Kitafe

by Michael Ray

  He left the office and headed back to the Stardust. Nothing seemed to have changed, the road was full of the same cars driven by the same people. The jacaranda trees lining it had come into flower, just as they had a year ago. Pale blue petals that seem to defy the normal colour spectrum, sunlit and electric against the dark clouds of the long rains but he felt disconnected from his surroundings, an alien wandering in a foreign world, surrounded by the babbling of life that didn’t seem to have anything to do with him.

  He greeted the askari guarding the compound and went up to his room. Paul had leant him a typewriter and he sat down in front of it; a pile of clean, white paper to one side, an empty space on the other.’

  “Fingernails of the Empire. Chapter One, Hanging On.”

  There was a knock at the door and without waiting for an invitation, someone entered.

  He ignored the interruption and ran the paper up a couple of inches. Abdul came over to his desk anyway.

  ‘The Colonel wishes to speak with you.’

  Graham sighed, ‘morning Abdul’. He’d taken great pleasure in telling Bradley where to put his job, but Colonel Harding was a different matter. ‘What does he want?’

  ‘He wishes to speak with you.’

  ‘Yes, you’ve told me, but what does he want to speak about? … never mind.’

  He put on his jacket, locked up his room and followed Abdul to the staff car.

  *****

  ‘I suppose you know that Ngai’s going to be here in a couple of days.’

  ‘I’d heard.’

  The Colonel went over to a cupboard, opened it up and poured a glass of scotch, hesitated then poured a second. He added water from a crystal jug and passed one glass over.

  ‘Bloody nuisance. I’d like you to write an account of your time with Ngai, include absolutely anything that you think might help us.’

  ‘Who’s us?’

  ‘Us, you, me, the white population. Don’t you realise what’s happening? Whitehall is demanding that we have elections, and then hand over the country over to whomever wins. Have you any idea what will happen if Ngai wins?’

  ‘An interesting period in the country’s history?’

  ‘Interesting? It will be a disaster. He’ll leave the Commonwealth and bring the country to its knees. Have you seen his manifesto?’

  ‘I wrote it.’

  ‘You did what!’

  ‘I wrote it.’

  ‘So all that communist nonsense was your idea?’

  ‘Not at all, I just made his ideas more understandable; besides, I think you’ll find that James Obuya is just as keen on centralised control.’

  ‘Obuya is sane, he’ll temper his ideology with reality. Ngai will proclaim a workers’ paradise then sit on the top as the country sinks into oblivion or worse still, becomes a Russian holiday camp.’

  ‘If they vote for him, that’s his prerogative.’

  ‘His prerogative! Don’t be an ass. Do you want him in control? Do you want to destroy the country?’

  ‘Not at all, given the opportunity, I’ll kill him.’

  The Colonel stared at Graham. ‘Ironically, it’s my job to see that you don’t.’ He got up and walked round the room, stared out of the window then turned back to Graham.

  ‘I won’t beat about the bush, if Ngai gets in, I’ll have to leave the country and so will you. There will be no place for whites in his regime. I like it here, I don’t want to live in Tunbridge Wells.’

  ‘I would think you can afford to live wherever you like.’

  ‘Do you? Well here is where I like.’

  ‘So what do you want me to do about it?’

  ‘I asked you to come over so that you could give me some intelligence, anything that would help us negotiate.’

  Graham took a sip from his tumbler and stared into into the remaining scotch. ‘When I was in the British Army, they tried to brainwash us and failed. They tried to turn us into dispassionate killers, follow orders and don’t think about it. If you don’t think about it then it’s not your responsibility, and killing without responsibility will make you a good soldier. They even showed us films to persuade us that killing was a good idea. Look at the bad man, skewering small children with his bayonet. It didn’t work; they didn’t try hard enough. David Kabonero does try hard enough and it works. He doesn’t show them films, he does it in real life. He orders ten year olds to kill their friends and older boys to rape young girls. By the time he’s finished with them, they’ve lost all sense of what is right or wrong, all sense of reality, of humanity. He turns them into psychopaths. You can’t negotiate with that sort of thing, it’s beyond negotiation. You can only stamp it out and try to sort out the mess that’s been left behind. I’m horrified that you’re even contemplating talking to Ngai, let alone allowing him democratic freedoms.’ He tossed back the rest of the scotch and looked at Harding straight in the eye.

  Harding stared back, surprised that the mouse that had sprouted teeth. ‘They’re arriving in three day’s time, flying in by light aircraft. If they leave their base in the North around nine, they’ll be at the airport by eleven. He wants to enter the city in the back of an open limousine, crowds cheering; so we’re lending him the Daimler the Queen used on her last visit. The Governor has decided it should be a public holiday and the crowds will be concentrated in the city. I don’t have enough men available to line the ten miles to the airport, so we’re giving him a clear run and no cheering or flag waving until he gets to King George Street. There will be two outriders, they will travel at least two hundred yards ahead of the car until it enters the city, at which point they’ll let it catch up. That will be all. Abdul will take you wherever you wish to go.’

  Harding turned his back on Graham and resumed looking out of the window.

  Graham turned down the offer of a lift and walked back into town, staring at the ground as he went. The ditch that ran between the road and the pathway served as a storm drain during the long rains, though, on at least one occasion, the early rains had overrun it, turning the hill down from Harding’s office into a torrent that then overwhelmed the river running through the city. The rains this year hadn’t caused any flooding, there was even talk of a water shortage by Christmas. A few dusty, scrappy looking flowers grew along the edge of the ditch, serviced by small butterflies that looked like flying pansies. This had been his favourite season. The beginning of the rains always brought an explosion of life, flowers providing for the insects at the bottom of the food chain, feeding everything all the way up to the lions and leopards. In his garden … what had been his garden, sunbirds would be busy collecting a bumper harvest of flying insects for their young, whilst taking the opportunity to gorge on nectar themselves. It all worked well, everything fitting into a jigsaw of need and opportunity. Why the hell couldn’t humans work at the same level?

  He reached the centre of town and headed for Aristotle’s Cafe, intending to have a late breakfast or an early lunch.

  ‘Graham!’

  He looked up from the pavement as Rose ran across the street and took his arm.

  ‘Hello my dear, I was just about to eat, care to join me for a greasy fried egg on a piece of burnt toast?’

  She looked at him quizzically. ‘No, thank you but you can buy me a coffee. I’ve been hoping to bump into you ever since you got back.’

  ‘Why, does James want to talk to me?’

  ‘No darling, I want to know how you are. Why haven’t you been to see me?’

  ‘Did you go to the funeral?’

  ‘Amani’s? Of course I did, we all did. It was a sad day. I am sorry for your loss.’

  ‘Thank you my dear.’

  He ordered a large breakfast and a couple of coffees. ‘So how is everything, how’s the revolution?’

  ‘James now has offices in town, provided by the British Government.’

  ‘So the revolution wears a jacket and tie and kowtows to Whitehall.’

  ‘He needs your help; he may not win these ele
ctions.’

  ‘And you would like me to see him in his big office?’

  ‘I need him to win these elections and so do you.’

  ‘Is he talking with the Colonel yet or are they still acting like shy teenagers?’

  ‘The Colonel organised the offices; he regularly comes round to discuss security. Graham, James needs someone to write his speeches, someone who understands words and how to get a message over to the people. We can match your pay at The Standard.’

  ‘I thought you had Paul Kabuye on board.’

  ‘Paul is busy with other things.’

  ‘I’ll think about your offer and give you an answer in a couple of days.’

  ‘We need you, Graham, I need you. Please, sooner than a couple of days.’

  She finished her coffee, gave him a peck on the cheek and left. He watched her go, absentmindedly staring at her departing rear and wondering at the effect of high heels.

  She was right, James could do with some propaganda and he’d already written an article supporting him for Bradley, but then he’d decided against giving it to him. Papers like the Standard weren’t read by people who wanted their views changed; they were read by people who wanted their ideology supported, not questioned. A few seats in the new government had been reserved for the Whites, but they were very unlikely to be voting for any of James’s chums, or any other Black. Bradley’s largely white, right wing readership was an irrelevance. He finished his breakfast and went to pick up his car from the garage. After its return from The Black Cat, Paul had lent him the money for a service and he’d accepted. His prompt payment would probably send the accounts department of Brown’s Motors into shock.

  *****

  ‘Morning Margaret.’

  She got up from the reception desk, and came over to him, putting a hand on each shoulder.

  ‘Goodness, look at you. I’d heard you’d brought your car in.’ She looked him up and down. ‘You’ve lost weight, it suits you. Was it as bad as they say?’

  ‘Who say?’

  ‘You know, people.’

  ‘The rumour mill? That depends on how bad they say it was.’

  ‘Stop it, you know what I mean.’

  ‘Paul’s written an article for the internationals.’

  ‘I’ve read it, but …’

  ‘But he toned it down a bit … a lot. They’re trying to get Ngai to cooperate, so best keep the insults to a minimum.’

  ‘And what about you?’

  ‘I’ve been sitting for the last week staring at a pile of clean paper, a typewriter and a title page.’

  ‘You’re going to write a book? How exciting!’

  ‘It would be if I could get started.’

  ‘Writer’s block?’

  ‘Just a lot on my mind at the moment, it doesn’t leave much room for anything else. I’ve brought cash to pay for the service!’

  ‘Oh, don’t worry about that, under the circumstances … I won’t tell Jack if you don’t.’

  Graham smiled, ‘you’re a diamond in a dirty world.’

  Fifteen

  A week later he got up at first light and set off. There had only been one choice. Most African countries like to have a good, straight road linking the airport with the capital, sometimes it’s the only decent road in the whole country. Thirty years previously, a barbed wire fence had been erected in an attempt to keep the local wildlife at bay, though now it was the bush and large acacias that were threatening to take over and much of the wire had disappeared. The land on either side of the road had been reserved by the Government for potential development, planning a string of warehouses and factories linking the airport and the city. As yet though, no industrialist had been persuaded to make the investment and no buildings had been erected. This had never worried Government House: keeping the land reserved for development meant there were no shanties, nothing to give visiting dignitaries the wrong impression.

  Graham had chosen a fifteen foot high mound running parallel to the road. Thirty years ago it had been formed by a cutting, now it was covered in trees. From the top, he would be able see in both directions along the road.

  The early morning sun glared straight at him through the car’s windscreen. Following its visit to Brown’s Motors, it was unusually clean, though recently deceased insects, squashed by the windscreen and lit by the sun, were beginning to decorate it. Probably have to sell the damn thing anyway. If he was going to be a starving writer, he couldn’t afford to ponce around in a car, however old and knackered. Paul had promised to contact some friends from Oxford about a book deal and hopefully an advance, so he might put starvation off for a year or so. There again, he might end up writing his Magnum Opus from inside a high security prison, no need for a car there. At least if he were banged-up, there’d be fewer distractions and regular meals.

  He parked the car around the back of the mound and sat down under a tree at the top. He took out a paperback and tried to read but couldn’t, finding it difficult to focus on anything other than the shot and whether he could actually kill a man. The British Army had done its best to assure him that under the right circumstances he could but having got away from Ngai in one piece, he’d resolved never to have anything to do with wars or death again. Except Ngai; he’d kill Ngai and he’d kill David as easily as his windscreen squashed a passing fly.

  After leaving the Colonel, Graham had gone to find the Seychellois, hoping that he might have a cheap Lee Enfield in reasonable nick, telling him that he’d wanted to be able to hit a gazelle at a hundred yards. Instead, the Seychellois had suggested a brand new sniper’s rifle with a telescopic sight and informed him that coincidentally he had one at a very reasonable price. Why didn’t Graham borrow it for a week and see how he got on with it? Graham hadn’t questioned the choice, or why Jean Vert was happy for him to borrow it. The next day he went into the bush and set up an improvised shooting range of baked bean cans and beer bottles. He had tried to remember what the sergeant had shouted at him, squeeze the trigger like you would a girl’s arse or something. By the end of the first magazine, he could hit a can at twenty yards. An hour later he had a bruised shoulder but could hit it at a hundred. He had attempted to down a few passing birds, but failed. Still, Ngai was bigger than a pigeon and it was stupid trying to down a pigeon with a rifle bullet. He had thought about stalking a gazelle, but there wouldn’t be any within five miles by now, so he had packed the rifle into a cricket bag and replaced his lack of ability with optimism. Now he would find out whether that optimism was well-founded.

  The quiet of the morning was interrupted by a cry from across the road. He picked up the rifle and looked through the telescopic sight, just a hornbill leaving its nest. He tracked the bird through the sight, leading it by a couple of feet as it made its lazy, swooping flight. He pretended to fire the gun, simulating a kick into the air at each pull of the trigger, optimistically assuming that each shot would have filled the sight with feathers.

  He’d worked out his escape route from the mound, a track across country and around the back of town. With a bit of luck, they wouldn’t realise where the shot had come from … no, they’d realise but it didn’t matter.

  He heard a rustling in the tree. A green vervet was sitting on a branch twenty feet above him, surrounded by red flowers and freshly sprouted leaves; it was studying him with interest. A troop of them used to go past his house every couple of weeks while patrolling their territory. Amani hated them; if you didn’t keep the windows closed, they’d sneak into the house and nick any food they could find but Graham didn’t share her animosity. The nearest thing they’d ever had to a monkey nicking food from the house in Manchester was a rat. He preferred monkeys.

  It chattered at him then threw a stick. Graham rolled onto his back, pointed the rifle at it and pretended to fire. The monkey looked unsure, tilting its head to one side then found a flower to amuse itself with, pretending it wasn’t interested in Graham.

  After a while it got bored and, on seeing another
member of its troop, dashed along the branch, took a flying leap to the next tree and disappeared.

  Graham checked over the rifle for the sixth time. Although he hated anything to do with the army, mornings spent stripping and cleaning Lee Enfields had given him an appreciation of their mechanical simplicity and elegance. The seventy or so years of development it had enjoyed in Army service had honed the design and this one, with its sniper’s sight, was at the pinnacle.

  The morning wore on and a light plane arrived, travelling quite low over his vantage point before landing. The Queen’s Daimler, with a pair of outriders on motorbikes, came along the road towards the airport, passing by his mound. As an exercise in public relations, an open car was quite sensible; as an exercise in security it was stupid. He wondered if Harding had suggested it.

  Another car headed towards the airport, breaking the stillness of the air. Three on board, looked like airforce types. Most of them were barracked at the airport but they went into town for R and R. This one was probably returning from a night of carnal entertainment. A month ago there would have been daily flights of Hawker Hunters taking off and heading north and the airforce rarely appeared in the town bars but that had changed with the truce. The British Airforce had even discovered the Stardust and the manager and girls who hung out there were raking it in. Consequently, the press corp were looking for an alternative venue, even thinking of starting their own. He trained the rifle on the car as it went past; bang … bang … bang.

  And then the road to the airport was quiet again, a slight breeze rustling the leaves above him, broken birdsong from the bush beyond. The bi-weekly BOAC flight wasn’t due for a couple of days so there were no returning businessmen, no wealthy tourists, no parcels and letters waiting to be picked up. Nothing to disrupt the assassination.

  A couple of locals arrived and were sitting two hundred yards down the other side of the road, probably just curious. They didn’t look like Ngai’s followers, most of those were in the town waiting to greet him; white robes and crosses lining the streets, they were already gathering when Graham had left. By now, James Obuya would probably be at Government House, waiting to shake the hand of his political opponent before trying to annihilate him in the elections.