There were dangers other than robbery, though. In the motor parks and crossroad communities she passed through, when the sun collapsed in on itself and the earth began to cool, darker appetites surfaced. Sheen-faced truck drivers would huddle around oil-barrel fires, speaking in thick southern tongues, drinking illicit gin from mason jars as they eyed the world beyond their circles with a predatory gaze.
At those moments, she left the road entirely and walked out into the savannah, where the baobab trees formed elephantine shapes, their branches knuckling upward in arthritic angles. Acacia canopies provided parasols of cover. Termite mounds, taller than she was, were silhouetted like earthen minarets under the great dome of sky, and as night fell, a chill would set in.
The hyenas that had once roamed these savannahs were gone, but human hyenas were on the prowl still, and even if shed had any wooden matches, she wouldn't have lit a fire for fear of drawing attention. Instead she would unroll the long strips of tanned goatskin, as soft and supple as suede, that she kept folded inside her robe and would begin a methodical mummy-wrap of her legs.
She would then pull the wide sleeves of her taqua across her chest as if in a funereal embrace, twisting the hems with her wrists until they were almost knotted. Even with her body heat turned in on itself, the warmth would seep out of the fabric during the night, leaving her to drift in and out of a shivering half-slumber. Alone, but not quite.
Hadn't the Prophet, Peace be upon Him, suffered harder trials in harsher climes than this? Hadn't He fled the city gates for Medina beneath similar stars and desert darkness?
Eventually, she would fall into something that resembled sleep, would dream, sometimes of horses, sometimes flamingos. It was more memory than dream; one from her childhood. The only flamingos she knew of were at Bula Tura, an oasis in the farthest corner of the outermost edge of her clan's widest range. Her family hadn't gone as far as Bula Tura for years, not since she was scarcely of walking age, in fact. It may even have been her earliest memory: Fulani nomads and Kanuri cattle drivers, camel caravans plodding past in slow-moving procession, and flamingos taking flight. The memories blended with those of other oases: of mangoes and African myrrh, of date palm and fire trees, of flowering jacaranda, the petals forming a mist among the leaves, and of water running clear and cool, gathered up with a laughing ease and flavoured with mint and crushed herbs. She woke with the taste of it on her tongue.
In the early hours, she would lie perfectly still to watch the stars blink out, one by one. It was a time of day when only the wind was awake.
She would untangle the knot of her sleeves, would sit up and slowly wind back the tanned goatskin from around her legs. She would shake the Sahel from her robes, would take a swallow of water, a slice of dried yam. Once, as she walked back toward the road, a lizard rippled through the dust in front of her—a flash of lemon and lime, yellow on green, appearing and disappearing at almost the same moment.
These early hours offered the thinnest sliver of opportunity before the rest of the restless world arose. Back at the roadside, she would move warily among the dens of drivers she had avoided the night before: sleeping bodies slumped in truck cabins or sprawled drunkenly on mats. If she moved carefully, stepped softly, she might find overlooked leftovers: jollof rice sticking to the sides of pots to be scooped with her fingertips and eaten hungrily, or sloppily discarded suya sticks with scraps of meat still clinging to them.
She fled these snoring roadside camps quickly, though, and would follow the highway south as the sun broke across the land. It was a sudden and immense heat, an oven door flung open, and the asphalt soon grew soft. The convoys of trucks that rumbled by left tire impressions in the blacktop as they passed.
Among her clan, the senior wives ran the household, the junior wives handled trade, and the men managed livestock: the selling and buying thereof. But the children, boys and girls together, would care for the cattle, making sure none wandered off or got stuck in sandpits. Only as they grew older would their roles slowly separate, girls milking the cows and harvesting millet, boys standing guard over land and livestock. Standing guard and—above all—grooming the horses.
As she walked, a memory surfaced, unbidden: a season of drought followed by heavy rains, which brought forth hordes of tsetse flies. Her family was forced to move the herd farther and farther afield to drier grasslands, trying desperately to avoid the flies and the sleeping sickness they might bring, travelling far beyond the grasslands, beyond the farthest outposts of her clan. So far, in fact, that she wasn't able to attend school that year. And when she did go back, it wasn't to the lycée but to the dustier outdoor tablet schools. The flies had cost her uncles their wealth.
Memories from that drought. "Little one!" Her brother calling to her frantically as a skinny longhorn ambled toward dense scrub. "Run!" And she did, stick in hand, as the steer lolled farther away from the herd. She hit the side of the animal with her stick, stopped it from escaping, ran so fast she tumbled headlong into a thicket of thorns. She remembered her brother soothing her tears afterward, picking out the barbs, saying, "You were very brave, very brave."
It was the highest praise possible in their language.
Her clan had not always been cattle herders fleeing flies. "We were ambush traders" was how they liked to describe it, eyes smiling. Ambush traders lying in wait for Arab camel drivers and Tuareg salt traders. "We negotiated with swords drawn." Caliphates and sultans were forced to kneel, emirs to bow down. Even the Seven Kingdoms of the Hausa had not been able to subdue them.
Whenever armies moved against them, her clan would simply melt back into the Sahel.
The glory and wealth of the trans-Saharan trade routes—the gold and silver, the salt and slaves—had passed through her people's arid lands for centuries. Heaving caravans, laden with Sokoto leather and clothes of Kano blue, salt from Lake Chad, medicines from the Middle Belt, the spice and perfumes of Arabia, cowrie shell currency, silk rolls, Islamic scrolls—the caravans had all paid tribute, had all paid toll.
"We are horse riders of the Sahel," her uncles had reminded her. Riders, born of motion. And even now that the trans-Saharan trade was gone, even as her clan eked out crops from sandy soil and tallied their livelihoods in domesticated cattle, it was the horses that were still the pride of her people. Horses, pampered and groomed.
Horses, as decorated and doted on as any bride. "The men love their horses," the women laughed, "more than their wives."
"Of course!" came the reply. "Our horses never scold us!"
On her first night of flight, she had slipped out of her uncle's home and hidden amid the outlying stables. The swish of tails and scent of manure both calmed and bestirred her; something moved within her on every shift and snort.
Once horsemen, now herdsmen. The royal indigo robes seemed threadbare and thin of late. A small people, crumbling underfoot like the soil. "If we are destined to disappear, we are destined to disappear." Those were the words they sang, handed down over generations, given voice, plaintive over the fields. "But if so, we will go with our swords drawn."
There were no hoofbeats of horses across the savannah now, not in pursuit or protection. There was only one foot sliding in front of the other, again and again and again. Only that.
Despair comes slowly, crawling its way up inside you until it threatens to overwhelm everything; it buckles the knees, makes you falter, makes you break stride. She felt drawn out, weak.
Too tired to sob, or even sigh, she'd watch the next cluster of tin roofs and market stalls plod toward her, would feel hollow and defeated.
In those moments she would hold her hands just so. She would will herself forward until despair was replaced by something stronger.
She knew that if she could just keep walking, she could outwalk anything, could outwalk sadness, outwalk hunger, could outwalk whispers and bottled rage, could outwalk sha'ria law, could outwalk memory itself. In those moments she turned for strength to the Prophet, Peace be upon Him, and to
God. Together, they would look into the wellspring of her heart, would know it to be pure, would guide her. And she might yet survive, Insha Allah.
At those moments, amid the thirst and headache heat, she would hold her hands just so, cupping her belly the way one might shelter a lamp in a wind. She would feel the flutter deep inside her—a stirring, a striving—and that too would whisper: Keep walking, don't stop.
CHAPTER 32
My Dearest Henry,
Please do not endanger our endeavour. We must not give up! I understand with fullest appreciation that the hardest part has been keeping this wonderful news secret. But trust in the goodness of life and you will be rewarded! Utmost secrecy at this stage Mr. Curtis! As soon as the money has been transferred and you have taken your percentage, you may celebrate in high style with your wife and loved ones. Why not take them on that cruise you have always dreamed upon? I have heard so much about your kind nature from Miss Sandra and Victor.
I only wish I could be there to see your wife Helen's face light up when you reveal the truth!
Perhaps some day we can meet and toast our friendship face to face.
With great happiness,
Lawrence Atuche, Professor of Commerce
CHAPTER 33
On the far side of the sky: a slash of lightning, crack of bone.
Thunder without rain. It woke her from her sleep, brought with it the memory of other storms, more violent than this. Memories of lightning that snapped like a whip, hitting the Sahel repeatedly as a rider might in final gallop.
One such storm had left trees burning across the plains like torches; it was a memory so vivid it might not have been real, may have been fostered in folklore instead, in stories told and repeated until they became truer than memory.
Another flash of lightning, veining the night sky. The nights were cooler and better for walking, but the taboo was still strong within her. Women who are with child mustn't walk after dark. And just as well. The roads weren't safe. She had heard loud voices patrolling the highway, had seen the sweep of headlights. They weren't looking for her, just looking. But the threat was the same.
There were no burning bushes on this night, only bruised skies and a clouded moon. I don't know if I can go on. She whispered this to her belly. It was all she could do to sit up, to unwind the goatskin from around her legs. The harmattan dust fountained off her.
Keep walking.
It took her three tries to get the jerry can onto the folded cloth atop her head, three more to make the first step. She could see the curve of asphalt running through the hillocks, and as she walked down to meet it, she heard the scurry of something small and afraid in the underbrush.
At the blacktop she saw no sign of the night patrols, or slumbering truck drivers either, so no scraps of food to pick through. Only asphalt and—to the south—her destination. Zaria.
She had been able to see the city, low along the plains, for several days now, had been walking toward its minarets and mosque, had been laboriously rolling it toward her, trying to bring it near. But it never seemed to draw closer, always seemed to hover out of reach, an illusion born of wavering heat and a walking that grew slower and less sure with every passing day. The globe was getting more and more difficult to turn underfoot. As the sun crawled its way back up the sky, Zaria city appeared again, then disappeared, slipping behind distant hills and scrubland trees, lost to a foreground of thorn bushes and acacia.
The road brought her suddenly to an army checkpoint, and she caught her breath, steadied the jerry can. It was still early and the road was quiet. She started past the barrier the soldiers had rigged up—planks bound by hemp rope, laid across cement-filled oil barrels—treading softly, eyes down. On the roadside, a single army lorry, painted a camouflage green better suited for the jungles of the Delta, was parked at a haphazard angle. Soldiers were sleeping on mats in the back.
She might have made it past, save for a young soldier who was squatting beside a small stove, boiling his morning coffee. He was startled by the sight of her and scrambled for his rifle as she hurried by. He hollered at her in the pidgin English that passed for a common language among those outsiders who couldn't speak Hausa or French. "Hoi! Wetin dey for?"
She kept walking. Heard him slide a round of ammunition into the chamber. A junior soldier, no doubt, given the rifle he was using. Not an AK-47 but a single bolt action, the kind her brothers had patrolled their cattle herds with.
The soldier's voice grew more frantic as she walked away.
"Wetin dey for? Get'in dis moto!"
But she kept walking. She heard grumbled voices of other soldiers complaining and then the sudden sound of a vehicle approaching, braking hard—and a gunshot. She flinched, almost dropping the jerry can. With her arms held out, she turned slowly around, hoping it was only a warning.
They had already forgotten her. A large diesel tanker truck was slowing down, grinding gears as it came to a jerky stop at the barrier. The other soldiers woke and tumbled out, wanting to make sure they got their share. Not a gunshot, an engine backfiring. And a modern form of ambush trading. She spotted the senior officer striding up to the driver's window, an AK-47 in hand, authority in every step, and she turned, hurried on.
Moments later the truck rumbled past, draping her in a chalky cloud. She was once again invisible.
CHAPTER 34
My Dear Henry,
Regarding the transfer of funds into your account.
I'm afraid there's been a problem...
CHAPTER 35
As she walked into Zaria, the traffic increased, with battered cars and wheezing buses funnelling into the city. On the outskirts, she made a hesitant foray into a motor park that was crowded under an overpass. Hawkers with wares stacked high on their heads were moving among the trucks and long-haul buses, singing out their offers, haggling with passengers.
She had to be mindful of former almajiri, the street boys who roamed the motor parks and flyovers of the north in feral packs. The youngest sons of indigent families, the almajiri began as beggars and foragers, but often grew into full-time thieves and freelance thugs. By the time they reached their teens, many of them were already part of an ad-hoc army-for-hire. Extortionists and vote-rigging politicians alike relied on them. And no sooner had the fear begun to rise inside her than she spotted several of these former
almajiri prowling the perimeter, planks with nails driven through resting casually on their shoulders. She ducked away before they noticed her, choosing the busiest crowds of people to squeeze through, fighting down the panic. Street boys were territorial, and a bustling motor park like this would be clearly demarcated, right down to specific bus stalls and taxi stands.
She needed to get deeper into the city.
The main road ran through the Sabon Gari, "the strangers' quarters," a sprawling neighbourhood that housed the city's motley assortment of outsiders and unbelievers: southern Christians and members of smaller pagan clans, Yoruba traders and Tiv day labourers.
Rumours of dark magic haunted the Sabon Gari, juju spells that could make one mad with blood lust. In the Sabon Gari, the stalls served millet wine and back-tavern gin with a brazen disregard for sha'ria strictures. Banners beside the doors advertised Gulder Beer and Star Ale with hand-painted signs above that read MERRY
YOURSELF GUEST SPOT! and REFRESH YOURSELF COOL SPOT. Codes that even she could crack. Alcohol, although banned in the sha'ria states, was tolerated in the Sabon Gari enclaves. Though she was very much a stranger, she didn't belong in the Sabon Gari, and she knew it.
It was now late afternoon, and traffic was backed up, drivers blaring their horns in impotent anger. Queen Elizabeth II Road curved past the sha'ria courthouse, and her chest tightened as she went by, fighting the urge to run.
Directly across from the courts was the raucous clatter of a hotel bar. Sha'ria law on one side, Western sins on the other—each pretending the other didn't exist. She skirted the hotel grounds, where a muddle of foreign words l
eaked out from barroom doorways, punctuated with sudden bursts of laughter. These would be Nigerian businessmen from the Christian south, or traders from Ghana; there might even be a few pink-faced batauri, what other Nigerians called oyibos. She'd heard how these batauri, foolish and indiscriminate, would fling their money about as though it were dried petals. If she could find a batauri businessman basting in alcohol and blasphemy, she might be able to induce a few nairas' worth of pity money... She edged closer, but a security guard spotted her and cut across, his path intersecting hers, his voice yelling out in anger as she quickly withdrew.