by Adam Brookes
“No, I took that on my phone. We have that.”
“Well, that’s something.”
Hallelujah drew on his cigarette and shook his head again. Mangan pulled back onto the road. The traffic had slowed. They passed corrugated iron shanties lit by naked bulbs, alleyways an oblivion of shadow, women roasting corn over charcoal stoves by the side of the road. Rain spattered the windscreen.
They climbed to Mangan’s flat, dumped their things, then went downstairs again to the First Choice café. They ordered tibs—the spiced, sticky beef—with injera, French fries and cold St. George’s beer. Hallelujah was nervous and fidgety; he lit a cigarette.
“So will you file?” he asked.
“Tomorrow, maybe,” said Mangan, absently.
“Okay. Me too.” Hallelujah reported for an Addis weekly, but moonlighted for Mangan, translating, fixing. Mangan watched him, this lean, earnest boy, his dirty shirt, worry like a stain in his eyes.
“What’s eating you, Hal?”
“Oh, nothing. They won’t like it, that’s all.”
“Who won’t? The paper?”
“No, no. The paper will hold its breath and run it. The government, I mean. And NISS.”
“If they’re so worried about the coverage, why did they give us access to her?” Mangan said.
Hallelujah looked at him.
“How long have you been in Ethiopia now?”
“A year, a bit less,” said Mangan.
Hallelujah stubbed out his cigarette.
“So you know they like to play with us, lure us out. We interview dissidents, publish their views, write about their situations, we become vulnerable. They can use it against us whenever they choose. Shut us down.”
The tibs arrived, and the beer. Mangan took a long, cold pull on the bottle, and ate. The beef was sizzling, the berbere—chilli and spice—leaving his throat pulsing with aromatic heat.
“Do you ever see them? Talk to them? NISS?” he asked.
“No. They send messages. Through other people. You have to listen.”
Hallelujah tore the injera, moulded it in the stew with his fingers. “A businessman takes you for lunch. Or an old professor calls you up. Very interesting piece in the paper last week, they say. Lots of people talking about it. Have you thought about a vacation? Somewhere far away?”
Mangan smiled.
“Sounds like China,” he said.
“African problems, Philip,” said Hallelujah, rubbing his eyes with the back of his hand. “African problems.”
Hallelujah took a taxi home. His nervousness and his talk of the National Intelligence and Security Service—Ethiopia’s tough, effective intelligence agency, with its vast web of informers modelled on the old East European practice—had put Mangan on edge. He labored back up the sour concrete stairwell to his flat, four floors above Gotera, his buzzy neighborhood. He stepped onto his balcony, the night air cool. It was late, but the streets around his block were filled with cafés, tinny music, the smell of grilling meat, coffee. He watched the couples strolling along the weed-strewn pavement, the girls done up in tight jeans, heels, the glint of gold from their necks, their slender wrists.
He went back inside, poured himself a belt of vodka and lay on the sofa in the dark. He thought about Habiba, squatting in the corner of some prison shed, the noise and squalor of it, her fingers probing the lump in her breast hopelessly.
He thought about going home, and where that would be, and how. About how loneliness was not something he was given to—in his years as a foreign correspondent, he had been alone many times. About how when it did find him, it came on as a physical sensation, a flood in the veins. He sat up and put his head in his hands. Loneliness came, he knew, from silence, from the inability to speak of what had happened.
Secrecy breeds loneliness.
And after loneliness comes fear.
He thought, as he did every night, when the cafés closed and the darkness thickened and the streets went silent but for the gray dogs in their skittish patrols, that they hadn’t talked to him for months.
Surely they must check on me soon.
So when, the very next day, they did finally check on him, it felt like an anticlimax. It came in an email from the Second Secretary, Commercial, Embassy of the United Kingdom. A small dinner, two days hence, very casual, at the house in Jakros village. Do come by.
Mangan filled the time. He prized from Hallelujah the notes of the interview at Kaliti prison, forced himself to write them up and filed a story. “In Ethiopia, Islamic Charity Worker is Emblem of Anti-Extremist Crackdown.” It ran, cut down, deep in the international section of the website, Habiba’s face peering from a tiny, bleary photo.
After some consideration, he roused himself, called the desk and half-heartedly pitched a story on unrest and uncertainty in Ethiopia’s south and east. Dogged insurgency in the Ogaden, spillover from the war in Somalia, the bitter traffic in chat, guns, humans, zealotry and war that pulsed along Africa’s sunbaked Indian Ocean coast. The foreign editor sounded preoccupied: send me a summary, Philip.
He bought a new shirt, took a jacket to the cleaners.
On the appointed night, he showered, his lanky body pinkening in the steam, ran a comb through his red hair, dressed and took a taxi to Jakros—the gated community that catered to diplomats, the aid industry and, at the higher end, Ethiopia’s wealthy runners. An Olympic gold medalist resided in one of its larger mansions, Mangan knew.
The car pulled up outside the Second Secretary’s house, a modest place of brick and concrete walls, creeping plants with orange flowers spilling over them, and an iron gate. Mangan got out of the taxi. The streets were quiet here. No music, no food stalls, no men slumped barefoot on the asphalt, their eyes glassy from chat. Expatriate life the world over, he thought. Lived at a hygienic remove.
Hoddinott was the man’s name, a pale thirty-something, prematurely bald, a doughy frame in a Marks and Spencer suit. He and his wife, Joanna, were keen to appear stoic and cheerful in their hardship posting.
“We love Addis,” said Joanna. “We absolutely love it here. How do you find it, Philip?”
She told a long story of squatter families on the edge of the city, kicked out of their shanty and forced from the land by developers, the women gathering up children, plastic buckets, a coffee pot, a blanket, walking away through the muddied building sites.
“Well, we did what we could. I took them clothes and some formula for the babies,” Joanna said. “But, honestly.”
As it dawned on Mangan that he was the only guest, Joanna stood and announced brightly that she’d better make the salad. Hoddinott gestured that he and Mangan should go out into the garden, where a grill was lit and smoking.
Hoddinott carried a bottle of chilled white wine and two glasses. He set them down on a garden table. Mangan eyed them while Hoddinott put on an apron, opened the top of the grill, peered in through a billow of smoke, then closed it again, sat and rubbed his hands together.
“Right then,” he said. He poured the wine. Mangan watched the glass mist.
“So how are you, Philip?” he said. “Are you settled? Are you well?”
They are checking, thought Mangan.
“I’m fine, I think,” he replied. “Who’s asking?”
Hoddinott looked concerned.
“Well, I am, for starters,” he said. “But you’re right. Others are interested, of course. They want to know you’re in fine fettle, sound of wind and limb, that sort of thing.”
“I’m fine.”
“Getting out much?”
“No. Not really.”
“Got a girl?”
“For fuck’s sake.”
“Sorry, sorry, don’t mean to pry.”
Hoddinott’s expression was very level.
“Heard anything from China?” he said.
“Who would I hear from?”
“Old friends. Associates. Anything?”
“Sometimes.”
“How do they c
ontact you?”
“Email. Social media.”
“What do they say?”
“Normal stuff, they… you know.”
“Philip, don’t be coy, now. What do they say?”
Mangan sighed.
“For a while they asked me what had happened, why I left Beijing so abruptly, where I’d gone. I gave the right answers, what was agreed. That happens less these days. They ask how I am, what I’m up to. They see stuff I’ve written, they comment on it.”
“No one being more persistent? Asking about the girl? What was her name, Ting?”
“One or two. But I asked them to stop.”
“I’ll need names.”
Mangan said nothing. Hoddinott sat, arms folded, and spoke very quietly.
“Does anybody, in your view, harbor any suspicion of your involvement in the operation?”
Mangan shook his head.
“You are sure, now?”
“As sure as I can be. If any of the crowd in Beijing had caught a whiff of it they wouldn’t have let go. They’re serious journalists.”
“Would you say you’re still friendly with any of them?”
“Not really. Many of the old crowd resent me. They blame me for Ting’s arrest.”
“I don’t have to tell you to keep your distance, I know that,” said Hoddinott. “And have you had any contact at all from the Chinese state?”
“Nothing,” said Mangan.
“Really? No visits? Messages? Chaps on a street corner watching you go by? You’re sure.”
“Nothing I’ve seen.”
Hoddinott paused as if considering.
“What?” said Mangan.
“Nothing. That’s good news, of course. And I know you’ve been told before, but I will tell you again. There is a great deal of respect and gratitude for what you did. A great deal.”
“Even though it ended the way it did,” said Mangan.
“Even though.”
Mangan drained his wine, slid the glass across the table for more. Hoddinott refilled it, the wine gold in the twilight, its murmur in the glass.
“And financially, Philip? Not bankrupt? Not about to sell your story to the Sundays out of desperation?”
“Not quite that bad.”
“Paper paying the bills?”
“Just.”
“Well, all right then.”
And at that awkward moment, Joanna skipped from the kitchen. She carried a bowl of clever-looking salad.
“Now that’s enough shop, you two. Let’s eat,” she chirped.
She knows.
“Anything out of the ordinary, Philip,” said Hoddinott. “Anything at all. You let me know, yes?”
Hoddinott grilled steaks and shrimp, doused them in butter and garlic. They ate in the gathering dark, a candle on the table, and Joanna propelled the conversation with self-deprecating anecdotes of life as a diplomatic spouse in Addis Ababa, the functions she attended, the committees, her exasperating book club. “Really, Philip, there we are, all these embassy ladies, earnest Americans, clever Germans, and we plough through all this worthy literary fiction, when all we secretly want is a jolly good bodice-ripper!” Mangan listened, did his best to be appreciative. Joanna’s ingenuousness was, he suspected, merely part of her cover. They were a Service couple, he was sure.
They saw him out afterward to a waiting taxi, waved from the doorstep in the darkness, Hoddinott’s arm around his wife.
The taxi ground back across Addis, windows open, letting in a breeze cluttered with the smells and sounds of the city’s late night, the crowds thronging the pavements, the boys hawking single cigarettes and bushels of chat.
So he’d been “topped up.” A watchful Service, keeping an eye on an old, blown agent. He wasn’t ungrateful.
6
London
Kai thought the Park Lane restaurant must be one of the most effete and pointless places he’d ever been in. Charlie Feng was there, straight from the bank, in a suit, waiting for him, and two others were down from Cambridge. Kai walked across the bar to them, mumbled a greeting.
“Well, hello, Fan Kaikai,” said Charlie. “I wasn’t sure we’d see you.” He was speaking Mandarin.
“Well, here I am.”
They all looked at him, then at each other.
“So how are you?” said Charlie.
Kai looked around for a drink.
“I needed a break.”
“From what?”
“Everything.”
“So here you are with us.” Charlie Feng nodded a fake nod of satisfaction. “It’s a thrill to have you.”
The Cambridge boys smirked.
They went to the table, sat surrounded by faux chinoiserie in fancy low light and watched as the pretty little waitress flown in from Guangzhou tottered over with duck and glistening belly pork and lobster in a black bean sauce at forty pounds a plate. Charlie was sneering, spoke in Mandarin.
“What the fuck is this?”
The waitress froze.
“It’s your lobster, xiansheng.”
“What moron puts lobster in a black bean sauce?”
“If you are not pleased, xiansheng, I can take it back.” She gestured toward the plate, her voice quavering a little now.
“I thought we were buying real food, not Hong Kong faggot food.”
“Charlie, just for once…” said Kai.
“Please, xiansheng, let me fetch you the menu and you can order whatever you please, and the chef can make it in whatever way you choose.” She backed away from the table, fright on her face.
Charlie looked around the table, grinning. The others were stifling their laughter. The manager approached, a starchy Brit in a suit, looking concerned.
“Good evening, gentlemen, and welcome. I hope everything is all right?”
Charlie spoke in crisp English now, Harrow and Cambridge-inflected, ripe with self-assurance.
“Everything’s marvellous. Thanks so much.” And then, as the manager nodded and walked away, in Beijing slang, “Prick.”
They all laughed except Kai, and Charlie picked up an entire lobster tail in his chopsticks and held it over his face, letting the black bean sauce drip into his open mouth. He wiped his face with a napkin, then gestured with his chin to Kai.
“So. Where’s your girlfriend?”
Kai looked back at him, startled.
“What girlfriend?”
“The Chen girl.”
“Oh. Her.”
“Still there, is she? Wobbling about Oxford on her little bicycle, in her precious college scarf, sitting in the library, keeping her little legs crossed.”
“She’s still there. I don’t have much to do with her.”
“You heard the news? About her daddy? General Balls-of-steel?”
Kai blinked, feeling a pinch of alarm.
“No. What news?”
Charlie Feng leaned forward.
“Christ, Fan Kaikai, you really do not pay attention, do you?”
He sat back, picked up his wineglass.
“He was appointed to the General Staff Department.”
Kai thought for a moment, failing to make the connections.
“And?” he said.
Charlie adopted an exaggerated expression of astonishment, held his hands up, looked about the table.
“And? And?” he said, then dropped the pretense. “Kai, listen to me. You need to start attending to matters of self-preservation. The Chen girl’s father now resides at the very top of military intelligence. Do you hear me, Kai? Are you with me?”
Kai nodded. Though he wasn’t really with him and was afraid to ask. He picked at the lobster.
Charlie stared at him.
“Old man Chen has stepped up, Kai. His people…” He gestured with his chopsticks. “They’re busy. My old man says they’re busy. General Chen and his army eunuchs.”
Kai looked at his plate.
“Mang shenme ne?” Busy doing what?
“Doing what? Who the
fuck knows what? Scuttling around Beijing. Taking a lot of trips to the southwest, where they have friends. Whispering in ears. Watching. Figuring shit out. Doing nothing that is any good for you, or your family or the company, that’s what. They loathe you, Kai. In the Chen girl’s pristine little bosom beats a hateful little heart. Do not give her anything she can use.”
One of the Cambridge boys spoke.
“I think he understands, Charlie. No need to torture him.”
“Does he, though?”
“Don’t talk about me as if I’m not here,” said Kai. He was aware that he was mumbling.
They ate in silence for a while. Charlie ordered more wine, though he was not drinking.
“So you’re not going back to Beijing for the summer,” he said.
Kai shrugged.
“I have to stay here. Study. Catch up.”
Charlie looked to be considering.
“What?” said Kai.
“They’ve got some sort of minder coming, I hear,” said Charlie. “To take care of you.”
Kai stared at him. “What?”
Charlie shrugged.
“What do you mean, a minder?” Kai persisted.
“Well, I can’t be there all the time, can I? Looking out for you.”
“A nanny for Kai,” said one of the Cambridge boys, and they all laughed again. “To protect him from the Chen girl.”
Charlie signalled they should leave it. Kai sat silent, humiliated. Charlie spoke again.
“Uncle Checkbook been in touch? Done his thing?”
“Is there anything you don’t know about my life?” said Kai.
“Thought so. Good. The Fan family business can pick up the tab tonight, then. Thank you, China National Century Corporation. We bask in your greatness. Wan sui. Long may you prosper.” He made a please-go-right-ahead gesture.
Kai sighed, took out a credit card, waved it at the waitress.
The four of them clambered into the BMW, and drove to Hackney, where an Asian events company had hired out some dark basement club and filled it with students and bankers from back home and models and Filipina nurses and a DJ, and got a champagne company to sponsor it. They sat on sofas under ultraviolet light, the music pounding, thumbing their phones. A few of the sharper girls present, recognizing Fan Kaikai, the heir to the vast fortune, the scion of political and business greatness, sought to join the group and sat long-legged, pouting, next to him. By three, Kai was unsteady due to the ingestion of substances, so Charlie Feng, sober and vigilant, drove the BMW carefully back to Kensington.