by Kyle Mills
Flannary didn't answer immediately, a pause that Josh had come to suspect was him calculating how much to say.
"JB?"
"I think Dan was looking for NewAfrica's other projects."
"What do you mean, 'looking for' them?"
"A few days ago, when I asked you about your other projects, you told me you didn't know anything about them."
"So? Why would I?"
Flannary shrugged. "Maybe you wouldn't. The problem is that no one else does, either. NewAfrica has all these brochures with pictures of fancy agricultural projects and grinning refugees, but when I ask for specifics from the locals, all I get is 'Oh, it's west of here a ways.' Or 'I met a guy once who knew someone who worked on that project.' "
"I'm not following you."
"Yes, you are."
"Are you trying to tell me that New-Africa's projects are fake and they killed Dan because he found out? I think you've been hitting the gin a little too hard, JB."
"Maybe."
"What about my project? That exists." "Really? It looks like a burned-out hill to me."
"You know what I mean."
"Yours is different. Pathetic as it sounds, it's NewAfrica's flagship. The others are always in much more remote areas, always completely self-contained, and always manned with imported workers -- not people indigenous to the area." Flannary reached into the backseat and pulled a manila envelope from his duffel.
"What's that?"
"Everything I've been able to find on NewAfrica's projects since they first started in business. I compiled it from brochures, notes of conversations I've had, and Freedom of Information Act stuff on projects the government was involved in." He dropped the envelope in Josh's lap.
"Why are you giving it to me?"
"I'm going to do a little digging while I'm in the States, and I thought maybe you could do the same here."
"I told you I'm not staying. I'm out of here in a couple weeks."
"Then you've got some time on your hands with nothing to do."
Josh didn't respond.
"What?"
"I think you've gone nuts, JB. Seriously."
"So what? If I'm wrong, you get a little vacation in the countryside before you go back to the world."
"You know, I'd actually like to. I'd like to prove once and for all that you're a paranoid schizophrenic and see that you get heavily medicated. But I'll be lucky to find my way back from the airport. How the hell would I track down a bunch of old agricultural projects out in the middle of nowhere?"
"Why don't you just ask Stephen Trent to take you on a tour?"
When Josh didn't answer, a smile spread across Flannary's face. "Because you think I might be right."
"No."
"So to review," Flannary said. "What you're concerned about is getting lost, getting kidnapped by rebels, getting sexually violated by baboons . . . that kind of thing."
Josh knew he was being set up, but after everything that had happened, everything he'd seen, it was hard not to have a little of Flannary's paranoia rub off on him.
"Yeah. I guess."
Flannary slapped the dash again. "Well, my boy, I think I have a satisfactory solution to those problems. In fact, I think I have a solution you're gonna fall in love with."
Chapter 24.
The satellite phone in Josh's pocket began to ring just as the soldier frisking him started up his left leg. Normally the fact that he was scared shitless would have prompted him to let the caller leave a message, but he hadn't been able to reach his sister in two days, and it was killing him. He took one of his hands off the Land Cruiser's scalding hood and dug the phone out.
The rifle butt to the kidneys he'd been expecting didn't materialize, and instead the soldier wandered off to start what would ultimately be a disappointing search of the Land Cruiser. It had been emptied of virtually everything of value at a similar military checkpoint two hours ago.
"Hello? Laura?"
"It's Stephen, Josh. I wanted to call and tell you I was sorry we couldn't talk when I was at the project. I know you must be concerned about what happened there, and I want to explain. Those weren't our crops Mtiti's government loaned them to us for the shoot. If we had the funds, we would have bought them and had them planted permanently. But the truth is that we don't right now."
"I understand," Josh said.
"Do you? Good. We're hoping the donations we get from the brochure we're putting together will give us the money to get your project going again."
Across the hood from him, Annika grabbed the hand of the soldier frisking her when it got a little too close to her left breast. She said something with a passive sternness that Josh recognized from the first three roadblocks they'd been through that day. It seemed like an impossible balancing act -- she had to be forceful enough for the man to take her seriously, but not so forceful as to make him angry. And, miraculously, she once again managed to create the illusion that they weren't completely defenseless.
"It's not my project anymore, Stephen. We --"
"I know, we still need to talk about your sister and about the possibility of you going home --"
"The possibility of me going home? You said --"
"Look, we're going to relocate some of the refugees you've been working with to one of our more successful projects. It has enough capacity to absorb them, and we can get them on the road to self-sufficiency. I'm knee-deep in that right now."
The soldier searching Annika tried to duck into the Land Cruiser's backseat, but she grabbed his sleeve and showed him the pictures and maps Flannary had collected.
"Which project?" Josh said, watching the soldier shrug and shake his head.
"What?"
"Which project are you sending them to?"
"It's in the northeast part of the country."
"Really?" Josh said. "I hear it's pretty up there. Maybe I should go check it out.
Where is it exactly?"
"I don't think it would be worth the trip -- we've got it under control. In the meantime, I need you to come back to the capital so we can get together. There are some things we need to talk about."
"I'm telling you that there aren't, Stephen. It's not that I don't appreciate the opportunity you've given me here, but it's not going to work out. For a lot of reasons."
"Humor me, then. Why don't you come up this afternoon? We'll have a drink and get everything out on the table."
Josh looked up the road and calculated how long it would take to make the drive. "That's kind of short notice. I don't think I can make it that fast."
"Why not?"
He was about to say "car trouble" but then realized that the phone he was talking on had a trackable GPS in it.
"I'm out in the countryside, Stephen. Like I said, I want to see some sights before I leave."
"Okay, when?"
"Give me a couple, days. No hurry, right? We've still got a few weeks before my flight."
"Fine. A couple days. But no longer. There are some things we need to resolve."
The line went dead, and Josh jammed the phone back in his pocket. The guard was starting to look a bit annoyed with Annika's interrogation, but their conversation seemed to be getting somewhere, so he just stood back and didn't interfere.
He should have guessed that she would be Flannary's solution to his reluctance to head off on this particular wild-goose chase. In truth, he'd probably have done it anyway there was definitely something wrong here, and he wanted to know what it was. Annika was a nice addition on a number of levels, though.
The soldier searching the vehicle slammed the back hatch and waved them on. They climbed in, and Josh accelerated up the dirt road while Annika shouted thanks through her open window.
"Did you get anything?"
"We seem to be going in the right direction, but he didn't know how far or where exactly."
Josh glanced in his rearview mirror at the soldiers settling into a narrow strip of shade. "How long did it take you to learn to do all t
his?"
"What?"
"Speak the language, handle those guys like that."
She thought about it for a moment. "I've been here almost seven years. Since I was nineteen."
Josh tried to wrap his mind around that amount of time, to imagine what it would be like to have spent more than a quarter of his life there. "What did your parents think of that?"
"Oh, the same thing you would imagine. My father was very angry."
"Really?"
"He thought it was too dangerous. And he believes that people have to help themselves. That this is the only path to improving your life."
Josh grinned. "For some reason, that's the exact attitude I would expect from an old Norwegian guy."
"Are you making fun of him?"
"Nope. It's the same principle my country was founded on. We've even got a phrase for it: pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps."
"Like you did. You grew up very poor, you went to jail. And now you have a good education and a good job. You did it without anyone's help."
"Who told you I went to jail?"
"JB's got a big mouth."
She shrugged. "Everyone makes mistakes. And everyone can be forgiven. What's important is that we're truly sorry and try to make things right."
He wasn't so sure. If there was a God, He clearly wasn't impressed by the Hagartys.
"You see, I'm different than you," Annika continued.
"Not an ex-con?"
"I was going to say that I grew up privileged. I lived in the small world that money could buy. Do you understand what I mean?"
He nodded.
"The price, though, is that you become a very tiny piece of a machine that works perfectly without you. I wanted more. I wanted to see what else there was in the world. I wanted to help people who weren't born like me. People who weren't born lucky."
The sun was moving toward the horizon, and Josh watched its progress as if it were a gas gauge hovering just above empty. "It's going to be dark soon."
Annika was reclining in her seat with her bare feet hanging out the window. "It's cooler to travel at night."
Her nonchalance wasn't as confidence-inspiring as it should have been. He couldn't figure out if it was the result of her belief that it was safe or if it was just the fatalism that permeated all things African.
She seemed to think they were on the right track, but as near as he could tell, they were just penetrating farther and farther into the middle of nowhere. The calendar rolled back with every mile, leaving behind everything the modern world had to offer electricity, machinery, modern clothing, and building materials.
The jagged, grassy buttes he was accustomed to had been replaced with endless jungle that swallowed nearly every trace of humanity. He hadn't realized how reassuring the intermittent villages and occasional animal-drawn carts were until they had disappeared.
"In some ways it's better in this part of the country," Annika said, seeming to read his mind. "By the time aid makes its way this far, most everything of value has been stolen by the government. So people rely on themselves and the culture they developed over thousands of years." She pointed to a distant figure moving along the side of the road ahead. He leaned forward and squinted, finally discerning the shape of a woman carrying an enormous jug on her head.
"Pull over. Let's see if she can help us."
Despite having witnessed similar conversations at least ten times that day, Josh sat transfixed by the way the woman immediately responded to the confidence and caring Annika exuded. It was hard not to wonder if he would have ended up a person like her if circumstances had been different. Probably not. But Laura could. She had it in her to do something worthwhile, and he was going to make goddamn sure that nothing got in her way.
The woman began nodding, the jar on her head teetering precariously. The scene continued to deviate from the script he'd become familiar with as the woman began giving what appeared to be detailed directions. Annika thanked her profusely before jogging excitedly back to the vehicle.
"We've got something."
"You're kidding."
"I swear. Go up about three kilometers and turn left."
"That's as far as we go."
The dirt track had been right where the woman said, but the farther they went along it, the deeper the ruts became and the more the jungle closed in. Annika threw open her door and stepped out into the gloom, taking a deep breath of the humid air before continuing on foot.
"This doesn't seem like a good idea to me," Josh said, jogging up next to her but keeping his attention focused on the foliage to either side. He imagined hundreds of pairs of eyes staring out at them. Waiting.
"What doesn't?"
"It's getting dark. Maybe we should come back later."
She threaded an arm through his and pulled him along. "Don't tell me you're afraid."
As much as he hated to admit it, he was.
"People say there are lions out here." He swatted a mosquito on his leg. "And I forgot to take my malaria pill this morning."
"If I lived in Norway, I'd be sitting in a tiny office dreaming about adventure," she said, apparently oblivious to the enormous felines that were undoubtedly tracking their every move. "What would you be doing?"
He glanced behind him. Nothing but deepening shadow. "I don't know."
"You don't know? Okay. What would you want to be doing?"
"I guess sitting in an office. Not a tiny one, though. A huge one with mahogany paneling and a really soft leather chair. And air conditioning. Lots of air conditioning."
"What would you be thinking about?"
"Probably the kind of private jet I was going to buy."
He'd expected a disapproving frown but didn't get it.
"A plane? Sure . . . a plane would be good. Where would it take you?"
"Dunno. I guess I never really thought that far ahead."
The bugs had found them, and she shook her head, using her long hair to shoo them from her face. "What good is a plane if you don't have anywhere you want to go?"
Despite her good-natured delivery, the question shook him a bit. In a single sentence, she'd made one of the main goals of his life seem like complete nonsense. How was it that it had never occurred to him that a plane wasn't an end? It was a means.
"Could we change the subject?"
"From money?"
"It seems more important if you've never had it."
"And that's how you Americans judge yourselves, isn't it? The more you have, the more valuable you are as a human being."
"I knew it."
"What?"
"You're a closet American hater."
"Oh, no. Definitely not. I love Americans. You're always thinking of something new and better. I just wonder when you're going to stop and enjoy those things you dream up."
They crested a hill, and she pointed, prompting him to slow and finally stop. The hill wasn't as elaborately carved as the one he'd been in charge of, but the terraces were still visible beneath the jungle reclaiming them.
Annika held up a color photo of the project from NewAfrica's brochure. He squinted at it in the failing light, trying to reconcile the image with what he saw in front of him. After a few moments, landmarks began to appear: a saw-toothed ridge to the east, a square depression where the tool shed had once sat.
"This is it," he said, focusing on the smiling faces of the people standing around Stephen Trent in the photo. After watching the presidential shoot at his own project, he saw that the crafting of the illusion was obvious. The angle, the focus, the workers' positions and expressions were all carefully designed to create a sense of progress that had never existed.
"Nothing's changed," Annika said.
"What do you mean?"
"Look at the state of the work in the picture."
She was right. It looked like the project had been abandoned the day after the photo had been taken.
Chapter 25.
"This the is so beautiful! And the water .. .
it's so hot!" Josh laid a pair of his pants on the bed along with a belt that would hopefully keep them from falling down around Annika's ankles.
It had been too late to take her back to her village, and he'd managed to convince her to stay the night at his place with the solemn promise that he'd return her first thing in the morning.
"I can't believe you have a pool here."
"It's more of a hole in the ground lined with plastic, but I'm glad you enjoyed it. They serve breakfast next to --"
The shower curtain rustled, and her face appeared around it. "They serve you breakfast?"
"It's nothing fancy," Josh said, squeezing some toothpaste onto his brush. "Just a little fruit and some cereal."
"I'm glad to see you sacrificing so much to help Africa."
It was hard not to be embarrassed by the way he lived. Despite everything that had happened to his project, to the people who were counting on him, he still had his pool, his breakfasts, and American Movie Night every Sunday.
She was enjoying herself too much to continue scolding him and instead nodded toward the shelf over the sink. "Is that shampoo?"
Josh held it out, and she snatched it, immediately disappearing again.
"It smells like apples! I love the smell of apples, don't you?"
He finished brushing his teeth and stood watching her vague shadow through the shower curtain. It was impossible not to.
"So what's next, Josh?"
"What do you mean?"
"JB's envelope had information on other projects. What if they're all like the one we saw today? We should try to find them."
"I thought you had to get back."
"I do. But this would just take another day or two. And it will give the women in the village something to gossip about. They feel so bad for me, you know."
"They feel bad for you?"
"Because I don't have a man and I'm so skinny and old, they figure I don't have much chance of getting one." She fell silent for a moment. "Oh, no. The water's getting cold and you haven't showered yet. Just let me get the soap out of my hair. I'll be out in a minute."
He chewed on his thumbnail, uncertain what to do. It was an opening that seemed almost too perfect to pass up.
"You don't have to get out. I mean, we could share."
