Chaga

backtracking and we think that we have the genes of Australopithecus, an ancestor of homo sapiens that lived and died on the plains of east Africa four to four-and-a-half million years ago.’

‘Heeeere’s Lucy!’ Gaby said, laying her head on his belly.

‘Heeeeere’s Gaby,’ Shepard said, and moved her head back to the place where it pleased him so much.

36

The plane took them away and there were too many chairs at the table and too few pairs of shorts in the washing machine and the rear seat-belts in the Mahindra were too neat and too tight and too unused in their housings. He was disconsolate. He had warned her he would be like that, but it did not make it any better for either of them. She was disconsolate too. They had been the best days. Snorkelling on the reef. Fighting over the last chapatti at dinner. Football on the white coral strand at sunset. Haggling for dreadful antiques in the Mombasa markets. Learning the tricks and secrets of tropical fruit. To the Mara. To the SkyNet offices, where Gaby sensed there was something too welcoming and smiling in the faces behind the desks. Especially the women’s. Gaby had not brought Shepard and his children as trophies of sexual victory, she was not aware of having fought a war of conquest, but she imagined the whispers running around behind her back like vermin. To the Elephant Bar, on the final night, where Oksana and all the Siberians who could not get drunk stood the boys on a table, drank toasts to them and carried them round the bar on their shoulders, singing ‘Consider Yourself’ from Oliver. The Siberians who could not get drunk were very into musicals.

And then they were gone and nothing was good. Gaby and Shepard bickered in Shepard’s ugly, under- lived-in apartment like two cats sharing a food bowl, until he went to Zaire to try to salvage the Goma debacle and she went to Tom M’boya Street to find that the whispers had mated and bred looks, and mutters, and little gatherings that always broke up when she walked past. There were snide post-it notes stuck to her videophone; she would return from the toilet to find crude animations of her and Shepard fucking on her terminal screen. No one admitted to these crimes when she stood and accused the room. The women barely acknowledged her, even her first ally Ute Bonhorst, and most of the men regarded her with polite distaste, like a leper in a candy shop. The Africans treated her as they always had, Jake Aarons was as comradely and at the same time distant as ever, and T.P. Costello held himself above office pettiness. Abigail Santini went out of her way to be friendly. Identifying the source of the infection, Gaby prepared her revenge.

She knew she would find them all at the particular table in the Thorn Tree: T.P., Jake, Mohammed Siriye from Editorial, Abigail. There had to be witnesses. Gaby got a drink from the bar and joined them on the patio. Nods. Greetings.

‘Isn’t that your ex-house-mate over by the jukebox?’ Abigail Santini asked. ‘That Somali woman?’

‘Why, so it is,’ Gaby said. She waved. Miriam Sondhai waved back, feigning surprise.

‘Who’s that white woman with her? The one in lesbian chic?’

Gaby shrugged and sipped her drink. ‘Must be a friend.’ You’ll find out soon enough, she thought. When Abigail went to the toilets, Gaby took her bag and accompanied her. Miriam and Oksana left their table a moment later and followed her in. They were waiting when Abigail came out of the cubicle. It was very quick. Oksana took the right side. Miriam took the left. Gaby bent her over the basins and pulled her head up so she could see both of them in the mirror.

‘What you have to understand is that I’m with Shepard because of what he is, not what he can do for me,’ Gaby said. ‘I know you may have trouble with this mode of thinking, but you should make the effort. It really can change your outlook on life. Another thing you should understand is that I’m not envious of things I can’t have. I know you’ve been pushing your tits in Shepard’s face long before I showed up, but what you don’t seem to grasp is that men are intelligent, men can choose, men aren’t just dicks with just enough motor system attached to get them to the next pussy. If Shepard had wanted you, it would be your underwear in his laundry basket, but he didn’t, and it’s mine, and it’s going to stay that way. Now, if we’ve got points one and two, maybe we can push on to point three. You do not go around spreading stories behind people’s backs that they’re cunt-brained gold- diggers who will stop at nothing to sleep their way to a good story. Because everything I have, I got on my own merits, by my own sweat and smarts. I don’t owe anyone anything. I see what I want, I take it with my own hand. Last thing to understand: I’m a Celt, we’re a people who prefer direct action to whispering campaigns. If something riles us, we do something about it. And we are people with very, very long memories and very, very short tempers. That’s it. Speech is over. Show time.’

She took the electric shaver from her bag.

‘You would not dare!’ Abigail Santini shouted.

‘Wouldn’t I? I’m T.P.’s green-eyed girl, I’m fireproof.’

She clicked the razor on and shaved a beautiful grey stubbled strip up the back and over the top of Abigail’s skull to the forehead. Softly curled black hair fell to the washroom floor. Abigail Santini struggled and swore expressively in Italian but Miriam and Oksana held her firmly. Gaby admired her handiwork. She had originally intended to shave everything off, but a Union Jack pattern of stripes was more satisfying. Abigail Santini would be forced to shave the rest herself. She pushed her enemy’s forehead against the raised rim of the basin and readied her weapon for a second pass from ear to ear.

A gloved hand stayed hers. The back of the glove was studded with Gothic spikes. There were silver rings on the fingers. The hand took the razor from Gaby and switched it off. The ladies’ powder room was full of young black women in serious leather.

‘Leave us, please,’ said the leather girl who had stayed Gaby’s vengeance. Abigail Santini turned at the door for a parting vow of hatred. A woman in leather pouch and pads over a ribbed bodysuit pushed her ungently out into the bar. The murmur of table chatter ceased immediately.

‘I stay with my friend,’ Oksana said.

‘It’s all right,’ Gaby said. ‘I promise.’

Oksana and Miriam left. The possegirls struck poses to match their clothes. Haran entered the women’s washroom. With him was the fattest black woman Gaby had ever seen. She wore a voluminous kanga dress printed with scenes from Kenya’s political history that made her look larger still. M’zee Jomo Kenyatta, father of the nation, peered from the folds of her matching turban.

‘Your peace negotiations have progressed since we last met,’ Gaby said. Haran smiled thinly and tapped one of the leather girls with his cane. She took up sentry duty outside.

‘Mombi and I have reached a position of mutual understanding. At the moment we are engaged in a process of assimilation and rationalization of our operations and clients.’

The big woman did not speak. She had most beautiful eyes. They should not be beautiful, Gaby thought. They should be piggy and cold in rolls of fat.

‘Ten drive-by shootings in as many days is assimilation and rationalization?’ Gaby asked. Mombi laughed silently but did not speak.

‘We kill those who require killing,’ Haran said. ‘These rude boys litter the streets; we are only doing the public a service, making the city safe for honest citizens.’ He perched on the edge of the sink unit and balanced himself with both hands on the knob of his cane. ‘Concerning our arrangement. I have made some progress in both your requests. It seems that both lines of enquiry lead to the same place.’

‘Unit 12? Peter Werther’s in there as well as William?’

‘He was taken there directly from the What the Sun Said community. That is our arrangement satisfied. However, knowing you would not be content with confirmation that he has been taken, and where he has been taken to, I have been conducting further enquiries on your behalf into the nature of this Unit 12.’

‘Which you are adding to the account.’

Haran smiled. At his signal, one of Mombi’s possegirls set up a PDU on a wash-hand basin. The screen showed a green and white wireframe CAD animation of an architectural plan. It looked like three of those romantically impractical wheelie space-stations from 2002 stacked on top of each other, turning slowly in dark green cyberspace. Gaby bent to the screen, trying to decipher scales and annotations. A tiny box was balanced on