City of Jackals

by Parker Bilal

  ‘He’s a friend of yours.’

  ‘I like the guy, yes. Look, I spend my life with arty types. People who see something in my work that maybe I never intended. They have money to pay for my canvases. Who knows why? Maybe it’s the painting, maybe they want some excitement in their lives. I don’t know, I just paint. What I’m saying is that most of the people I meet are phonies. Aljuka is genuine. He doesn’t have a lot of affection for Northerners. He’s capable of hurting people he thinks might be a threat.’

  ‘Is he capable of cutting someone’s head off?’

  Fantômas cast him a wary eye. ‘Now you’re talking crazy.’

  ‘Supposing someone was threatening him. Could he do something like that, to send a message?’

  ‘You’re talking about the head found on the riverbank.’

  ‘Could Aljuka or his men be responsible?’

  ‘Why? It makes no sense. Why go to all that trouble?’ Fantômas chuckled to himself. ‘Or is it that you think we still run around waving spears at each other?’

  Makana decided that perhaps he had exhausted this particular line of inquiry.

  Estrella’s mother lived in a single room that was no more than a fenced-off partition in a basement off an alleyway narrow enough to take the shoulders off your shirt. None of the five small children running in and out were hers, she assured them, but the offspring of various relatives, neighbours, friends, who were earning money in the city. A woman in her late thirties, she could have passed for twenty years older. Stray wires of grey twisted out from her braids and she seemed distracted in a way that implied she was having trouble sticking to the narrative of the present.

  ‘We’ve come here because we’re trying to find Estrella. Nobody has seen her.’

  ‘She’s a good girl,’ she smiled. It was the third or fourth time she had repeated herself. Makana had given up counting. ‘She works hard. Always ready to take care of the small ones.’ She lapsed into silence, her eyes seeking a corner of the room where nothing was moving. Fantômas cleared his throat.

  The woman’s jaw churned idly, as if chewing something that wasn’t there.

  ‘She’s not in any trouble. Estrella is a good girl. She stays away from the troublemakers. She has no time for them. Work is all she cares about. She takes everything she can find.’

  Around her neck she wore a small silver cross, similar to the one he had seen Estrella wearing. The woman herself seemed lost. Asking about the whereabouts of the girl seemed to be taking absurdity to new heights. Asking the day of the week would have presented a challenge.

  ‘I was taken to Cuba as a small child.’ Distant memories seemed to flow more easily than the narrative of the present. ‘That’s where I learned Spanish. ¿Sabes? That’s where Estrella comes from. It means star. Lucky star. I always thought it was a good name. In those days we represented something. We were orphans of an African revolution that never came.’

  No mention was made of the men of the family. Brothers, husbands, fathers, siblings. All of them somehow lost in the matrix of transition. A mattress on the floor was covered in a pink sheet. The youngest of the children, a baby of no more than three months, lay drooling in blissful slumber, unaware of the world it was about to wake up in. The woman brushed flies away from its open mouth with an absent flick of the hand. She put a hand to the cross around her neck.

  ‘Estrella has one like that, doesn’t she?’

  ‘It’s from Ethiopia,’ she said. ‘She’s a good girl, always goes to church. She gave it to me.’

  ‘Do you have any idea where she might be?’

  A spark of clarity glowed in the woman’s eyes.

  ‘America.’

  Fantômas glanced back at Makana. ‘America? Why do you say that, mother?’

  ‘I know it. If she is not here, it is because her time has come. She is always talking about her chances of getting across there. We are patient.’ Her head rocked up and down. ‘When she is settled and all is well, she will send for us. Everything will be all right. I believe this is what our Lord intends for us.’

  She reached under the mattress to produce something that she passed to Fantômas. He glanced at it and handed it across to Makana. A brochure for the Homehavens Project.

  ‘Her best friend is already there.’

  ‘Her friend, mother? Which friend?’

  ‘Beatrice. And her brother Jonah.’ She nods with conviction. ‘They have already crossed. Now it is Estrella’s turn. Then it will be the turn of the young ones.’ Her eyes found Makana, perched on the edge of her field of vision. He caught a flicker of wariness there which made him hold back. Throughout the conversation Estrella’s mother had barely registered his presence. Now, for some reason, she seemed to seek him out. Who could say what was going through her mind? There was something she wanted him to hear.

  ‘I prayed for them, for the young ones like my daughter, who have known only hardship. I prayed for Beatrice and Jonah and my prayers were heard. Then I prayed for Estrella, and now she too has been taken up. Hallelujah, praise the Lord.’

  ‘Isn’t it strange that you haven’t heard from her?’

  Her eyes bored into him. Makana the Unbeliever.

  ‘I prayed for them and they reached safety. Then I prayed for my daughter, and He has answered. She will get in touch when she can.’

  ‘Praise the Lord, sister.’ Fantômas bowed his head in supplication and Makana felt strangely out of place, as he always did when religion made its awkward entrance.

  ‘You wouldn’t happen to have a photograph of Estrella, would you?’

  ‘Of course.’ She smiled warmly at him and reached underneath her pillow. ‘I keep her safe here.’ Estrella was dressed in a smart white dress. ‘She’s in the choir,’ her mother explained. She had the faraway look of one who is no longer sure of the ground beneath their feet.

  ‘Who are these people she was talking about, Beatrice and Jonah?’

  They were walking back towards the church, turning through narrow gaps between grubby, broken walls, the air rich with the smell of ash and burning wood. It was a maze that seemed to have no order to it. Everywhere the stench of the world breaking down, rotting vegetation, stale piss. The white jawbone of what might have been a sheep, or perhaps a dog, lay in the dirt like a skeleton key to the gates of heaven, just waiting for someone to find.

  ‘Friends of Estrella’s. Brother and sister. I think I know them.’

  ‘Why doesn’t she think it strange she hasn’t heard from her daughter?’

  ‘People cling to hope where they find it. She wants to believe that God intervened and took her daughter to America. The alternative is that her daughter is engaged in some other kind of work that she doesn’t want to know about. People disappear all the time. They wind up as house slaves for some wealthy family, here or abroad, in the Gulf, say.’ Fantômas pushed back his dreadlocks. ‘Sometimes it’s better for a mother not to know.’

  ‘We should speak to Father Saturnius.’ The church was the link between Estrella and the magical ticket out of here to America. If the mother was right and Estrella was on the Homehavens Project, Makana wondered why the priest had failed to mention it. Perhaps he thought it wasn’t relevant, or it had simply slipped his mind.

  They were almost there when they ran into Aljuka and his boys. They fanned out with long loping strides, all of them tall and thin, moving with the surefooted grace of experienced predators. Aljuka’s tracksuit top was so white it seemed to glow. He must have had a stock of them. Either that or a small army to do his laundry.

  ‘So, what do we have here?’ The heavy gold crucifix swayed across his chest like a pendulum. ‘Why are you coming where you don’t belong?’

  ‘We’re not looking for trouble,’ Fantômas began. Aljuka ignored him, his eyes on Makana.

  ‘I don’t trust this one. He smells like government.’

  ‘He’s not government. He’s like the rest of us.’

  Aljuka’s face tightened in a fierce grin. ‘
No, he’s not like us.’

  ‘Is there a reason you don’t want me looking into these deaths?’ Makana asked, receiving a hard shove in the chest for his pains. He staggered back until his shoulders struck the wall.

  ‘Hold on.’ Fantômas tried to step between them but found himself shunted aside by a couple of the boys. A large knife had appeared in Aljuka’s hand. He pressed the tip into the wall, close enough for Makana to feel the steel against his neck, and brought his face closer.

  ‘Why should you care about us?’

  ‘I would have thought you’d care about someone killing Southerners, unless you have something to do with it.’

  Aljuka’s face was electric with fury. Makana considered the wisdom of provoking a man carrying a knife.

  ‘We are capable of taking care of our own.’

  ‘Who exactly do you consider your own? Dinka, Nuer, Mundari? Are you the protector of all, or only the sacred few?’ Makana considered the faces of the men around him. They all seemed so incredibly young. Aljuka grunted. The knife twisted roughly. Makana felt the blade nick his skin.

  ‘You’re a long way from home, my friend. When you leave here, don’t think about coming back. Next time you might not be so lucky.’

  It was hard to decide if there was some part of Aljuka he could reach. How do you appeal to someone whose life has taught him that violence is the only thing he can trust? One of his men stepped up to whisper something in his ear. Aljuka nodded and then stepped back, the knife dropping to his side. He took one last look at Makana and then he smiled.

  ‘Your kind look at us and see wild beasts who belong in the jungle. Well, take a good look, because now we’ve brought the jungle to you.’

  With that, he pivoted and walked away. His men followed. Not a bad exit, Makana thought, rubbing his neck.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Father Saturnius was eating alone when they were shown into his office. He seemed embarrassed as he scrambled to his feet, as if it were unbecoming for a priest to be seen eating. As if he was expected to live by spiritual nourishment alone.

  ‘The remains from our Christmas feast. Won’t you join me?’

  ‘Thank you, Father.’ Fantômas dipped his head in a quick bow.

  The offer was a reflex, a courtesy that neither side had any real interest in taking further. Makana caught a glimpse of an enamel bowl with a thick red sauce out of which an island of steamed sorghum rose. Throwing his tablecloth, a sheet of newspaper, over his supper to keep it warm, the priest led the way outside to a standing tap in the middle of the compound where he washed his hands and face.

  ‘To what do I owe this honour?’ he asked when he had finished, running a damp finger around his ear to wipe off the excess water. Makana explained that they had come from talking to Estrella’s mother.

  ‘She mentioned a couple of friends, Beatrice and Jonah. I’m wondering if there is a connection. Her mother has the idea that her daughter was planning to follow them to America.’

  ‘Strange,’ the priest frowned. ‘I don’t remember seeing Estrella’s name on the list.’

  ‘Could she have been mistaken, Father?’ Fantômas suggested.

  ‘I hardly think that’s possible. There is always a celebration when someone is chosen. Nobody keeps it a secret.’

  ‘What about her friends?’ Makana asked.

  ‘Yes, definitely. Beatrice and Jonah were outstanding candidates.’ The priest’s face glowed. ‘Both of them excelled at school. They helped out in church. Beatrice taught the younger ones to read. Jonah did odd jobs. Painting, carpentry, even installing lights. There was nothing that boy wouldn’t turn his hand to, and never a word of complaint from either of them.’

  ‘Is there a picture of them on the noticeboard?’

  Father Saturnius took a moment to check but returned shaking his head. ‘Perhaps in the application files.’

  ‘Once they move to America you no longer have contact with them?’

  ‘That is correct.’

  ‘It’s one of the rules of the project, right Father?’ Fantômas said.

  Father Saturnius tilted his head to one side. ‘If this is important, perhaps you would like to speak to Reverend Corbis or his sister?’

  He led the way along the front of the building. They found Doctor Corbis in her infirmary. She was training an assistant, a tall adolescent with bright eyes who followed her intently as she showed him how to operate the machine for sterilising instruments. She looked up when they came in and smiled at Makana.

  ‘You’re back. I suppose that means you didn’t find what you were looking for.’

  ‘I don’t seem to have much luck.’

  ‘We were hoping to run into your brother,’ added Fantômas.

  ‘What is this about?’

  ‘I’m trying to find someone. I believe she was on your Homehavens Project,’ said Makana.

  ‘My brother is really in charge of all that.’ She lifted the lid of the machine, releasing a cloud of vapour into the air.

  ‘Well, perhaps you could just tell me a little more about the selection process.’

  ‘I can try,’ she smiled.

  ‘I understand you do medical examinations for all the candidates?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Our checks are quite thorough.’ Liz Corbis grew solemn.

  ‘I’m sure, and that would mean you have records of all of them.’

  ‘That’s correct, but we don’t keep them here.’

  ‘Then where?’

  ‘At the clinic?’ She made a statement sound like question.

  ‘The clinic?’ Makana gestured at their surroundings. ‘I thought this . . .’

  ‘Oh no,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘Not here. This is fine, but for the kind of tests we’re talking about we need a proper laboratory. The Hesira Institute allows us to use their facilities.’

  ‘The Hesira Institute?’ Makana recalled seeing the poster on the wall of the Munir Abaza’s office.

  ‘It’s private, a very exclusive place that caters to a special kind of patient.’

  ‘I see, so you use their laboratories.’

  ‘It’s a collaboration.’ She paused. ‘The thing is, this material is personal, for use within the organisation. We have to be very strict about how we deal with that information.’

  ‘What information?’

  They turned to find the doorway blocked by the bulky figure of Preston Corbis. He wore the same baseball cap with the Homehavens Project logo on the front that Makana recalled the priest had been wearing the first time they met. The arms of the crucifix were replaced by feathered wings. The top of the cross was adorned with eyes and a smile. His black trousers and shirt showed signs of fatigue, as did his face, which was flushed and drawn. He lumbered inside to lean against the counter, his fingers splayed out. ‘I apologise for my sister, who can be a little overzealous when it comes to protecting our angels, that’s how we think of our charges.’ He stepped over to put his arm around his sister and give her a squeeze. ‘The fact is that we came here to make friends and we’d like to help wherever possible. So what’s all this about?’

  ‘Preston, this is Mr Makana. You remember we met him the other day?’

  ‘Indeed I do.’ Makana’s hand was swallowed up by the reverend’s huge, meaty paw. ‘How can I be of assistance, sir?’

  Doctor Corbis intervened. ‘Preston, Mr Makana is trying to help someone. He believes she may have been a candidate for our programme. I was just explaining that the profiles we draw up are confidential.’

  ‘Absolutely. Have to be. I mean, our charges trust us with their personal details. That carries a certain responsibility.’

  ‘I don’t doubt that for a minute. I’m really not interested in the details, all I would like to know is whether or not Estrella was part of your programme, and if she has recently travelled to the United States.’

  ‘Well, now, even that is, in principle, confidential. People have a right to change their lives, to make a new start. That’s really
what Homehavens is all about. A fresh start.’ Reverend Corbis beamed around the room. A confident man. For the moment in any case, he held all the cards. ‘We believe that it is their right to decide who to share that information with.’

  ‘Really, and does that apply to her mother?’

  ‘Her mother?’ Reverend Corbis furrowed his brow. ‘I’m not sure what . . .’

  ‘I just spoke to her mother. She is convinced that Estrella has gone to America. She’s worried, understandably.’ Only a slight exaggeration. The mother hadn’t struck Makana as being acutely concerned with what planet she was on, let alone anything else.

  ‘Unfortunately that doesn’t change the principle of the matter. Our candidates are over the age of sixteen, which we consider to be the age of legal consent. It’s their choice how much they tell anyone.’ An apologetic smile played upon the reverend’s lips. There was an air of mischief about him. A man who liked to be at the centre of things. The life and soul of the party. Alongside her brother, Liz Corbis appeared to shrink.

  ‘Having said that, I don’t believe the name rings any bells.’ He glanced at his sister, who shook her head in agreement. He turned back to Makana. ‘Now, I assume that since you are a friend of Joseph’s you are on the side of the good. I’m sure you can sympathise with our caution. We live in dark times. Nobody knows that better than the boys and girls who come to this church seeking shelter.’ He addressed Makana with exaggerated sincerity, resting a hand on Father Saturnius’s shoulder. ‘This man is a hero, and in another time and place his country’s president would be pinning medals on his chest.’

  ‘Preston, please,’ Father Saturnius protested, wriggling with delight or embarrassment, it wasn’t clear which.

  ‘Nonsense. With his help we have set up a network that gives young men and women real hope. A chance to make something of themselves in a new life, and . . .’ He raised a finger towards heaven. ‘In doing just that we also bring joy to good Christian families, all over the United States, who have prayed for another child to raise. Everyone’s a winner!’