The Illegal

by Lawrence Hill

  “Thank you.”

  “Anything else I can do?” she said. “I would really like to help you.”

  “No, thank you. You’ve already been so kind.” Keita couldn’t stop running his finger over the smooth, laminated card. Perhaps this was how every refugee managed to make the transition into a legally recognized life: by obtaining a library card and using it to build a wider base of identification.

  He walked back to the computers and took a spot again beside Mbira Man, who was still typing with thumbs and middle fingers. Keita entered his library code and checked his email. Three messages awaited him.

  The most recent was from John Falconer, who used a peculiar email address: mostgifted@freedomstate.fs.com.

  Thank you for walking with me during the night. And for talking. Could we meet for a proper interview, for my documentary? I could be useful to you too.

  Yours truly,

  John Falconer

  P.S. I hope my email address doesn’t sound boastful. “Gifted” was already taken so I had to take “Mostgifted.”

  Keita opened the second message. It was from Viola Hill.

  Dear Keita,

  I got your email address from the race registration form, hope you don’t mind. I am the reporter with the Clarkson Evening Telegram. We met after the Buttersby Marathon. May I meet you for an interview? It is urgent.

  Thank you,

  Viola Hill

  Keita had no time to think about media interviews. Next, he found an email from Mitch Hitchcock.

  Dear Mr. Ali,

  We met at the Buttersby Marathon. I gave you refuge in my director’s tent and kept you away from Mr. Hamm. I have just been appointed director of the Freedom State Olympic Marathon Team. It is a six-year term, designed to take the team through the next two Olympic Games. We could use an athlete of your talent on the team. Could we meet to discuss at your convenience? Just name the place, date and time, and I’ll see you there. Lunch on me!

  Cheers,

  Mitch Hitchcock

  Keita was so preoccupied with trying to stay hidden and finding a way to help his sister that he found it almost impossible to contemplate Hitchcock’s suggestion. But yes! In the best possible outcome, Keita and his sister would be reunited in Freedom State. They would not have to hide and would be allowed to stay in the country. Charity could build her career and her life, and Keita could finally run free. He couldn’t imagine a more beautiful way to be welcomed into the country than to be invited to run for the Olympic team. But none of this seemed within reach. He couldn’t waste his time fantasizing about the impossible. Where was his sister? Why had he not heard from her again, or from her abductors?

  Keita checked his junk folder and found two other emails. The first was from Anton Hamm.

  You got away from me at Buttersby. Nice run. You made $4,000, which belongs to me. I require payment of $10,000, with a first instalment of $4,000 by April 25 and a final payment of $6,000 by July 1. If you comply, I shall wash my hands of you. If payment is not forthcoming, there will be consequences. You will meet with a royal beating if the first deadline is not met, and a suitable collection of your bones will be broken if full payment is not made by the final deadline. After which, I will see to it that you end up in the hands of deportation authorities. Rest assured that your reception in Zantoroland will be indelicate. When we first met, I concluded that you were a man of intelligence. I am now doubting my original judgment, but invite you to confirm it.

  As Keita closed Hamm’s message, he felt an onslaught of nausea. Hamm was after him. Charity’s captors were after him. Everybody wanted a piece of him.

  And there it was. The message he wanted. Buried among spam about lottery prizes and penis enhancement. The final message came from George Maxwell.

  Dear Mr. Ali,

  Just a reminder to provide $15,000 by June 22. This amount is required, in full and on time, to secure the safety of your sister.

  George Maxwell

  Keita swallowed, afraid that he would vomit. His computer keyboard and screen became so blurry that it was hard for him to log out of his email account. He wished for a bed. A floor. Any surface on which to rest his body. Even with his eyes closed, he felt dizzy. He felt his body follow the pull of gravity. From a distance, he heard a woman’s voice call out, “Good God, is he all right?”

  WHEN HE CAME TO, KEITA WAS LYING ON A COUCH IN THE first-aid room of the Clarkson Library, with Mrs. Beech sitting on a chair pulled up next to the couch, holding an ice pack to his forehead.

  “You gave yourself a nasty bump on the head,” she said. “Do you know who you are?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “What is your name?”

  “Keita Ali.”

  “Is it, really? Where are you?”

  “Freedom State.”

  “Can you be more specific?”

  “Clarkson Library. You are Mrs. Beech.”

  “That’s good. Since you’ve got brain function, you may call me Ivernia.”

  Keita tried to raise himself up on an elbow, but he felt unusually tired. He couldn’t walk a kilometre, let alone run a marathon.

  “You seem agitated,” she said. She left but returned a few moments later with a bottle of apple juice. She popped off the lid, inserted a straw and brought it to his lips.

  “May I have water, instead?”

  She brought him two mugs of water, which he downed quickly. He asked for another two mugs, and two more after that.

  “I should be okay soon,” he said.

  “When was your last proper meal?” she asked.

  “I’ve been eating here and there,” he said.

  “Take this. If you don’t eat it, I’ll revoke your library card.”

  Keita ate Mrs. Beech’s egg salad sandwich on rye bread. Then he ate her two pickles, her apple and her three oatmeal raisin cookies.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever had such pleasure watching somebody else eat my lunch,” she said.

  “I’m fine now and would ask permission to leave the library.”

  “This is not a police state,” she said. “Though it has tendencies in that regard. But this is my first-aid room, and you are free to leave.”

  “Mrs. Beech, thank you. By the way, the computer I was using. Was the account . . . ?”

  “Yes, it was shut down. I closed it after you tumbled off the chair.”

  He looked at her steadily, and she returned his gaze. If she had seen anything, she was letting him know it would be their secret.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Beech.”

  “Signing out any literature today? You are allowed three books the first time you use a card.”

  “Not today, thank you very much. I’ve had enough reading for one day.”

  “How old are you, if I may ask?”

  “Twenty-four. And you?”

  “I am eighty-five, sorry to say.”

  “In my country, old people are venerated. They are wise. We know that and treat them well.”

  “I lost my husband years ago, and now my son wants me put away.”

  “Put away?”

  “Into an old age home.”

  It was good, speaking with a man young enough to be her grandson. You could ask him out for lunch without any risk of the invitation being taken the wrong way. It wasn’t at all like that with men in their seventies or eighties. Show them a spot of kindness, agree to two consecutive lunches, and suddenly you were fending off marriage proposals. Since Ernie died six years ago, she had held up a stop sign to three men. And they hardly even knew her. Eventually, she had stopped going out, even for a bagel, with any single man in her age bracket.

  “Come to my house for tea,” said Ivernia. “My shift’s almost over.”

  “I would love to accept. I’ve never been invited into the home of a Freedom Statonian. But I have to decline, because I must look for a place to stay.”

  “Come to my home, and we will work it out.”

  In any city or town in Zantoroland, a
foreigner would have trouble walking the streets for two hours without being invited into somebody’s home. The poorest people in the world brought in strangers, it seemed, and the richest people in the world kept them out. Keita decided to accept this kind invitation. He would go to Ivernia’s house as soon as he recovered a few items of clothing from the bus station. If he was lucky, perhaps she would let him wash his clothes.

  “I don’t do fancy,” Ivernia said. “I don’t have time for it. This is what I have at home: crackers, cheese, salami, apples, grapes and an inexhaustible supply of cookies. Oh. And tea. I may not have a pot roast in the oven, but I will always, always, be able to serve you cookies and tea.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  ON THE FAR SIDE OF RUDDINGS PARK, PEOPLE with placards were gathering outside the Freedom Building. A crowd was the last thing Keita needed. Police could come to bust it up, or tear gas or arrest demonstrators. All the demonstrators appeared to be white. Well dressed. They jabbed their signs to the skies: Illegals Get Out; Go Home; and Bulldoze AfricTown. A man with a loudspeaker initiated a call and response.

  “What do we want?”

  “Deportations!”

  “When do we want them?”

  “Now!”

  Keita stood just one block away, transfixed.

  “Mr. Prime Minister,” the man with the bullhorn called out, “we know that you can hear us. We know your lackeys are listening. You promised to deport Illegals. You made this promise, and so we elected you. But how many have you deported?”

  “Not enough!” someone in the crowd hollered back.

  “Have you torn down AfricTown?”

  “Not one shack!”

  “Illegals don’t pay taxes. They drain our resources. They are violent and criminally oriented. Out with Illegals!”

  “Out with Illegals!”

  Keita felt a nudge against his back. It came from a man of about forty, white, tall, with a sign that said Boot Them Out!

  “Who are you?” the man said.

  Keita just stared at him.

  “What are you doing here? Do you have your papers? Are you an Illegal?”

  Keita looked behind the man. From the south, more demonstrators were coming. He looked up ahead, to the north, where the crowd was thick. But to the east, there was an empty street. Keita dashed for it, at a speed no demonstrator could hope to match. Two blocks down, he turned north. Nobody was following him, but he ran hard anyway, continuing north for a full kilometre before he swung west again, turned north once more and continued along Aberdeen in the direction of Ivernia Beech’s home.

  The shops disappeared about a kilometre north of Clarkson’s downtown core and were replaced by houses and apartment buildings and parks. At least the city planners had thought to include green space. Keita ran into Serena Park, which continued for eight kilometres northeast. The park followed the road and was about a kilometre wide, with a running and biking path through the middle of it. Keita noted that unlike Ruddings Park in the central city, where runners and joggers at least waved to each other, here nobody greeted anyone else. To Keita, it seemed the height of rudeness to pass someone walking or running on a path and to not say hello. But he didn’t want to draw attention to himself. Even at an easy pace, he overtook other runners as if they were standing still. To his far right, a forest bordered the park. He left the path to explore it and saw footpaths continuing into woods that were thick and deep. Good places to hide, he noted. At the end of Serena Park, Keita turned right onto Elixir Bridge Road. It was a quiet, eastbound street. A ravine ran behind the houses on the north side. Many homes had driveways blocked by wrought-iron gates protecting as many as four or five cars. He noted the big garages and imagined how many people from AfricTown could sleep in each one.

  37 Elixir Bridge Road was perched on the edge of a ravine. It was rectangular and three storeys high with a white stone exterior. It had a two-car garage and a mound of earth on the driveway. Keita could think of much worse places to hide. Still, it stood out from the other houses with manicured lawns. The grass needed cutting, and weeds abounded in the bed of untended earth that might have been a garden. As Keita approached the front door, he heard a woman’s voice call out from the house to his right.

  “Yoo-hoo. Yoo-hoo. Are you expected, sir?” She emphasized the “sir.”

  Keita ignored her and knocked on the door.

  “You, sir, over there. By the door. Black man! What is your business here?”

  He knocked again. If Mrs. Beech did not answer the door, he would have to run.

  Out of respect to Mrs. Beech, he felt it best to not reply to the neighbour. But she would not relent. She stepped inside her house and came right back out with a small canister, which she pointed at him. As she marched closer and Keita knocked once more, he glanced back and saw that the canister was labelled Bear Spray.

  “Apologies, madam, no need for distress. I will be on my way.” Keita retraced his steps over the granite blocks implanted like elephantine teeth in the walkway between the front door and the gate.

  As he reached the end of the driveway, another voice called to him. “Roger. Roger Bannister. Where are you going?”

  He turned and saw Mrs. Beech standing in her open doorway.

  “I knocked,” he said, “but this lady—”

  “Come back,” Ivernia said. “I’m hard of hearing, and you have to use the doorbell. Lydia, everything is fine, and there is no need for bear spray.”

  “Who is this man?”

  “My friend,” Ivernia said, “and he is coming in. Lydia, you may go now.”

  Lydia still looked suspicious but turned to leave. Ivernia grabbed Keita by the wrist, pulled him into her home and bolted the door.

  “Don’t mind her,” she said. “One of the crazies. There are more and more like that in Freedom State. Even, unfortunately, on good old Elixir Bridge Road.”

  “Is this your home?” Keita asked.

  “It is a bit much for one person,” Ivernia said.

  “You live here alone?”

  “Yes, I have since Ernie died,” she said, “although I keep him here with me in an urn. A few people object to the fact that I live alone, and the neighbour you met monitors every arrival and departure. But what can you do but carry on in the best British tradition?”

  Keita smiled. To his knowledge, his father had never set foot in Britain, but when homework needed to be done or discipline summoned, he too had been fond of puffing out his chest and saying, “Let’s just carry on in the best British tradition.” He told this to Ivernia, who smiled and said she’d learned the expression from her father.

  Inside the house, Keita slipped off his running shoes and put down his small knapsack.

  “Would you like to use the powder room?” she said.

  Keita changed quickly into street clothes and then joined Ivernia in her kitchen.

  She looked straight at him. Blue eyes, and white hair that was cropped and hanging slightly untended, almost like that of a child. No lipstick. Half-moon bags under her eyes.

  “I don’t cook anymore,” she said, “but I have crackers and tinned oysters.”

  “Tinned? Do you mean smoked?”

  “Yes.”

  “My father used to eat smoked oysters at our kitchen table every Sunday. On Ritz crackers. With a mustard sauce. It was one of his few extravagances. That, plus roasted peanuts.”

  “I have peanuts too,” Ivernia said. “Let me roast them for you.”

  “Could we sit and talk first? I have something urgent to discuss.”

  She pointed to a chair and they sat at her table.

  Keita took a deep breath and told her about the death of his father, his flight to Boston and Freedom State, and the abduction of his sister.

  “I am ashamed to ask for help,” Keita said, “but it is not for me. It is for her.”

  “Are you able to get the money by winning races?” she asked.

  “Perhaps,” Keita said. With the dizziness and the cra
mping, he was starting to doubt himself. Would his body betray him again?

  Ivernia explained about her accident, and how she had lost her licence and control of her assets. “I can’t give you any large amount of money,” she said, “while my assets are frozen. But here’s how I can help you.”

  As Ivernia prepared a snack, they came to an agreement: she would give him room and board as well as five hundred a month in cash, if he would make three meals a week for her and tend to gardening and other tasks totalling eight hours a week.

  “You have nobody who does these things for you?” Keita asked.

  “Who would do it? My son is useless.”

  “Surely he is not as bad as you say.”

  “I say that my son is useless, and it’s true.”

  After they finished eating, Ivernia and Keita decided that he would begin his first task right away, transferring the mound of earth from the driveway to the gardens in the backyard. It took him about two hours to cart the earth to the back in a wheelbarrow and spread it where Ivernia indicated. Between the tenth and the eleventh trip, he stopped to peer at a metal cylinder hanging like a lamp from a post in the veranda at the back of the house. Tiny embossed letters circled the brass container: Ernie Beech, 1923–2012. Passable cook, good plasterer, great husband.

  “I’m afraid it’s not much,” Ivernia said, when she showed him the bachelor’s suite in her basement.

  But it was as perfect as Keita could have imagined. It had a kitchen with fridge and stove, a bathroom with a shower, sink and toilet, and a bedroom with a window looking out on the backyard. The bed even had sheets, a blanket and a pillow, and next to it, a night table with a lamp and radio. The bed was firm, and the sheets were clean. He was relieved to have a safe space to sleep, which would allow him to intensify his training.

  “How can I ever thank you?” he said to Ivernia.

  “I am an old woman, Keita. I can’t help every person who is in a bad way. But I can help you.”

  HIS FATHER’S SCREAMS WERE SEEPING THROUGH THE WALLS of the Pink Palace and echoing in the waiting room where Keita sat. The president’s men offered Keita tempting plates of fresh oranges, pineapples and coconut water, which he refused. After hours of waiting for his father’s return, Keita was unbearably hungry and thirsty, and he began to weaken. Would having just a little food and drink constitute betrayal? As he brought one solitary section of the fresh orange to his mouth, his father cried out again, and suddenly, the fruit was transformed into a rank and rotting sardine. Keita dropped the sardine and was then ordered to get down on his hands and knees to lick the floor clean. Then he awoke, thrashing.