Papa was waiting for her to say something. What could she say? She needed him. She and Femi needed him. But all these other people said they needed him too. Across another ocean.
“Sade? Are you there?”
“I’m here.” Her thoughts darted wildly like the bees smoked out of their hive at the back of Family House.
“Papa, what would Mama think?”
Sade swallowed in awe at her own question. The words had just trickled out of her mouth, thin and clear. She held her breath.
“Probably…no…” Papa corrected himself softly. “I think she would want me to remember Sade’s Hill!”
On the day before Christmas Eve, when the afternoon light was beginning to fade, there were unexpected visitors. Even from the sitting room Sade recognized the voice at the door.
“Shh!” She signaled to Femi to stop jiggling the letters in the Scrabble bag.
“I hope you don’t mind us calling round like this! We just wanted to drop off these presents for Sade and Femi. Such poor things! We saw them on telly, didn’t we, Kevin? I knew they must’ve been through something, but I had no idea just how bad! You just don’t think, do you?”
They could hear Aunt Gracie’s invitation to come inside. There was no way of avoiding the visitors. When Sade and Femi peeped into the hallway, the pushchair with the sleeping twins had already been levered into the hallway.
Mrs. Graham flurried toward them. Caught like a nut in a cracker, Femi stiffened in her hug. But the moment he was released, he escaped upstairs. Kevin stood behind his mother looking awkward. Sade wondered how she could escape too. She knew Mrs. Graham meant well, but her stomach twinged at the thought of answering questions. Aunt Gracie saved her as soon as Mrs. Graham’s arms freed her.
“Perhaps you should also go for a rest, Sade.”
“Aaah! All this palaver! They’re only kids! It’s too much strain for them! You know what I mean?” Mrs. Graham tutted sympathetically to Aunt Gracie. She turned to Sade.
“Before you go, lovie, Kevin has a message for Femi. Right, Kevin?”
Kevin shuffled.
“Tell your brother”—he stumbled, then raised his eyes—“if he wants to play football on Saturdays, he can come with me if he likes. To my club, I mean.”
If Kevin had not looked directly at her, Sade would have thought this was his mother’s idea. The flicker of nervousness across his face, however, suggested the offer was genuine.
“I’ll tell him,” said Sade. “But you should ask him yourself.”
“Yeah. Another time. I’ll call, right?” He bit on his thumb. Just like she did when she was unsure of herself.
“Any friend of Sade or Femi is always welcome,” Aunt Gracie offered. The lilt in her voice drew out the word “friend.”
When Papa did not call at his usual ten to eight, Sade began to inspect the hallway clock every few minutes. At half-past eight, Uncle Roy rang the prison. Something was wrong.
“Where is he?…Why not?…I see.” Uncle Roy’s voice sank. He replaced the receiver slowly.
“Your daddy has been transferred. The man wouldn’t say where. We have to ring in the morning to talk to the senior officer.”
Uncle Roy and Aunt Gracie exchanged one of those silent eye messages. Just what Mama and Papa used to do when they were worried. The worst thought sneaked into Sade’s mind. Before it had time to bury itself secretly, she blurted it out.
“They’ve taken him to the airport!”
“Hold on, hold on!” Uncle Roy’s hands waved as if calming a choir. “Your daddy is probably in hospital,” he said slowly. “The man said the doctor has ordered tests.”
“Tests?! What kind of tests?”
“I am sure he will be all right.” Aunt Gracie’s arm slipped around Sade’s waist. “Let’s talk about it over a cup of tea.” Femi moved out of Aunt Gracie’s reach but followed them into the kitchen, his eyes sunk deep within his small warrior’s mask.
Together they turned over the possibilities. Mr. Nathan’s answering machine offered no number for emergencies and the office was closed until after Christmas. Uncle Dele’s line was still cut off and Mama Appiah’s telephone rang endlessly. There was nothing they could do except wait until the morning.
CHAPTER 41
CHRISTMAS EVE…IF
SADE LAY AWAKE, LISTENING for the telephone. Surely Papa would ring if he could. Was he too ill? Or were the hospital tests a cover-up? What better time to get rid of him—while everyone was busy with Christmas. But both Aunt Gracie and Uncle Roy said the government would not risk doing something underhanded while Papa was still in the news.
Of course! Why had she not thought of it before? The news people could find out where Papa was! She jolted up and switched on her desk lamp to search for the paper with the address of the television studio. Mrs. Howe had added the telephone number underneath. She could ring and ask for the newsroom. It was very late, but Papa had sometimes worked on his news all night. With luck, someone would be there.
The landing was dark with no beam of light underneath Aunt Gracie and Uncle Roy’s door. Sade crept downstairs by clutching on to the banister. The streetlight glowed eerily through the ruffles of net that veiled the window beside the front door. By shifting the telephone nearer, she could just make out its buttons. As she propped up the paper with the number on the window ledge, the clock in the hallway began to chime. She waited, counting. Twelve. The echo of the final chime covered the pips as she dialed. Holding the mouthpiece close, she asked for the newsroom. Once again she listened to ringing. It kept on ringing. Perhaps no one was there after all. They must have gone home. It was Christmas Eve now. Sade was on the point of giving up when a woman answered, her voice flat and brisk. It seemed to pick up a little interest, however, when Sade said who she was and why she was ringing.
Curled back in bed, in the shadows of her room, doubts began to rise. Even if the reporter found out where Papa was being held, that would not stop him being sent off into the waiting arms of the Brass Buttons and their soldiers. Caught halfway between sleep and wakefulness, Sade could not stop her mind zigzagging. Pictures from the past mingled crazily with thoughts of what might happen. She remembered the night on the airplane, peering out to see their home—and all of Lagos—disappear into a scattering of pinprick lights in the vast darkness. She remembered her feeling then of spinning out into space. Adrift.
How much older she felt now than that Sade of six weeks ago! So much had been frightening, yet somehow she and Femi were still here. Even if her brother kept his misery wrapped up like a hand grenade, at least they were still together. All they needed now was for Papa to be well again and to be allowed to stay with them. Was that too much to ask for? Mama had always said nothing was too much or too little to pray for. But Mama had believed in miracles.
Sade was awakened by Uncle Roy rumbling on to the landing. Someone was knocking at the front door.
“Who on earth? Seven o’clock—on a Sunday morning!”
Sade threw off her quilt. A sixth sense propelled her out of bed. Aunt Gracie, fastening her dressing gown, joined Sade at the top of the stairs. Femi too came shuffling out of his bedroom in time to see Uncle Roy unbolt the door.
A whirlwind followed. Uncle Roy’s deep roar of delight swept upstairs with the open blast of frosty air. Sade and Femi tumbled headlong downstairs. Papa, frail and supported by Uncle Dele’s arm, stood smiling in the doorway.
“Take care!” Uncle Dele pitched out his free hand to stop the children bowling Papa over. Swiftly they wriggled as close as possible to their father.
“Lean on me, Papa!” Femi urged.
With Uncle Dele’s help they escorted Papa to the sitting room.
After the first flurry of greetings, Papa unraveled his tale. The doctor had become worried about pains in his chest and wanted him to have tests in the hospital. It would be difficult to get them done on a weekend just before Christmas but the doctor had gone away to see what he could arrange. The prison off
icers, however, seemed more worried that other detainees might riot if anything happened to Papa. They had moved him to another wing of the prison where he was on his own. When he overheard talk about taking him to another prison altogether, he had rung Uncle Dele who in turn rang Mr. Nathan.
“But his office is closed!” Sade interrupted.
“He gave me his home number—for emergencies,” explained Uncle Dele.
Mr. Nathan had acted straightaway. Somehow he had managed to speak to a member of Parliament who spoke to the Home Secretary himself. Within hours Papa was taken to a hospital in Oxford and the Home Secretary ordered that he should be set free! Papa could live in England for six months while they decided whether to let the family stay or send them away.
When the hospital said that the tests could only be done after Christmas, Papa had discharged himself.
“I told them that you children would be my best medicine!” Papa stroked their heads. “Your mama always said I was a bad patient. But perhaps she would forgive me this time.”
He fell quiet. Sade had never seen their father look so tired. She watched him take small sips of tea. Mama had often reminded him to slow down when he gulped his food in a hurry to get back to his work. Yet today even sipping seemed to take an effort.
Uncle Dele took up the story of how he had brought Papa back from Oxford to London at midnight. They had decided it was too late to disturb the Kings. Sade smiled to herself. She might tell them later about her midnight call to the television newsroom.
“It’s my fault we are so early,” Papa apologized. “I couldn’t wait any longer.”
Aunt Gracie laughed and shook her head.
“Good folk get up with the sun,” she reassured him. “It’s we who have become lazy! All these clouds in England, you see. They cover up the sun and we forget!”
Papa’s brief chuckle touched Sade’s memory of Papa of old. Uncle Dele laughed as well, but then turned serious.
“Do you know, Sade and Femi, that you actually saved your Papa?” He gazed earnestly from one to the other. “If you hadn’t taken his story to those news people, there could have been a very different ending.”
Sade felt herself flush and Femi’s lips wavered into a little grin.
“Like for poor Mr. Galib, my teacher friend from Somalia.” Papa’s face and voice became subdued again. “They sent him back last week. Almost certainly to prison. Such a brave man—” Papa broke off, closing his eyes.
“May God help him,” Aunt Gracie murmured, then brought the conversation back to Uncle Dele’s tribute.
“Roy and I have been wanting to tell you, Mr. Solaja, that we think you have two special children. They have gone through such a great deal, you know, and they’re bearing up!”
“Very true! And it hasn’t been easy.” Uncle Roy’s words rolled out into a silence that caught them all.
Papa was the first to speak.
“There are some things I have been wanting to give you children. I brought them with me”—he paused—“from home.”
He signaled to Uncle Dele to pass him a small holdall. He began rummaging down one side, then the other.
“Ah, here they are!”
With a flourish he held up two pairs of red and black goalkeepers’ gloves, one larger than the other. Femi’s eyes followed like a cat riveted by butterflies. Papa handed them to him. Femi turned the gloves over to examine them, his eyebrows raised in pleasure.
“Mama bought them for you and me—just before she died,” Papa added quietly.
In an instant Femi’s face crumpled and distorted in a battle against sobs and tears. He would have dashed from the room, but Papa’s arm swooped around him and pulled him onto his lap, pushing aside the bag. Femi buried his head in Papa’s chest.
Although Sade felt her own eyes pricking slightly, she somehow knew that this time she was not going to cry. She seemed to have cried so many tears already in the past few weeks. Today it was Femi’s turn. She knelt next to Papa, waiting for her brother’s sobs to subside. Auntie Grace, Uncle Roy and Uncle Dele slipped quietly out of the room. She and Femi were alone with Papa for the first time since Uncle Tunde had left them together in Papa’s study on the day Mama died. That day they were like three survivors clinging to each other, stranded on a tiny raft. Since then they had been flung apart, thrown into so many dangerous rapids. Yet here they were, having finally reached the same shore. Perhaps in a few months they were going to be pushed away again but, for the moment, it was enough that they were together again.
“Look in my bag, Sade.”
Papa’s arms were still comforting Femi as he directed her to look for a white agbada. Her hands delved in to lift it and she felt the weight of something inside. Something solid and heavy. Suddenly she felt light and fluttery, as if the little Christmas tree birds were alive inside her fingers, beating their tiny wings. She unwrapped the material. There, gleaming against the starched white cotton, lay her own ebony Iyawo! Oh, Iyawo was almost alive with her delicately patterned hair and serene, calm eyes! Sade’s fingers nimbly unfolded the agbada’s matching trousers. It was indeed Oko! Iyawo’s own companion with his narrow high-boned cheeks and his eyes still so sorrowful. With Oko cupped between her palms, she stretched to plant a swift kiss on Papa’s ear. Then, one at a time, she placed Oko and Iyawo on the mantelpiece between the Christmas cards. A puffy flame-red bird, perched on the shoulder of a snowman, seemed to inspect the newcomers through its beady black eyes.
It was as if Papa knew what she was thinking.
“We’re not going to give up hope. Those rogues and thieves in our country won’t be there forever. One day we shall go home!” He spoke in that steady voice that Sade had always found so comforting. She nestled back close to Papa and Femi. Home. She still found it so difficult to say the word herself. She would have to learn. Now that Papa was with them, England might become their new “home” for a while, if they were allowed to stay. If Papa was to lecture in America, they might make a new “home” there. If they went to South Africa…If, if…Wherever they went, they would have to become like tortoises who carry their homes on their backs. She thought of Papa’s brave tortoise and hoped that at least they would not have to meet any more leopards.
Sade gazed at Oko and Iyawo and the rich streaks of brown within their glowing ebony faces. She thought of her desk at home and the forest behind Family House from where the wood came. She thought of Grandma. Grandma who had lost a daughter—and whose grandchildren were now thousands of miles away. This Christmas one whole branch of the family would be missing at Family House. Sade suddenly knew what she had to do. Papa and Femi were dozing next to each other and she eased herself away. Cradling Iyawo and Oko in her arms, she made her way carefully upstairs to her desk.
CHAPTER 42
LETTER HOME
24 December,
Christmas Eve
Dear Grandma,
I am very sorry I did not write for a long time. Femi and I couldn’t say good-bye to you or anyone. Everything was so horrible. Why are there such wicked people in the world, Grandma? I will never never forget what they did to Mama.
But today Femi and I are happy that Papa is with us again and Uncle Dele is here too. Papa carried my Iyawo and Oko all the way here. They are on the desk in front of me, watching me write. We are staying with Aunt Gracie and Uncle Roy in London. You would like them. They have been looking after Femi and me. Their own children are now grown-up, but they are coming home for Christmas. Just like we always used to visit you, Grandma. If I think about Mama and you and everyone at Family House, I shall start crying again. I didn’t know I had so many tears. They would fill up your biggest pot and spill over onto the earth.
Aunt Gracie says that Papa must stay here until Uncle Dele finds somewhere for the four of us. She says that she will fatten Papa so he won’t feel the cold so much. She is in the kitchen downstairs cooking the chicken broth that her mama used to make in Jamaica and it smells good.
I miss you ve
ry very much, Grandma.
Your loving granddaughter,
Sade
AUTHOR’S NOTE
The characters in this story are all fictional. However, we hear about three political figures who were real people. Ken Saro-Wiwa was a well-known Nigerian writer. He protested that Ogoniland, his birthplace, had been polluted and robbed by multinational oil companies and the military government. He was hung with eight others in November 1995.
The novel is set immediately after this event, when Nigeria was under the rule of the dictator General Abacha. He has since died—quite unexpectedly in 1998—and a year later the government was handed over to a democratically elected president.
The third real figure in the novel is President Barre, whom Mariam mentions when telling her story about fleeing from Somalia. Barre was a military ruler who dealt very harshly with rebel groups. In 1988 government planes bombed the city of Hargeisa in northern Somalia. This is where Mariam lived and it was from there that her father was taken by soldiers. The journey, on foot and by donkey, that she made to Mogadishu in the south was over 600 miles. President Barre fled abroad in 1991 and, at the time of writing, Somalia still has no settled central government. The north has been the most peaceful region. It declared itself an independant country—Somaliland—but is still waiting for the world to recognize it.
GLOSSARY
agbada a robe for a man, usually embroidered (Yoruba)
aso-oke a wrap and blouse made from special cloth hand-woven with gold or silver thread (Yoruba)
ayo a wooden board game with sunken “cups,” played with pebbles moved at lightning speed (Yoruba)
buba a blouse for a woman (Yoruba)
The Other Side of Truth Page 18