Echo of an Angry God

by Beverley Harper

  ‘I think you know what I’m saying.’

  ‘Spell it out.’ Henning sounded amused rather than angry.

  ‘Our records go back a long way. It’s interesting how often your name appears. What I’m saying, Mr Henning, is that if anything happens to Lana Devereaux while she’s sailing with you, this office would be obliged to assist with any official enquiry.’ Tim had his fingers crossed. ‘It’s in your interest to keep her safe.’

  ‘Accidents do happen, Mr Gilbey. I can’t be held responsible for her absolute safety. We’re sailing to Nkhotakota. Yachts sink.’ His voice was calm, as though he were reasoning with a child. Tim realised just how dangerous the man might be. He did not appear to have been thrown in the least by Tim’s veiled threats to expose him. In fact, he seemed to be enjoying himself.

  ‘You know what I’m saying, Henning,’ Tim snapped. ‘Don’t play games. You’ve been lucky so far but don’t push it.’

  ‘I haven’t the slightest notion what you’re talking about,’ Karl Henning said silkily. ‘Now, if that’s all I’m rather busy.’

  ‘Just bear this in mind,’ Tim growled, hating the man. ‘Your overseas connections are known to us. Your activities in Malawi just prior to the’83 coup attempt are also on record. You had some interesting friends back then. Oddly enough, they’re all dead. Do you understand me?’

  ‘Go to hell, Mr Gilbey.’ The receiver was slammed down.

  ‘Great!’ Tim was thinking. ‘A gentle diplomatic breeze! Christ, I just sent out a bloody tornado.’

  Unable to sleep, he sat by the window staring out, thinking. There had been one or two moments earlier when the urge to touch Lana had been almost too strong to resist. It wasn’t just the way she looked, though God knows, she was most certainly worth looking at. It was her fierce determination, coupled with one or two signs of vulnerability.

  Tim never actually sought romantic interludes while on assignment, though he certainly didn’t back off when they popped up. Lana was different. A night of passion with her would, he knew, lead to something deeper, more permanent and that was the last thing he needed until his job was over. He acknowledged that, as well as finding Lana the most attractive woman he had ever met, he also liked her. He admired her spirit and courage. He respected her intelligence. He liked her sense of humour. ‘Dear God,’ he was thinking. ‘I even like the way she threw me out.’

  Lana lay on her back, staring up at the ceiling. Dinner with Tim Gilbey had been pretty well what she expected – enjoyable. ‘What else could it be?’ she asked herself. He was sophisticated yet possessed an endearing homely quality. He was sensitive yet firm, with the quiet assurance that rests easily with peak physical condition. He was certainly something more than his official position would suggest. What then was the reason for his being in Malawi? ‘Good conversationalist, good company, good-looking, good . . . God!’ She sat bolt upright. ‘What the hell is wrong with you?’ She lay back frowning. ‘He’s just doing his job. Get your mind back on track.’

  But she couldn’t. Not straightaway. The way he looked, the feel of his arms, of his lips on hers, the passion in those deep blue eyes, this was a man she wanted to know better. This was a man, she admitted to herself, that had the words ‘satisfaction guaranteed’ stamped all over him. And Lana was not thinking about sex.

  She forced herself to concentrate on Karl Henning. Tim had told her nothing. ‘Don’t go,’ he had said. So what did that tell her? Not a damned thing. She was still irritated that Tim Gilbey obviously possessed knowledge about Karl, and possibly even her father, yet had done little more than warn her to be on her guard.

  Karl, she admitted, did disturb her. She could accept coincidence – life was a series of them. But were there too many? He seemed nice enough. Why was he helping her? Because she was new in his country and he was just being hospitable? Her father had said there was more hospitality in Africa than anywhere else in the world. Did Karl have seduction on his mind? Seduction she could handle.

  What about Tony Davenport? Tim was going to lean on Davenport but, if he found out anything, would he tell her? ‘Would he hell!’

  She turned onto her back again. Tony Davenport was trying to frighten her off. How the hell did he know I was in the country? Someone told him. It could only be Karl or Tim – no-one else knew. Frustrated, Lana stared into the darkness. ‘This is ridiculous. Bernard tried to warn me. I wish I’d never come.’

  But she knew she didn’t mean that. Just being where her father had been would help. Her thoughts drifted to Moffat Kadamanja. He lived in a village on the outskirts of Lilongwe but it was not possible to contact him by telephone. He was expecting her and prepared to talk to her. That was all she knew. Had he made any enquiries of his own? His father’s body had at least been found and the coroner’s report stated accidental drowning. Perhaps there was no reason to suspect foul play. He might be a simple, rural Malawian with an African’s stoic acceptance of death and no desire to take the matter further. He could be fifteen or fifty, she had no idea. She remembered Tim’s comment and grinned into the darkness. Dammit! she didn’t even know if he were circumcised!

  Tim! Tonight something nearly happened, a chemistry of some kind, which, however fleeting, had been strong. But she had backed off. Why? Was it because she wanted nothing to complicate her real reason for being in Malawi? ‘That makes sense,’ she thought. ‘I’ve waited fifteen years for this. I need a clear head, I can’t have a man, no matter how attractive he is, clouding my judgment.’

  The last man Lana had found attractive had been a Dutch drilling supervisor in Sumatra. More at ease planting dynamite in cliffs than bothering about political correctness, he had impressed Lana by shedding tears over the plight of a small, badly injured puppy. She was half in love with him when he casually dropped the fact that he was married.

  The experience had left Lana with a legacy of deep suspicion about men. While her heart had not been seriously broken, it had been fractured enough to hurt for several months. She drew no comfort from the knowledge that he had not deliberately lied. She had assumed he was single because he was a willing participant in a relationship which deepened rapidly. Her shock, when he said he was married, astonished him. ‘And that,’ she conceded, ‘is what hurt.’

  Lana played fair. She expected others to do the same. Her first tentative step into love had slapped her in the face. While she was too honest within herself to turn one disappointment into bitterness, she nonetheless had retreated into cynical observation of men, rather than trying again.

  It was three years since the Dutchman in Sumatra. Lana was over that hurt. She was probably over the mistrust too. Was she ready to try again?

  ‘It’s not simply physical, although, God knows, he’s attractive enough.’ It was a total thing. Tim Gilbey fitted perfectly into her idea of the ideal man: modern enough to treat her as an equal yet old-fashioned and comfortable enough with himself to offer the courtesies which she believed had, by and large, been bludgeoned to death by the feminist movement.

  She discounted the fact that she had literally thrown him out of her room. The unexpected rush of emotion had unsettled her, left her unsure of herself. ‘Defence mechanism,’ she excused her actions. ‘It all happened too fast.’ She felt her eyelids grow heavy.

  ‘On a scale of one to ten,’ she mused. She was getting sleepy. Her thoughts often rambled like this just before she dropped off. ‘Tim might go a perfect score. And those eyes!’

  Lana fell asleep.

  TWELVE

  In the morning, refreshed and eager to get going, Lana’s mental meanderings of the night before fell into place.

  Moffat Kadamanja was, for now, an unknown element. If he knew anything, if he could help, well and good. If not, she’d go it alone.

  Karl Henning might be a very nice man trying to help. Okay, she’d let him help. He might also be a very nasty man trying to harm. There was only one way to find out. And in finding out, she might learn more about her father.

/>   Tim Gilbey was undoubtedly the most attractive man she had ever met and probably one of the most provoking. Had he told her everything? What else was he hiding from her? Would she ever see him again?

  Just where Tony Davenport fitted in she had no idea.

  Over breakfast Lana reviewed her options. She concluded she didn’t really have any. Not yet. What she had was a vague plan of action, an invitation she was uncertain she wanted to accept, a man who wanted to meet her in Lilongwe, a woman in Karonga, and that idiot, Tony Davenport, who was going out of his way to make life as difficult as possible. ‘I can do this,’ she told herself. She was in Malawi doing what she always intended. She owed it to her father and to herself. ‘And that,’ she decided, ‘is the bottom line.’

  Satisfied and resolved, Lana drove north towards Lilongwe. She could have taken the new freeway and been in the capital within five hours. Instead, because it was the road she knew her father would have driven, she went via the old route, through Zomba, over the Shiré River and up the Dedza escarpment to the plateau. Shorter by far than the freeway, it should have taken less time than the new road. Unfortunately, the road was more pothole than tar but the views were worth the inconvenience. Beyond Zomba, once colonial capital of Nyasaland, the hilly country quickly fell away. Heat haze stretched to a blue infinity. The air became still and sultry as the highway swept down to lake level and crossed the swirling, chocolate brown Shiré River at Liwonde. The scenery Lana had admired from 30,000 feet did not let her down. The further north she travelled, the more diverse it became until she was high on the spectacular Dedza plateau, where mountains stretched away on all sides like monstrous waves. She wondered why more tourists didn’t come to Malawi. Lakes, rivers, hills, mountains, open savanna, for such a small country it had so much. ‘Except a healthy economy,’ she thought, dodging some wicked potholes in the centre of the road. ‘If only Dad had found oil . . .’ But she knew he hadn’t. The two reports he’d sent to PAGET indicated that oil under Lake Malawi was still a good five million years in the making.

  Lana forced her mind back to the present. She had decided to allow herself two full days in Lilongwe before going on up to Karonga. Her intention was to spend as much time as possible with Moffat Kadamanja. He, more than anyone else, might be inclined to speak honestly.

  It was early afternoon when she booked into the Capital Hotel. Clever use of wood, dark brick and tiles created a cool tranquillity. Tropical gardens planted close against floor to ceiling windows displayed their lush verdancy both inside and out. Her room on the second floor had an uninterrupted view of manicured gardens and Lana, who had never paid much heed to horticultural pursuits, found much to admire in the well-planned mix of mature palms and shrubs. She looked at her watch. Three o’clock. Might as well go and look for Kadamanja’s village.

  All she knew about Moffat Kadamanja was that he lived in Area 3, off Selous Road near the Civil Service Club. ‘Old Town,’ the original small town which existed before the new capital was built, she was informed by a man at the reception desk, ‘is over the bridge.’ She had no idea how to find it and decided to explore on foot.

  She had no difficulty in locating the main shopping centre – it was a block away from the hotel and stunning high-rise buildings, towering up from the trees, showed the way. She took time out to admire the Reserve Bank of Malawi building, its golden colour and top heavy design intended to represent one of the traditional baskets used in Malawi to gather maize. The city centre was a strange mixture of modern Western style buildings – the design of some which defied gravity – side by side with markets, Indian trading houses, and squat, run-down African style shops. New buildings were being erected everywhere. Lana strolled from shop to shop, a growing band of hawkers displaying their wares behind her. She supposed that one day, when all the building was finished, Lilongwe city centre might have some sense of order. She found it messy and considerably different to the impression she’d got of it from the air.

  Having explored, and becoming a little fed up by the persistence of some of the hawkers, she went to return to the hotel. As she walked up to the entrance, however, she noticed a sign on the opposite side of the road which said ‘Japanese Gardens’. She crossed the road and found herself in a park. Of the Japanese Gardens, she saw no sign, unless a lone pavilion was supposed to be it, but she wandered on through the park and, ten minutes later, found herself on Capital Hill.

  This was the new seat of government. Every Ministry had its own building, each identical to the other – a long white rectangle, three storeys high, with balconies running along the entire length of the first and second floors. Set in landscaped gardens, which were showing signs of neglect and recent drought, Capital Hill must still have been a pleasant place to work. Lana spent thirty minutes wandering in the park-like grounds until a man came out of one of the buildings and asked if she was lost.

  ‘No,’ she replied, smiling. ‘I’m just looking.’

  He smiled back. ‘Are you a visitor?’ He was watching her carefully.

  ‘Yes I am.’

  ‘You should visit the nature sanctuary.’

  Lana took advantage of the man’s knowledge. ‘Where will I find old Lilongwe?’

  ‘Old Town? On the road to Blantyre.’ His gaze shifted to a point over her left shoulder.

  ‘Really?’ She was surprised. ‘I drove up from Blantyre today and didn’t see it.’

  ‘Then you have been there.’

  ‘I see. I thought that was the start to Lilongwe.’

  ‘That is so. That is Old Town.’ He turned to leave. ‘If you have no business on Capital Hill you must not trespass. I’m sorry.’

  Something was wrong. The man spoke softly, with no anger, yet his actions were almost aggressive. He was gesturing with his hands that she should leave. Lana couldn’t see why she should. ‘I’m not doing anything wrong. If you don’t want people in here you should put up a fence.’ Cool it for Christ’s sake, girl, you’re not in England now.

  She half expected anger. Rules and regulations were rigidly enforced in most developing countries, especially when being broken by a white person. But when he turned back all she saw was regret, though he was still waving his hands that she should go. ‘There is a sign in the car park – did you not see it?’

  Arguing would be a waste of time, she could see that. ‘I’ll leave immediately even though I think it’s ridiculous,’ she snapped. Then she relented. The rules were hardly this man’s fault. ‘Good day to you, sir.’ God! I don’t believe I said that.

  ‘Yes, madam,’ he replied soberly, walking away.

  Leaving the grounds Lana did see a small sign which read OFFICIAL BUSINESS ONLY and remembered seeing it on the way into the complex. She had thought it referred to the parking area.

  It was four-thirty when she returned to the hotel. Old Town must be about ten kilometres away if she remembered correctly. No point in going today. She bought a postcard in the lobby curio shop then sat outside with a cup of coffee and wrote briefly to her mother and Bernard.

  Locating the original old town of Lilongwe the next morning was easy. Moffat Kadamanja’s house was less obliging. Streets very often had no name – or none that she could find. It wasn’t until she realised that every house was numbered and the numbers ran with a reasonable degree of consecutive order, that she was able to find it.

  Driving through the labyrinth of old Lilongwe, Lana felt she had stepped back into an older Africa. There was no comparison with the new capital’s wide and carefully planned street pattern. She wondered which the local people preferred. New Lilongwe was a meshing of a number of different cultures but it lacked an essential element, an African meander which, while not as orderly, had a village quality, a friendly, family feeling about it. The shops had a market look to them with a bazaar-style jumble of goods displayed and, outside each shop, tailors worked on ancient hand-wound sewing machines. Loud reggae music from hundreds of radios joined the shouted conversations. Stalls sold everythi
ng from fish to tin buckets – some stalls sold both – and venders thought nothing of running to the car displaying their wares in a friendly, smiling, but very persistent hard sell. Lana knew which she preferred. Old Town was the real Africa.

  She reached Moffat Kadamanja’s house a little after eleven in the morning. As houses went, it wasn’t much to look at. Like most in the area it was set in the centre of about an acre of land. Around the plot a high chicken wire fence, with two strands of razor wire on top, protected the Kadamanjas from burglars. The red brick rectangular-shaped house was shaded by several huge mango trees. The small windows had curtains drawn. The corrugated iron roof, the sheets of which varied significantly in age and condition, had once been green. Mealies grew down one side of the house and on the other a woven straw wall shielded a flourishing vegetable garden from the worst of the sun. A goat was tethered in the shade near the house. An old and battered child’s tricycle lay on its side on the hard-baked red earth. The rusted cab of a Bedford truck gave purchase to vigorously healthy busy lizzies, while a few arum lilies competed gamely with their colourful display. Lana parked in the street, went through the gate and knocked on the front door.

  After nearly half-a-minute, just as she was about to knock again, a woman’s voice called something in Chichewa. Feeling somewhat foolish, Lana shouted her name, then added, ‘I come to see Mr Kadamanja.’

  ‘You wait,’ the voice said in English.

  Lana heard footsteps, then silence. She waited. Nothing happened. She stared at the front door as if it were to blame for the inactivity. Feeling she was being watched Lana glanced sideways just in time to see a small head pop back behind the house. Deciding to investigate, she stepped quietly to the corner and discovered three giggling children who, at her appearance, fled shrieking with laughter. A woman appeared from the back, smiling and beckoning. ‘Excuse. My English not good.’

  Lana shook her head. ‘My Chichewa is none.’ Unconsciously, she was speaking pidgin English, something she always tried very hard not to do but, under the circumstances, simplifying the conversation was the only way to go. She placed her hand against her chest. ‘I am Lana Devereaux. I come to see Mr Moffat Kadamanja.’