The Water Thief

by Claire Hajaj

  But I must not think of that. I tell myself: she is the illness that took Bako. She is the dry land and the men who steal from us, those men in their suits who said Baba must not work at the hospital. She is the storms that come and the fires. She is the one who called Adeya names and made her cry. She is Nicholas putting his hands on Mama in the kitchen. She is Mama begging my forgiveness. And I cannot forgive. I will not.

  Her eyes, they see me. They are white all around. I cannot look at them. There is water on my face, and it runs into my mouth. It tastes bitter and warm. But the gun is so cold. Like the snow Nicholas said comes in England. It is the only cold thing in all of this place.

  I fire.

  In the evening Mister sends us home. The sun is red, and soon Imam Abdi will sing from the mosque. In all these houses, the people will start their meal. But not me. I am not hungry. The bang cigarettes burned my stomach. Their smoke tastes like fire.

  There is a light in Adeya’s house. It dances and moves in her window. I try to rub my eyes but I see only more shadows. Maybe the spirits are coming here. They are tired of waiting for us. There is no more water at the lake. So they are coming here to find us.

  I see one – there, standing by Adeya’s door. Dark and small, like an animal. I wave my arms at it. Go, I try to shout. Go. My tongue is heavy. It does not work. But the spirit is not afraid. A real animal would fear me. A real animal would run.

  The door opens and Adeya looks out. Her mouth moves; she is speaking to me. But that is not her voice. It is only the singing from the mosque. I laugh at Imam Abdi’s voice coming from her mouth. She looks at me. I think she is saying: ‘JoJo, wait.’ But the spirit is walking away from her, back towards the lake. And I have to follow.

  There is the well, in front of the sun. The sun has grown big, like a balloon. It has split into two suns. One is like a shadow of the other. It swallows the drill that breaks the rocks. Somewhere there are men talking. Maybe it is Nicholas. But he cannot see me. He never sees me any more.

  She is there. The dog is right there, on the bank above the water pits. She waits for me.

  I shout to her: ‘I am one of The Boys now! I am not afraid of you spirits! I passed the test.’

  But now the sun is down, and everything is cold. The cold is calling me from under the ground. The well is like a mouth and these pools of water are its eyes. But these are not eyes for seeing. They are for hiding. They hide the spirits.

  I will call them out. ‘Come and find me, if you want me!’ I will not run.

  So I lie on the wall beside the pool. Down I look, into the black water. It is far below, and it smells strange. Not mud and grass, like the lakewater. A cold smell, from deep in the ground.

  This is where the spirits hide. I can see them moving. I lean further forward. I call: ‘Come out! I am waiting for you. Come!’

  I hear my words come back to me. They are laughing, those spirits. They mock me.

  I lean over further, down into the darkness. I want the laughing to stop. I want to pull the spirits from the black water. My head is so heavy. It is pulling my body in.

  And now I cannot stop it. I reach out with my hands. I must find the edge of the wall. The stone is wet and my hands slide on it. It tears my skin, like the fire tore Adeya’s. Inside something is shouting: ‘Get back!’ I do not want to fall. I do not want to join the spirits.

  But I am already falling, sliding down the bank. The mud is hard and wet. My fingers cannot hold on. I feel my body moving, sliding and sliding. My heart is beating, beating – and I scream. But there is nothing to hear me.

  I put my arms over my face as the black water fills my mouth. Something has taken me, something has my legs and shoulders. The spirits have me. I fight them, but their fingers bite down, on my legs and my shoulders. I do not know if I am falling or rising. There is cold all around me, and light. Please do not make me open my eyes. I do not want to see the spirits. I do not want to join them.

  But now I can feel hard ground. My skin is cold, and I can taste the black water. But my mouth is empty. Something is holding my arm. Someone. I can feel their skin. It warms me. Through my fingers I can see a torch. And the face behind it is Nicholas’.

  His face is white, white as the spirits. He is speaking. But the beating inside me is too loud. I can only feel him, holding onto me. I can feel his fingers. Tight, so tight, like they will never let me go.

  March

  The well reached its target depth of ninety metres at the height of the dry season, a few days before Ramadan. The crew worked feverishly to finish before Imam Abdi announced the start of the daily fast.

  High excitement spread through the village. Aisha Kamil sashayed to see them through the dust, bearing a bowl of Ramadan sweets. Akim tossed them to an eager mob of children, bright fistfuls of cellophane filling the air with festival colours. Adeya crept around behind Akim, her burned fingers like shiny pink snakes as they slipped into the bowl – stealing a handful for the too-timid smallest children waiting at the melée’s outskirts.

  As Ramadan’s dusk neared, men began scanning the sky for the sliver of a crescent moon. Work pounded on around them: the great red beast had been hauled away and disassembled, replaced by new machines driving compressed air down the hole. A mixer churned cement for grouting. Mud, flushed from the depths, was darkening the desert. An open tube twelve inches wide protruded above the surface like a new blood vessel, carrying life from the silent aquifer. A ten-thousand-litre water tank squatted on the earth beside it – grey and hulking, like a sad beast of burden. Adeya’s mouth had turned into a perfect round O on seeing it for the first time.

  The pump had been lowered into the well’s depths – an electric lung, driving water up to the parched surface. A diesel generator would power it day and night; the council would take levies, Mr Kamil had assured Nick, to buy the fuel. The pump’s seal was a gasket sandwiched between two expensive steel plates. Eric had imported them from the capital, paying smuggler rates. ‘The most valuable pieces of metal I own,’ he’d grumbled. ‘If I find a nice girl they could be a fucking wedding ring.’

  On the day of the first pumping test, the village turned out to witness the moment of truth. A long hose had been attached to the pump, snaking three hundred feet to the bare remains of the lake. If all went well, a flip of the generator’s switch would send the first water flowing from the earth’s depths down to the lake, pure and unstoppable. If not . . . Nick did not dare to imagine what might come next. The last hurdle, he reassured himself, as the crowd began to gather on the baking ground, an agitated blur of heat and hope. Eric’s technicians were fiddling with the pump’s pressure gauge. Its thin metal bones looked so fragile, almost apologetic, against the enormity of the task.

  Mr Kamil was waving at Nick, Aisha by his side. He saw Jalloh with his red hands and heavy brows standing behind the throng of heads – and Tuesday, smiling as his eyes swivelled from face to face.

  A pale flash caught his eye at the edge of the site. JoJo’s friend, Mister. He’d come more than once to watch the progress of the well, his presence tangible like a weight. Today he was silent, taking a cigarette from Juma. They were the same height and build – but Mister loomed larger, a low-sun shadow. He caught Nick staring at him as he raised the cigarette to his lips.

  ‘You want one, boss?’ he called across the scrum, lifting the pack to Nick.

  ‘You should stop,’ he called back. ‘They’ll kill you, those things.’

  ‘Yes,’ Mister said. ‘I know.’ Beside him, Juma laughed.

  Something drew Nick’s attention from them – Margaret approaching from the path that led to Dr Ahmed’s house, heads turning as she moved through the crowd. She’d changed out of the dark houseclothes he’d left her in that morning. Now her hair was wrapped in a brilliant headband, a vivid jacaranda red that seemed to shout its presence. A blue scarf trailed behind her like a covering sky.

  Celebration colours. They moved him deeply – he hadn’t been sure she would come
today. There’d been a strange tension between them earlier that morning – the unspoken knowledge that the well’s birth was the prelude to other great changes in their lives, foreshadowing difficult choices. She’d appeared unexpectedly at his office door before he headed to the site, casually, as if just passing.

  ‘So, Sir Galahad,’ she’d said, their old joke. ‘You achieved your quest.’ Her chin was lifted in a tremulous smile, her body taut as a violin string.

  He had not dared to take her hand, aware of Miss Amina’s fan flapping curiously from her watching porch. He barely knew what to say; they’d never talked about what came next. Any future they imagined in those stolen moments by the lake under the sky’s vast canvas was far distant, the misty impression of a crystal ball – two old people tending roses in his mother’s garden, Margaret’s sketches on the wall next to her framed doctorate, and Wordsworth on the bookshelves. The immediate future was taboo; Dr Ahmed and her children cast long shadows over it, and there could be no painless path through.

  But he’d answered, in the hope that the words would make themselves truth. ‘Margaret, this is only the beginning. For you, for the children. For all of us.’

  Now she looked up and smiled across the construction site, as if he’d just spoken her name – as if his mouth were still pressed to the hollow of her ear or the pulse between her breasts. And again he experienced the thrill of a connection that overturned every childhood certainty – that mocked the years he’d spent burying himself in formulae and chasing scientific proofs when this deeper, vaster world had been just at hand, its nameless forces waiting to remake him.

  A shout from Eric reminded him that the pump was about to start. The air swelled with the generator’s roar, Eric’s technicians hovering over the surface gauges, a keening sound like the agony of birth.

  Suddenly, the hose began to vibrate. Nick watched as it stiffened and filled. Water. His knees shook with relief, head spinning as the adrenalin dropped away. It’s working. It worked.

  Eric threw up his arms. ‘Done,’ he shouted. ‘Done, you bastard!’

  A cheer started, pounding Nick with a visceral joy. Listen, he told his father and Madi’s watching spirit. Listen. It was a beautiful sound, flooding through the old channels, washing out the debris of loneliness.

  He turned to see Mr Kamil beaming at him, hand outstretched. ‘Masha’Allah, you are a clever man, Nicholas,’ he said, grasping Nick’s elbow. ‘I knew it . . . I knew you would do good things for us.’

  ‘Well fucking done!’ Eric said, slapping Nick on the back. ‘A good job.’

  ‘There’s still more to do,’ he replied, fighting to stay afloat on a rising tide of triumph. ‘We have to finish the pumping test and connect the tank. But in a day or so we’ll be drinking free water. Then we can think of the next phase – irrigation and crops.’

  He sensed Margaret near him, listening outside the circle of men. Her arms were around Adeya, their light hairs trembling in the hot wind around the red of Bako’s bracelet.

  Nick walked over to them, trailed by Mr Kamil. Adeya’s face was flushed red. She dropped her gaze in embarrassment; Nick touched her lightly under her chin.

  ‘You can plant your millet again, Adeya,’ he said, tilting her face to his. ‘And give them new names.’

  The girl blinked, moisture pooling in her eyes. ‘Yes, Mr Nicholas,’ she said. He saw Margaret’s hand touch Adeya’s cheeks, catching the tears as they fell.

  Mr Kamil put his hand on Nick’s arm, his palm moist with sweat.

  ‘We must have prayers and then a meal at the mosque,’ he said, brimming with satisfaction. ‘I have special food coming from the Town. And a special guest!’ He raised his voice and waved to the crowd around him.

  ‘Eh!’ Tuesday nodded alongside Mr Kamil, like a deputy cheerleader. ‘Danjuma! Danjuma!’ Others took up the chant. ‘Dan! Ju! Ma!’ A pocket of stillness caught Nick’s eye – Jalloh, frowning, thick arms dangling by his sides.

  A voice rang out – sharp, sounding a note of alarm. ‘Hey!’ Eric was standing next to the sealed well, shading his eyes as he looked northwards. His other hand was raised, pointing into the afternoon glare. ‘Hold up, boys and girls,’ he called. ‘Something’s coming.’

  Something’s coming. Hairs prickled on the back of Nick’s neck. He followed Eric’s finger towards the distant ribbon of road connecting the village to the horizon.

  At first he could see nothing – just blank, blinding desert.

  But then shapes coalesced in his vision; a cloud of dust drawing near – a convoy – cars or trucks, leaving the highway to cross the sand towards them. Their sides shone through the haze of sand, sleek as a raven’s wing. Only one man could have sent them.

  As the governor’s Land Cruisers closed in, Nick’s mind flicked to the safe in his office. How much money do I have left? No more than two thousand at the last count. He’d been expecting Kate’s reply to his letter every day, anxiety growing with every successive, silent sunset. By now she should have liquidated their bonds and wired the money to Western Union. She’d do it – he was still confident. But in the past week, he’d decided to ration his funds. The hospital construction had gone onto half-day rates. Tricky Dicky had been furious, stalking him with accusations from his car to the office. In response, Nick had shown him the wages bill. ‘There are twice as many men listed here as we have on site,’ he’d yelled back. ‘I can pay full rates for half of them or half rates for all of them.’ Nick suspected the slowdown in cash was making it harder for the foreman to skim his take.

  ‘I knew this was coming,’ he told Eric, swallowing the plunge of his nerves. ‘It’s Tricky Dicky, making a fuss about nothing. He’s probably complained.’

  Eric nodded. ‘OK. Well, lucky the governor’s an understanding fucking fellow.’

  Nick breathed in, dust sharp in his lungs. I’m not afraid. He turned to Mr Kamil. The chanting had stopped. Mr Kamil wore a dogged look: arms folded, robe clinging to his stomach. ‘The jackal comes,’ he said. ‘But the lions do not run.’

  ‘Please, Mr Kamil. Let me handle him.’ Nick wished them all away; Dr Ahmed had achieved nothing, and Mr Kamil was no substitute. The doctor had wished Nick a cordial ‘good luck’ this morning, excusing himself from the well-capping ceremony to clean his surgical tools with the last of his iodine solution. Miss Amina had another abscess in her foot, and a boy from JoJo’s class needed a deep splinter drawing. Nick had not protested.

  The Land Cruisers were drawing nearer and a pickup carrying armed bodyguards. They rocked across the scrubland, the scars of their passage twisting back to the highway.

  Aisha hurried off, pulling Juma and Akim with her. Margaret looked at Nick, her hand on Adeya’s shoulder. Go, he mouthed. Go.

  She bit her lip, scarf slipping as she rubbed sweat from her forehead. One hand reached quietly to his wrist, transferring a jolt of courage.

  ‘Come,’ she said to Adeya. He watched them leave, like a garden moving through the dry landscape. Tuesday had vanished. Jalloh stayed, his head raised; he watched the governor’s car approach like a dog hearing footsteps at the door.

  Mister stayed, too. As Nick’s eyes flickered over him, he dropped his cigarette, squashing it with his bare heel.

  The convoy stopped on the other side of the well. Nick waited, his chest tight. Adeya’s flags snapped frantically in the wind’s blast – orange leaves in a silent field.

  The window of the middle Land Cruiser rolled down. Cool air spilled from the dark interior. A man’s figure sat in the back seat.

  Cheap showmanship. It made Nick feel bolder.

  He walked over and laid his hand on the hot metal. Inside, the governor was reading papers. He wore a suit: heavy brown pants stretched over his large legs, a brown jacket, double- breasted. His white shirt was closed at the neck with a pin.

  His eyes flickered upwards briefly. ‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Nicholas.’

  ‘Sir.’ Nicholas kept his voice low and respectful.

&nb
sp; The governor shifted one paper aside. Nick felt the silence stretch between them. It’s a tactic, he told himself. Be calm.

  Finally the governor looked up, taking off his glasses. His gaze passed over Nick, to the parched desert and the last vestiges of the lake, drying and cracking on the earth.

  ‘We have never had such a dry season,’ he said, as if speaking to himself. ‘I remember when all this was green.’

  ‘Dr Ahmed told me,’ Nick said. ‘He said you could fish in the lake.’

  The governor’s head shifted on its powerful neck. ‘And how is the good doctor?’

  ‘He’s well.’ The false concern poured onto Nick like gasoline, waking his anger. I will not give you one inch, you bastard.

  ‘And I also have not seen you at the hospital for a while,’ the governor continued. ‘My foreman tells me that we are behind schedule. And his men have not been paid.’

  ‘I paid the team a few days ago. But the foreman wants me to pay ghost workers. And I’m afraid I can’t do that.’

  ‘I see.’ The governor looked down at Nick. Rising heat from the engine blurred his features. But Nick could smell the man – a cocktail of gasoline, dust, sweat and cologne.

  ‘You have been very busy with your well, Nicholas,’ he said, pointing his finger out of the window like a pistol. ‘And I see one of your workmen is a ghost, too.’

  Nick’s gaze followed the governor’s. Mister was standing by the unfinished generator. To Nick’s shock, JoJo now stood beside him. He was jolted by the similarities between the two boys – the same jagged lines of early manhood, the same aura of contained force. The governor’s cap was perched on JoJo’s head.

  Now Nick felt the first trickle of fear, like rain in a thunderstorm. ‘The well is finished. I’m paying for it personally.’

  ‘I understand you.’ The governor did not look at him. ‘And yet still we are behind schedule.’