I was shouting too — protesting — but the howling of the mob was so loud I could not hear my own voice. The car had darkened because of the Africans surrounding it, blocking out the light. It was shadow and panic and the strong smell of their dirty clothes. The back window went with a splash, and a side window splintered. They were clubbing the metal of the car, hammering the roof and the doors.
The Africans’ smooth babyish faces were clear in the front window. Their clothes were torn, their hair was tangled and dirty, they were sweating. They were all laughing, and now they were rocking the car, trying to tip it over. I had the impression of a great number of big dangerous hands and dirty fingers snatching at me.
Jenny was now hysterical. There was no way I could get her out of the car unless I got out first, and from the moment the first window broke I had been trying to open my door. It was impossible. The Africans pressed against it held it firmly shut.
Still I shoved at it with my shoulder, and I shouted, “Stop! My wife is inside! She’s hurt — she’s bleeding—”
They paid no attention to me. They were intent on smashing the car, and in their eagerness to club the roof they stood away from the door. I managed to open it wide enough to squeeze myself out, and I braced myself to be clubbed, raising my arms to ward off the blows.
There were none. The Africans stepped aside — they were grinning at the car, and still laughing. Now I saw there were many of them — we were surrounded by hundreds of Africans, all of them holding sticks and iron bars. One moved past me to hit the door with an iron bar, and he hit it so hard he lost his grip. The bar went clanging to the road.
A struggle was going on at Jenny’s side of the car. I put my arms over my face to protect myself and shouldered my way through the crowd. But she was gone. The car was rocking, it was empty.
I hated the laughter most of all. The mob had turned my car into a toy they had decided to break. I felt helpless and weak, and I was desperate, because I could not see Jenny anywhere. The Africans were all around me, and I moved with them: I became part of the mob — part of their will. We were overturning my car — I was among them.
Then my arm was gripped and I was being tugged out of the mob, moving sideways into the sunlight.
“Come with me.”
It was a small, beaky Indian in a gray suit. He was half my size, but I needed his strength to get me free of the Africans. He helped me nearer the sidewalk and just then I looked up and saw Jenny pass behind a door.
The little Indian rushed me through the door, then slammed it and bolted it — three bolts. Just as he slid the third bolt someone began pounding on it. I knew who it was: I had seen their hands.
But the beaky man was smiling.
“They cannot break it. The door is strong.”
The hammering grew louder. Still the Indian smiled — he was smiling at the door.
“I made that door myself,” he said. “In my own workshop. I know my business.” He smoothed his suit. “But just to be on the safe side we will go to the roof, where it is comfortable.”
He led me to the stairs and looked back at the door, which was being thumped.
“That is a political matter,” he said. “That is nonsense. That is—”
And he loudly cleared his throat and spat.
On our way to the roof we passed a landing. Hearing us, an Indian woman stuck her head out of a beaded curtain and said something to the man.
“Your wife is inside. Not to worry. She is receiving treatments.”
Jenny was sitting, murmuring, her skirt hitched up and her thighs painted with antiseptic. Her forearms were cut, her dress was torn. I hugged her awkwardly and she began to whimper softly.
“We’re okay,” I said. “Thanks to this guy.”
“C. D. Patel,” the man said, and straightened and put out his hand. “Carpentry, furniture, bedding. And you?”
“Andre Parent.”
“Your occupation?”
“I’m a writer.”
We had tea and cakes under an awning on the roof as the last of the rioters passed beneath us on the street.
“What was that all about?” Jenny asked.
“African fuss and bother,” Mr. Patel said. “They attacked the British High Commission — they broke the doors down. Glass doors. And then they ran riot.”
His wife clicked her tongue in disapproval.
“It is a political matter,” Mr. Patel said to her, smiling.
“That was a nightmare,” Jenny said.
Mr. Patel was still smiling. “It is balderdash,” he said.
When he said that I was certain that I would be able to bear it, and understand it, and write about it. And in that same moment I was also certain that I would leave Africa as soon as I could.
“You must have some sweetmeats,” Mr. Patel said. “My wife has prepared them. We call this gulabjam. Please take.”
I was still listening to the last of the mob.
“They wrecked my car,” I said. “What do we do now?”
“You will be able to go home soon. I will drive you in my van.”
I remembered that I had seen policemen near my car, after I got out and the mob had surged around me. Why hadn’t they helped me — why hadn’t they stopped the attack? I was trembling with anger and was about to describe this — and all my other complaints, like Wangoosa, who had honked at me and obstructed my retreat — when Jenny suddenly stood up. She was not steady on her feet. She braced herself by gripping my shoulder.
“Oh,” she said softly and touched the great curve of her abdomen.
She tried to take a step, but she hesitated as water coursed down her legs and darkened her skirt. In the next second the Indian’s wife scrambled to her feet — before I could react. But I was looking at Jenny’s face. She seemed at once very calm and quietly surprised, as though she had just heard something — but no ordinary sound, it was a whisper from the heavens, something pulsing in the air.
FIVE: LEAVING SIBERIA
1
It was winter in Siberia. I had been expecting deep snow and drifts, and had already rehearsed the phone call I planned to make in Khabarovsk: how cold it was, the icicles, the blizzards. But we traveled deeper into Siberia and though it was very cold, the snow was thin and disappointing. For miles at times there was nothing to see but slender peeling birches under a heavy sky — as if all the snow still lay packed in the low-hanging clouds, and was about to fall on me.
I was traveling westward from Japan and had been thinking about that phone call since Hokkaido, where I had tried three times to make it. It rang and went on ringing — the ring that makes you see the room again, but empty. It was Sunday in Japan but Saturday in London. Maybe she had gone away for the weekend?
The trouble with taking long trips was this suspense, which could be tormenting, and I hated guessing what was going on. But I had left in a hurry — I had left under a cloud. After six weeks I had called. This was in India, a miserable line, the squeezed and ghostly voice of the Indian telephone that makes you think of a séance. I heard her say faintly that everything was all right.
There were no letters waiting for me in Singapore two months later, but I was there a week and one arrived the day before I left. It was a short letter: she said she missed me. After that there was silence. I was in Vietnam, and when I knew it was impossible to call I stopped thinking about it. I kept writing my notes — it held me together, it ordered my thoughts, it helped me forget, and when I reread them I was consoled.