cock-and-bull stories, our government, which had nothing to hide, agreed to allow teams from the Red Cross, Doctors Without Borders, and the UN High Commission for Refugees to accompany the refugees out of the rain forest. Since we could no longer do our job in peace and privacy, we were redeployed to other locations around the city.
During one of our patrols through the districts, by a stroke of sheer luck, we met up with Giap. I practically hugged him. We described how we’d been searching for him, and said that now that we’d found him we were at his disposal.
He told us not to call him “General” anymore—he had changed his rank. He was now a real soldier and had been integrated into the army as a corporal. Goddamn Giap! What a guy—full of surprises and always way ahead of us. When I remembered that he owed his prestigious name to me, that it was thanks to me he’d been recruited into the militias, that I was better educated than him (since he’d never got beyond first grade), and that now he was a soldier and I was nothing, I understood that life was truly unfair. But this wasn’t all. He’d been given an even more spectacular promotion: he was now a member of the preside
nt’s bodyguard. You know what that means? The fucking pinnacle! The president’s life in your very own hands!
Our reunion couldn’t have been better timed. Giap said he could use us in the security force at the refugee camp during the president’s upcoming visit. After the grotesque campaign of lies mounted by the foreign press and its local lackeys, the president was coming to tour one of the camps. In this way he would undermine the propaganda that the former rulers, those genocidal murderers, were continuing to spread abroad via the Web and the international media, while they stewed over their defeat and dreamed of a coup d’état.
We were at the camp long before the arrival of the president and his wife, to prepare for the ceremony and set up the basic components of the security system. We’d spent hours ripping off the labels of the charitable organizations that had donated the relief supplies, and replacing them with tags that said “Children’s Solidarity,” the name of the nongovernmental organization headed by the president’s wife. We’d chosen six refugees, three girls and three boys who clearly showed the ravages of hunger and malnutrition, and we’d given them new clothes. We’d made them repeat several times what they were supposed to say in front of the cameras and the president. Above all, they’d been reminded to convey a heartfelt thankyou to the president’s wife, whom they were supposed to address as “Mama.” Then we’d set up a security cordon around the dais where the nation’s leader was to stand.
The excitement was at a fever pitch when we heard the sirens and spotted the surveillance helicopter that preceded the head of state on all his travels. The refugees were crowding so closely against the barriers that they risked endangering our beloved leader, and we were forced to drive them back with the butts of our guns.
Accompanied by his legitimate wife, the president finally arrived, shielded by a forest of machine guns. Giap, the point man, was wearing dark glasses and looked like an FBI agent. He no longer had his Kalashnikov, but was carrying a new automatic weapon—I couldn’t tell where it had been made. The children of the Mayi-Dogo refugees began to sing spontaneously:
Papa a yo, nzala essili,
Mama a yo, nzala essili.
Papa is here, good-bye hunger!
Mama is here, good-bye hunger!
It was touching to see how deeply the people loved our leader! Although I was responsible for security, for staying calm and vigilant, I, too, was inspired—I couldn’t help silently joining in as the crowd shouted its enthusiasm:
“Papa brought peace to our land! Long live Papa!”
“Stay on as leader! Complete the work you’ve begun! Without you, war will return . . .”
“You’re like Muhammad Ali! The greatest! Unbeatable! You KO them all!”
The president was beaming with pleasure, and his wife was even more radiant. The children we’d selected were obediently lined up in front of the dais. The president’s wife said a few words and offered the first bit of cake to a little girl of five or six, who was smiling in her brand-new dress, courtesy of Children’s Solidarity. Then, with the gesture of a loving mother, she took the child in her arms, and in front of the cameras—not just our national network but media from all over the world—she hugged her several times to the cheers of the crowd. After a scene like that, I didn’t see how the liars who were spreading disinformation could possibly go on saying that the refugees were being mistreated.
Then the president gave a speech, while the helicopter circled overhead and we kept watch on high alert. He began by thanking the refugees for their warm welcome, promising that they would be able to return to their districts as soon as vital services were restored and public health could be guaranteed. And here he thanked the international humanitarian organizations that had sent contributions. He expressed particular gratitude to France, which had been the first to come to our aid by sending six tons of lime and a thousand shovels. This was news to me. Our masons would certainly find the shovels useful for digging foundations and mixing cement when they were rebuilding the houses that had been destroyed, and the lime would come in handy for whitewashing the walls. It was a pity France hadn’t provided us with sacks of cement as well, since I could have used a couple of tons to build a place of my own.
Finally the president left and the camp administrators got ready to distribute the food, as planned. But before they began, we decided we’d take ten percent for ourselves, despite the protests of the NGO representatives. What did they expect? A goat grazes where he’s tethered, and a bellboy eats at the hotel. So it was perfectly normal that we should claim our share, and the money we got from selling the goods at the market would be our well-earned salary.
But as soon as the refugees saw us toting sacks of food to our trucks parked in front of the camp, a riot broke out. Those runty children who’d stared wide-eyed with fear at our guns, those mothers who’d been so passive just a few minutes before, threw themselves at the boxes of biscuits, the sacks of rice, the cans of beans, the containers of oil . . . They broke through our security cordon. So we began driving them back with kicks and blows.
Even the kid who’d been embraced by the president’s wife, the little star of the day’s festivities, the child whose image would soon be appearing on national news reports and on TVs all over the world—even she had lost every shred of dignity. She was a disgrace to our country and to the president’s wife! She began by picking up the pieces of biscuit that had fallen to the ground and stuffing them into her mouth. Then she blatantly stole a whole packet. A thief at the tender age of five or six! Can you imagine? The nation was in peril! I unbuckled my heavy military belt and aimed a tremendous whack at her just as she was reaching for a box of powdered milk. The belt missed its target and hit the box, which flew apart and scattered its contents in the dirt. I raised the belt over my head, but just as I was about to give the little thief a blow across the hack, someone came up behind me and snatched the belt from my hand. I whirled around. I was furious. In front of me was a young woman, likewise in a rage.
I glared, glowered, thrust out my chin—assumed the terrifying expression that Mad Dog used like a weapon to strike fear into the heart of the enemy. But she didn’t even bother to look at me; she acted as if I wasn’t even there. Shouting words that my brain couldn’t register through the fog of my anger, she ran past me and shielded the child with her own body. My fury doubled, and seizing my belt again I began lashing out. Bending over the child’s body, she completely blocked it from view. I took my rage out on her. I struck her on the back, on the ass, on the head, everywhere—but she never let go of the child, who was crying the whole time.
Someone dealt me a blow behind the ear. The men—who had thus far been slouching about with a shamefaced expression, like dogs that have been beaten—had suddenly joined the fray, as if bent on avenging all the humiliations that they and their wives had endured. I fell to the ground. They whipped me with my own belt; they struck me with the butt of my own gun. The riot spread through the camp. If the guards didn’t fire soon, it would be the end of all of us. Then I heard gunshots, screams. And finally, after a while, calm was restored. The riot had been quelled.
We called off the food distribution, to punish everyone. And then, to stifle any further revolt, we made a sweep through the entire camp. We rounded up all the men between the ages of fourteen and forty-five, to take them to our military bases. They were terrorists bent on inciting rebellion among the refugees. And this time the women weren’t going to get off so easy. Each of us chose a young and pretty female (except for Little Pepper, who chose two) to take away with him.
But I didn’t need sex; I needed revenge. And you won’t be surprised to hear that the one I threw into the truck was the bitch who was responsible for the beating I’d gotten. I could have been killed if the soldiers hadn’t shot at the rioters. In any case, she would feel the heat of my revenge. She looked at me contemptuously in her ragged T-shirt, still holding the little girl in her arms, as if protecting her from the rest of the world.
Chapter Twenty-eight
Laokolé
So now I’m in a refugee camp. I don’t really know how I got here. Only a few vague impressions—sounds, voices, colors, kaleidoscopic fragments—emerge now and then from the fog of my memory. A long walk through the forest. A road of blood-red laterite, so muddy that my shoes were soon covered with mire and every time I lifted a foot to take a step, I felt as if I were tearing a ton of earth from the ground. Legs weak and trembly. Body on the verge of collapse. The sound of passing cars. The words, “She’s alive . . .” Cool water trickling down my throat. Then nothing more. I regained consciousness in a truck belonging to Doctors Without Borders that was returning from its rounds. A refugee camp. I was unloaded from the truck.
I found a bit of space beneath a tent made of orange plastic. All around me were emaciated children with swollen bellies, discolored hair, limbs puffy from edema, faces prematurely aged with malnutrition and hunger. It was hard for me to look at those girls and boys who had been robbed of their childhood.
A young woman arrived that morning, destitute, accompanied by a daughter who appeared to be about twelve. The woman was walking like a zombie. I made room for her next to me. She sat down without noticing that she’d sat down. She remained motionless for a long time, a handkerchief on her bowed head, her chin resting listlessly on the palm of her right hand. It was as if she were in another world. Obviously, she and her daughter were suffering from more than fatigue—malnutrition, no doubt, and some profound inner torment. The day before, I’d had my ration of beans boiled up with a bit of palm oil, to bring out the flavor and also to keep them from spoiling in the heat. Since some of the food remained, I offered it to them, as well as water to drink. I thought they would pounce avidly on the beans, the way I’d pounced on those bananas in the forest. Far from it—they ate slowly, like gourmets. The mother drank the water I offered her, and thanked me with the simple words: “I’d forgotten what salt tastes like.”
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