Bingo's Run (11 page)

If Room 349 at the Livingstone was heaven, the Tate Suite was the book from which heaven was ripped, and Mrs. Steele was heaven's queen. Her hair hung loose to her shoulders. She wore a brown African-print dress, a gold chain, and leather sandals. It looked as if everything came from the Maasai Market, though I was sure she had paid tourist price. The room smelled of her perfume. If smells can be opposites, her perfume smelled the opposite of Kibera. We went down to the same place where we'd had lunch. This time the green tables were covered with white cloth and there were fewer people. Five o'clock was early for dinner in Nairobi.

“I'll have a Bloody Mary,” Mrs. Steele told the waitress, and then she turned to me. “Bingo, what would you like?”

I said to the waitress, “Give me a Blood Mary, ya.”

Mrs. Steele laughed. “He'll have a Blood Mary, but hold the vodka.”

The girl looked confused. “But, ma'am,” she said, “a Bloody Mary without vodka is—”

Mrs. Steele interrupted. “I know,” she said. “A Virgin Mary.”

I enjoyed the comedy. I had probably been in more bars than Mrs. Steele and knew what a Bloody Mary was, with or without vodka. “Just bring me a Tusker,” I said. The waitress left, and I was alone with Mrs. Steele.

Mrs. Steele pretended to read the menu. I did, too, but when the blanket of silence became too heavy I asked Mrs. Steele, “Why you do this?”

She knew what I meant, but she asked, “What do you mean?”

“I mean, you come to St. Michael's, pay monay, and take me to America.”

She sighed, but before she could speak the drinks arrived. She lifted her glass and I lifted the cold bottle. “
L'chayim
,” she said. I did not understand. “That's Jewish for ‘long life,' ” she explained.

I looked at her. “Jewish?”

She laughed. “No, I'm Catholic, like Father Matthew. But everyone in America says
l'chayim
. It's complicated,” she added.

How can anyone make drinking complicated? I replied, “
Rathima andu atene
.”

We tortured each other's drink words, laughed, and drank. Her eyes were lighter than they were at lunch. “Colette,” I said slowly, “why you'z wan' me in America?”

Mrs. Steele sipped before she spoke. “Bingo, it's complicated,” she finally said. I wondered if everything was complicated with Mrs. Steele. She went on, “It is several things. First, while I was married, Mr. Steele never wanted to have a child in the house. Children are not his thing.” She paused and said something in her head. The green of her eyes turned darker, as if she had walked
from a sunny field into a night forest. She waved her hand like a traffic policeman saying, “Move on.” “But, really, it was when I went to a fund-raiser in Chicago and heard Father Matthew speak that I realized I could do so much by helping one child. If so many kids need homes, I could make it one less. Imagine if everyone did that. There would not be any children left alone.”

I thought, also, there would not be any Mrs. Steeles left alone.

But Mrs. Steele was not finished. “Lastly,” she said, her bright green eyes flashing, “I met you.”

I sputtered on the beer and swallowed hard. “I'z glad,” I said back.

Mrs. Steele leaned across the small table and kissed me on the cheek. Her lips were cold and tight. They were different from Deborah's. She laughed. “Here,” she said, and wiped her lipstick off my cheek with her napkin.

The next few hours were filled with starts, fits, tumbles, hesitations, misunderstandings, deceptions (by both of us), and long silences. Mrs. Steele learned that I could read and write. I told her about the School of Benevolent Innocence I went to when I was little. Mrs. Steele said, “So what do you think American school will be like?” I had seen a porn film set in an American school where the students and teachers were naked all the time, but I knew that could not be completely real. In a TV program I had seen about American high school, all the pupils sang, smiled, and danced all day. American school was different from the school in Kibera. American school looked more fun, without too much time wasted on learning. “Good,” I said.

Pause. We both pretended to study our menus.

“Bingo, after all of those terrible killings you told me about when I met you at the orphanage, do you have any other family?”

I told her that I had no one.

She asked, “How about friends? What do you do for fun?”

I told her that my friend was called George, that I liked soup, beer, and hookers, and that in America I wanted to be rich, have a Ford FISO, and to be an art dealer. “Like you,” I said.

She asked me about St. Michael's. All I said was “It waz good.” I did not tell Mrs. Steele about Sadist Sister Margaret or Father Matthew's special confirmation classes. I did not tell her about Father Matthew's business or about the four million dollars he had in his small yellow notebook.

Then I asked her what I wanted to know. “Colette, why'z you so rich?”

Mrs. Steele laughed and sipped her Bloody Mary. “Well, actually it is Mr. Steele who is the super-rich one. He's a major art dealer in America. He has two galleries in Memphis, a large gallery in Manhattan, and a half share of a major gallery in Los Angeles.” Her eyes darkened. “I personally only own two small galleries in Chicago, where I live, but that's only been recently. Mainly, I am an appraiser.”

“What's that?” I asked.

“I work out whether paintings are real and help figure out how much money they're worth.”

“How much one of tha paintin's cost?”

She said, “Well, Bingo, it mainly depends on who the artist is.”

“What's tha most monay for a paintin' eva?”

She smiled. “Well, last month I sold a Braque for two million and a Chagall oil for four million. A few years ago, before money was tight, we sold a Blue Picasso for ten million.”

I almost choked. “Dollar?”

She nodded. “Yes, Bingo, dollars.”

“Fook.”

Her perfectly painted eyebrows frowned for a breath. She leaned forward. “Bingo, what is incredible is that I can sell a canvas by a famous name for a million dollars and, frankly, the work
is trash. Just because a famous artist paints a piece does not make it great art. Just like people, art can be masked in layers of nonsense. Anyone can wear fancy clothes, but it tells you nothing of true worth. Bingo, just like a person lies, so can art.”

She sounded like a preacher and Art was her religion. To me, a million dollars was a million dollars.

I said, “How much a Thomas Hunsa worth?”

Mrs. Steele laughed. That annoyed me. “I am sorry, Bingo,” she said. “I've never heard of him.”

“Thomas Hunsa is a big artis'. He tha Masta,” I said. “He used to sell to tourists. He don' sell no more when tha bastard American dealas scam him.”

I caught myself—I had not meant to insult Mrs. Steele. But she smiled. “Bingo, that is not how I operate. Not all Americans are out to rip people off.”

We drank and I thought about how Mrs. Steele sold rubbish art for a million dollars.

In the end, we drank enough so that words did not matter. Mrs. Steele was an excellent drinker; we had four more rounds of Bloody Marys and Tuskers. It was good, just her and me. She asked me more about Kibera and life there. I told her about how people gang together and help each other out. I told her about how people share, and that the people are proud. I told her that people in Kibera are good.

I did not tell her about the stabbings, knifings, and shootings—sometimes just for an old television. I did not tell her about the beatings, burnings, and rapes. I did not tell her that there are no toilets, tablecloths, napkins, or towels. I did not tell her that Wolf was my boss, Dog a psycho-killer, and that Slo-George was a fat retard. I did not tell her that for fun I threw stones at a lunatic who lived on top of a pile of garbage. I did not tell her that the runs I did were white; I told her that I was on the Kibera Athletic
Team. I did not tell her that I ended up at St. Michael's because I saw Boss Jonni and two hookers get killed by Wolf. I did not tell her that I had stolen Boss Jonni's businessman case full of money, and I did not tell her where I'd hidden it. I did not tell her any of this, because it did not help me.

Mrs. Steele asked me about Mama, but I did not want to talk about that. It was like when I asked Mrs. Steele about Mr. Steele. “Not now” was how that conversation ended.

I liked being with Mrs. Steele. At 7:00
P.M
. we ordered chicken. “Bingo,” she said, “eat up. You look thin.”

In the lift, Mrs. Steele touched my shoulder. Her straight eyebrows softened. “Bingo, I did not mean to be rude about your artist, Thomas Hunsa. I am sure he is gifted. The trouble is that without seeing one of the paintings I cannot tell you what I think.”

A trinket is a trinket. A million dollars is a million dollars. Everything is masks; the inside is hidden. If rubbish is worth one million, a Hunsa is worth ten million.

After Mrs. Steele delivered me to my room, I waited thirty-two minutes, until the TV clock read 8:30. Then I ran down the Emergency Exit stairs and out a back door of the hotel, by the kitchen. The night air was cool and smelled of gasoline and food. Hotel boys in red jackets stood around smoking. Across the alleyway, the woman from the antiques shop sat on her crate forging papers. The fact that she worked so late meant the shop workers made a lot of antiques. I took the 16B matatu to Hastings; in my pocket were the three bags of white I had taken from the cutout hole inside my St. Michael's Bible.

When I got to Hastings, the drink hut and the hairdresser-brothel were open. A man stood outside trying to decide: here or there. I walked down Salome Road toward Thomas Hunsa's house. As usual, children sat outside the house slapping paint onto anything they could find. I wondered who would bring Hunsa's white to him now that I was going to America. “Jambo, Masta,” I called as I entered his house. The room smelled familiar; the paint mixed with piss, dirt, and rot softened my thinking. The Masta was looking through his paintings when I walked in.
To Hunsa, each painting was one of his children. But a million dollars is a million dollars. I needed to adopt.

When Hunsa looked at me, I could see that his mind was mixed up.

I said, “Masta. It's da meejit. How's ya doin' ya?”

I grew real inside his head. “What's ya wan'?” he asked.

“I'z here for ma special white delivery,” I said. It was Wednesday, the day before my usual day, but I knew Hunsa had no idea. Time to Hunsa was like the color of a car before it explodes—not that important.

I took out of my pocket the three small plastic bags of white and threw them onto the floor. The bags landed between his bare feet, and I saw that each of his toenails was coiled like a snail shell. He looked down, and then at me, and grinned. He was ready for business.

“Masta,” I said. “I'z a deal for you'z. I give ya all tha' white in tha three bags for one paintin'? Masta, have I got a deal, ya?” My words hung above his head.

Then Hunsa spoke. “I use to sell ma paintin'.” His eyes lost focus and then shut. He spoke into his own dark, “But tha fookin' dealas—they rip me off an' I sell no one no mores.”

I pushed the deal into his head. “Hunsa, do we have a deal, ya? All tha' white in tha
three
bags for
one
paintin'. That a good deal, ya?” I could have just lipped a painting, but that is not honest; besides, I needed him friendly.

The artist's gaze flicked across me like a flame. He looked up at the ceiling as though an answer was written there, bent his toes, and said, “Okay. Deal, ya.”

I picked up the plastic bags from between his feet and emptied the white onto the bronze dish balanced on the arm of his orange armchair. He sat down and looked up at me like a dumb goat. I
pushed his finger onto the side of his nose. With the other hand, I pushed his head down. His thick, long, matted hair fell forward. A grin cracked his lips. He inhaled it all in one breath.

I felt drunk and sick from the fumes in the house. I grabbed a small painting, left the artist's house, and ran to the matatu stop.

I got back to the hotel at 10:00
P.M
. and went straight to Mrs.

Steele's room. There was a cleaner's cart outside. I knocked on the door and Mrs. Steele opened it. She wore a light pink gown. “Bingo, come in,” she said. From the main room I could see a cleaning girl in the bedroom making the bed. She folded the sheets and smoothed them flat with her hand. She had an excellent behind. I held up the painting. “Look it!” I said.

When Mrs. Steele saw the painting, she gasped.

The painting I had bought from the Masta went just up to my hip. It showed Hunsa standing on a red turtle, legs apart, his arms out like Jesus. A woman's head, her skin darker brown than his, looked over his shoulder. Her hair was braided, and from the braids grew leaves. The woman's arms hung round Hunsa's neck. Her skin was creased like bark and her fingers were nobbled to look like twigs. Her eyes were leaf-green and her deep red lips looked like spoons. Her face was so gentle and soft that I wanted to kiss it. At the bottom of the painting her legs melted into the red turtle's shell. Paint was smudged where the woman's head touched Hunsa's; it connected them. The only parts of Hunsa
that were not brown were the whites of his eyes and his bhunna, which was purple, and hung from his groin down to the turtle shell. The bhunna's head was shaped like a breast. “Masta” was written in the bottom right-hand corner.

Mrs. Steele asked, “Bingo, is this some kind of joke?” I guessed that Mrs. Steele had never seen a bhunna like this.