“A little. But I’m always in danger. From my former associates
…”
“And Tom Weathers.”
“Him, too.”
“And once you have these papers what are you going to do with them?”
“Travel with them.”
“Where?” Noel squinted, pulled at his lower lip. Niobe stormed forward until she stood right in front of him. “I will not be treated like a goddamn mushroom!”
“Are we having our first fight?” Noel asked lightly.
“You only wish. If you think this is me angry… well, you’ve got a lot to learn. Now where are you going?”
“Kongoville.”
“The place where Tom Weathers lives. The man who vowed to kill you.”
“Well, he vowed to kill Bahir.”
“And if he kills Bahir, won’t you be dead, too?”
And suddenly Noel had to acknowledge that that loose feeling in the depths of his bowels was fear. He stood up, wrapped his arms around Niobe, and buried his face against her shoulder. The tension in her shoulders dissolved as she stroked his hair.
“The PPA is dangerous, viciously dangerous,” Noel murmured into her hair.
“Oh, my dearest, don’t do this. Let somebody else handle the PPA. The Silver Helix, SCARE, the Committee…”
Noel smiled down into her face. “Those idiots? You eluded SCARE, I ran rings around the Committee, and the Silver Helix is hamstrung with Flint and John facing trial. It has to be me.”
Her hand went to her belly, fingers spread protectively. “Don’t you dare get killed.”
“And have you really angry with me? Not a chance.” Her mouth tasted so sweet and he wished he didn’t have to leave.
She broke the embrace and asked, “Do you have time to take me to New Orleans?”
“Why on Earth do you want to go to New Orleans?”
“Bubbles has woken from her coma.” Niobe’s eyes were glowing. “She’s my friend and I want to see her.” She touched her stomach again. “And I want to tell her about the baby.”
“I thought we were keeping it secret until… we were sure.
…”
“Not from my closest friends.”
Noel sighed, and while Niobe went off to change into something cooler he phoned Bazyli to tell him he’d be delayed.
6
Tuesday,
December 1
Mwalimu J. K. Nyerere
International Airport
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
Dar es Salaam. The name translated as “safe harbor”-at least, that’s what the guidebooks Jerusha had read claimed. Jerusha hoped they were right.
They flew into Mwalimu J. K. Nyerere International Airport. An aide from the American Embassy was there waiting for them-that was certainly the Committee’s doing-and he walked them through Customs. Jerusha didn’t attract much notice as they walked through the airport, but Wally certainly did. She saw people pointing and whispering, heard them chattering and calling to each other. A crowd followed at a judicious distance as the aide shepherded them from the airport lobby and out to the waiting limo.
The heat and humidity of the outside air hit them like a physical blow as the doors opened. “Cripes,” Wally said. “It’s hot here.”
The aide was openly grinning. “Welcome to Africa,” Jerusha told Wally. “We both need to get used to it.”
As they drove eastward back toward the city, she stared out from the darkly tinted windows. The area directly around the airport was dominated by industry: warehouses and businesses served by a double-lane divided highway. The landscape was rather barren: between the buildings there was bare, brown earth punctuated with scrub brush. It reminded Jerusha of the American Southwest and the parks her parents had worked, except that the Southwest was never this humid.
The driver turned north off the divided highway after a bit, though, and they were driving among houses. There were lots of kids: laughing, running after each other, huddled in groups around adults or parents, playing ball. The aide was rattling on as he had been since they’d left the airport, talking about how proud they were to be hosting two such famous American Hero members as the famous Rustbelt and Gardener, how they believed in good relations with the United Nations, how Ms. Baden had called the embassy herself.
Jerusha listened to him and answered with polite nods and short replies, but Wally stared out toward all those kids. She watched him watching them, as if he were looking at each face hoping to see his precious Lucien there. She wondered what he was thinking.
They drove past a winding river heading toward the sea. Here the trees were thick and dense, more like what Jerusha imagined Conrad’s “Africa” might have been. They caught a glimpse of deep blue water running out to the horizon: the Zanzibar Channel. The limousine pulled onto another large divided road and continued north. Wally’s eyes were closed and he was snoring softly; Jerusha envied him. The jet lag was pulling at her and she wished the aide would stop talking. She leaned her head against the window, staring out at the strange world drifting by.
Then she lifted her head again. “What is that?” she asked, pointing. The aide turned in his seat.
“Oh-that’s a baobab tree,” he said. “Lots of native tales about them. The baobabs are one of the symbols of Tanzania-of Africa in general, in fact. We have one of the oldest baobabs in Dar es Salaam on our compound grounds.”
The baobab loomed in the central divider, as if a divine hand had ripped a gigantic tree from the ground and rammed it upside down back into the hole with the root system dangling from the top and overhanging both sides of the highway. The trunk was enormous and thick, furrowed with deep ridges, and green leaves fringed the branches here and there. The tree looked powerful and ancient, at home here like an ancient, gnarled oak might dominate a forest back in the States.
Jerusha stared at it and touched her seed pouch. “A baobab, eh?” She would remember that. “Listen,” she said to the aide. “I-we-appreciate your taking us to the embassy, but it’s important that we get to Lake Tanganyika as soon as possible. We’re…” Jerusha didn’t know what Barbara had told the ambassador, but it didn’t seem wise to mention that they were intending to cross over into the People’s Paradise. “… we’re supposed to meet someone there. It’s Committee business. We have to keep it quiet.”
“Ahh.” The aide pursed his lips, tapping them with a forefinger. “There’s a man,” he said. “A joker, Denys Finch. He’s a bush pilot flying out of a little airport a few miles north of the embassy. Sometimes we have him courier for us, or take dignitaries out to the national parks or up toward Kilimanjaro.”
“Could you take us to him?” Jerusha asked. Wally was still snoring. “Now?”
A shrug. “The ambassador wishes to have dinner with you, but that’s not for a few hours.” He tapped on the window separating their compartment from the driver and gave the man directions. Jerusha heard the word “Kawi.” Then the aide turned back to her with a smile.
“We’ll go there now,” he said.
Jackson Square
New Orleans, Louisiana
There are more corpses in the pile this time. Adesina is curled into a fetal position on top of the pile. Michelle
