“Mais ça n’est pas possible.”
“Vous devez venir avec moi.”
“Mais que faire de notre conteneur?” Lars called after him, pointing at the boat.
“Il ne bouge pas.” The man turned and began walking toward a small, windowless building. What he said was true: the container did not appear to be going anywhere.
• • •
THE HARBORMASTER’S OFFICE WAS air-conditioned, but the air conditioner was not working very well. It would make a horrible chattering noise and then proceed to die a dramatic death before repeating the process all over again. The harbormaster took no notice. His desk was covered in a stack of large leather-bound ledgers. The office was completely empty except for the desk and a yellowing poster of the president tacked to the wall. There was no place to sit, so they stood.
The harbormaster selected one of the ledgers from the bottom of the stack and began to write in an entry.
“Qu’est ce qu’il y a dans votre conteneur?” the man asked without looking up.
Lars cleared his throat. “C’est indiqué sur le papier.” He pointed at the folder on the desk.
The man stopped writing. “Quel papier?”
Lars sighed. “Props. Des décors de théâtre,” he said. “Nous sommes des artistes.”
The man resumed writing. “Il y a un problème. Vous n’avez pas le permis nécessaire.”
“Le permis est là.” Lars pointed again at the manila envelope. “Tout était arrangé avant. Je vais vous montrer.”
“Avant, ce n’est pas maintenant.”
“Et c’est quand, maintenant?”
“Ce permis est périmé. Il n’est pas valide.”
“What is he saying?” Otik asked.
Lars rubbed his beard. “He’s saying he wants some money. Un encouragement.”
At this, the harbormaster looked up. His cell phone began to ring. Radar recognized the ringtone as a popular song, but he could not place the title or the artist. All he knew was that the song was sung by a sexy black woman in tall boots. Ana Cristina would know who she was. He longed for her then. Why couldn’t she just be here? They would go find a bar and share an ice-cold Coca-Cola. Maybe a Diet Coke if she preferred. They would talk about this woman in tall boots. They would talk about many things.
The harbormaster began to speak loudly into his cell phone and stride around his office, gesturing like a conductor. Radar understood that much of this show was for their sake. When he finally hung up, the phone immediately rang again. He answered and repeated his performance. They waited, watching as this man spoke rapidly in his native tongue. Though his demeanor was aggressive, he was not angry; he appeared perfectly content with this exhibition of verbal combat conducted through his small device. After a long while, he hung up. The phone immediately rang again, but he made a great show of not answering it, throwing it into a drawer before sitting down at his desk.
“Vous comprenez?” he said.
“Je comprends,” said Lars. “Combien pour le permis requis?”
The man was searching the drawers of his desk. “Vous avez de la chance que je vous aide. J’ai le formulaire ici.”
“Combien?” repeated Lars.
“Eh bien. .” said the man. “Mille dollars.”
Otik snorted. “He is full of shit,” he muttered. It was nice to see him back to his old self.
“How much does he want?” whispered Radar.
Lars reached into his pocket and took out a little roll of money. He placed four battered American twenty-dollar bills on the desk.
“Voici, quatre-vingts. C’est tout.”
The harbormaster considered this meager pile of money as if it were an insect. He paused, then reached out and took the bills.
“D’accord.”
Radar watched as the man filled out the form with great care. Stamping and counterstamping both the back and the front. If this was a bribe, it was an elaborate, well-documented bribe.
“Dans notre pays, la forme triomphe de tout,” the man declared. “Nous avons appris cela des colons.”
He had become quite cheerful as he showed them outside. It was already dark. Captain Daneri and the crew were still nowhere to be found.
Lars turned to the harbormaster. “Qui est responsable des trains, ici? Nous devons envoyer notre conteneur à Kinshasa.”
“Ils sont morts.”
“Mort? Qui est mort? Les hommes ou les trains?”
“Tout est mort,” the harbormaster said, and he smiled in the way a man smiles when he knows more than he says but does not know how to say it. He bade them goodnight and walked off into the darkness.
7
Without anything else to do, they returned to the ship. Lars asked one of the pimpled seamen on watch where they might find the captain.
“Ya pokhozh na suku?” The youth smirked. Apparently, he did not know.
They were about to retire down to their den of bird parts for the evening when they heard a whistle coming from the docks.
“HELLO! WELCOME TO AFRICA! HELLO!”
They looked over the bulwark and saw a thin black man waving at them. He was dressed in a simple white tunic.
“Are you speaking to us?” said Lars.
“AFRICA IS THE FUTURE! AFRICA LOVES YOU!”
“Is he speaking to us?” asked Lars.
“YOUR CAPTAIN!” the man said from below. “YOU ARE LOOKING FOR YOUR CAPTAIN?”
“You know where he is?” Lars called down.
“Of course,” said the man. “Your captain is my friend. He is at the Hôtel Metropole. Everyone is at the Metropole. I will take you there.”
The man’s name was Horeb. He was a Muslim. They knew this because these were the first two things he said when they came down off the ship.
“My name is Horeb. I am a Muslim,” he said. “I love all people.”
“Well, I am atheist,” said Otik. “I hate most people.”
“It is fate that we met!” cried Horeb, hugging each of them. “How do you like Africa?”
“We haven’t seen much of it,” said Lars. “Mostly the docks.”
“The river’s very big,” said Radar.
“The river gives life.”
“It’s beautiful,” said Radar, trying to be complimentary.
“Of course. Africa is the most beautiful place in the world. And Congo is the most beautiful place in Africa,” said Horeb. He took a step back. “Are you a football team from Europe? No. You are too fat to be a football player. Maybe you are the coach?”
Radar remembered that they were still wearing their matching yellow tracksuits.
“Maybe we should change,” he said.
“We do not change,” spat Otik. “It is beginning.”
“You can take us to the Metropole?” said Lars.
“I can take you anywhere you want, my friends.”
Horeb led them to a motorcycle with a small rickshaw lashed to the back by several unsteady-looking cables. They piled into the cart, though Otik took up most of the seat by himself.
“Okay?” said Horeb. He kicked the motorcycle into gear. The engine coughed and spat and then settled into an uneasy putter.
“The fuel is no good here,” he said. “They have huge tanks of pure petrol right there, but do we get any? No. It is shipped far away.”