Vernon Mooers writes

THE WHITE MAN'S GRAVEYARD

chapter 6 (3)

Somehow they found the car. Steve was almost passed out laying in the rear over the spare tire. The three girls were in the back seat singing a tribal song. Aretha Franklin and her back-up band. Alex was in the front seat catching glimpses of empty streets and dust. No neon. Darkness.

There was a house. Jerry was gone, so was his friend. The girls stopped singing.

Somehow they found the car. Steve was almost passed out laying in the rear over the spare tire. The three girls were in the back seat singing a tribal song. Aretha Franklin and her back-up band. Alex was in the front seat catching glimpses of empty streets and dust. No neon. Darkness.

There was a house. Jerry was gone, so was his friend. The girls stopped singing. 

Jerry was walking his friend to the house. Steve was singing now, from the back of the station wagon, "Country Roads, take me home... to the one I love..." Jerry was back out on the road in front of the car. Why were there two of them? Different colours. Alex saw him hand the watch over. He climbed over into the driver's seat. Drunk! Jesus! He fumbled for the keys. A man was banging on the back windshield. "Lock the doors!" Alex yelled. He reached over -- he was at the passenger side then. It all happened so fast. He got the car started, reached for the knife under the seat. Where was the clutch? They had to get out of there somehow. Where was Steve? Where was the karate?

They'd take the car. A van squealed to a stop. People piled out -- a policeman with a machine gun -- men with clubs. They were gone. Jerry was walking back to the car. Alex rolled the window down part way. "Move over, I'll drive," Jerry was saying. The policeman shone a light in the car.

"What's going on?" he said.

“I think we just got robbed," Alex stammered. The policeman looked at the girls in the back.

"I don't think they had anything to do with it," Jerry said. "We'll go home."

They pulled out. Men were walking back to the van. "Vigilantes," Jerry said.

"Jesus, couldn't they read?  The crest on the car says United Nations. What did you lose?"

"My watch. Maybe thirty naira."

"I started the car," Alex said. "I might have run him over. I couldn't find the knife."

"It's O.K., I could have taken him out."

"Yeah, they probably had guns in the car," Steve said. "They wouldn't be robbing people without them. I couldn't get out of the back."

"It's best not to fight," Jerry said. "They don't know what white guys would do. I came out of the ditch. He just said `I'm going to rob you. Are you going to resist?' I was looking at his hands for a weapon. Anyway, in a second I could have been gone over the fence. You guys could have taken off in the car."

"Yeah, well let's get home," Alex said. "You'll come?"

The girls nodded.

They were driving down deserted streets back toward Ikeja. Alex imagined being trapped in the car, machetes crashing on the windshield, getting hacked to death. He reached over and felt the girl's hand clasp his.

"Two weeks here and I've been robbed three times," she said. Her hand was warm. Jesus, did he need a woman, need to feel safe, feel someone human.

She slept in Alex's room. There were gunshots far away in the night. Her beautiful bronze body was reaching for the window. There was a string of beads around her waist. She closed it, came back to the bed.

    

"Do you like this?" Alex asked.

"Maybe I'll get married next year," she smiled. She was very beautiful.

"Who will you marry?"

"I have a boyfriend, an Englishman. He gives me things."

"But not love," Alex said. "Not like this."

"No."  She moved a bit. "It hurts. I have a sore there."

"Jesus, you should have told me. You should go to a doctor."

"Maybe," she answered.

Alex pulled her closer. She snuggled in.

"Where are the girls?" Jerry asked in the morning when he got up.

"We sent them home in a taxi. They were O.K. I had to put my wallet under the mattress. It's not really fair to have to do that."

"No. It's not fair to you and it's not fair to her."

"Christ. What a night," Steve laughed. "How do you live here?"

"When I first came, I didn't go out. Then I said if I'm going to do that I'd better go home. Now I go out. I have to work at four o'clock."

"Anyway, we're going. We're not going to that Embassy party. Steve wants to get home. We'll take the train."

"Better have a drink at the Club before you go. We can get breakfast there."

"Yeah."

They walked over to the Club. It was peaceful in the daytime.

"Are the girls still there?" Bernard, the ex-SIS man asked.

"No, they're gone," Steve said.

"How did they know the girls were there?" Alex asked Jerry at the bar.

"They know everything that goes on here. One of the guys had a fiance back in England. Someone wrote her a letter that he had a girlfriend down here. You have to watch it."

"They're crazy, Steve. We have to get out of here."

"Yeah, we're getting out of here today."

They drank at the Club all afternoon and got a taxi to the rail station at five o'clock.

Alex watched a thousand kilometres go by the window.

"This is our football," Steve was smiling. He was pointing to pictures in Sports Digest, explaining the game to two other passengers.

Back in the North. There were mosques. People were praying. Their bags were safe on the train.  Alex could sleep now.

In Ngami they got a taxi to the school compound. Alex went straight to the office to see if there was mail.

"Sannu, Malama," Ademu, the school messenger greeted Alex. He was smiling.

"Lafia. Ina aiki?"

"Aiki da godiya. There is letter." He handed Alex the mail, smiling widely. Ademu took care of the mail, made it a personal job to keep it for Alex. "In Maiduguri," he said. He was holding a small Canadian flag pin out from his chest, beaming. "Canada, Head of State."

Alex smiled back.

"The first Head of State to visit Maiduguri. It was a big celebration," the Principal said.

Later, Alex found out the entourage visited the Ministry of Education offices. It was a big affair, CBC and everything. The Prime Minister was scheduled to go to Kaduna and had been re-routed when they thought there might be trouble there. All the other teachers met Trudeau at Marcel's house. There was a party, dancing and things. Some of them got their pictures with him. Sharon Murphy was on the front page of the Ottawa Citizen, dancing with him.

 

He and Steve had been tied up in Lagos. Alex knew they could have been there, had their pictures taken shaking hands with the Prime Minister. Maybe they all would have seen him on TV back home, sitting in the front row when they put on the Durbar. Everyone else was there. Steve got a letter. There was a clip on The National that included it. It was a chance of a lifetime.

Penicillin, chloroquine and valium could fix everything else. He and Steve missing the State Visit was the one thing Alex regretted. They were robbed.