“I don't want to be an inconvenience. My name is Gary Sanders. As I explained to Lily, I'm travelling in Mozambique on business and was curious about your home for children. My church back in the States is looking to sponsor a work in Mozambique and they asked me to do some research. From what I have seen so far, I'm very impressed. It's amazing what you have founded here, Doctor Campbell. Given the recent history, a place like this is much needed.” Gary was not sure if Doctor Campbell believed his story – he simply nodded and smiled. He was not at all like Lily who talked feely and laughed at almost everything.
“When we first started here, it was harsh. There were many children – especially boys – who had lived through the traumatic events of the civil war. Many of our boys were soldiers and knew only about killing. When the fighting stopped, Gary, no one wanted them. They couldn't look after animals, they didn't want to farm and people were afraid of them. Rightly so. But we took them in, clothed and fed them and looked after them. At heart they were just kids who'd seen and done things that brought shame and terrible nightmares. We loved them and they thrived. What kids don't if you give them love, eh?”
“I guess so. I don't have children of my own so I'm no expert. But I do want to offer help – I know a good thing when I see it.”
“You're American, Gary? From the east coast: Boston or Washington perhaps?” Gary was both shocked at how accurate Doctor Campbell had just located his home and wary that he did not want to give away too much personnel information.
“Washington. How did you know?”
“I asked your driver.” Doctor Campbell smiled. “I'm sorry, but the look on your face was priceless. Shall we tour the ward?”
“Yes, that would be great. We have a few MD's in the congregation so this sort of thing would be right up their street and perhaps help them dig into their pockets.”
Doctor Campbell showed Gary round the ward. It was pretty basic and comprised an eight-bed ward, an operating theatre – no more than a small room – and a store of prosthetic arms and legs. Doctor Campbell explained that there were two main problems: AIDS which they tried to treat using an inadequate supply of antiretroviral drugs, and dismemberments. In the surrounding countryside, farmers sent their children off to tend the animals. Sometimes they wandered into unmarked mine fields. The war might be over but the killing and maiming continued.
“Where do you get your supplies? I couldn't help notice that you have a shipping container in your yard. Do you receive supplies from England? Or from the States?” Gary bravely asked to see what he came to see – in as natural a manner as he could. A refusal might prove informative – hopefully he would not arouse suspicion.
“Mostly we get supplies from India but occasionally from America. It just depends. India is cheaper but there are some things you just can't get.” Gary mused that one thing you could not buy from India was twenty-five tonnes of heavy water. “The container arrived just yesterday, in fact. From America. We haven't unpacked it yet – it's full of medical supplies. Would you like to see?”
Gary could not believe his luck and audacity. However, the fact that he was getting to see the contents made him suspicions that it would prove futile. As Doctor Campbell swung the container door open, Gary held his breath in anticipation. The container was full of cardboard boxes. Some were already opened and Gary could see an assortment of medical equipment. There were a lot a drugs and saline drip packs. All were wrapped in sterile plastic bags.
“If you have needs, please send me a list. I will need to report back to the rest of the congregation but I'm sure we can help you in some small way.”
“No help is too small, Gary. We appreciate what we get.”
“Doctor Campbell, one last question if I may. Why Eden Village Orphanage?” Gary was really curious.
“Ah! I called it Eden to signify a fresh start – a beautiful and peaceful place. It's one thing that many of our children appreciate.”
Gary gave Doctor Campbell an email address and asked again that he send a list of supplies he needed. Gary thanked Doctor Campbell for the tour and took his leave with further promises of help. Gary smiled at Nito as he climbed in the pickup. Gary had a pocket of stickers that he had used to get samples from the children. He also had managed to collect a few discarded items of clothing. He scraped the dirt from the tread of his shoes into a sample bag as soon as he was safely out-of-sight. On his phone were a few photographs taken around the site. Most showed black children with smiling white teeth, one showed the inside of the shipping container. Nito drove away from the orphanage.
Chapter 13
Cabo Delgado, Mozambique
Nito drove and Gary relaxed, self-satisfied and utterly full of himself and his own accomplishment. It was not often that Gary came out on top but this time he had proved Nito wrong. All those years of being pushed around at school for being a total nerd were revenge-motive enough to gloat now. Nito said it could not done but Gary had walked into the orphanage located the shipping container and obtained samples for later analysis. Nito was silent and so was the blasted radio and Gary was milking it. He was also thinking of Mandy. Yes, Mandy from Ohio.
At a petrol station just south of Pemba, the attendant filled the tank while Nito began to exchange news in the loud, gregarious way that was the local custom. It was another oppressively hot day. Always the sun blazed down and parched the land until it was thirsty – even for blood. A single bullet was planted in the middle of Nito's stomach. He fell backwards, blood and petrol oozing into the dry dirt. The attendant stood gaping. Nito's attacker walked up to the open driver's door and looked in. His face lit up when he spied Gary inside.
“White man, if you want to live, do not panic and do what you are told.” He spoke Portuguese unhurriedly. He expected to be obeyed. With that he walked round the front of the pickup and opened Gary's door. “You drive.” He placed a pistol into a holster inside an open camouflage jacket. Gary was stunned. Events had moved faster than he could process. Was Nito still alive or dying or already dead? The man's hand pushed Gary's shoulder and he slid across to the driver’s seat. “You drive! You know how?” Gary nodded. The door was slammed shut and Gary started up the engine and drove off. He turned back on to the road south winding its way eventually to Maputo. Gary squinted in the rear view mirror hoping to see Nito. He saw nothing.
“Do you like gum, white man?”
Where are we going? Who the hell are you? Why did you shoot Nito? He was just the driver for God's sake. The questions surged and demanded utterance but were held on the tip of his tongue. The guy was a psychopath. It was best to humour him. “Where do you want me to take you?”
“You'll see. Keep driving, white man.”
“My name is Gary.”
The man laughed. “Gary the white man, eh?”
“That's right, you don't see many whites round here, do you?”
“Enough. Enough to know they don't listen to no black man. So white man, gum? Yes or no?” He held out a stick of gum. Gary took it. He decided to accept the offer to avoid any offence.
“You like Mozambique, white man?”
“Yeah, it's a great country. Real picture postcard stuff and the people are so … friendly.”
“You can be honest with me, white man. Most likely I'll have to shoot you but, since you talk Portuguese, you might amuse me and I'll let you live. You've got so little to lose. You American?”
“Yes, American,” replied Gary. “And you? From Mozambique?”
“All my life. All my miserable, pointless life. You think we're worthless, don't you? Over there, in precious America, you hear that another thousand million Africans died of hunger, or disease, or just plain self-inflicted stupidity. But if one America honcho goes down – that's reason to hoop up all kinds of action. Let me tell you, we are just as precious. It's just our lives are worthless.”
“We're only human you know. Just worrying about our own little existence – paying the bills, paying the mortgage, trying to look a
s rich as the next man. Buy a big car, buy a bigger car.” Gary behoved the glib nonsense he was coming out with. He was more worried about not being late for work again and avoiding the apparently indiscriminate railing of his boss. Oh yeah – there was Nito too. Was he dead? Probably.
“If you think life's tough being rich, you should try being poor – dirt poor.”
“You know, I might give that a try. You make it sound so appealing.” The man laughed but abruptly became serious.
“It could come sooner than you think, white man.”
“Do we go straight on at the crossroads?” It was a welcome diversion to the current thread of conversation.
“No, turn right.”
The conversation lulled for a few minutes and Gary tried squinting across at his abductor to size him up. He was black and dressed like any other local he had seen here but not like Nito. He looked tough and lean but not particularly strong. Gary himself was no match, however. Gary would lose a struggle if it came to that. The man seemed abnormally calm for someone who had just shot a man more or less at random. It did not bode well. The man was definitely a textbook psychopath. In Gary's mind the further they drove the closer to execution he came. He struggled to come up with a plan but with frugal results. The man was armed and would as soon shoot him as drink water, breath air or take a piss.
“I'm sorry. I didn't catch your name.”
“Escobar. But now I'll have to kill you for sure.” Escobar leaned over menacingly then started laughing.
“Tell me Escobar, all this killing – I mean, my driver Nito, he wasn't the first was he?”
“No.”
“How many?” Gary saw a look of contemplation but no there was no answer so he went further, “I'm guessing it's more than ten? Yeah. Is it more than a hundred?”
“I've lost count – a few hundred I suppose. What about you?”
“I'm still in single digits.” It bordered on lying. Gary reasoned that a big fat zero was still a digit. “How's your conscience? When you go to sleep do you see their faces and, when you meet God, how will it go?” Gary was digging deep to keep calm and come up with conversation – any conversation to avoid what was looking more and more inevitable. His only hope, stuck as he was in the middle of nowhere with a gun-toting maniac, was divine intervention.
“I used to get really disturbed. I couldn't sleep. I had to drink myself to sleep. I'd wake up sweating and screaming. My head would pound. I'd get dizzy. Voices in my head. I'd feel like killing someone else. It was a vicious cycle. I'm reformed now.” Escobar paused. Gary had felt he was getting somewhere but, if reformed meant killing Nito without a second thought, he was glad not to have met Escobar before his change of heart. “I know this witchdoctor. He drilled into my head in three places – to let the demons out. Look here's the bit of skull he removed for the left side – just here.” Gary was horrified to glance across and see Escobar hold up a small white disc of bone about the size of a nickel. He wore it round his neck on a piece of string. He was also pointing to somewhere on his head; Gary decided not to look. The pickup had veered off the road and Gary swung it back violently. “Wow, I need to take you to see him. He'll sort your nerves out. A few holes here and there and you'll feel great. Do you know white man, I don't drink any more. I'm five weeks sober.”
“That's quite an achievement. I'm sure your mother and father are very proud.” Gary nodded along devoid of sincerity but choked by macabre revulsion.
“My mother maybe but I doubt my father's proud. He was so proud he left to work in the mines. So proud he never came back – stopped sending money. So proud he shacked up with some bitch. But don't worry. I made my peace with them.” Gary looked across to see Escobar nod his head and place his hand over his heart – no not his heart but his gun tucked under his left arm.
“You shot them, didn't you?”
“Yip, and her brood that he chose over me.” There was stinging resentment in his voice. Gary moved to defuse any bad feelings before they boiled over into bloodshed.
“At least you made your peace. That's good.”
“Yeah.” Escobar calmed and became reflective. “Yeah,” he repeated, “Not bad for an African. You won't believe me, Africa being the dark and backward pit of evil and ignorance as it is – especially here in Mozambique, but the best witchdoctor I know is a white man – just like you.” Escobar laughed. Gary was mentally blocking what Escobar was saying; he did not want to hear it. “Yeah, Doctor Campbell can bewitch anyone. He can make you do what he wants.” Gary started at the mention of Doctor Campbell.
“You know Doctor Campbell?”
“You interested in Doctor Campbell, eh white man?” Escobar stared across at Gary.
“I am,” said Gary failing to hide his enthusiasm. “What can you tell me about him?”
“I know something but I would need to be killing you – no question about that. Pull over, white man.” There was a small shop and canteen at the side of the road. Gary pulled up wondering if this was it – if the moment had arrived. “You want food?” Gary wondered if this would his final meal – a last supper breaking bread with Escobar.
“Yeah, why not?” Though Gary had no appetite.
“Wait here.”
Gary was swamped by relief as Escobar jumped out the pickup and strolled across to the food stand. This was the moment. He was alone in the pickup, engine running. He could simply drive off. He hesitated. What did this murderous crazy man know about Doctor Campbell?
Gary was still debating whether he should drive off or wait around and see what Escobar knew when a gunshot broke the moment of relief. Gary looked round at the food stand to see a woman slump to the ground. She had been shot in the head. Next the passenger door opened and Escobar slid in.
“Here's yours. Now, let's go and see the head doctor.”
“Yeah, let's do that. I can't wait.” Gary was surprised at how sarcastic and morbid he had become. This would not go down well back at the office – if he ever made it back to the office.
Gary ate the spicy tortilla-thing that Escobar bought as they drove for about twenty minutes. It was hard to tell since Gary refused to check his watch – that would be too much like a countdown. Escobar leaned over and half-whispered in Gary's ear as though someone might overhear them.
“White man, you want to know about Doctor Campbell, don't you?” Gary looked across ignoring the road for several seconds. He said quite definitely.
“Yes, I sure do.”
“Did he hex you?” There was apparently genuine concern in Escobar's voice. Gary was almost touched.
“Maybe. But why do you think he's a witchdoctor?”
“How else do you explain it? He hexed my brother. Armando was my brother. We did stuff together along with Jose and Idi. He met Doctor Campbell and he spoke strange words. I heard them but I couldn't understand. Armando heard them and I think he did understand. Afterwards, he stopped talking, just sulking and thinking; stopped drinking, started wandering off by himself. He abandoned us. He killed Jose. Doctor Campbell turned him into a zombie and packed him off to be a big shot down in Maputo. Armando was my brother, now I hardly recognise him. They made him President. Can you believe that? My brother?”
“Armando? Armando de Sousa?”
“Yeah, that's what I said: Armando was my brother.” Escobar was irritated. “We were born under the same chanfuta tree – you'll see it when we get to the head doctor.”
“Are you talking about Armando de Sousa, President of Mozambique?”
“Yeah, the whole country is bewitched by him. A powerful delusion has blinded their minds and Armando will sacrifice them all to the Devil. The streets will run with the blood of infants and innocents. Everyone you see, everyone you meet is a zombie – a puppet manipulated to the will of Doctor Campbell. I'm the only one who sees it. Only I know the truth. I've been trying to help them – make them see. I've set some free. Doctor Campbell has no power over them now. I'm a realist, you know. I can't help them all, but
a few – the ones I like – I liberate. The girl at the food stand had a beautiful smile so I set her free.”
Gary felt his stomach knot. He felt a metallic dryness in his mouth. He prided himself in his pragmatic approach to life, someone who was not fazed by how bad the world could be – it was just how life was and it should be accepted. Face it head on. It was all part of his professional blinkering to imagine catastrophe devoid of humanity by reducing it to impersonal numbers, statistics and policies. Rather late he realised that he was not experiencing an emotional response to Escobar's drastic picture of Mozambique but instead a reaction to the food he had just eaten.
“I'm going to be sick,” Gary blurted desperately as he pulled over to the side of the road and half-jumped, half-fell out of the pickup. He heard Escobar laughing as he crawled in the dirt, his stomach convulsing. The pain was like having a corkscrew twisted into his belly. He was sick four times in succession. After a minute or two Gary felt the tall presence of Escobar standing over him.
“You're in a bad way, white man. Here, drink!” Escobar handed down a water bottle. Gary glugged on it, spat some out but then took a sip. Escobar helped him up and back into the pickup. This time Escobar drove and Gary slumped against the side of the cab weak and no longer able to resist sleep.
Gary awoke with a jolt as the pickup hit a burr on the road. He was disorientated. He could not be sure how long he had slept. He did not recognise where he was but there was a marked change in the landscape. They were driving through hill country with thicker bush and tree cover. Escobar looked across and Gary saw him smiling – he was beaming like an excited child.
The Nephilim Protocol Page 7
