“Where am I?” he asked. They explained what had happened, while he dragged himself to his feet and lurched down the length of the plane, supporting himself on the backs of the seats looking for Amie. He didn’t see Diana, or Richard or Kate, and he didn’t see Amie. There were lots of people missing. He grabbed the steward’s arm.
“There are people missing!” he gasped. “We must go back for them!”
“Sorry, sir, that’s impossible, they opened fire on us as we were taking off, it would be suicide to return,” the steward replied. He took Jonathon by the arm. “Let me help you to your seat, and we’ll get that cut on your head seen to.”
Charles rushed up to say his wife wasn’t on the plane either, but the story was the same. They would not put the lives of over a hundred people at risk, for the few people who were missing.
Jonathon was forcibly returned to his seat and he buried his head in his hands, trying to hide the tears which filled his eyes. He had no idea where Amie was, and he was desperately afraid of what might have happened to her. He didn’t even know if she was alive. It was all his fault, he should never have accepted the job in the first place. He remembered how reluctant she was, and how scared when they first arrived in Apatu. He’d wanted to climb the corporate ladder, prove how capable he was, and now look where his ambition had got him, and her. What was he going to tell her parents and her sister? They would never forgive him for not taking care of her. He began to plan how he could get back to Togodo to go and look for her, and he knew just who was going to help him do that.
At Heathrow, the cameras began to roll before the door to the plane opened and the first of the evacuees walked slowly down the steps. No one was quite sure who had leaked the information to the press, but it was going to be a great story. Not for years had the entire expatriate population of a developing country, including all the embassy staff, been flown out due to civil unrest.
It was a subdued group that was taken for de-briefing. What had happened in Togodo? Who was in charge now? Did everyone get out? Did anyone have a complete list of all the British in Togodo?
Amie had no idea how long she was left in her cell, but time seemed to have little meaning. As the sun was going down, they opened a flap at the bottom of the door and pushed in a filthy, dirty tray. There was an enamel mug of the ubiquitous sugar with tea added, two large lumps of bread with a scraping of jam, and two bowls, one of thin gruel in which floated a mixture of vegetables and chunks of some kind of meat, and the other with maize meal porridge. Although Amie would have liked to refuse, she was so ravenous she fell on the food and wolfed it all. The tray had appeared so fast Amie hadn’t even had a chance to call out and ask why she was locked up. How long did they intend to keep her here and what did they want from her?
She tried to cheer herself up with the thought at least they were not going to starve her to death. Death, she shuddered. Was Jonathon alive? Was he safe? If she ever saw him again, she would never, ever complain when he left his clothes on the floor, or was too tired to talk to her at night, or when he was in a grumpy mood. All those things were so insignificant now. Sitting here in this small, filthy cell was the reality.
It wasn’t until the following morning they came to escort her upstairs. These guards were more deferential, they didn’t grab her arm, but beckoned politely and walked beside her back up the steps and along the corridor until they reached the commander’s office, they knocked on the door and the commander stood up to welcome Amie.
“Please sit down,” he said politely. Amie sank into the soft chair on the opposite side of his desk, it felt like a cloud after the thin, bare mattress in her cell. She was still badly bruised from the truck ride. It was not a large office, housing only the desk, a few shelves filled with files, and a couple of easy chairs which looked somewhat out of place. The most impressive piece of furniture was the large, leather office chair occupied by the commander.
“I must apologize for the scarcity of our accommodation,” he smiled at what he thought was a good joke. “As you can see, we have a shortage of good rooms after all the bombing.”
Amie didn’t laugh or smile. It was not a situation she found funny in the least. Yesterday she had felt really frightened, but overnight her mood changed and now she was beginning to get really angry. These people had no right to treat her like this. She’d done nothing wrong and she had a right to be sent home. This was abuse on a major scale; her human rights had been violated for no reason at all.
“Oh, you must think me very rude, let me introduce myself. I’m Commander Nyatasaki of the Free Togodo Forces.”
Amie did not respond.
“I am sure you are curious to know what has happened in the last few days, so I am happy to tell you we have overthrown the old corrupt government, and we will set up a new, democratic parliament. Yes, just like you have in your Westminster, with elections and everything. But first of course, we must put all the systems in place and ensure this time we will give benefits to all our people, not just those corrupt and ignorant Kawas.”
Does he really believe this? thought Amie in a flash of clarity. If he has such contempt for the old ruling tribe, will he give them a vote, and then provide them with a good education? She didn’t think so.
The commander paused for a few moments as if he expected Amie to say something, but she remained silent.
“Now while you are a guest in my country, I need a little information from you and then we will be happy to escort you to the airport and see you safely on your way back home.” He paused. “Are you happy to answer a few questions?”
“I suppose so, if I can,” Amie said at last
“Good, good. Now the first thing we want to know, is how long you have been working for Colonel Mbanzi?”
“But I never ...” Amie stopped. In truth she had done what the colonel asked, even if it had been under duress. “It wasn’t proper work. I mean he only wanted some programmes made for the Trade Fair.”
“And these were video programmes you recorded with your camera, yes?” Amie nodded.
“Yes, and what did these programmes show?” the commander prompted.
“The upliftment schemes, the hospital, electricity supply, computers in schools, that sort of thing.”
“And you were impressed with all these new innovative projects yes?”
“Well,” careful Amie she thought, you can see the trap. “I guess it’s early days and the projects have not been going all that long – it takes time …” she trailed off.
“Quite, quite. Let us say you did not think much of the efforts made by the previous government.”
“But I didn’t say that at all!” protested Amie.
“Ah, so you were impressed then, very good. Of course, being closely aligned with the former rulers, you would see things from their point of view.”
“No, no, you don’t understand. I was quite neutral about it all. Colonel Mbanzi asked me to record certain projects and then give him the programmes to show at the Trade Fair, and that’s all I did!”
“Oh, no, no, no, no, no, I do not think so,” Nyatasaki said softly. “I believe you also went out into the bush and recorded some let us say ‘scenes’ in the bush. Am I right?” The captain leaned back in his chair and stared at Amie.
Amie didn’t know what to reply. She sat thinking for several minutes.
“I didn’t want to film those, those scenes,” she replied. “When they took me out to the village, I had no idea what I was going to see.”
“And?” the commander waited patiently.
“And, I was told to film and so I did. I was too scared not to.”
“But of course, you got well paid for this.”
“No. No one ever mentioned money to me. They, er they said it would help my husband in his work, get permissions early and plans passed and so on.” Amie could tell he didn’t believe her.
“I find it most unusual Britain would send a woman to Togodo as a spy,” said the commander.
Amie gasped. “No!” she cried and half rose out of her chair. “I’m not a spy! I’m just an ordinary housewife. I’m nothing, I mean I couldn’t … I wouldn’t know how ...”
“Enough for today I think,” the commander interrupted her. “Maybe when you have had time to think a little more, you will be persuaded to tell us the truth.” He barked out an order and immediately the door opened and Amie was conducted back to her cell.
The days merged one into another. Sometimes Amie was left to her own devices, the only break in the monotony was the food pushed through the flap in the door morning, noon and night. Often, they didn’t even empty the bucket left in the corner of her cell for days. From the few sounds she could hear of the outside world, things seemed to have returned to normal, under what she assumed was the new ‘rebel’ government. If there were any counter insurgences, she wasn’t aware of them.
Every now and again they would take her upstairs, sometimes to be questioned by the commander, sometimes by his underlings. On each occasion, the situation was getting worse. They had found the spare tapes which she had squirreled away in the house at Spring Glen to take back to England and make her own programmes showing, as she thought at the time, ‘the real Africa, without the propaganda.’ They had also discovered the bank statements which showed the large amounts of money in her account, and they laughed when she protested that she had no idea who put the money there.
The commander didn’t hit her, but stared at her from behind the desk, and patently didn’t believe a word she said. On other occasions, she was taken to a smaller room and questioned again and again and again. The questions were always the same.
“When did the British government ask her to spy for them? What did they want to know? Who put such vast sums of money in her bank account? Was it the British? Why was she withholding tapes in her own home which showed Togodo in a bad light? Why did she want to show the poor people and the bad housing and the broken roads? Where were the tapes she made from the two bush visits?”
And Amie always gave them the same answers, but they either didn’t believe her, or they simply refused to believe her. Then their mood changed, they got angry, and they began to hit her, punching and kicking and twisting her arms. She was battered and bruised, but there was nothing she could tell them, except maybe why she had hidden those extra tapes. She was wise enough to know that admitting she was going to try and put them together to show the ‘real’ Africa, was not going to help her cause.
She had little idea of the passing of time. Had she been locked up for days, weeks, months? What was happening in the outside world? Was anyone trying to get her out? Had her home country just washed their hands of her? Surely Jonathon and her parents were knocking on doors, talking to the newspapers, campaigning to get something done? She briefly remembered that Britain had a policy of not giving in to blackmail, and since everyone had been evacuated, there was no longer any representation from the government. Just how important was one British housewife? She feared no one outside her immediate family and friends was too worried about her. She remembered cases of other British nationals locked up abroad for years and years. Sometimes they were released and sometimes they were never heard of again.
Day by day, Amie sunk deeper and deeper into a depression. The sheer monotony of prison life was mind destroying. She saw no other prisoners, although occasionally she heard bloodcurdling screams from somewhere inside the building. She was beginning to think it would be better to end it all than continue to live like this.
Until one day they came for her soon after the first rays of the sun began to pour over the far distant hills, spilling down the slopes onto the earth below. She heard them approach, their footsteps echoing loudly on the bare concrete floors. As the marching feet drew closer, she curled up as small as she could and tried to breathe slowly to stop her heart racing.
The large fat one was the first to appear on the other side of the door and he was accompanied by three other warders. They unlocked the old, rusty, cell door and the skinny one walked over and dragged her to her feet. He pushed her away from him, swung her round and bound her wrists together behind her back, with a long strip of dirty cotton material. She winced as he pulled roughly on the cloth and then propelled her towards the door. The others stood back as she was pushed into the corridor and up the steps to the ground floor.
She thought they were going to turn left towards the room where they made her sit for hours and hours on a small chair, but this time they didn’t turn left, they turned right at the top of the steps and pulled her down a long corridor towards an opening at the far end. She could see the bright sunlight reflecting off the dirty white walls. For a brief moment she had a sudden feeling of euphoria. They were going to let her go! She could hear muffled sounds from outside in the street and shouts from the other side of the prison walls.
It was surreal that there were people so close to the prison going about their everyday lives. On the other side of the wall, the early morning suppliers who brought produce in from the surrounding areas were haggling with the market stallholders over prices, shouting and arguing at the tops of their voices. But all these sounds could have been a million miles away, for they were way beyond her reach.
Hope flared briefly. Her captors had finally realised she was innocent. They’d never openly accused her of anything sensible, and she still didn’t know why she’d been arrested. She kept telling herself she’d done nothing wrong, and she convinced herself the nightmare was over at last.
All the doors on either side of the corridor were closed, as they half carried, half dragged her towards the open door in the archway at the end. The closer they got, against all reason, her hopes just grew and grew. They were going to set her free. She was going home.
As they shoved her through the open doorway, she screwed up her eyes against the bright light, and when she opened them, it was to see a bare courtyard, surrounded on three sides by high walls with no other doors leading to the outside world.
Then she saw the stake in the ground on the far side, and brutally they pushed her towards it. She was too weak to resist, and it was difficult to walk, so she concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other, determined not to give the soldiers or police or whoever they were, any satisfaction. She would show as much dignity as she could.
The skinny one pushed her against the post and took another long piece of sheeting from his pocket and tied it around her chest fixing her firmly to the wood. She glanced down at the ground and was horrified to see large brown stains in the dust.
Not freedom, this was the end. She squeezed her eyes tight shut, determined not to let the tears run down her cheeks, but the sound of marching feet forced her to open them again. She saw four more men, all dressed in brown uniforms, and the all too familiar guns, lining up on the other side of the courtyard opposite her. They were a rough looking bunch, their uniforms were ill fitting and stained, and their boots were unpolished and covered in dust.
She was trembling all over. She didn’t know whether to keep her eyes open to see what was going on, or close them and pretend this was all a dream. She was torn, part of her wanted it all to end now, but still another part of her wanted to scream, ‘Let me live!! Please, please let me live!!’
The big fat man barked commands and she heard the sounds of guns being broken open as he walked to each of them handing out ammunition then, with the safety catches off, they prepared to fire.
To her horror, she felt a warm trickle of liquid running down the inside of her thighs, at this very last moment she had lost both her control and her dignity. They’d not even offered her a blindfold, so she closed her eyes again and tried to remember happier times, before the nightmare started. Briefly, she glanced up at the few, fluffy, white clouds floating high in the sky as the order was given to fire.
The noise was much, much louder than she’d expected, more of an explosion than gun shots. And then there were more loud bangs, all around her. Apatu had erupted yet agai
n. She opened her eyes to see that the wall of the prison had collapsed, and the line of soldiers, who moments before had raised their rifles to kill her, were gone, lying lifeless under the masonry that had once been a wall of the prison building.
For several moments, Amie was too shocked to move. She looked over to the market, where people were running in all directions, screaming, shouting and wailing. Some stopped to attend to the wounded, while others just took flight, running away as fast as they could.
There was nothing to stop her running away either. She tugged at the strip of cloth holding her to the post, but instead of tearing the cloth, the post came free, and she stumbled forward falling flat on the ground. She paused to catch her breath and then desperately tugged at the post, until she had managed to slide the cotton over one end. Slowly she stood up. While her brain was screaming at her to get away as fast as possible, her body would not respond. She took one tentative step forward and fell over again. She pulled herself up on her knees, stood upright and took another step, wobbled, and then another. Slowly, she tottered towards the outside world.
On the other side of the prison walls, she was tempted to sit and recover, but the fear that maybe they would come and drag her back inside the undamaged part of the building, gave her strength. All around her, bombs were falling, shots ringing through the air, and several aircraft flew overhead, strafing the people as they ran for safety.
But which way should she go? She paused for a few moments with her back to the prison wall, or what was left of it, and dithered over which was the quickest way out of town. She would just have to trust to fate to take her in the right direction. If the worst came to the worst and she made for the beach, maybe she could cross the border into Ruanga – a wild idea, she knew, but she simply didn’t have a better one. The best course was to try and head for the shore south of Apatu, away from the northern areas where the rebels might be patrolling. Then, she would just keep going.
Amie in Africa Box Set 1 Page 28
