Blue White Red

by Alain Mabanckou

  The old man also did not forget that according to popular belief in the country, luck and success were just the achievement of blessings upon all family members, even the most distant. It was an obligation to support these parasites sometimes. They would eventually leave. And don’t ask them when they would be coming back. Such a question would infuriate them forever. They would immediately grab their bags and shake the dust off their shoes in front of the home as a curse. So Moki’s father put up with it. He opened his door, took out old straw mattresses, and laid them on the ground himself. Meals were prepared in big aluminum pots. But a slight tension was visible in the old man’s face. He camouflaged it. He’d pass by and get involved in a vehement argument, turn away from it, go back to his leopard skin chair, cross his legs, and fill his pipe.

  He smoked with his eyes closed. Yet for all that, he didn’t sleep. He returned to serve his guests beer and red wine from France. They drank, shouted themselves hoarse, told tales of the Parisian’s childhood. An aunt, tipsy from palm wine, recalled that her nephew defecated on her when he was four months old. An uncle boasted that he had seen Moki’s first tooth. A distant cousin insisted that they had played marbles and soccer with a ball made of rags that Moki had known how to make back then.

  In the evening, people nestled together in the salon to sleep. Indeed, half the family spent the night there. Especially those who had come from very far away. The others went back to their homes and returned very early the next morning . . .

  On the second day, conversations were exhausted. They touched on the weather, on how to shell peanuts quickly, to let the cattle graze during the dry season, about the morals of these young girls who came back from the big cities with skirts that left their whole derrières hanging out. These conversations continued in absolute unanimity. They got bogged down. Jokes and pleasantries no longer captured anyone’s imagination. Instead, those assembled watched the Parisian’s every gesture. They witnessed in silence. This weighty silence meant that one expected things would finally turn to serious matters.

  Who didn’t think so?

  Then Moki began handing out little gifts. The family was attentive to the distribution. Everyone looked out of the corner of their eye at what the other had received to compare it with their own present. The fake coughing of an impotent patriarch meant that he felt he had not done as well as he should have and the distribution should be reconsidered. The Parisian reviewed his prize and added two or three trinkets. The old man exhaled joyfully. For Moki, the distribution was a complicated and dangerous exercise. His father intervened in advance, with complete discretion. He alerted Moki, armed with his experience:

  “Pay attention to what you give the old people. Those people are waiting for just one false move to stir up the ashes. Do you remember the story of Kombo’s son, who died because he didn’t offer a torch to his old uncle? Of course, some people would think that’s a ridiculous gift, but he would have used that torch for hunting and to keep away evil spirits when the shadows of the night send us the devils from neighboring villages . . .”

  In the end, everyone left with a little something from France and gave thanks, in the first instance to the Parisian’s father, and then to him, while wishing him good luck. The same phrase was oft repeated:

  “Thanks a lot, Moki. Until next year . . .”

  The Parisian’s father could finally breathe; the nuisances had scampered off.

  He blessed his son, hugged him with his legs, touched his head, and asked him to hug the ground. This did not surprise the Parisian. Every year, every dry season, the same ritual was repeated. The ritual of luck and success.

  Moki had arrived.

  The first thing we noticed was the color of his skin. Nothing at all like ours, poorly cared for, devoured by the scorching sun, oily and as black as manganese. His was extraordinarily white. He argued that they didn’t have winter over there for nothing. Later, in France, I learned that he applied hydroquinone products to his entire body. The young people of the country who knocked themselves out in their irreversible blindness to ape Parisians made do with cheap products made in Africa like Ambi Red and Ambi Green. The results were not the same. They didn’t come close to the brilliant skin of a Parisian. The suffocating heat of the country accelerated side effects. The imitators got slapped with allergies, red spots, and blood clots on their faces.

  Moki’s pace was nimble, light-footed. One would have said it was the sound of a cotton ball falling on the floor. He must have walked in slow motion, suspended. Every one of his movements was detailed elegance. No gesture, no movement, was excessive. Everything was planned down to the nearest millimeter. This elegance disconcerted the young girls in the neighborhood. They spoke of nothing but the Parisian. They flocked together on the main street to watch him go by, offering him a timid and reverent hello. They spied on him, followed his comings and goings, guessing what he did with his time . . .

  During the first week, Moki passed his time sitting under the mango tree in the courtyard, there where his father had set up a dining table. The father and son talked, looked around together at what the house needed. The old man wore an expression of infinite happiness. He wore new clothes, tried using a television outside—one of the gifts his son had given him. He never left the Parisian. These conversations spread out over at least a week.

  Afterwards, Moki’s time was spent very simply. Sit under the Mango tree. Go out when he was invited by the neighborhood girls.

  In the morning, he read newspapers from Paris that he had brought back with him from the North: Ici Paris, Paris Match, Le Parisien . . . He stayed in his silk robe with taffeta motifs. Young men from the neighborhood, his childhood friends, came by to cut his hair. He paid for these services with things from Paris. And not just any odd thing! Moki thanked them with little Paris Métro maps. They were jubilant. Of course, they didn’t understand these tangled itineraries, these numbered lines that were so intertwined that one would have said it was a hydrographic map of China. They surprised the Parisian himself. In fact, certain natives described the Métro lines with unequaled talent, station by station, to the point that you would have thought they had stayed in Paris. Others took pseudonyms after the names of the stations. One dubbed himself Saint-Placide. Another, Strasbourg-Saint-Denis. Yet another, Colonel Fabien and Maubert-Mutalité. They added the word “Monsieur” to these pseudonyms. Monsieur Saint-Placide, Monsieur Strasbourg-Saint-Denis, Monsieur Colonel Fabien, Monsieur Maubert-Mutalité.

  Moki also supplied them with unused Métro passes. They glued their photographs on them and wowed the more naïve girls.

  The local heat bothered the Parisian now. Even this moderate dry season sun. He didn’t eat manioc or foufou anymore, the basic foodstuffs of the country that he grew up on. He preferred bread. Manioc and foufou had no dietary virtue, he said. He looked anxiously at everything he put in his mouth.

  We admired his speaking style. He spoke French French. The famous French of Guy de Maupassant, whom his father alluded to. He pretended that our tongues were predestined to mispronounce the words. Thus we didn’t speak real French. What we considered to be French, with our rustic accent, a dry, coarse, and jerky accent, was not in fact French. It was an unintelligible string of firofonfon naspa, the French of a former little black soldier and pretentious collector of medals. We listened to him with pleasure, dumbfounded and won over. Just to hear him speak was an intense moment. It was he who taught us that even those imbeciles who presented the television and radio news in our country didn’t speak the real French of France. He, Moki, didn’t grasp what they were telling us.

  “There’s a big difference between speaking in French and speaking French,” he claimed, without developing his point.

  We acquiesced. Amongst ourselves, the game was who could imitate him the best. We tried. Nobody succeeded, not even his three brothers, the oldest of whom was a civil servant in the Post and Telecommunications office in the center of Pointe-Noire. And then there were the word
choices. The Parisian used big words. You had to listen to all those words that pleasantly caress the ear and that were likely to amaze the listener. And between a simple, more precise word and a grandiose word, he opted for the latter, no matter what it meant . . .

  Moki didn’t move around on foot.

  He would not debase himself by getting caught in the sand and the muddy streets like a vulgar native. No, that was out of the question. He would not lower himself down to that level, especially because he owned two taxis. He commandeered one. The chauffeur, the same one used by his father, puffed out his chest and swaggered. He proclaimed from every rooftop that he had been chosen to be the Parisian’s driver. The king was no longer his cousin. We saw the car scour the neighborhood all day long. The chauffeur did not allow Moki to open or shut the door. He took a devilish pleasure in performing his duties. His zeal impelled him to turn on the trouble lights to announce the presence of the Parisian in the car. He played music in the background, lowered the windows, and made the vehicle dance by hitting the brakes heavily and regularly. For no reason at all, he honked the horn and yelled insults at those in his way. He thought he came first, no matter what. He didn’t slow down when approaching intersections. When Moki got out of the car to go into a West African’s boutique around the corner, the zealous chauffeur took that time to use a cloth and cleaning product. He nervously set himself upon the car windows until he achieved a brilliance he deemed impeccable. He dashed away from the car to contemplate it from a distance. He returned at the same speed, his eyes fixed on a spot he detected on the windshield. He vigorously sprayed a hefty dose of product and polished the glass while uttering swear words against himself. Everything was just right if he didn’t bang the glass with his fist.

  Moki returned.

  In an outpouring of obsequiousness, the chauffeur fell back two steps, then four, so as to not walk in front of the Parisian. He scrambled for the door, opened it, grinning ear to ear. He took off at top speed, not without having accomplished one of his specialties: a big figure eight in the sand amid a salvo of applause from groupies idling nearby . . .

  Moki received visitors. In actual fact, he issued strict instructions to his younger brothers to make sure they selected visitors well. Young girls were spared this unpleasantness. The villa’s doors were open to them at all times. They took advantage. They came running. Since they needed a motive to justify their untimely visits, they all said they came to ask about the latest fashion trends in Paris. They arrived early in the morning, stayed half the day, going so far as to help Moki’s mother do the shopping and cooking, watering and sweeping the courtyard.

  It was no longer rare to hear that in a certain street in the neighborhood at a certain hour, young girls fiercely confronted each other, with their claws out, because of the Parisian.

  And then there were all those less enterprising ladies, held back by pathological shyness. They were the most fragile. Their feelings languished in the shadows. They didn’t dare approach the Parisian. They waited patiently, counting that he would personally take the initiative himself. They could wait forever.

  Many girls had photographs of Moki in Paris. They bought these pictures for the price of gold, and sometimes payment in kind, according to our hallowed expression.

  Who was behind this traffic in photos of the Parisian? His two younger brothers, of course. These two proclaimed themselves their elder brother’s spokesmen. They swore by nothing except his name. Only Moki knew the truth about Paris. Other Parisians who were less famous in the country were nothing but vile liars. Moki’s brothers were servile. True automatons. They never spoke for themselves anymore. They went ahead and spoke to us about France, to preach to us just like their brother would have done. This devotion on their part was compensated. The Parisian dressed them. He offered them clothing he had already worn. The brothers handed them down to each other, one after the next. These outfits were coveted by the neighborhood show-offs. They suggested to the Parisian’s brothers that they mine them. Throughout the country, mines consisted of clothes borrowed for a sum of money for a rendezvous or a night out. You’d have to get up early to mine these outfits. Demand exceeded supply. The best was to be among the first miners, thereby avoiding having to wear this clothing after one of the young neighborhood show-offs put them on. Those really in the know reserved a year in advance. The price was high. That was the cost of exclusivity. It wasn’t given to just anyone . . .

  Moki’s brothers took advantage of their brother’s reign to impose their own. Every young person that wanted to speak with the Parisian had to go through them. Two inseparable brothers. So inseparable that we dubbed them (secretly, of course) Dupond and Dupont, just like the characters in The Adventures of Tintin. Those who took the risk of calling them that aloud definitely compromised their chances of meeting the Parisian someday. The brothers’ demands intersected the rhythm of requests. They became unbearable, vain, more royalist than the king, two caliphs in place of one. They scorned you for saying whatever. They attained the heights of presumptuousness. They protected their restricted domain, their private preserve. They strolled near the mango tree in the courtyard. Or they kept Praetorian Guard outside the door to their brother’s room while he rested. As soon as they heard him, or thought they heard his cough, both of them went running to investigate the situation. They took turns to make sure the villa was permanently guarded. Every undesirable male visitor was forcibly evicted.

  The two fierce guardians were overwhelmed. Or rather, they gave the impression of being so. They were here. They were there. We didn’t see anyone but them anymore. Sometimes in a taxi with their father, the conductor who lifted his baton higher and higher to show that he had the situation under control and to count on him.

  Dupond and Dupont each owned a Vélosolex moped. They rode around, dressed to the nines. They made no secret of their satisfaction. The false image they projected decrypted for us the real image they had of themselves. To their eyes, the neighborhood youth were nothing but poor wretches, cockroaches who should grovel before their commands. Their power? They were the blood brothers of the Parisian and therefore, by ricochet effect, potential Parisians themselves. The girls understood this. It was better to bury the hatchet with those two. Otherwise, the brothers would exact consequences when the time came . . .

  The girls were ready to drop everything to nail a rendezvous ahead of their competition. In the interest of getting the best place in the race and not getting sent back to the end of the line, they bribed Dupond and Dupont. Those two pleaded the girl’s case with the Parisian. They requested a rendezvous at a buvette, one of those public eateries and watering holes that were found all over the country. In those places, people drink, eat, talk, and listen to music outside, seated on stools around tables. It goes without saying that the girls would get their money’s worth, once Moki agreed to meet them. They presumed that the fallout would not be negligible. Otherwise, they contented themselves with a visit to the Parisian’s home, where they were welcomed whenever they wanted. But who could see them talking in a house? It was the spectacle that got them to enlist in this way. The buvette was the dream location because everyone would see them eating grilled fish and having a drink in the company of the Parisian. These rendezvous were also a godsend for Moki, whose influence rose a notch, speaking of him, of Paris, and of his exploits as a dandy at Aristocrats—a club for young elegant people in the neighborhood, where he had once been president.

  Did he tell stories about events that really happened, or was he leading his listener down the garden path? Nobody could answer that question.

  The meetings with girls at a buvette took place toward late afternoon. The young ladies waited for him for hours. They worried themselves sick with the thought that the Parisian had changed his mind at the last minute and would turn up at a more enticing rendezvous with one of their competitors. Moki arrived without so much as a word of explanation for being late. The girls thanked him profusely. They devoured the Pari
sian with their eyes and assessed the value of his clothes under their breath. He had a weakness for linen, a fabric about which one said, “It wears sublimely and crumples divinely.”

  During the course of one of these encounters—how could I ever forget it—I was there, at the back of the crowd. The Parisian filled us with wonder. For me, it wasn’t the first time. I couldn’t help myself and rushed over when I learned that he had been invited to a buvette by the girls.

  On the day that I’m thinking of, he was dressed in a tailor-made suit by Francesco Smalto. A very see-through shirt allowed you to make out his white skin as soon as he took off his jacket in public. His silk tie was covered in a pattern of miniscule Eiffel Towers. He wore only Weston shoes, and he was the only one in the country to have a pair made of crocodile; one pair cost the equivalent of a minister’s salary in our country. His brothers, who accompanied him, swam in roomy outfits like the Zouaves wore, those soldiers in the French infantry formed in Algeria in 1831, who wore big puffy breeches in resplendent colors.

  To wear their big brother’s pants, Dupond and Dupont used shrewd tricks. First they put on several pairs of breeches and then wore the pants on top of them. Is this pair longer than the other? If it wasn’t right, they fashioned their own makeshift hems with paperclips.

  Dupond and Dupont played a leading role in pulling off these rendezvous successfully. Each one had a specific task. One of them opened the car door. The other held an umbrella over the Parisian’s head. Not a ray of sun on his fragile skin. As soon as he was out of the car and aware that all eyes were upon him, he put on what could have been a walk down a fashion runway, to the great delight of the fanatics sitting in the buvette. He unbuttoned his jacket, handed it to one of his brothers behind him. Under the see-through shirt, his skin looked brighter, almost pale, without any irritation or the other severe allergies borne by local imitators. This metamorphosis stupefied the crowd. The Parisian hitched his pants up all the way to his belly button. The gesture was stiff, contrived, and rehearsed, in order to show off his socks, which matched his tie. One of his brothers handed him Emmanuelle Khanh sunglasses, not to wear them but to pose them lightly on his forehead. A hail of bravos ensued. The girls forgot their long hours of waiting patiently and gushed frenetically.