The Ghosts of Eden

by Andrew JH Sharp

  Michael almost dropped the binoculars, his arms weak with shock. But Mr Adams was no longer in front of him. He had moved away and was looking under a cushion on the sofa, still searching for his cigarettes. Directly opposite Michael on the wall, a mask stared back. It was surrounded by other hollow-eyed masks, sticks stuck with feathers, and gourds hung with strips of leather and little bones. A wooden female figure squatted on the platform beneath the wall, her hands gripping her breasts which were shaped like ice-cream cones, except they were black. Michael had never felt scared of any of these things before – he had seen them in Tomasi’s village – but now they seemed revolting; as if them being in Mr and Mrs Adams’s house had made them so.

  ‘My mum and dad collect that stuff,’ Simon said. ‘There’s stuff to frighten away ghosts of ancestors, and there are things that witchdoctors use to find out whether someone’s a murderer, and there are knives for throwing at people. I’m not allowed to play with them – it’s crap stuff.’

  ‘Language, son!’ Mr Adams said. ‘And be careful; one day something’s going to crawl off the wall and get you. Ah, found the blighters.’ He lit up immediately.

  Mrs Adams was still arguing over payment with the driver who had collected Michael from his parents. It had been a forty mile journey and they had made a detour in town to collect Simon from Lewis’s home. Simon had spent the first three days of the holiday with Lewis’s family so that he could go with them to a game reserve. He had told Michael that his parents didn’t mind at all if he was away as they went out a lot to clubs. His father went to the Great Lakes Golf Club and the Crested Crane Cricket Club, while his mother went to the Bateleur Bridge Club and the Hepburn Film Society.

  The argument with the driver was becoming heated but Mr Adams had sunk into the sofa with his cigarette and had closed his eyes.

  ‘Come and see my Meccano,’ Simon said.

  He opened his bedroom door. Michael’s eyes widened; for a moment he wished he did not have poor missionary parents. On the polished-wood floor a large Meccano crane and two ships gleamed red, green and gold. When he stretched out on the floor to look closely he felt like the happy rich boy on the front of the Meccano box.

  ‘Did you make these?’ Michael asked.

  ‘Not really. My dad did. He plays with my Meccano when I’m at school.’

  ‘My dad doesn’t have time to play,’ said Michael ruefully.

  ‘It’s because my mum doesn’t like him hanging around in the living room when he’s at home. She shouts at him and he shouts back. Then she says something like “nothing for a month if you carry on”, which I think means she won’t let him have his cigarettes – and then he always shuts up.’

  ‘I’m lucky – although there is no such thing as luck – because my mum loves my dad,’ Michael said.

  ‘What, they don’t shout at each other?’ Simon was amazed.

  ‘No, never. They say good things about each other. They’re like Christ and his Bride – I think.’

  ‘That’s sissy.’

  ‘Why did they get married if they don’t like each other?’

  ‘I don’t know. They met each other when she was a stewardess on a BOAC jetliner. My dad stroked her arm and she liked it, so they got married.’

  Mrs Adams brought in the boys’ drinks and a chocolate cake on a tray. Michael decided that it was better to drink the ginger beer than upset Mr and Mrs Adams. Later he was surprised how little the beer affected him: he didn’t say or do anything silly afterwards at all.

  While Michael wound pulleys and marvelled at real gears, Simon pulled his complete set of Tintin books and boys’ annuals off the shelf onto his bed. He jumped on the bed and started bouncing, sending the books scattering. Leaping off, he pushed the crane over.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Michael asked, rolling out of the way.

  ‘I’m bored. Let’s do something else,’ Simon moaned. He seemed to be getting poked – by Satan probably. Or maybe it was his ginger beer. He had ants in his pants. Michael thought Simon might be mad at his parents – he would be if he was Simon – and that it was making him want to break things. He felt sad for him. He wondered if his own parents could adopt Simon so that he could be happy. It might be the kindest thing.

  Simon kicked his scattered books and said, ‘Let’s fly the water rocket. No, it’s broken. Let’s play with my dad’s Bull Worker. I can’t even pull it one little bit.’ He made a bubble of spit between his lips. ‘No, let’s do an East African Safari.’

  Dinky models lined the window ledge. They selected their cars, attached string, and marked out a route around the house. When Michael rounded the house onto the back lawn he saw that there was a girl in a crinkly blue swimsuit, lying face down on a bright-yellow towel on the grass, reading a magazine. She looked like a miniature Mrs Adams although her hair was turned under, rather than flicked out, and she had freckles so big that Naaman, the leper, could not have looked blotchier. The girl looked at him though her fierce, yellow, horn-rimmed sunglasses.

  ‘What you looking at, you little bleeder?’ she snarled.

  This may be the Arrows Of The Evil One, thought Michael.

  Simon said quickly. ‘She’s my sister. She was nice until last hols and then she changed. Her name is Angeline and we called her Ange, but now we have to call her Angie.’

  ‘This is my friend, Michael,’ Simon said to Angie in the kind sort of way that grown-ups did when they were talking to a sick little child. Michael smiled a worried smile at her.

  ‘Welcome to the house of boredom,’ Angie said, and let her head suddenly fall on the towel as if she had been whacked with a pole.

  ‘She wants to leave home but she’s only thirteen,’ Simon said. ‘She wants to go to London where she can get a boyfriend.’

  ‘Shut up and go and play, Si.’ She rolled onto her back and pulled her swimsuit down her chest so that the sun shone on the top part of her small white blubbery breasts. Michael felt a bit sick.

  The cook sounded a gong for dinner. Michael sat with his back rigid and with his hands on his lap – an ambassador must be very polite – but Simon bent forward with his elbows on the table driving a fork around his plate. Mrs Adams rang a little brass bell. The cook, in white jacket and trousers, a red band around his waist and a red hat brought silver servers to the table, opened their serviettes and poured their drinks: Pepsi for Simon and Michael, beer for Simon’s father, water for his mother and Angie.

  Michael opened his mouth a little and sucked in the steam from his plate of steak, mash and squash. A curl of butter melted on the squash. His spit glands hurt with longing. Simon had told him that they never ate goat, and never would. This was just what he imagined the Banqueting House Of The Lord would be like.

  ‘Do start, Michael,’ Mrs Adams said. He saw her pull her lips into an encouraging smile.

  ‘He’s waiting for us to say grace,’ Simon said.

  ‘Oh, how quaint, er . . . Henry, can you say grace?’ Mrs Adams asked.

  ‘No, I bloody well can’t. The hypocrisy would cause a lightning strike.’

  Mrs Adams started to ask Michael to say it for them but Simon said excitedly, ‘I’ll say it.’

  He put his hands together above his plate. ‘God bless this bunch as they crunch their lunch.’

  He laughed loudly. Michael also laughed, although afterwards he felt uncomfortable as he remembered that God Is Not Mocked.

  ‘D’you think you could remember that grace, Henry? It’s not in Latin, it’s quite neutral and it won’t perjure you,’ Mrs Adams said.

  ‘Will you stop sniping at me, Rhonda. We’re unlikely to need it again.’

  Michael kept his eyes on his plate.

  ‘Aw, flip!’ Angie said. ‘This family stinks.’

  ‘Angie! Please! We have a guest,’ Mrs Adams said.

  ‘I’m just telling the truth. I’m sure he can smell us whether I said it or not,’ Angie said.

  Mr Adams struck his plate with his knife, making Michael jump. ‘
Go to your room, young madam.’

  Mrs Adams leant forward. ‘No, don’t, your father’s overreacting. She’s not five any more, Henry.’

  ‘Michael’s parents are kind to each other,’ Simon said loudly.

  ‘What people do to each other in their own homes is their own business. I’ll not hold it against them,’ Mr Adams said.

  ‘They’re like Christ and his Bride,’ Simon said.

  Michael saw Mr and Mrs Adams exchange glances. Angie said, ‘Huh?’

  ‘Christ and his what?’ Mr Adams sneered. ‘You’ve gone soft in the head, boy. Toughen up. If you’re ever to get a woman like your mother you’ve got to be a man.’ Mrs Adams looked across at Mr Adams, her eyebrows raised. ‘Like she was when I first met her, of course.’

  Mrs Adams rolled her eyes and said, ‘The kid has a point.’

  ‘Very well,’ Mr Adams said, ‘so what’s the secret of your parents’ marital bliss? And don’t say it’s religion because that’s not going to help us.’

  Michael found that everyone was looking at him. Simon had stopped his gravy-and-mash dam building. Angie was waiting for him with her upper lip twisted in a frozen sneer. Mr Adams was no longer chewing his steak with his muscley jaw. Mrs Adams had swivelled her neck and moved her face towards him. Michael feared that she might pounce if he squeaked. A fly stopped buzzing on the windowpane behind the Venetian blind. He puzzled over what Mr Adams had said about religion. Jesus was a friend, not a religion.

  The fly started buzzing again as if it had got bored waiting.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Michael said, and then, sensing that this fell well short of what everyone expected, added, ‘That’s what mothers and fathers are like.’

  He saw Mrs Adams’ smile slump; Mr Adams coughed.

  ‘A very sweet sentiment,’ Mrs Adams said eventually. She touched her lips lightly with her serviette and rang the bell for some more water.

  ‘I got the specifications on the latest Kenwoods,’ Mr Adams said. ‘They’ve got extra power and extra blenders. But I’ll have to find better distributors than the Mehtas. They sold only six Chefs last month and all of those to Europeans. It’s the mass market we’ve got to get. Once the Afs catch on that they don’t have to beat their millet in a pound all day or break their backs mixing their matooke with some goddamned pole, they’re going to shift in their thousands. Imagine, a Chef in every hut!’

  ‘So what happens when they have the big ekiihuro with thirty uncles, aunts, brothers, sisters and their picininis milling in as well, and the electric’s down?’ Mrs Adams asked.

  ‘They’re going to pressure the government to get their act together. Get things working. Once they’re hooked in to modern appliances they’re not going to accept the old pounding and grinding again.’

  ‘Yeah, I can just see them marching in the streets ’cause their Chef won’t work,’ Angie said.

  Mr Adams ignored her and poured more beer – slowly and with a smile on his face, as if he was sure he was right.

  ‘Kid has a point, Henry,’ Mrs Adams said.

  ‘Kid has a point, huh? Well, I guess she does. Just got to be patient. It takes time to turn a primitive people into mass-market consumers. You’ve got to find the hook; then you’ve got ’em. You’ll never find a civilisation that abandons a technological advance. Imagine – what about it, chaps? Let’s not bother with pens any more; let’s chisel marks on rocks. Let’s not bother with umbrellas any more; let’s go back to banana leaves. No, once the Afs have got their Chefs they’ll never go back to big sticks, or whatever they use.’ He snorted at the end of his speech, sounding to Michael like a buffalo, pleased it had trampled something down.

  ‘Your mother got a Kenwood Chef yet?’ asked Mr Adams to Michael.

  Michael had hoped not to be asked any more questions but now everyone was looking at him again. He had his mouth full of juicy steak – he had been wondering if this was the Flesh he had been warned about, and that he would end up wanting more and more until he became a Glutton And A Sinner. He had not come across a single glob of gristle to retch on, unlike the goat meat they had as a treat at home. The Flesh was undoubtedly the most difficult and dangerous temptation yet.

  He swallowed and said, ‘I don’t think so. I’ve never seen one in the kitchen.’ There was an awkward silence. He sensed his family might have let everyone down. ‘But it’s a bit dark with smoke because our oven doesn’t work properly.’ Then he remembered something his mother had said which might be a better reason. ‘My mum says she doesn’t want to have too many things that the Africans haven’t got.’

  Mr Adams banged his beer down on the table. ‘How wrong headed is that? How are they going to want appliances if we – we Europeans – don’t show them.’

  Michael pulled his shoulders in. He was worried that Mr Adams might hit him.

  Mrs Adams said, ‘Bernard and Stella are not “we”, Henry. They’ve got different priorities. They don’t see everyone as a potential consumer.’

  ‘Sure – they see everyone as a potential convert. Bloody hypocrites.’

  Michael had never heard anyone attack his parents before. He felt hurt, and then angry. All his mother and father wanted was for everyone to be happy by knowing Jesus. He imagined Mr Adams and his father having a fight. It was a bit worrying to think that his father might not win. He would have to use a Bull Worker first and then he could easily knock Mr Adams flat.

  Mrs Adams said, ‘Enough, Henry. It’s not Michael’s fault his parents are religious, and I don’t think you know what a hypocrite is.’

  But Mr Adams wasn’t finished. ‘What did that guy say? Religion’s the opium of the people?’ He cut his steak clean in two.

  ‘Come on, Henry,’ Mrs Adams said. ‘You’ve just been going on about how you’re going to get the Afs hooked on appliances. Your goods are just another opium. We’ve all got our opiums to anaesthetise us from what’s coming. Maybe the missionaries have got a better opium.’

  Angie groaned and slumped. ‘Yeah, like I said, we stink, even though we’ve got Kenwoods and automatic washers.’

  Mr Adams banged down his beer again but Mrs Adams looked fiercely at him. Simon said loudly, ‘Wish we had smoke in our kitchen like Michael does.’

  Mrs Adams rang the bell for dessert. The cook came through with a pavlova.

  ‘Oh, well done, Isaac.’

  ‘Yummy!’ Simon said.

  ‘None for me,’ Angie said.

  Mr Adams said, ‘That’s what your mother could do if she had a Kenwood, Michael. You tell her, huh?’

  ‘Would you like some, Michael?’ Mrs Adams asked, cutting the meringue.

  He would, but he was close to tears and said nothing in case his voice came out quivery.

  ‘Please don’t worry about Simon’s father,’ Mrs Adams said, sending her husband another withering look.

  Mr Adams leant across and ruffled Michael’s hair. ‘We’re going to take you on a special outing after lunch.’

  ‘I’m not coming,’ Angie said.

  ‘You’re not invited,’ Mr Adams replied.

  Mrs Adams said, ‘You boys can have some sherbet on the journey. Special treat.’

  Michael and Simon exchanged looks.

  The long Citroën DS, with its shark-like bonnet, sped out of the town, pedestrians and animals running before it like a bow wave, throwing themselves out and away at the last second. Mr and Mrs Adams sat in the front, not talking, while Michael and Simon sat in the back grinning out of the windows. As if he were in a vicious presidential cavalcade, Mr Adams never slowed down. A woman screamed, ‘We’re saved!’ as she pulled her young child from the vehicle’s path.

  Mr Adams chuckled and said, ‘We’re the cavalry, you’re the infantry; we ride, you walk.’ Then he added grimly, ‘They’ll learn.’

  The scraggly outskirts of the town gave way to scabby land pocked by the makeshift dwellings and the scratched smallholdings of those attracted to the town but too poor to live in it; the beginnings of the sh
anties that would stow the cheap labour for the next century’s cities. Soon they were away from the town, and the few small fields of millet and maize petered out as the land opened out into undulating grassland.

  Michael felt cocooned from the outside world and spread his arms out on the seat, luxuriating in the space. His parents were always stopping to give people lifts and would continue to pick up anyone who waved a hopeful hand until no more bottoms could be wedged in.

  Mr Adams said, ‘This will make wonderful cattle ranching country but the government will have to clear out the nomads first. Can’t have pest control without fences.’

  ‘They’ve got by for thousands of years without fences, Henry.’ Mrs Adams’s voice sounded as if she’d got a stuffy nose.

  ‘Yes, but they die off when their cattle are wiped out by rinderpest or drought.’

  Simon exclaimed, ‘Look, people camping!’ He pointed to small, grass, tent-like structures on a hillside.

  ‘Those are the nomads,’ Mr Adams said. ‘They don’t bother with houses because they’ve got to move every few weeks.’

  ‘Hmm. Wonder where they’ll put their automatic washers,’ Mrs Adams said.

  Mr Adams changed gear. ‘It’s the march of history – you can’t stop it.’

  They caught up with a bus, crabbing its laden way, trailing a smelly cloud of exhaust and dust. Mr Adams shifted himself to see past. Michael became anxious, worried that they hadn’t prayed for safety – his family never set off on a journey without asking for protection, and it was always given. As his father prayed he imagined God’s hand holding their Anglia like a Dinky car and guiding it along the road. God could flick obstacles out of their way if necessary or slow them down at junctions if he saw a drunk coming the other way. He wondered what would happen if his father tried to throw off God’s hand by out-accelerating him or taking an unexpected turn. But now he was in a car travelling at speed without any request for God’s help.