The African in the green uniform reappeared at the far side of the compound, near a building, talking to a man in sunglasses. The man in sunglasses was white, the first mzungu Hock had seen in more than six weeks — since Norman Fogwill in Blantyre. This man wore a green baseball cap and a Hawaiian shirt and khaki shorts and sandals, like someone on his way to the beach. Seeing the man, Hock became hopeful again, as when he’d first seen the compound. He felt like an earthling on a planet in deep space who’d just had a glimpse of another earthling — a brother, he thought, and he was almost overcome by a hatred for Manyenga. Seeing another white man inspired and allowed this feeling. He was stronger, not alone anymore, and, being stronger, he was able to admit this feeling of indignation.
He waved to the man in the flower-patterned shirt, who was still talking to the African at his side — laboriously, perhaps because of the loud generator. Hock tried to call out, and his voice caught and failed him — he was too full of emotion, near tears in spite of himself. He snagged his fingers in his mouth and whistled sharply.
The white man stared and then walked toward him, taking his time, kicking the gravel. Hock could see from the casual way he walked that he would be unhelpful. His cap visor was pulled low; his sunglasses were too dark for Hock to see his eyes. The double-A stitched on his cap Hock took to indicate the agency, L’Agence Anonyme.
Before Hock could speak, the man said, “What are you doing here?”
“I need help — please,” Hock said, clinging to the fence.
“How did you get here?” The man stepped back as though from a bad smell.
“With another guy, on a motorcycle.”
“I don’t see anyone,” the man said. “And there’s no road.” The man was stern, and his sternness emphasized his accent, which Hock could not place.
“We pushed the bike through the bush — does it matter? Listen, I need you to send a message for me to the consulate in Blantyre. It’s very urgent. I haven’t had a decent meal in a week. I’ve been sleeping in the bush. I’m thirsty — I need water. I need a lift out of here. All I’m asking…”
The man set his face and his beaky cap at him and said, “You know this is a protected area?”
“Please help me.”
“You need permission to come here.”
“I’ll get it. I have friends in Malawi.”
“This isn’t Malawi.”
“Or Mozambique. Whatever.”
“It’s not Mozambique.”
“What the hell is it then?” Hock said in a shriek, his voice breaking.
“It’s the charity zone, between both countries, and it’s policed. So take my advice and go away.”
“Can’t I just stay with you tonight?”
“We are not running a hotel.”
“I need a drink of water.”
“This is one of our busiest days,” the man said, sighing in exasperation. Hock hated the man’s shirt, hated the flowers, hated its cleanness, the neat creases on the sleeves. “We’ve got VIPs in the field — I mean, serious people. Heavy security. And you expect me to drop everything because you show up at the fence? Do yourself a favor. Go away. That’s a polite warning.”
“What’s the name of this outfit?”
“That’s confidential. We’re contractors.”
“I know. The agency — Agence Anonyme,” Hock said. “Okay, I’ll go. But just send an email for me. Please.”
“Who says we have the capability?”
“You’ve got a satellite dish.”
“It’s not operational.”
“Look, I’m an American, like you.”
“I’m not an American”—and saying so, accenting the word “American,” Hock knew the man was telling the truth.
“Where are you from?”
“Who wants to know? Who are you with?”
“I’m alone.”
“What agency?”
“No agency,” Hock said. “I’m a retired businessman. I came to Malawi over a month ago. Almost two months — I lost track of time. My clothes were stolen. My radio was stolen. I used to teach school here…”
As he spoke, Hock could see the man backing away, and finally he turned and walked along the gravel path, snapping his fingers at the African in the uniform, beckoning him.
For a moment Hock believed that the man was summoning the African to help him. But instead of approaching him, the African returned to the stainless-steel water tank next to the fence and resumed his work, using a rag to wipe off the dried polish and to buff it, shining it, so that a whole oval patch, head high, gleamed like a mirror.
Watching him work, Hock saw his own face reflected in the metal of the shiny tank, distorted because of the curving cylinder but clear enough for him to be appalled, terrified, and now he knew what the man had seen. He had not looked at his face for a week, since leaving his hut in Malabo, where he had a small mirror on the wall.
His first thought was, I am a monkey. His hair was wild, clawed to one side but stiff with caked dust and dried sweat. The grit in his eyebrows thickened them, made them seem hairier, and the bristles in his week-old beard were darkened with dirt and streaked with muddy sweat, still damp. His eyes were puffy, bloodshot, and miserable — the sad and scary eyes of a madman. Yet when he opened his mouth in horror, he saw that his teeth were white, and this whiteness made his face more monkey-like. The filthy face pushed against the fence, the dirty hands, the torn clothes, must have seemed so desperate to the agency man. The sight of himself devastated Hock. He had never imagined that he could have been so reduced, so degraded. He had become almost monstrous in his days as a fugitive on the river — or was it in Malabo he’d begun to degenerate? If so, it was no wonder they’d taken advantage of him. He looked as though he’d lost all self-respect. Judging from this wild face in the gleaming side of the tank, which the curve of the stainless steel distorted even more, he was an unwashed fugitive, the strangest sort of white man in the African bush — a dirty one, helpless and stinking and probably insane.
Yet he still had his good wristwatch, his small duffel bag, his medicine, his passport, his money, a change of clothes. The bag was filthy, too, but it was valuable, and he saw it as a friend.
“Bambo—father,” Hock called to the African in the uniform, raising his voice so he could be heard above the generator.
The man winced, pretended not to hear, and went on polishing the tank. Hock, unable to bear seeing his dirty face, had moved away from the tank.
“Water,” Hock said. Getting no response he said, “Madzi,” and repeated it.
He thought he saw the African’s lips form the word pepani— sorry — but he could not be sure. The man glanced back at the bungalow, and while buffing the tank he stooped and picked up the plastic bottle he had used to dampen the washcloth. He wiped the mouth of the bottle on his shirt and then stuck its short neck through the chain-link fence.
Hock crouched and drank, but clumsily: the water slopped at his mouth and ran down his chin. He was aware that, with the bottle tilted this way, and in his submissive posture, he was like a baby, or a zoo animal being fed through a fence. He had never felt so helpless, but he was grateful to the African, and when he finished, gagging from the greedy mouthful, he thanked the man.
Without acknowledging Hock, obviously afraid that the white man might have seen him from the bungalow, he put the water bottle aside and set to work again. He had polished enough of the tank now so that Hock could see his upper body — horrible, wild man, desperate man, crazy man. Nothing this dirty man said could possibly be true.