My second girazi came to me because of rain.
It was our fourth day in the military camp and there was still no sign of my father. I knew he would not leave me here. He had plenty of money to buy my freedom from the soldiers. I had to believe that he had escaped when the soldiers attacked the mine and that he was not buried in a mass grave, that he was safe with Grace and working out a way of getting me out of the military camp.
Everything here had become very confusing. First, Commander Jesus said that we could not return to the mines, but then three days later he changed his mind. Now he said we should work together, soldiers and miners, for the good of Zimbabwe. If a ngoda or girazi was found by a miner, he would receive payment from the army paymaster. I didn’t understand what was going on any better than the adults when they heard Commander Jesus’s change of heart.
“You need not run away from us anymore,” he had said, addressing the hundred captured miners. “Tell us how and where to find diamonds and we will share whatever you find.”
First we had worked for the Banda syndicate and now we would be working for the army. Their words were hard to believe until they gave us plates of sadza and gravy, and handed out bottles of water and boxes of medical supplies. We ate their food, patched up our wounds, and stared blankly at our new masters. Mostly, we were still in shock at what Commander Jesus had done to us. One moment we were being fired on by helicopters, beaten by soldiers; the next we were in some weird partnership with him. Uncle James never gave his miners food or medicine, but then Uncle James never kept his miners prisoners in a camp.
“We are here to discuss a business proposition with you,” Commander Jesus said to us the following day, in the manner of a reasonable manager. The miners glanced uneasily at one another, bewildered by his new approach. “We want the names of diamond dealers. We know about the dealers at the Dairy Den, and those men who come from Mutare wanting to buy the diamonds you find. We want their names.”
I had a bad feeling about his business proposition. I would never betray Boubacar or the Baron to Commander Jesus.
“If you give me a name I’ll pay you with more food and money.” With a smile as taut as razor wire, he added, “And now we will sing a Chimurenga song.”
Commander Jesus started singing and his powerful voice stirred some of the miners seated before him to join in. Others stared in stunned silence as he sang, but when the soldiers moved threateningly toward them, they quickly started singing too. Soon we all sang the old liberation song as loudly as we could.
Mothers, don’t be afraid to send your sons to war.
Keep disillusion at bay, keep fighting to have your say.
These are the ways of good revolutionary soldiers;
Don’t take riches from the masses, return them to the rightful owners.
Hide in the mountains to free Zimbabwe!
When the song ended, I felt strangely rejuvenated. I noticed that some of the other miners were even smiling, as if they had forgotten where they were and what they had been put through. Commander Jesus clapped his hands, slow and steady, exactly four times.
“Excellent. We shall sing every night after our work. It is good for the spirit,” he announced, nodding approvingly. “Now, you boy miners, come here, all of you. I want to speak to you. Alone,” he said, dismissing the rest, who by this time had learned to break ranks swiftly.
At first, none of us dared move. Kamba glanced over to where I was sitting. I could see he didn’t want to get up. Chipo sat next to him, keeping her arms tightly folded across her chest.
“Come. Don’t be frightened. I won’t hurt you,” Commander Jesus said, with the warmth of a favorite uncle, but I still felt the menace radiating from his mirrored sunglasses. A few boys stood and moved forward; more followed. I woke up Arves and helped him to his feet. I hoped that if Commander Jesus saw how ill he was, he might allow him to go home.
“What does the Big Cheese want from us kids?” asked Arves weakly, coughing, as he stumbled toward Commander Jesus. “He’s the devil, Patson, you watch out for the man with no eyes.”
“Can you keep your big mouth shut for once, Arves?” I whispered, squeezing his arm tightly. He flinched in pain. I had forgotten how thin he was.
Kamba slipped in front of Chipo, blocking her from Commander Jesus’s view. He was still trembling, but that was a brave thing for him to do. Chipo, meanwhile, hung at the back of the boys, her head still down. None of us could bear to think what was in store for her if even one soldier saw she was a girl.
“So, you are the boy miners of Marange,” said Commander Jesus. Up close he was cleanly shaven and every feature of his face was hard and angular. There was something hypnotic about the glint coming off his sunglasses. I couldn’t keep my eyes off the image of us in their reflection: a ragged group of mud-splattered boys, staring stupidly up at him. “James Banda says your hands and eyes are quicker than that of any man on this mine. Would you like to work for me? I will teach you boys about the meaning of community service and give you lessons in patriotism. Bring them more food,” he ordered the soldiers. Then, as he leaned toward us again, his voice became low and smooth. “You will now be my eyes and ears on Mai Mujuru. If you bring me stones, I will give you lots and lots of money. You can also help me in other ways. People shouldn’t steal from the state. It’s not only dishonest, it’s unpatriotic. If you tell me who takes what does not belong to them, I will give you even more money. Do we understand each other?”
We listened to him intently; a few heads nodded.
“Arsehole,” said Arves and for a moment I thought Commander Jesus had heard him. He jerked his head up—a black snake came to mind—and his head swiveled in our direction.
“You at the back, what’s your name?” he asked.
The boys all turned around.
“Me?” I squeaked.
“Yes, you.”
“Patson,” I said.
“Did you say something, Patson?”
“No, sir, nothing, sir.”
“What’s wrong with that boy next to you?”
“I got diarrhea since I started eating your shitty food,” said Arves loudly enough for all to hear. There were a few gasps before everyone turned back to Commander Jesus to see his reaction.
Commander Jesus choked three short coughs, but actually he was laughing. “Give that boy some Imodium,” he ordered, and one of the soldiers tossed a box in my direction. It fell at my feet but I didn’t pick it up.
Still smiling, he said, “I will look after you boys, if you look after me. Commander Jesus does not hurt children. You are our country’s future.”
I felt his gaze lock directly on me and I realized, no matter what he said, my situation was now worse than ever before.
Commander Jesus knew who I was.
The following day all the miners were ordered to return to work in the pits, but nobody was allowed to leave the camp. The soldiers patrolled the perimeter of the fence and walked through the mines, their rifles slung low over their backs, watching us silently. I noticed several pairs of soldiers working in the field beyond the fence. They appeared to be digging holes and covering them with sand. They would never find diamonds by digging such shallow holes. No wonder Commander Jesus wanted us to keep working the mines; the soldiers were useless at diamond mining. We worked harder than usual, with no breaks, no talking, only the lifting of heavy ore sacks and the back-breaking work of sieving, sieving, and more sieving.
At the end of the day we returned to the tents, but before we got our food all the boys had to report to Commander Jesus. He asked each of us what we had seen, who had found ngodas, and where we had worked. Once he was satisfied with our answers we were separated from the older miners and given the same food that was cooked and served to the soldiers. A pile of sadza with a meat stew and vegetables. The food was good and it didn’t take us long to clean our plates.
Arves was feeling a little better but still couldn’t work a full day. He was now five days wit
hout his medication and although he didn’t say anything I knew his situation was serious. His face remained gray; dark rings grew under his eyes and he could barely lift even a half-full sieve.
The helicopters had not returned and the sky remained empty, except for the large black clouds that rolled over the faraway Bvumba Mountains, gathering strength above Marange. Each day had been marked by rounds of gunshots from the nearby hills. None of the miners looked up from their work anymore; gunshots had become routine. I overheard men speaking about it late at night: The soldiers were hunting down more miners, capturing them to work the fields, and killing those who tried to escape.
“We came to Chiadzwa Dam and there were bodies everywhere,” one man said quietly, his voice dark with sadness. “The soldiers made us dig a grave and bury the bodies. We put seventy-two people into that one hole.”
“Do you know who they were?” asked another. “I am missing my brother’s son.”
“I did not know any of them,” he replied, and spoke about the military camps, similar to this one, that had been set up at PaMbada and how the diamond fields of Mafukose Munda had been closed down. The Mafukose eye had even been filled to cover the bodies of the people who died there on the first day the soldiers came. And there was talk of a torture camp up behind the hills for all those who refused to support President Mugabe. The men listening only shook their heads and none of them talked about running away.
Every day I worked at the far end of the mine, where I had a clear view of the entrance. I knew my father would come for me. I would not allow myself to think that anything bad had happened to him, but at night, when the camp was quiet and I lay on my back looking up at the canvas, I wanted to weep for my lost father. In the morning, however, I would wake up with the reassuring thought that he was too clever to be shot by soldiers. Somehow he would have escaped. He had to be alive.
Chipo and Kamba were planning how they would escape from the camp, but I had to stay and wait for my father. Also, I was worried about Arves; his spark had been stubbed out. He slept most of the day, complaining of stomach cramps. The blisters on his tongue made it difficult for him to eat and he grew weaker every day. I promised that I would get him his medication as soon as possible. But in the meantime, if Chipo and Kamba did escape, I couldn’t leave Arves alone in the camp.
“It looks like it might rain this afternoon,” Chipo whispered to me as we worked close to one another in the shallow water. “Kamba and I are going tonight.”
“They won’t waste their bullets on kids trying to escape,” said Kamba in a low voice. “And if it does rain, that will only help us.”
Chipo nodded. “It’s too dangerous for me here, Patson,” she said. “I’ve seen the soldiers looking at me. I’ve got to get out of here before it’s too late.”
“I hate it here,” murmured Kamba. “Living in my boring village in the mountains doesn’t seem such a bad idea anymore.”
“I want to go with you, but I have to come back,” I said. “I need to see if Grace and my father are all right at the sheds. I also have to get Arves’s medication from his grandmother at the school. He’s getting sicker every day.”
It was decided. Later that night we would slip under the razor wire behind the long-drop toilets. I hoped Kamba was right about the soldiers not worrying about kids escaping. There was no way to know what Commander Jesus would do if we were caught. So, for better or worse, we were all agreed. Tonight.
We returned to our work, the soldiers silently watching us, patrolling every corner of the mine. Their heavy boots and automatic rifles always close by; oppressive and threatening. As often as we dared, we looked up at the darkening sky as the clouds gathered, promising rain. Another truck arrived in the afternoon and off-loaded more men but my father was not among them. Everyone stopped working to stare at the familiar figure stumbling off the back of the truck. There, standing in the dirt, was the disheveled Prophet Ubert Angel and some of his followers still in their white robes. They were shunted through the main gates, handed mining tools, and set to work in one of the troughs close by the Banda men. Uncle James hardly greeted the prophet. He and Musi now seemed no different from any of the other miners—beaten, muddy, and exhausted.
Then the gray sky was shot open by bolts of lightning and the hills reverberated with claps of thunder that always came at this season. Rain fell in blinding sheets, and one by one the soldiers sought shelter under the tents. A few miners threw down their tools, but when rifles were pointed at them, they returned to their work.
The roar of the rainfall was deafening; air turned into water. I lifted my face to the stinging downpour, cupped my hands before my mouth, and drank from heaven’s water. I had just finished sifting a bag of ore and laid my sieve down to fill it again, when I noticed a black rock sticking out from the riverbank. I picked up a shovel and started digging. The force of the rain had loosened the earth around it, but before I could grab it, the rock fell with a large plop into the water puddling at my feet. I groped blindly for it beneath the water, lifted it up, and, as I did so, a piece of it fell away into my hand as the rest of it slipped back into the water.
A girazi lay in the palm of my hand.
It was the size of a dove’s egg and, unlike my first girazi, this one was smooth and clear. I plunged my tightened fist back underwater, while my brain raced back to what Arves had told me when I first came to the mines. What good had I done in my life that two girazis should come to me? In what way did I deserve them, or was finding them pure chance? I had been cleansed by Prophet Ubert Angel, who now worked knee-high in the mud, but then so had so many other miners. I couldn’t work out what it meant, but I knew I had to get my girazi off the mine to a safer place.
Despite the heavy rain, I made the pretense of splashing my face with water—it made no sense to anyone watching, but it gave me the excuse I needed. Then I wiped my muddy hands on my pants and slid the rain-stone into my pocket. It was raining so hard it was unlikely anyone could have seen what I did. The stone’s hardness against my thigh felt good and I carried on working, my mind spinning. My anger-stone was bigger than this rain-stone, but this one was as clear as the rainwater that delivered it. A true girazi. The diamond must be at least eighteen carats. I imagined Farouk Abdullah staring at its multifacets for hours through his loupe. How much would he give me for this stone?
The rain poured down for the remainder of the day, presenting me with the perfect opportunity to get the diamond off the field. As we finished our shift we entered the tented area soaked and shivering, desperate to get warm and dry. In the rush to get under cover the soldiers weren’t searching everyone as carefully as they normally did. It was easy to slip into the crush of adults heading straight for the hot food. I was careful to lose myself in the crowd, as standing anywhere alone meant someone would surely see the lump in my pocket. But everyone was exhausted, too wet and hungry to pay much attention to anyone else.
Once I finished eating, I ran back out through the rain to the long-drop toilet. I slipped my pants down to my ankles, retrieved the rain-stone, pulled the plug out of the sole of my running shoe, and worked the stone into the secret cavity. My two girazis fit snugly together, like the first had been waiting for its mate. I returned to the tents, feeling Arves’s eyes on me as I took up my place in the line for an extra helping of food.
After the singing, everyone settled down for the night, and I lay on my back listening to raindrops falling on the canvas, waiting for the signal from Kamba and Chipo, and dreaming about all the things I could buy with the diamonds in the sole of my shoe.
“You shouldn’t come back,” whispered Arves, lying next to me. “There’s no reason to come back to the camp. You should run as far away from this place as you can. Bad things are going to happen here, I can feel it.” Then, almost as if an afterthought, he pitched his voice low, looked me straight in the eyes, and said, “You’ve found your girazi, haven’t you, Patson?”
I rolled over on my elbow, wondering how
he knew. “Arves, I’m going to get your meds, check in on Grace, and see if my father is at the sheds,” I replied. “But no matter what happens, I will come back. I’m not leaving you here.”
“You’ve found one. I know you have.”
This time I couldn’t avoid answering him.
I nodded.
“How big?”
I showed him my thumb and he whistled softly. “You’re set for the good times, Patson.”
“We can share it, Arves,” I said.
He smiled the sort of weak smile a condemned man offers his hangman. “I won’t be around long enough to be driving any sports cars, Patson. I’ll leave living the high life to you. The doctors at the clinic in Mutare said a long time ago that I was a walking miracle, but that doesn’t make me feel any better.”
I could have said a hundred things to Arves—about staying hopeful and being positive; about praying to God, eating the right food, making an offering to his ancestors—but it would have all sounded so hollow. I knew what having full-blown HIV/AIDS meant. If Arves was so honest about his own condition, how could I not be too?
“That’s not going to happen tomorrow, Arves, nor next month or even next year, so we have plenty of time to spend a whole lot of money,” I said.
He shrugged. “I suppose if I had my own girazi I’d give it to the doctors at the clinic. I miss them,” he said. “If only you can get it out of here. What’s your plan?”
“Not sure yet.”
Then Arves spoke in a way that crushed my heart. “You know, Patson, your father has been gone for a week now and what everyone is saying—”
“I heard, Arves.”
“About the mass graves. So many people were killed that first day.”
“He’s alive,” I said, louder than I meant to, afraid at how huge my cave of doubt had grown. I couldn’t think that my father was dead. He had to be alive, and by saying it aloud, it made it real somehow. “I know he is alive, Arves, I just know it. He’s with Grace.”
“I’m just saying. We all heard what the soldiers did out there.”
Diamond Boy Page 14
