Swinging his head back toward the voice, Hanley asked, “Come on up here, will you?”
9
The late afternoon air was still, hot to the touch, or so it seemed to the American, whose clothes always seemed wet, dank, smelling of sweat and tension, for tension had a smell here in the bush, like hot metal on an electric alarm clock, hot from ringing its shrill tone for years and years, with no one waking, no one to turn it off. Hanley heard it all the time, a high piercing sound, uncomfortable, deep inside his head. It was tinnitus, something he inherited, he supposed - his mother suffered from it. When he concentrated on the sound, he felt uneasy, felt he might begin to slip into a place where he might stay, a place where he could not control it.
Having carried an old aluminum folding chair out to the shade of the barracks, Hanley unfolded it with some trouble, the frame sticking, pressure on the cheap plastic liners, rods and grommets forced against each other, pinching and impeding, making it difficult. The chair was a bit bent, the nylon strapping frayed and faded, from white and blue to a dirty cream and denim, it was uncomfortable in its precariousness, but better than the hardness of the old box back porch or the ground. The webbed seat creaked like a horse saddle when he sat down, allowing him to sink, giving Hanley a sudden tightness in his gut, anticipating he might fall through. His small descent stopped and he relaxed. A search of the storage room in the barracks yielded only one chair. He would give it to the nun if she came.
Hanley watched the activity of the mission compound, breathing the heated air, still surprised to feel the air he inhaled to be measurably hotter than his tongue. He was tired, sleep difficult to find. A small child cried somewhere near, the crying of children a constant piece of the workings of the mission. He would never tune it out, he knew, never ignore it. His days were filled with the same noises; children, shouting adults, bugs, a slow persistent wind, the noise of the heat, the madness over the horizon; his imagination.
Coping with the change in his daily routine was proving to be challenging, more than he had thought, the years of the same routine so deeply stamped into him. He never noticed how repetitive his daily life had been; waking at six o’clock every morning after a bad night’s sleep, toast and coffee for breakfast, quick necessary murmurs between he and his then wife, Belinda, each ignoring the other for years. Shaving, a shower, sometimes walking the dog, many times just chaining him to the corner of the garage, then the trip to his office, the meetings, the deals, the accomplishments. Would he ever settle into a routine in Mapuordit?
He waited for the nun. He needed to talk to her, needed to ask her questions, had to get his courage up. Yesterday, at lunch, he asked her about her history, tried to find out who she is, what she believed about her work at the mission, why she stayed so long, why the church kept her there? He was curious about what she knew about him, his reason for coming to Sudan, what it might mean, about his success, could he give enough back. “How long have you been here? I may have heard that along the way but I can’t recall,” he asked.
“I’ve been here for more than eight years, the longest of anyone but Father Robineau. My first months here were hard, but then all of Africa is hard, at least for Europeans, whites. Soon, I gained some comfort, at least with my work; never with the situation,” she said. “I have been in other countries, in Senegal and then Zimbabwe, but those stays were short, at least compared to my stay at Mapuordit. I hate this country, but love the people. So, I deal with the people and try to avoid dealing with the country.”
The sun was low, hanging over the clinic building, a globe of bright orange cupped in a tree, the bare branches applying a filigree pattern to its lower half. A goblet. Gnats swarmed him, lighted on his lips, one lodged in the corner of his left eye, slamming it shut, the first knuckle of his right hand digging in to push it out. Feeling it moved out, Hanley wiped it away, dragging a tear with it, the relief momentary as the gnat swarmed again. Pushing himself out of the low-slung comfort of the chair, Hanley moved ten feet away, waiting for the gnats to follow. Hovering low over the ground, the gnat seemed to forget about him. The sun was sliding down the tree trunk, split, bulging from each side. The gnats stayed away; so did the nun.
Her humming reached him first, soft and melodious. She had a good singing voice from what he heard, singing to the children, to the workers unloading a truck. Hanley wondered if she was trained to sing, like an athlete trains to run. The humming stopped, followed by the sound of a knock on thin wood.
“I’m over here, beside the building,” he called out. There was a creaking of wood and then silence. She stepped from behind the building, smiling brightly as she saw him.
“A man of your age risks much sitting in a chair like that, don’t you think?” she asked.
“Yes, I suppose so. But men of my age take a risk just by getting out of bed in the morning, assuming we wake up at all.” Her smile widened a bit more. “Sit here,” he said, as he pushed himself
