The Mission Song Page 14

  And I am one of the cowardly ones, but at this bare green table where I am sitting there is no hiding place. Wherever the Mwangaza dares go, I must go too, conscious of every word I render. Two minutes ago he was talking production figures. Now he is talking genocide, and once again he has his figures off pat: how many villages razed, how many inhabitants crucified or hacked to death, suspected witches burned, the gang rapes, the endless back-and-forth of East Congo's internecine slaughter fomented from outside while the international community bickers and I turn off the television if Penelope hasn't turned it off already. And the dying continues even as the Mwangaza speaks, and I render. With every month that passes, another thirty-eight thousand Congolese die from the ravages of these forgotten wars:

  “One thousand, two hundred deaths a day, my friends, including Saturdays and Sundays! That means today and tomorrow, and every day next week.”

  I glance at the faces of my delegates. They are hangdog. Perhaps it is they for once who are on autopilot and I am not. Who can tell what they are thinking, if they have consented to think at all? They are three more Africans seated at the roadside in the midday heat and nobody on earth, perhaps not they themselves, can fathom what is in their heads. But why is the Mwangaza telling us all this with time so short? Is it to beat us down? No. It is to embolden us.

  “Therefore we are entitled, my friends! We are twice, three times entitled! No other nation on earth has suffered such disasters as our beloved Kivu. No other nation is in such desperate need of rebirth! No other nation has a greater right to seize its wealth and lay it at the feet of its afflicted ones, and say: ‘This is not theirs any more. This, my poor people — nous miserables de Kivu! — is ours!’ ”

  His magisterial boom could have filled the Albert Hall, but the question in all our hearts is clear enough: if Kivu's wealth has fallen into the wrong hands, and the injustices of history entitle us to get it back, and Kinshasa is a broken reed, and everything from Kivu is exported eastwards anyway, what do we propose to do about it?

  “Take a close look, my friends, at our great nation's politicians and protectors, and what do you see? New policies? Oh yes — very new policies, you are right. Quite pristine, I would say. And new political parties to go with them, too. With very poetic names” — des noms tres poetiques. “There is so much new democracy in the whore-city of Kinshasa that I am afraid to walk down Boulevard 30 Juin in my old shoes these days!” cette ville de putains! “So many new political platforms going up, and built of the very best timber too, at your expense. So many beautifully printed, twenty-page manifestos that will bring us peace, money, medicine and universal education by midnight next week at the latest. So many anti-corruption laws that you can't help asking yourself who has been bribed to draft them all.”

  The laugh is led by the smooth-skinned Dolphin and the rugged Tabizi, and backed by Philip and Maxie. The Enlightener waits sternly while it fades. Where is he leading us? Does he know? With Pere Andre there was never an agenda. With the Mwangaza, though I am too slow to sense it, there has been agenda all the way.

  “But take a closer look, please, at these brand-new politicians of ours, my friends. Lift up the brims of their hats, please. Let a little good African sun into their hundred-thousand-dollar Mercedes limousines and tell me what you see. New faces full of optimism? Bright young graduates ready to offer up their careers in the service of our Republic? Oh no, my friends, you do not. You see the same old, old faces of the same old, old crooks!”

  What has Kinshasa ever achieved for Kivu? he demands to know. Answer, nothing. Where is the peace they preach, the prosperity, the harmony? Where is their inclusive love of country, neighbour, community? He has travelled all Kivu, north and south, and failed to find the smallest evidence of it. He has listened to the People's tales of woe: Yes, we want the Middle Path, Mwangaza! We pray for it! We sing for it! We dance for it! But how, oh how, will we obtain it? How indeed? He mimics their pitiful cry. I mimic the Mwangaza: “Who will defend us when our enemies send their troops against us, Mwangaza? You are a man of peace, Mwangaza! You are no longer the great warrior you used to be. Who will organise us and fight with us and teach us to be strong together?”

  Am I truly the last person in the room to realise that the answer to the People's prayer was lounging at the head of the table with his scuffed suede boots stuck out in front of him? Evidently I am, for the Mwangaza's next words jolt me out of my reverie so fast that Haj swings round and peers at me with his comedian's bubbly eyes.

  “No name, my friends?” the Mwangaza is yelling at us indignandy. “This strange Syndicate that has dragged us here today has no name? Oh, this is very bad! Where can they have put it? This is all very fishy and mysterious! Maybe we should put on our spectacles and help them look for it! Why on earth should honest folk conceal their names? What have they to hide? Why don't they come out with it straight and say who they are and what they want?”

  Start slow, Pere Andre. Start low and slow. You have a long way to rise. But the Mwangaza is an old hand.

  “Well now, my dear friends,” he confides, in a weary tone that makes you want to help him over the stile. “I have spoken to these no-name gentlemen long and hard, I want to tell you.” He points at Philip without turning to look at him. “Oh yes. We have had many tough talks together. From the going down of the sun and up again, I would say. Very tough talks indeed, and so they should be. Tell us what you want, Mwangaza, the no-names said to me. Tell it without adornment or evasion, please. And then we will tell you what we want. And from this we shall establish whether we can do business, or whether we shall shake hands and say sorry and goodbye, which is normal commercial discourse. So I replied to them in the same coin” absently fondling his gold slave collar, and thereby reminding us that he is not for sale — “ ‘Gentlemen, it is very well known what I want. Peace, prosperity and inclusiveness for all Kivu. Free elections, but only when stability is established. But peace, gentlemen, it is also well known, does not come of its own accord, and neither does freedom. Peace has enemies. Peace must be won by the sword. For peace to be a reality, we must coordinate our forces, repossess our mines and cities, drive out the foreigners and install an interim government of all Kivu that will lay down the foundations of a true, enduring, democratic welfare state. But how can we do that for ourselves, gentlemen? We are crippled by discord. Our neighbours are more powerful than we are, and more cunning.’ ”

  He is glowering at Franco and Dieudonne, willing them to draw closer to each other while he continues his commercial discourse with the no-name gentlemen.

  “ ‘For our cause to prevail, we need your organisation, gentlemen. We need your equipment and your expertise. Without them, the peace of my beloved Kivu will forever be an illusion.’ That is what I said to the no-names. Those were my words. And the no-names, they listened to me carefully, as you would suppose. And finally one speaks for all, and I must not tell you his name even today, but I assure you he is not in this room although he is a proven lover of our nation. And this is what he says. ‘What you propose is well and good, Mwangaza. We may be men of commerce, but we are not without souls. The risk is high, the cost also. If we support your cause, how can we be sure that at the end of the day we shall not go away with empty pockets and a bloody nose?’ And we on our side reply, ‘Those who join our great enterprise will join in its rewards.’ ”

  His voice drops even lower, but it can afford to. So does mine. I could whisper into my hand and they would hear me.

  “The Devil, we are told, has many names, my friends, and by now we Congolese know most of them. But this Syndicate has none. It is not called the Belgian Empire, or the Spanish Empire, or the Portuguese Empire, or the British Empire, or the French Empire, or the Dutch Empire, or the American Empire, or even the Chinese Empire. This Syndicate is called Nothing. It is Nothing Incorporated. No name means no flag. No name will help to make us rich and united, but it will not own us or our people. With no name, Kivu will for the first time o
wn itself. And when that day dawns, we shall go to the fatcats of Kinshasa and we shall say to them: ‘Good morning, fatcats. How are you today? You have all got hangovers as usual, I suppose!’ ”

  Not a laugh or a smile. He has us.

  “Well, fatcats, we have some good news for you. Kivu has freed itself of foreign invaders and exploiters. The good citizens of Bukavu and Goma have risen up against the oppressor and received us with open arms. The surrogate armies of Rwanda have fled and the genocidaires with them. Kivu has taken back its mines and put them into public ownership where they belong. Our means of production, distribution and supply are under one hat, and that is the hat of the people. We no longer export everything to the east. We have found alternative trade routes.

  “But we are also patriots and we believe in the unity of one Congolese Democratic Republic within the legal borders of our Constitution. So here are our terms, fatcats — one, two, three, you can take them or leave them! Because we are not coming to you, fatcats. You are coming to us!”

  He sits down and closes his eyes. Pere Andre used to do the same. It made the afterglow of his words last longer. My rendering complete, I permit myself a discreet poll of our delegates' reactions. Powerful speeches can bring resentment in their wake. The more an audience has been carried away, the harder it struggles to get back to shore. The fidgety Haj has ceased to fidget, contenting himself with a series of grimaces. The bone-thin Dieudonne has his fingertips pressed to his brow in distracted meditation. Beads of sweat have formed at the fringes of his beard. Old Franco next to him is consulting something on his lap, I suspect a fetish.

  Philip breaks the spell. “Well now, who will do us the honour of speaking first?” A meaningful glance at the post-office clock, because time is after all short.

  All eyes on Franco, our senior member. He scowls at his great hands. He lifts his head.

  “When Mobutu's power failed, the soldiers of the Mai Mai stood in the breach with pangas, arrows and lances to protect our blessed territory,” he asserts in slow Swahili. He glares round the table lest anyone should presume to challenge him. No one does. He continues, “The Mai Mai has seen what has been. Now we shall see what comes. God will protect us.”

  Next in class order comes Dieudonne.

  “For the Banyamulenge to remain alive, we must be federalists,” he declares, speaking straight at his neighbour Franco. “When you take our cattle, we die. When you kill our sheep, we die. When you take our women, we die. When you take our land, we die. Why can we not own the highlands where we live and toil and pray? Why can we not have our own chieftaincies? Why must our lives be administered by the chieftaincies of distant tribes who deny us our status and keep us captive to their will?” He turns to the Mwangaza. “The Banyamulenge believe in peace as much as you do. But we will never renounce our land.”

  The Mwangaza's eyes remain closed while the sleek-faced Dolphin fields the implied question.

  “The Mwangaza is also a federalist,” he says softly. “The Mwangaza does not insist on integration. Under his proposed Constitution, the rights of the Banyamulenge people to their lands and chieftaincies will be recognised.”

  “And the Mulenge highlands will be declared a territory?”

  “They will.”

  “In the past, Kinshasa has refused to give us this just law.”

  “The Mwangaza is not of the past, but of the future. You will have your just law,” the astute Dolphin replies: at which old Franco emits what sounds like a snort of derision, but perhaps he is clearing his throat. In the same moment, Haj jerks himself bolt upright like a jack-in-the-box and rakes the table with his wild, exophthalmic gaze:

  “So it's a coup, right?” he demands, in the shrill, hectoring French of a Parisian sophisticate. “Peace, prosperity, inclusiveness. But when you strip away the bullshit, we're grabbing power. Bukavu today, Goma tomorrow, Rwandans out, screw the UN, and Kinshasa can kiss our arses.”

  A covert glance round the table confirms my suspicion that our conference is suffering from culture shock. It is as if the church elders had been sitting in solemn conclave when this urban heretic barges in from the street and demands to know what they're yacking about.

  “I mean do we need all this?” Haj demands, dramatically spreading his open palms. “Goma has its problems, ask my dad. Goma's got the goods, the Rwandans have got the money and the muscle. Tough. But Bukavu isn't Goma. Ever since the soldiers mutinied last year, our Rwandans have kept their heads down in Bukavu. And our town's administrators hate the Rwandans worse than anybody.” He flings out his hands, palms upward, in a Gallic gesture of disengagement. “Just asking, that's all.”

  But Haj is not asking the Mwangaza, he's asking me. His bubbly gaze may tour the table or settle respectfully on the great man, but no sooner do I begin to render him than it shoots back to me, and stays on me after the last echo of my voice has died in my ears. I'm expecting the Mwangaza to take up the challenge, or failing him, the Dolphin. But once more it's my saviour Philip who sidles in from the wings and gets them off the hook.

  “That's today, Haj,” he explains, with the tolerance of his years. “It's not yesterday. And if history is anything to go by, it won't be tomorrow, will it? Must the Middle Path wait for post-electoral chaos and the next Rwandan incursion before creating the conditions for a strong and lasting peace? Or does the Mwangaza do better to pick his time and place, which is your respected father's view?”

  Haj shrugs, stretches out his arms, grins, shakes his head in disbelief. Philip grants him a moment to speak, but the moment is scarcely up before he lifts the handbell and gives it a little shake, announcing a brief recess while our delegates consider their positions.

  4

  It is frankly a conundrum to me, observing these events from where I sit today, that as I followed Bridget down the stairs and back onto the pavement of South Audley Street, attired as I was in the garb of a secondary-school master up from the country, and with nothing to attach me to the world except a bunch of bogus business cards and the assurance that I was about to endure unfamiliar perils, I should have counted myself the most blessed fellow in London that night, if not the whole of England, the most intrepid patriot and secret servant, but such was indeed the case.

  Fram is the name of the boat designed by the famous Norwegian explorer Nansen, a top member of Brother Michael's pantheon of men of action. Fram in the Norwegian language means onwards, and Fram was what inspired my dear late father to ride his heretic's bicycle across the Pyrenees. And Fram willy-nilly had been my mood ever since I had received what Brother Michael in a different context had dubbed the Great Call. Onwards while I gathered my fortitude for the decision that lay ahead of me, Onwards while I earned my wings in my country's silent war versus ruffians in the flesh, Onwards, and away from Penelope who had long been a stranger to me, Onwards while I mapped out my shining white path back to life with Hannah. Onwards, finally, to my mysterious new master, Maxie, and the even more mysterious consultant, Philip.

  Given the extreme urgency of the operation and its importance, I expected to find Fred our white driver keenly revving his Mondeo at the kerbside, but what with a police cordon at Marble Arch and the traffic jams, Bridget assured me it was quicker to walk.

  “You don't mind, do you, Salv?” she asked, taking a firm grip on my arm, either because she was thinking I might make a run for it, which could not have been further from my mind, or because she was one of the touchy-feely brigade who pat your cheek and roll the palm of their hand around your back and you never know, or I don't, whether they're distributing the milk of human kindness or inviting you to bed.

  “Mind?” I echoed. “It's a glorious evening! I couldn't borrow your phone a moment, could I? Penelope may not be picking up her messages.”

  “Sorry, darling. Against the regs, I'm afraid.”

  Did I know where we were headed? Did I ask? I did not. The life of a secret agent is nothing if not a journey into the unknown, the life of a secret lover no l
ess so. Off we strode with Bridget setting the pace and me with my second-hand shoes hacking at my ankle bones. In the evening sunlight my spirits rose further, assisted perhaps unconsciously by Bridget, who had hoisted my right forearm so high against her that it was nestling under her left breast, which by the feel of its under-curve was self-supporting. When Hannah has lit your lamp for you, it's natural to see other women in its rays.

  “You really love her, don't you?” she marvelled as she steered me through a bunch of Friday-night merrymakers. “So many married couples I know, they just bitch at each other. It pisses me off. But you and Penelope aren't like that, are you? It must be great.”

  Her ear was six inches from my mouth and she was wearing a scent called Je Reviens, which is the weapon of choice of Penelope's younger sister Gail. Gail, apple of her father's eye, had married a car-park owner from the lower branches of the aristocracy. Penelope, by way of retaliation, had married me. Yet even today it would take a board of top Jesuits to explain what I did next.

  For why does a newly anointed adulterer, who hours earlier has abandoned himself body, soul and origins to another woman for the first time in his five-year marriage, feel an irresistible urge to put his deceived wife on a pedestal? Is he trying to re-create the image of her that he has defiled? Is he re-creating the image of himself before he fell? Was my ever-present Catholic guilt catching up with me in the midst of my euphoria? Was praising Penelope to the skies the nearest I could get to praising Hannah without blowing my cover?

  It had been my firm intention to draw Bridget out regarding my new employers, and by means of artful questions learn more about the composition of the anonymous Syndicate and its relationship with the many secret organs of the British State that toil night and day for our protection, far removed from the sight of your average punter's eye. Yet as we threaded our way through near-stationary traffic I embarked upon a full-throated aria to my wife Penelope that proclaimed her the most attractive, exciting, sophisticated and faithful partner a top interpreter and secret soldier of the Crown could have, plus a brilliant journalist combining hard-nosed with compassionate, and this fantastic cook — which anyone would know verged upon the fanciful, seeing who did the cooking. Not everything that I said was totally positive, it couldn't be. If you're talking in the rush-hour to another woman about your wife, you can't help opening up a bit about her negative aspects or you wouldn't have an audience.