Jimfish (6 page)

C
HAPTER
11

Bucharest, Romania, Christmas 1989

Jimfish flew back
to Bucharest, on Christmas Day, aboard the same helicopter in which he had begun his journey with Nicolae and Lenuţa-Elena. He landed once again on the roof of the Party Headquarters to be met by the same generals, Securitate officers and Communist Party functionaries who had waved goodbye to the presidential couple on their last fateful journey. They all wore the same hats, yet they were now very different. ‘Viva the revolution! Romania libera!' they chorused, waving their hats, much as they had done just hours earlier when they chanted ‘Ni-co-lae Cea-oooo-şes-cooo . . . Romaneeeeaaah!'

The change in their demeanour was nothing short of miraculous. They had shed their Party badges, unclenched their fists and went about hugging each other in an ecstasy of self-congratulation. Gone was every trace of banners and bunting, along with portraits of the beloved leader. A lifetime's solemn, sincere, dogged attachment to the Party had vanished overnight.

So complete was the transformation that Jimfish's head began to spin like a giddy top. The men who led this revolution were surely the same officials who willingly murdered, harried, spied on and lied to the very people in the square all through the long rule of the late dictator. Who had flinched in horror when the crowds dared to boo the Genius of the Carpathians and who fled for the roof when the crowds, revved up on the rocket fuel of lumpen-proletarian rage, invaded Party Headquarters.

When Jimfish asked them what they felt about Nicolae and Elena's show trial they looked at him as if he were quite mad. When he admitted that he had been saddened by the firing squad in Târgovişte, they laughed outright. Was he, they demanded, a counter-revolutionary?

‘We fought for freedom and defeated the tyrant. Finishing him off was the best Christmas present in the world. We have given the people what they wanted: the dictator is dead. Anyone who can't see that is an enemy of the revolution.'

With that they beat Jimfish savagely about the head and might have killed him had he not run into the very lift that had once saved Nicolae from the angry mob. The lift descended to the ground floor and Jimfish escaped into the giant square in front of Party Headquarters, where a vast crowd was still camped in their threadbare coats, cold and hungry, watching on a large screen scenes from the execution of Nicolae and Elena, replayed day and night, as if this were all the food they needed, and the images of the bloody end of these two monsters was also the end of tyranny and terror. While to Jimfish – ashamed though he was of his
negative thoughts – it seemed as if the way the Ceauşescus had died, rather than killing off the past, had given the old demons a new lease of life, free to haunt the country for years to come.

As he turned away from the ghastly images, a tall, elegant black man in a dove-grey tunic, wearing on his head a leopard-skin toque, offered Jimfish his silk handkerchief.

‘Wipe the blood from your eyes, my friend.'

The stranger wore heavy black spectacles and he carried a wooden sceptre, surmounted by a leopard.

‘How sad to find these crowds rejoicing at the murder of their Great Leader. We would never allow this in Africa.'

For the first time since the loss of Lunamiel, the murder of Jagdish and the shooting of Soviet Malala, Jimfish felt happiness rising inside him like the sun and he grasped the other's hand. ‘My compatriot! I'm from the Mother Continent, too. My name is Jimfish of Port Pallid, a tiny town on the eastern coast of South Africa.'

The other lifted his sceptre in salute. ‘And I am Marshal Mobutu Sese Seko Nkuku Ngbendu wa Za Banga – which is to say, “The All-powerful, Earthy, Fiery Warrior Who, through His Endurance and Inflexible Will to Win, Moves from Conquest to Conquest, Trailing Fire in His Wake”. I am the embodiment of Zaire, a country twenty per cent bigger than Mexico and very, very rich in diamonds and minerals. You may call me the Great Leopard.'

Jimfish complimented the gentleman on the size and wealth of his homeland.

‘Far more than a simple homeland,' said the other. ‘Zaire is my personal invention. The very appellation, along with what my citizens are allowed to wear or name themselves, as well as how my nation's riches are spent, are all extensions of my dreams. A country that began as a land of slaves and sadness, which greedy European imperialists called the Belgian Congo, is now, thanks to my vision, the glorious, authentic Republic of Zaire. People know me as its Great Marshal, Grand Chief and Messiah.'

‘And you were a friend of the late Nicolae and Elena Ceauşescu?' Jimfish guessed.

The gentleman held up two fingers tightly pressed together. ‘We were as close as this. Brothers under the skin. Imagine how I felt when, on Christmas Day, lying in bed in my palace, I tuned into satellite television to find myself witnessing the Genius of the Carpathians being done to death by barbarians. I ordered my jet to be made ready and flew post-haste here to Bucharest, hoping at least to arrange for my old friend a state funeral in Zaire. Too late, alas. Why do those who killed the great Ceauşescu not see they had the leader they deserved? A reflection of themselves?'

Jimfish reported what he had been told. ‘They called him a cruel tyrant.'

‘Cruelty in a leader is often plain common sense. In my country, for example, some say I don't bother to feed my prisoners. But why should I, when I can't even feed my own peasants? However, cruelty needs to be judiciously employed . . . I once had the pleasure of hanging four of my ministers in a popular public ceremony, attended by
fifty thousand enthusiastic citizens. It was on the feast of Pentecost, as it happens. Punishment is all the more impressive – I speak as a fervent Catholic – when combined with piety. Murder,
tout seul
, is a clumsy tool. Better to pay off your rivals or have them done away with discreetly or buy them back into government on your own terms. Genial corruption is the key. Steal if you like, I counsel my ministers, soldiers and gendarmes – but not too much – and not all at once. That way you win more.'

‘What I can't fathom about those who killed the Genius of the Carpathians and his wife,' said Jimfish, ‘is their reasoning. They were socialists yesterday, call themselves democrats now and yet they beat those who disagree.'

The gentleman in the leopard-skin toque shook his head sadly. ‘We will never understand the reasoning of Europeans, if they possess anything of the sort worth bothering with. Western ways have no place in Africa and that's why I have abolished Christian names. They're nothing but sentimental western affectations, so I have banned them. And business suits may no longer be worn. They're symbols of the old imperialism. Not fitting for the tiger-daughters and lion-sons of the New Africa, who deserve real leaders. In our tradition we have room only for one chief, one Big Man.'

‘Surely some opposition is good in a democracy?' Jimfish asked.

‘In our authentic Zairean system, democracy is the foundation on which the leader bases his divine right to rule. When opposition is needed, I provide it by calling an election and standing against the President. That way
voters may choose freely between me and myself, but there can be only one winner.'

Jimfish was a little confused by this. ‘I take it, then, you don't like change?'

The tall man smiled and waved his wooden sceptre. ‘I am warming to it all the time. But it must be carefully managed. Many of the greatest African leaders have been in power for decades, thanks to their understanding of the proper use of elections. When I consider what I call the Ceauşescu conundrum, I think I see where he went wrong. Freedom is better than stagnation and repression, so long as it's regulated. I begin to think encouraging democracy and allowing several parties to compaign might be useful. Why should I be held to account for everything? Let them also share the blame.'

Jimfish returned the borrowed and now bloody silk handkerchief to his new friend.

‘The Romanians could profit from your advice. As far as I can see, and I may be wrong, those running their revolution look like the same people who ran the old regime.'

The gentleman from Zaire nodded. ‘No doubt. And mark my words, soon they will be claiming the high moral ground and lecturing African leaders about their appalling habits. This is the way of Europeans. They enslave Africa, pillage the continent and then preach sermons to their former slaves. I prefer their lash to their lectures. Enough of savage Europe. You need to get home again and I can help. Come with me.'

With that the elegant stranger in the leopard-skin toque took a handful of dollars from his Vuitton bag, hailed a taxi
and they rode out to the airport. There on the tarmac was a most beautiful needle-nosed jet, which, his friend from Zaire explained, he rented from the French. Jimfish was greatly impressed. What a people these French must be! The cloud of radioactive dust from Chernobyl had stopped at their border and then gone around the sides of the country. And supersonic jets were loans they lavished on African heads of state.

‘Since we are compatriots,' said Sese Seko, ‘let us dispense with titles for a while. At least in private. You are called Jimfish . . . Well, when I was a boy at the Christian Brothers College, in what was then Elizabethville, my name was Joseph-Désiré, but the other boys called me Jeff.'

It was agreed they would maintain this friendly informality, at least until they returned home, when Jimfish would have a variety of choices as to the name he preferred for his new friend: Messiah, Lion King, Redeemer, Guide or Great Helmsman. And so it was that, in the spirit of school friends, Jimfish and Jeff boarded the waiting Concorde and flew off to Africa.

C
HAPTER
12

Zaire/Gbadolite, 1989–90

The needle-nosed
jet taxied along the runway in tropical sunshine and Jimfish was glad to be home, even if this Africa of red dust and dark green bush was one he did not know. On the flight from Bucharest he had been pampered with caviar and Laurent-Perrier champagne, which, along with Coca-Cola, was the favourite beverage of the inventor of Zaire, whose destiny was an extension of his dreams, and who now gently reminded Jimfish that – as he was back in his country and must take on again the duties of his office – there would be no more schoolboy names.

‘Which of my many titles would you feel happiest to use? You may choose any one of them. Feel free, my fellow African friend.'

‘“Great Leopard” seems the best suited, I think. Especially because of your signature hat,' Jimfish told him.

His companion was delighted, because it showed how well Jimfish understood his very special relationship with the Mother Continent – something his compatriots too often failed to grasp.

‘A very wise choice. I have my toques specially made for me in Paris, using only the fur of leopards I myself have shot. As principal protector of the royal beasts of Africa I can assure you that the leopard selected to become my headgear counts itself lucky to crown an intellect of such distinction.'

Jimfish was impressed by the other's unassailable certainty, as well as his remarkable ability to adapt to all circumstances, even if this left him a trifle uneasy. It was a flexibility he had seen in the men who executed Nicolae and Elena Ceauşescu on Christmas Day, and who turned overnight from cowering flunkeys into incendiary revolutionaries. How he wished he might achieve a smidgeon of their adaptability or feel even a tenth of their revolutionary rage.

His found his deficiencies in both these qualities very distressing. Surely he had seen enough cruelty and heartbreak in the time since fleeing Port Pallid, moments before Sergeant Arlow could shoot him? He had been present at the massacres in Matabeleland led by General Jesus; endured the loss of his lovely Lunamiel, cruelly blown to bits as she said her prayers; watched helplessly as Ivan the Russian murdered the good Jagdish at Chernobyl; and he had looked on helplessly as his mentor Soviet Malala was executed by a drunken firing squad in the doomed city of Pripyat.

But now he was home once again. It was Boxing Day, the New Year and a new decade of the Nineties lay ahead, and Jimfish made it his New Year's resolution to try harder than ever to burn with the fury that fired the
lumpenproletariat to a happy landing on the right side of history.

In a giant, open-topped limousine, flanked by motorcycle outriders and Horse Guards – splendid in uniforms based on those worn by Napoleon's cavalry – the Great Leopard and his friend progressed from the spanking-new airport, where the runways had been specially lengthened to allow the Concorde to land, into a town called Gbadolite. Chanting crowds lined the route and Marshal Mobutu translated the praise song they repeated: ‘One party, one country, one father – Mobutu!' He waved his wooden sceptre to acknowledge the cheers.

Almost everyone in the town was related to Seso Seko Mobutu, he told Jimfish proudly, and they all adored him.

‘I am bound to my people by pure love. But what good is love if it doesn't take very concrete forms? It is as simple as that, you will find.'

Simple was not at all what Jimfish found.

What had been a tiny village was now a thriving city of thousands. His friend pointed out the German-run hospital, the new sawmill, the factories, the impressive dam to supply hydroelectric power, the experimental breeding farm stocked with thoroughbred English cows and Swiss goats, the Coca-Cola plant, and, last but not least, the Central Bank of Zaire, where printing presses worked day and night to produce bushels of banknotes adorned with the image of the leader in his leopard-skin hat.

Gbadolite was his home town, and ‘Home for a king,' the marshal explained, ‘is where your palace stands.'

Ahead loomed a colossal palace ringed by a high fence.
Sentries saluted as the limousine swept through the gates of gold and drew up at the main door, which was bracketed by enormous pink marble columns and guarded by four life-size white marble lions. In the palace gardens stood towering sculptures of elephants, lions and buffaloes, while peacocks wandered at will among pools, fountains and waterfalls.

Jimfish was lost in admiration. ‘It is a palace in the forest!'

Marshal Mobutu nodded. ‘It's known as Versailles in the Jungle. I have a second one nearby, a pagoda, built for me by the Chinese. And somewhere' – he made a vague gesture towards the thick green bush that surrounded the estate – ‘is a third. But I lose track of them. After all, I own a castle in Spain, a palace in Switzerland, capacious residences in Paris, the Riviera, Belgium, Italy, the Ivory Coast, Senegal, South Africa and Portugal. Not to mention a string of palaces that adorn Zaire like a lovely necklace, stretching from Kinshasa to Lubumbashi. To me a palace is just one more place to hang my hat.'

Seeing his friend's incomprehension at this prodigious display, the Great Leopard said soothingly: ‘I don't do this for myself, but because I know my people. I understand how much they admire glamour. They are too poor to afford anything themselves. So someone must take up the challenge on their behalf. I sacrifice myself in the name of peace. We have over two hundred ethnic groups in Zaire and I am the magic that melds them together.'

In what was clearly a customary ceremony of welcome, a butler led in a young leopard on a silver chain and pre
sented it to the Great Leopard, who in turn introduced his pet to Jimfish.

‘This is Simba, my friend and brother.'

The leopard looked at Jimfish and he looked at the leopard. It seemed a shame to keep a big cat on a chain, but he was too polite to say so.

‘Come, let's go to my office,' the marshal proposed.

Up the spiral Italian staircase he led Jimfish, beneath great crystal chandeliers flowering from tall ceilings, followed by butlers, valets, pages, chefs, housemaids and praise singers, while from speakers hidden in the walls came the plaintive chant of Gregorian monks.

The presidential office seemed about the size of a tennis court and, after opening the safe and stuffing his favourite Vuitton bag with hundred-dollar bills, they moved into the presidential bedroom. It was dominated by an immense bed of sculpted marble in the shape of a pink cross. Jimfish was invited to seat himself beside the Great Leopard, and then, at the touch of a button, like an ascending elevator, the great bed climbed smoothly until it was level with the windows. Gathered in the gardens below was a large, excited crowd.

‘My relatives,' the President explained, throwing fistfuls of dollar bills from the window, beaming to see his devoted family fighting for their share as the greenbacks rained down. ‘This ceremony encourages loyalty and love and competition. My advice over the years, to poor Nicolae, was to keep your friends close and your enemies closer still. I wish he had listened to me.'

Once the distribution of dollars was over, palace tailors
came and took Jimfish's measurements, and returned a few hours later with a set of splendid clothes. The Great Leopard having forbidden all western costume in his country, the craftsmen had sewn for Jimfish a tunic of gunmetal grey that echoed the President's. It had a pert collar, worn with an olive-green silk cravat. He was also presented with a ceremonial pistol in a holster of python skin to be worn on formal occasions. In each pocket of his tunic he found neat stacks of hundred-dollar bills, placed there by his ever-thoughtful friend the Great Leopard, who, when Jimfish tried to thank him, brushed aside his gratitude.

‘You are my African brother,' he said. ‘It is I who must thank you for helping me to find another recipient for a very small part of my fortune.'

There was to be a great banquet that evening with more pink champagne, truffles, foie gras, shrimp, quail and caviar to celebrate the safe return of the Redeemer to his people. But Jimfish had begun to feel the strain of his travels and pleaded to be allowed an early night, to which his host graciously assented.

And so it was that Jimfish found himself alone in a bedroom, itself as large as the old trawler captain's house in Port Pallid. Before sleeping, he switched on the giant TV and watched the evening news bulletin. It opened with a portrait of Mobuto Sese Seko, Beloved Leader, Solitary Sun, Incomparable Helmsman, shown descending from heaven, garlanded with golden rays, while unseen choirs hymned his incomparable genius. There followed film of their arrival at the airport of Gbadolite and scenes of his relatives massing in the palace gardens to receive the rain
of dollars. The nightly newscast closed with the Blessed Redeemer of Zaire ascending to heaven to the accompaniment of harps and trumpets.

Unable to keep his eyes open a moment longer, Jimfish fell fast asleep wearing his splendid new suit of clothes, with his ceremonial pistol in its holster of python skin. So dead to the world was he that, when he felt someone shaking him gently, he was sure he was dreaming.

He opened his eyes to find a black lady swathed in a silver veil, who bent over him and whispered: ‘Follow me and you will be very, very happy.'

When he asked what this happiness might be, she touched her finger to his lips and whispered, ‘Trust me, Jimfish.'