Her baby was cradled in her lifeless arms, still nursing.
Francisca’s mind was racing—I don’t want to know this—as brothers and cousins jumped in, talking over each other in a chorus of details.
I asked the family if they knew the mother and baby.
Yes. Francisca’s eyes widened when she heard the name.
It was Antoinette, Francisca’s cousin.
The Procure
• • • •
The first night of our arrival in Dungu, rusty metal gates pulled away to reveal the courtyard of our new home. After we had heard about the Bamokandi attack, Francisca arranged for us to stay at the Procure de Mission. Just the name of this guesthouse, run by the Catholic Diocese on the more peaceful side of town, conjured images of a charming place, a sanctuary, something a guide book might describe as “spotless” or “nestled” somewhere lovely with “friendly hosts.”
It wasn’t.
The Procure was a basic brick compound facing inward, wrapped around a dusty clay parking lot. The odd fruit tree stretched up from the ground. The lot was littered with industrial trucks, car parts, and piles of gravel and sand. A lone cement room stood in the middle of the courtyard, a kind of snack bar. Men seemed to lounge and drift in and out all day and night, sipping beer, sitting in stackable plastic deck chairs scattered about in collections of ones or twos or threes. They might chat with Clementine, the hostess who served drinks, when she hadn’t disappeared into her staging room for afternoon naps.
I was assigned a dark room, in an annex, next door to Francisca and Mama Koko. When I closed the door, daylight was blocked out almost entirely, leaving a small florescent LED lantern to augment the dreary light bleeding through a cinderblock window slit, set eight feet high on the wall. Dark blue, ruffled gingham curtains with bright embroidery, try as they might, couldn’t lift the spirits of the place, with its ubiquitous dust and cement. The generator roared. Francisca asked about a room change for me. With the departure of Procure guests, I was shifted to a neighboring room, brighter with picture-frame windows. It reeked of piss. Not like any urine-soaked bathroom a few weeks behind in the cleaning, but that long-neglected urinal smell, the ferment of piss stacked on top of piss.
The stench couldn’t outdo the glory of our welcome-basket treats: an oil drum filled with murky whitish water, like watered-down milk, with floating dead flies and miscellaneous organic matter. Mama Koko, who would be staying at the Procure with us, sat out front sipping a beer while Francisca and I stood in the hallway, contemplating the situation. Francisca broke our silence. “The water is a little bit … not clear. And cold,” she said. “Maybe I’ll bathe at home.”
I was not above bucket baths, even cold ones. I’d taken them many times in India, even in icy Himalayan water. Still, I weighed out going the following weeks without bathing. But the dust and sweat had already done their mating dance, forming a gritty film covering my body.
I set up my toiletries and dashed back to the room. I found Francisca stalled in her doorway, wrapped up in her African cloth, bath supplies in hand. “Decided to go for it?” she asked.
We did a few rounds of “You go.” “No, you go.” “No please, you first.”
I caved and went in, dousing away the grime in a murky-water bucket bath, my mouth firmly closed.
A half hour later, as Francisca emerged, we gave each other thumbs-up and high fives. It felt good to be clean … ish.
It was only when Francisca woke up on our second day with Mama Koko sleeping on the floor beside her that the surreal cast of the visit retreated and she felt she was home. As we gathered our things to leave the Procure and head over to Mama Koko’s, I noticed the Runner from our first day on the far side of the mission compound. It was perched on a dirt mound, chug-chug-chugging as a group of guys pushed it off. I leaned into Francisca, “That’s not the car we rented, is it?”
“That’s the one,” she said.
We both looked back over at it. The guys were pushing it across the courtyard, trying to give it a running start. It kicked to life.
A quick-starting getaway car was a prerequisite for our trip, even if it meant I needed to spend $50 per day for five weeks. Although the Procure generously offered the push-start guys as part of the deal, I told Francisca flat out: I’m not renting a car that won’t start.
Runner
• • • •
So, we rented the car that wouldn’t start. It was the only rental car in town.
Mayano, our driver from the first day, a distant cousin of Francisca, picked us up in the Procure parking lot. He pulled Francisca aside: “I didn’t look my best our first day. I didn’t know we would have a white person with us. That’s not the real me.” He stood back, arms wide, displaying his new outfit as though revealing a prize: baggy dark wash jeans with lots of extra ’80s-style zippers, and men’s fashion dress shoes, extra long and pointy. “I like to look a little bit different.”
In town, Francisca dashed into a government office to take care of a film permit—a requirement if I wanted to video and shoot photos around town—while I waited in the car with Mama Koko. Mayano sauntered and roamed the yard. His floppy wide-brimmed hat gave the impression he was imitating the strut of some lone hero in an old Western, always with a hand on his belt or pager, ready to quick-draw. He finally wandered back from a food stall and slid back into the Runner, reeking of booze.
I rolled down my windows to breathe.
“I’m not renting a car with a drunk driver,” I said as Francisca got back in the car, as though I still had discretion.
“I smell it, too,” she said.
I pictured our worst-case scenario: an attack. Our getaway plan a complete fail, with Mayano slurring and stumbling around, grasping his pager, while Francisca and I push the chug-chug-chug Runner, a raging drunk driver hopping in and seizing the wheel.
Francisca didn’t have any luck securing the film permit, so we pulled up to The Bureau, as locals called it, the only freshly painted and renovated building in town, fixed up with a trickle of aid dollars. It was the mayor’s office and a city hall of sorts, a two-story building with a wide wraparound porch and a flagpole out front. We sat outside, waiting for a meet-and-greet with the mayor.
Francisca had fragmented memories of The Bureau. She and Kevin were married there. It was decorated with impatiens that day. But sitting out front, she pondered the flagpole. When Francisca thought of childhood—the family “castle” in Duru, the corn-husk dolls, the monkeys dangling around the edges of the peanut fields—her memories were tinged with magic. That flagpole, though, was a relic from days she would rather have forgotten—memories that were now her only reference point for what was happening with the gunmen now, and for what a family, what a town, does when it is washed out in bloodshed.
“When I was little, they killed people there,” she said. “I saw it once.”
The Bureau
• • • •
Young Cisca didn’t understand the forces swarming around Congo after independence. She was eight years old when, in 1964, she first heard talk about Simba rebels. Cisca was with her mama Dette visiting relatives out of town when André called them home.
The United States had recently aided the murder of the first democratically elected head of state in Congo, Patrice Lumumba. In a backlash, the anti-Western, Marxist-affiliated Simba militia took control of much of Congo, with the aim of taking over the country. The militia quickly turned on the people, who mostly wanted no part of its rebellion. It aimed not only to kill all white people in the country but also to wipe out anyone who appeared elite or affiliated with whites.
Cisca and her brother rode on other people’s bikes along the road to Dungu, passing mango trees and cemeteries, watching the road’s packed gravel, so smooth back then that it created a mirage reflecting the sky. Dette peddled at their side with one baby strapped to her back and her bike piled with Cisca’s toddler brother along with all their things stuffed into an oversized du
ffle bag.
A pickup truck and a Land Rover pulled up behind them. Rebels hung off the sides and top of the pickup. Guns pointed out of every window of the Land Rover. The rebels had crowned themselves with palm leaves and wore matching palm-leaf skirts over their trousers, a cheap embellishment for self-appointed kings.
Dette pulled over to the side of the road to let the vehicles pass, pushing Cisca behind her. The truck slowed; one of the rebels spoke to Dette. “Trying to run away from us?”
Cisca hid from his red eyes and hair gone wild.
Dette said, “We hear you are good guys. We were just visiting family.”
“Looks like a heavy load on the bike. Why don’t you let us take the kids in the car?”
It was not Dette’s place to refuse a favor from heavily armed gunmen. Still, she tried. “No thanks. We’re fine.”
“Give us the address. We’ll drop them at your place.”
Cisca and her brother climbed in the back of the Land Rover, between big men with big guns, commander in the front seat. The rebels shouted and drummed songs the whole way. Cisca tried to not move. Down the road, a man flagged down the car. It was Kumbawandu, the chief of that area; tall and fat and dressed sharp, he carried himself like royalty. He told the gunmen he was tired of hiding and demanded to talk directly to the Simba leadership.
He squeezed in next to Cisca. She tried not to look at anyone, as the commander hammered him with questions—mostly about his association with white people—while the rebels screamed their songs all the way back to Dungu.
Dette had never peddled so fast, trying to balance babies and bags, saying Hail Marys the whole ride. When she finally reached their shop at the junction, she found Cisca and her brother with André; they’d been dropped off at home without incident.
In the morning, Cisca heard gunshots from the center of town. It was already a routine: Every morning, before the shops and market opened, the Simba started their day by raising the flag in front of The Bureau. Then they executed one, maybe two or three enemies of the rebellion, mostly the educated or moneyed. It usually took only one or two shots.
Not that morning.
Papapapapapa. Papapapapapa. Papapapapapa. Papapapapapa. Pow.
As townspeople filtered back through the neighborhood crying, Cisca overheard them tell André: “The big chief is dead.”
Kumbawandu had been taken out to the flagpole, with onlookers gathered around to watch. They told him to lie down, but he wouldn’t do it. “I’m not going to let you tie me like a goat in front of my people!” He lunged for their gun, and shot several of the rebels dead before they killed him.
They rolled his body in a barrel to the one-lane Kibali Bridge, next to the manor house, where they dumped him in the river. The current would eventually wash away his body, like all the bodies they dumped over that frilly Belgian archway.
The next day, Dette tried to get the family back to the normal routine. She got up early and had coffee while heating the leftovers for breakfast. She warmed water to bathe the kids before they came to eat. As they did every morning, together, they said one Hail Mary, one Our Father, one Glory Be to God.
Cisca dressed in her blue and white school uniform and met her friends in front of her house for their walk across town. Dette stood at the front of the house, flagging down stall-keepers from Bamokandi on their way to the market, asking them, “What are you selling today?”
Cisca and her friends passed through the town center, past The Bureau, and onward across the Kibali Bridge. She noticed blood caked over the spot where the bodies of the chiefs had been dumped. It was greasy, too. She wondered if Kumbawandu’s body was the one that left the grease stains. He was so big.
The Simba soldiers interrupted class that morning, and hauled the children back across town to The Bureau, with their teachers at their side. The children lined up around the flagpole. Cisca was one row back, but she was tall enough to see, even if she didn’t want to. Simba marched their enemy-of-the-day out for execution, already beaten and bandaged. Cisca recognized him: the principal of a neighboring school and a good friend of her dad’s. They tied him to the flagpole, as the Simba sang and danced. They asked the audience of captive school kids, “Do you want him to be killed?”
“No,” some mumbled.
Cisca’s teacher told the girls to pray. Some girls covered their eyes; some put their thumbs in their ears to block out what was to come. Cisca bent her head and stared at the dirt, as she and the other girls began: Hail Mary, full of grace. The Lord is with Thee. Blessed… .
Gunshots pierced the air before they could finish even one Hail Mary. Girls cried, pee trickled between their legs onto their uniforms and pooled on the ground. Cisca wouldn’t look up. Instead, she buried her face in her hands, while they pulled out the next prisoner. It was her skinny chirpy classmate Biroyo’s dad, who worked in the school office. Biroyo passed out on the ground when she saw it was her father, before they pulled the trigger. They severed his hands like the Belgian colonists used to do, mounted them on spears, attached them to the bumper of their car, and drove around mocking the children. “Hey, wave hello!”
Cisca couldn’t help but see. She held her hand over her mouth and shook, trying to hold it in, but vomit seeped around her cupped hands, spilling down her uniform and onto the ground.
They shouted at the kids, “Go back to school!”
None of them did.
Cisca walked home with her cousin, silent the whole way. The world was so different. Every day, she walked over the Kibali Bridge on her way to school. Even if the current carried away the bodies, there was always more fresh blood on the spot where they threw the chiefs. No one cleaned it. The blood caked and crusted unless rain washed it away.
The grease stayed a long time, long after the blood.
The Simba were out of control, they were killing everything: people, dogs, anything that moved. Everyone in town knew that André, with his scooter, boutique, and history with the Greeks, was a prime candidate for The Bureau. A friend warned them his time at the flagpole was coming. Soon after Chief Kumbawandu’s execution, Dette set out with the kids, while André stayed behind just long enough that they wouldn’t notice the family sneaking out of town. He left every door and window of the house open, to look like someone was still home, and then slipped out of town unnoticed.
The Mango Grove
• • • •
On the road outside of town later that day, André caught up with Dette and the children, and they continued until they were about thirty miles from Dungu. In Kiliwa, they gathered with extended family before setting off again. Of those who wanted to flee from the spreading Simba violence, few wanted children with them. Too risky. Children made too much noise and slowed the group down. Those who had children stuck with André and Dette.
The family left the road behind them, past the farmers’ fields that clung to the road, out into Congo’s bush. André swung his machete, slicing his way through vast fields of elephant grass taller than even he was, as Cisca followed close behind. They passed through fields of grass and scrubby trees, stretches of jungle teeming with snakes and monkeys, and more fields of elephant grass. The walk seemed to go on forever.
Then, as if by magic or blessing or both, the dense forest undergrowth opened into a flat, bare patch of ground, without underbrush, covered only with leaves, perfect for a campground. Ancient mango trees surrounded the campground, their thick trunks and tops so dense Cisca couldn’t see the sky. They were planted in a perfect circle. The family surmised that someone must have lived there years before, since mangoes don’t plant themselves in circles in the forest. Nearby, baby cassava tendrils peaked out, fresh, soft and new, the kind that grows after fires burn off the old bushes.
While the grown-ups built shelters of leaves and twigs to keep them dry in the torrential rains soon to arrive, Cisca and her brother found sticks and poked around a nearby stream covered with dry leaves. Cisca’s stick wriggled. She lifted the leaves. Ca
tfish! Pools formed under the leaves, and the fish were in water so shallow the kids could reach in and grab as many as they wanted. Dette heard them squealing with delight and brought a basket. The grown-ups joined the children in collecting bunches of fish, which Dette smoked and saved for the long campout to come.
The family fell into a routine. Every morning, they went to the creek to pray to the ancestors and forest spirits, with only special leaves they gathered around camp as an offering. The family gave thanks: We have nothing to offer. No eggs. But thank you, spirits, for the day, another new day. Guide us. Protect us. If we did something wrong, forgive us. They sipped stream water and sprayed its droplets through the forest, hoping their prayers would land like the droplets on the leaves, and touch the spirits.
During the daytime, Cisca and the other kids played silently. They were not allowed to roam. The men set traps for antelope. André planted peanuts. They harvested oil from the palm trees. André even made soap. But mostly, the whole family spent all day, every day together with little to do but tell each other stories.
At night, the men took turns with the watch, sitting up with homemade spears should Simba rebels on the run stumble into this place—and of course they also listened closely for the lions that sometimes stalked the camp. Most nights, Cisca chose to sleep outside under the trees, next to the papas on night watch. She wasn’t scared, even when she heard the heavy lion breath and low growling just on the other side of the bushes. Ancestor spirits were supposed to be out in the middle of the night, so if she did get scared, she prayed for intercession and drifted back to sleep.
Months passed as the family cocooned in the forest. Cisca forgot they were on the run. She let thoughts of the Simba go. She loved the birds’ songs, the crickets chirping, and the antelope that sometimes wandered into camp. Cisca believed that the ancestor-spirits of the creek chose her family. She thought for sure the spirits led them to this sacred grove, and surrounded the family with its force-field of good to protect them. The spirits brought the fish, cassava, palm oil, as if to make it possible for Cisca and her family to retreat to a time when things were pure, untainted by the forces consuming their country—forces that seemed to be squeezing Dungu, squeezing Congo, like dried termites crushed in a sieve for their oil.
Mama Koko and the Hundred Gunmen Page 4
