Mazar Balim had been raised in the absolute knowledge that he would one day take over the family business. There had been no option, nor any reason to think of an option. He had tried to instill the same feelings in Bathar, but something had changed, some aura in the air had shifted, and none of today’s generation was so unthinkingly secure as he had been about the future or about the continuation of family business.
The common reference to the Asians as the Jews of Africa was perhaps after all too glib. There were certainly similarities enough: the outsiders who retained their own customs and languages and religions; the shopkeepers and bankers, harbingers of the middle class, bringing with them civilization and usury, hated for their knowledge and success and difference. But in Europe and America it had finally been possible for the Jew to assimilate if he wanted to, or at most times and places to retain his difference if he preferred. Though anti-Semitism certainly existed, the Nazi experience was seen as an aberration, whereas in Africa the expulsion of the Uganda Asians had been hailed by politicians of the surrounding black countries as a template for their own futures.
If Bathar were in London, the firm of Balim & Son would eventually cease to exist.
If Bathar were murdered in Uganda, the firm of Balim & Son would certainly cease to exist.
At least in London they won’t kill him. So long as he stays out of the East End.
If my boy comes back alive, God, I promise I will let him do what he wants with his life.
Late in the afternoon a stockroom worker approached, hesitantly, unused to dealing directly with the owner. “Master,” he said, “men in the office.”
Balim frowned, his mind still full of thoughts of expulsion and pogrom. “Men in the office?” And Isaac not here, Frank not here, Lew Brady not here! Reluctant to confront them, these men in his office, he asked, “How dressed?”
“Northern clothes, master.”
Suits; somewhat reassuring. Possibly merely salesmen. “What people?”
“Bantu, master.”
Black; could be good, could be bad. Government functionaries, seeking a bribe? “How many?”
“Two, master.”
So at least physical violence was unlikely. “Thank you,” Balim said, with more careful courtesy than he usually showed his employees, and hurried away to the offices, where he found the two men at their ease in Isaac’s room. How empty the place looked; how vulnerable Balim felt; how secure and comfortable these black men were, seated and smiling in their own country.
They rose, almost identical men of the civil service mode, a bit rumpled as was considered the appropriate way to express their independence from the European culture that had engulfed them. One had a thick moustache, the other black-framed eyeglasses. Both carried soft leather document cases under their left arms.
The moustached one stepped forward, smiling. “Mazar Balim?”
“I am Balim. In what way may I serve you?”
“I am Charles Obuong,” the moustached man said, not offering to shake hands, using his right hand instead to indicate his companion. “And this is Godfrey Magon. We are with the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, just up from Nairobi.”
“Import Control Department,” Godfrey Magon added. They both spoke in correct academic English.
A bribe, then; on what pretext? “I do hope I may be of assistance.”
“Oh, we think that quite possible,” Charles Obuong said. “We are here to discuss with you this shipment of coffee you are anticipating.”
Shock froze Balim, but none showed on the surface. Polite but puzzled, he said, “Coffee?”
Godfrey Magon smiled, his eyes twinkling behind his glasses. “From Uganda,” he said.
“I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage,” Balim said. He had begun to perspire fiercely under the arms. He accepted the belief that Africans have a keener sense of smell, so he pressed his arms tightly to his body to keep them from getting a whiff of his fear. They know! he thought. They know everything!
“It would be better,” Charles Obuong said, “if we could dispense with the first several hours of denials and evasions.”
“You see,” Godfrey Magon explained, his manner almost kindly, “we believe someone else plans to steal the coffee before it reaches Kenya.”
“With violence,” Charles Obuong said.
Balim by now had given up trying not to look shocked and fearful. “With violence?”
Charles Obuong nodded, smiling as though he quite enjoyed the anticipation of violence. “Oh, I’m afraid so,” he said.
“Unfortunately,” Godfrey Magon said, “our investigator was murdered by one of your people before he had completed his investigation.”
“Oh, no, surely not!”
“I’m afraid so,” Godfrey Magon said, but not as though he intended to make a major issue of it. “None of us can understand,” he said, “why your chap wanted to murder a simple boneman.”
“Boneman?” Balim shook his head; innocence always left him at a loss. “I know nothing of this,” he said.
Charles Obuong waved a deprecating hand. “That is beside the point, for the moment. The concern for now is our desire that this coffee should come to Kenya.”
Balim stared. “Oh, yes?”
Both men beamed at him. Godfrey Magon said, “Have you not heard of balance of payments? Of the difficulties of such small nations as ours in avoiding trade deficits? Of the terrible prices we are paying for the importation of oil?”
“Uganda plants,” Charles Obuong said. “Kenya harvests. So good for our trade deficit. You are a patriot, Mr. Balim.”
“Perhaps,” Godfrey Magon said, “we would be more comfortable if we continued this chat in your private office.”
54
When he heard Kekka’s voice, Chase felt a moment of utter black despair. Amin, that cunning cunning bastard. Of all the crooks and incompetents in Kampala, by God he’d chosen the one who’d give Chase the most trouble. Could Kekka be outfoxed? Could he be bribed? Chase remembered, vividly, all those sessions in the State Research Bureau, and he knew he absolutely had to get out of this. Some way, any way. Somehow, between here and Kampala, he must either escape or die.
They had tied him with many ropes, his arms twisted painfully behind him, his knees bent and one rope looped first around his ankles and then around his neck, so that if he tried to straighten he would choke himself. But not to death, unfortunately; at the instant of unconsciousness, his legs would relax, the pressure on his throat would ease, and he would live some more.
The only faint hope he could retain was based on the lucky chance that he apparently had no broken bones. Those bastards had tried enthusiastically enough, but for all their pummeling and kicking they seemed merely to have given him a lot of bruises and scrapes. So long as he was not physically impaired, there was still some faint chance he could get himself out of this mess.
How many hours had he been lying here in the stench and heat inside this mud hut, the packed ground painful under his bruised body? The corner of the outside world he could see through the angle of the low doorway was still in daylight, though the shadows were lengthening. And now one of the shadows was Kekka’s, and he could hear Kekka’s voice giving orders, and two soldiers came in to grab Chase by the ankles and the belt and drag him outside, not caring whether they choked him or not.
Kekka stood in front of the hut, spraddle-legged in the dirt, hands on hips, staring with those cold eyes at Chase on the ground. With him was that damned fat border guard, and angry-looking Ulu and Walter, and a platoon of uniformed soldiers. In the background was a camouflage-painted armored car, dusty from the road.