Those Who Love Night (10 page)

Two taxi cabs occupied a rank intended for more. Krisj Patel had his own car, an ancient Nissan that seemed to have been repaired many times, always with more enthusiasm than skill. Sections had been touched up with paint of three slightly different shades. The other cars in the parking looked to be in better condition, not too different from those at any other airport.

“I'm afraid this is my car,” Patel said. “I have to get in first to open the door on the passenger side. There's no door handle on that side. I hope you don't mind.”

“Not at all.” Abigail looked doubtfully at the car.

Once inside, Patel had to lean all of his weight against the passenger door to get it open and allow Abigail in. Despite the car's appearance, the engine started easily and it pulled away smoothly enough. As they drove, Abigail turned to look back. The woman from the concourse was outside now, watching them go.

“As I was saying on the phone…” Patel spoke quickly, as if fearing that he might be interrupted or that his message might not be favorably received and that he should deliver it quickly before there could be resistance. “… my clients want us to get an order releasing the prisoners, and Tony, of course, is one of them. When we get to court, I will appear with you. I am the attorney who will brief you.”

“And is Smythe happy with you spending a lot of time on the case?”

“Smythe?”

“Your partner, the Smythe of Smythe, Patel and Associates.”

“Oh no. Blake left after the 2000 referendum when the people voted against the government and the old man really went crazy.”

“And the Associates part of your firm's name?”

“No associates either. Just me. I am the whole of Smythe, Patel and Associates.”

Absurd as it seemed to her, Abigail thought she heard a measure of pride in the statement. He seemed to be saying that as long as Krisj Patel was alive, the firm of Smythe, himself and the associates would be alive too. “Things have not been going too well here, Krisj,” she said.

“Not well at all, Ms. Abigail. I have more cases now than last year, though. I'd have still more if people were braver. Many would like to sue the government, but few have money. And most of those who do have money are afraid.”

As they traveled, the airport property gave way to open fields, fringed with trees. Both trees and grass were a deeper green than she remembered. It felt like a homecoming.

Perhaps it's not the way the newspapers say, she thought. And yet she knew that the beauty of the country was only one part of her memory. There was also the other part, and that had not diminished with the years. She expected that she would soon be confronting it again.

Spanning the road, a sign announced: “Zimbabwe Independence 1980.” A little farther on, a billboard bore a bank's suggestion to “Bring money back to Zimbabwe.”

Without warning and with an open road ahead of him, Patel braked sharply, swung the car onto the grass verge and switched off the engine. Cars on either side of the road were doing the same. It was a moment before she heard the sirens and some seconds longer before their source came into view. Three uniformed motorcyclists were followed by an armored personnel carrier. Through its darkened windows she could just make out armed soldiers. Close behind it, a black limousine flew the national flag. A second armored car and an ambulance brought up the rear of the motorcade.

As the sirens faded, cars started moving again. Patel restarted the engine and accelerated gently away. “What in hell was that?” Abigail asked.

“The old man's motorcade. He must be on his way to the airport to meet some bigwig.”

“Does it happen often?”

He shrugged. “Quite often—twice a day on Borrowdale Road, as he comes to the office and returns home.”

“And everyone has to stop?”

Patel smiled. “Only if you don't want to be shot.”

“I've heard of this. I thought it was an exaggeration.”

“A lot about our country must seem like an exaggeration.”

They were passing through the outskirts of the city now. Over the years, Abigail's memory of Harare had faded like an old photograph that had been left in the sun. Those had not been the worst years. The bloodletting of the Gukurahundi was past, and the other lunacy was still to come.

Despite fading and blistering signage and discolored paintwork, the doors of small enterprises were open for business. A man was adding fuel to the tank of his car at a small filling station while two others stood in line. That these enterprises had survived at all was, to Abigail, a sign of the indomitable spirit of ordinary Zimbabweans. In contrast, a few stripped bodies of cars rusted at the roadside.

“Can people afford to buy food?” she asked Patel.

“We pay in American dollars now. It's much better than it was in the days of the Zim dollar, when inflation was so high that some prices changed twice a day. In those days we had to barter to survive. Even now, some of my clients pay me in food—maybe some eggs, a chicken if I'm very lucky. I handled the transfer of a house last month for ten pockets of potatoes, to be paid at the rate of one pocket a month.”

Patel cleared his throat in the manner of a man about to say something important. “Our clients, the Organization for Peace and Justice in Zimbabwe, are very pleased that you're here.” It was said in the same proud way that he had when telling her that he was the sole member of his law firm.

“Do they have any money?”

“Very little, I'm afraid.” He glanced quickly and anxiously at her. “Does that make a difference?”

“I can work without being paid,” Abigail said. “I hope we have no major expenses though.” She looked at this serious man in his ill-fitting clothes, driving his old car. “How many members do they have? Thousands, I hope.” She already had a fair idea of the answer and realized that the question was cruel.

“Thirty-one, actually.”

“And you're among them?”

“Yes.”

“So you're both attorney and client. That's an unusual situation.”

She could see a line of perspiration forming along the top of Patel's forehead. “I'd hate to be cross-examined by you in court.”

Like all good cross-examiners, Abigail was not easily distracted. “And the missing seven, are they also members?”

“Yes.”

“So twenty-four remain—you and twenty-three others.”

“Yes.”

“Any of them over the age of thirty?”

“Oh, yes. Me and Paul Robinson, a commercial farmer who had his land confiscated, and one or two others. And our group also has solid overseas connections.” When she kept looking at him, he added, “In Europe.”

“I'm relieved to hear that we have allies ten thousand kilometers away.” Abigail sighed deeply. “You're not putting my head into a noose, are you, Krisj?”

“If I am, my head will be right next to yours.”

It was not much consolation, but she could see he meant it. “Why are there so few members?”

“We're not a political party, Ms. Abigail. We don't go looking for members. We are just committed Zimbabweans.”

They had turned away from the main artery into town and had entered a pleasant suburb. The gardens were wooded and the houses did not have the worn look of the buildings she had seen so far. Patel stopped the car at the glass front door of a small hotel. The brick walls on either side of the main building carried electrified wiring along the top. A modest sign attached to the wall next to the motor gate gave the establishment's name as McDooley's Inn.

“It looks like a nice place,” Abigail said.

“Yes, and the owner's an opponent of the dictatorship.”

Good for them, Abigail thought. I will be living in a guesthouse whose owners oppose the dictatorship, and surrounded by a bunch of kids with the same sentiments, seven of whose colleagues have disappeared off the street. And the dictatorship is still in place and, according to the papers, whatever moderating influence existed in the coalition has now been withdrawn. On top of all this, there is little doubt that they are already aware of my presence here. What other favorable factors could I have forgotten? she wondered.

“Ms. Abigail,” Patel said uncertainly. “I suppose you'd like to rest before we meet our clients tomorrow?”

“What I'd like is to be home in Johannesburg with my husband.” The car had come to a stop and Abigail leaned toward Patel. “As that is not a reasonable possibility, I'll see these clients of ours today. Get them together for a meeting this evening.”

“Ms. Abigail, I don't know if it's possible to assemble them all so quickly. I do think…”

“Do you want me in, or don't you?” she interrupted him.

“I do, but…”

“Then get them together this evening. I'm not here on leave.”

13

The old scout hall was situated on the edge of one of the city's shack suburbs. The day had passed, but the building had no ceiling and it had retained much of the day's heat.

Abigail had not known what to expect when she first met her clients. Krisj Patel had already told her that most of them were young. There were also very few of them, so clearly they were brave. Her experience of political activists, especially those who were young and radical, was that they were good at shouting slogans, but not good at viewing their own behavior introspectively. Most of the activists she had contact with since being an adult had been active in places where there was no danger to themselves. She had seen them protest outside the New York offices of companies that did business in apartheid South Africa, or take part in marches in London to draw attention to Mugabe's Zimbabwe. They were always loudly certain of the correctness of their causes and passionate about righting the wrongs they had read about or seen on television.

The twelve people who had gathered in the old scout hall were altogether different. They were quiet, talking in undertones, knowing that they could not afford to draw attention to themselves. They had come in just three cars. The cars had been parked in separate places, none of them within a hundred meters of the hall. By Abigail's calculation, the organization had another twelve members in addition to those present and the seven who had been detained. The other twelve seemed to have thought better about gathering with their fellow conspirators in a season when government had decided to come after them.

They were a disparate group. The one man who, like Patel, was over forty, was introduced as Paul Robinson. He was a gray-haired farmer who had lived in the country since childhood. She would learn later that six months earlier he had been driven from his farm by a heavily armed gang of fifty, who had claimed the land in the name of redistribution to the masses. He had won a court order instructing them to vacate the farm, but they had stayed and the police had shown no interest in his court order. His nose was discolored with the red-blue tint of the habitually heavy drinker.

A man called Prince, no older than twenty-five, was concerned for his wife, who was among the seven who had been taken. A university student, who had recently been barred from the campus because of her political activities, was hoping that Abigail would help to get her sister released. Most had no such direct link to the missing seven. They were just brave people who believed in justice and wanted to see it done in their country.

Two serious-faced young women had been introduced as Tanya and Natasha, the Makwati twins. Both shook hands solemnly with Abigail and thanked her for coming.

“This can't go on forever,” said Tanya.

“We won't be staying long,” the other twin said. “We have to relieve Abel.”

“Abel?”

“It's our shift to watch the gate at Chikurubi. We all take turns. If they move our people, we'll know.”

“Do be careful.” Abigail had not been able to stop herself. That was so damned obvious, she thought. Of course they would be careful.

“We are very careful,” Tanya said.

Abigail immediately recognized the woman in T-shirt and jeans. While the others had crowded around Abigail, she had hung back, leaning against a wall much as she had at the airport, her thumbs again hooked into the pockets of her jeans. To make contact, Abigail had to approach her. “Helena Ndoro,” the woman said, as they shook hands.

“You were at the airport this morning.”

“Yes, I wanted to get a look at the person who's come to save our friends.”

Abigail heard the faintest trace of mockery in her voice. “You don't believe that I'll be able to?”

“I believe you'll do what you came to do. Perhaps you'll even win your court order. But it'll make no difference. Some of our members have had court orders awarded to them by brave judges before this.”

“Maybe we'll be lucky,” Abigail said.

“Maybe we will.” Unexpectedly she reached out, her fingers brushing one of Abigail's arms. “I came tonight, didn't I?”

The hall had no table. Abigail and the members of the Organization for Peace and Justice in Zimbabwe sat in a circle on folding chairs. The chairs had long since lost whatever varnish they once had and creaked when anyone moved. They all looked at Abigail, waiting for her to start. “The first thing I need to know is under what conditions the authorities picked up your colleagues.”

Prince was first to speak, explaining that when he had returned from work his wife was gone. The neighbors told him the
CIO
had taken her. The student whose sister had been taken, had a similar story.

“Helena, you tell.” It was Robinson, the farmer.

“I'm not sure what I saw,” Helena said.

“Tell us anyway,” he said.

“I was a block away when I saw one of their double-cab pickups with the
CAM
registration pull away from outside the flats where I stay. They travel only in those vehicles and no one else has those registration plates.” Her voice was flat, altogether without emotion. “I don't know why, but I followed. They went straight to Chikurubi. I didn't see who was in the back. When I got home the other people in the building told me they'd taken Petra. I never actually saw it, though.”