Treacherous Paradise (9780307961235)

  Moses turned up outside her house as dusk fell. She had been standing by the window, waiting for him. He knew already that Isabel was dead. Ana never bothered to ask him how he knew about what had happened. He stood there, grubby and dirty after the digging he had just embarked upon.

  He was digging to make a tunnel, she thought. An opening through which a person would be able to escape into freedom. Instead, what he is doing now is the beginning of a grave.

  “You can collect her body tomorrow,” she said. “It won’t have started smelling by then. If you want me to help you, I will. Nobody will mistreat you at the fort. Soldiers are standing guard over her body.”

  “I’ll collect her myself,” said Moses. “I want to make the last journey with her by myself.”

  “What will happen now to her children?”

  Moses didn’t answer. He merely shook his head, muttered something inaudible, and left.

  At that moment she was on the point of running after him, following him to wherever he was going—back to the mines in the Rand or Kimberley or anywhere else in the world that extended for ever out there, beyond the mountains and the vast plains.

  But she remained where she was. Ana Branca and Hanna Lundmark didn’t know which world they belonged to.

  When she returned to the house, she saw that Carlos had returned to his place on the chimney. All that could be seen in the last light of the setting sun was his silhouette. Carlos looked like an old man, she thought. An ape, or a hunchbacked man weighed down by an enormous burden he was unable to free himself from.

  That evening she made a note in her diary. She wrote: “Isabel, her wings, a blue butterfly, fluttering away into a world where I can no longer reach her. Moses left. I love him. Impossible, in vain, desperate.”

  She closed the book, knotted a red linen ribbon around the covers, and put it into the desk drawer.

  She didn’t touch the laundry basket full of money that evening.

  69

  She stood on the veranda as the sun began to rise over the sea, but Moses wasn’t around. Disappointed, she went back into the house, emptied the laundry basket of all the money and packed the bundles of notes into the safe and cupboards and drawers. She had great difficulty in making enough room for it all. When she had finished, she washed her hands thoroughly—but even so there was an unpleasant, lingering smell.

  When Julietta came with her breakfast tray, Ana instructed her to go immediately to the fort and find out about arrangements for Isabel’s burial. To Ana’s surprise, Julietta didn’t react to what ought to have been the news that Isabel was dead: she obviously knew about it already. There must be a secret way, she thought, for black people to send out invisible messengers to one another with important news.

  “Be as quick as you can,” said Ana. “Don’t pause to look in shop windows, or to talk to any boys or girls you meet. If you are really fast and get back here so soon that I’m surprised, you’ll get a reward.”

  Julietta hurried out of the room. Ana could hear her footsteps racing down the stairs.

  Julietta arrived back less than an hour later, panting after all that running up the steep hills. Ana was forced to tell her to sit down and get her breath back, as to begin with she couldn’t understand what Julietta was trying to say.

  “The body has gone already,” said Julietta in the end.

  Ana stared at her.

  “What do you mean by ‘the body has gone’?”

  “He fetched it as the sun rose.”

  “Who fetched it?”

  “A black man. He carried her away without any assistance.”

  “Did you not see the young commanding officer?”

  “One of the soldiers said he was still in bed in his lodgings, asleep. He’d been invited out yesterday evening.”

  “Invited by whom? Had he been drinking? Do I have to drag everything out of you?”

  “That’s what they said. Then they tried to lure me down into the dark underground prison where Isabel had died. I ran away.”

  “You did the right thing.”

  Ana had prepared a reward for Julietta. She gave her a pretty necklace and a shimmering silk blouse. Julietta curtseyed.

  “You may go now,” said Ana. “Tell the chauffeur I’ll be down shortly.”

  Julietta remained standing where she was. Ana realized immediately what she wanted.

  “No,” she said. “You’re never going to be allowed to work in the brothel with the other women. Go now, before I take back what I’ve just given you!”

  Julietta left. Ana put on her black clothes, the same ones as she had worn at Senhor Vaz’s funeral. Once again she was going to accompany a person to her grave, someone who had died quite unexpectedly. Unlike Senhor Vaz’s funeral, Ana would be the only white person among the mourners. And any whites who saw her would become even more antagonistic towards her, more adamant in what in many cases had already become their hatred of her. She was not only concerned about the welfare of blacks who were alive, but she also accompanied a convicted murderess to her grave.

  She was unsure about black people’s burial rituals, but she picked a few red flowers from her garden and sat down in the car. The chauffeur gave a start when he heard that he was being asked to drive her to the cemetery. He knows, she thought. He knows it’s now time for Isabel to be buried.

  A new wall was being built at the entrance to the cemetery. When Ana got out of the car the black workers paused and stared at her with bricks and trowels in their hands. She stood in the shade of a tree and told the chauffeur to ask when Moses and the rest of the family were due to arrive with Isabel’s body. She watched him asking one of the bricklayers, and could see that the reply he received surprised him. He hurried back to her.

  “They have already arrived,” he said. “They are waiting inside the cemetery.”

  “Waiting for whom?”

  “Waiting for you, Senhora.”

  Moses, she thought as she hurried into the cemetery, the red flowers in her hand. He knew that I wouldn’t allow Isabel to be buried without my being present at the ceremony.

  The chauffeur pointed out a part of the cemetery separate from the graves of white people, where a group of blacks were waiting. As she hurried along past the crumbling gravestones she detected a sort of sweetish smell of dead bodies rising up from the earth. She held her hand over her mouth, and was afraid that she would feel so sick that she would throw up.

  The coffin was brown, made of rough planks. It had already been lowered into the grave. Standing round it were Moses in his overalls, Isabel’s children and several black women Ana had never seen before. She assumed they were Isabel’s sisters who were now looking after the orphaned children. There was no priest from the cathedral present. When she reached the grave, Moses led the mourners in the singing of a hymn. Everybody joined in, singing in harmony. Afterwards Moses mumbled a few words that Ana couldn’t understand, then looked at Ana.

  “Would you like to say something?”

  “No.”

  Moses nodded, then began shovelling soil down over the coffin. All the others joined in to help. They dug with their hands, or with sticks and flat stones. Ana had the impression that they were in a great hurry. The coffin should be covered over as quickly as possible. She remembered something Senhor Vaz had said, about black people always wanting to get away from burials as quickly as possible because they were afraid that evil spirits would escape from the coffin and chase after them. Could it be that despite everything, Isabel was regarded above all as an evil, obsessed murderess, even by her own sisters? Ana placed her red flowers on the heap of earth on top of the grave. Then she saw that what she had heard was true: everyone apart from Moses scuttled away from the grave. Some of them jumped back and forth between the paths as if to confuse the evil spirits they were afraid might be following them. It looked so odd that she found it hard not to burst out laughing, despite her deep sorrow.

  In the end there was only Moses and herself left.
r />   “What happens now?” she asked.

  “I go back to the mines.”

  “But surely you could stay here? I still have the money I’d saved to try to get Isabel set free.”

  Moses looked at her.

  “I’m serious,” she said. “You can build a house, and look after Isabel’s children. You don’t need to toil in the mines any more.”

  Did he believe her? She couldn’t be sure. But in any case he said no.

  “I can’t take your money.”

  “Why not?”

  “Isabel wouldn’t have wanted me to. Her children are well looked after as it is.”

  “As I understand it you have been working for many years in the smoke and dust in the mines—it’s not good to work for too long in those conditions.”

  “But that is where I’m at home.”

  She could sense that he was a little bit hesitant even so.

  “I shall think about what you have said,” he said. “I’ll come to your house tomorrow, when I’ve finished thinking.”

  He turned on his heel and hurried off along the paths between all the unmarked graves. She watched him until he came to the white mausoleums, then vanished completely.

  She was driven back to town and asked the chauffeur to stop at the brothel, but just before they got there she changed her mind and told him to drive her home. She still didn’t know what she ought to say. Isabel’s death and her meeting with Moses had increased her feeling of being totally absorbed by herself and her own thoughts.

  After taking a bath, she lay down on her bed. Over and over again she relived the long journey that had eventually taken her to the room where she was now lying. But the images inside her head were jumbled up haphazardly. Now it was Senhor Vaz she had married in Algiers, and Lundmark she had met in the brothel. Moses was her bouncer, and O’Neill was dressed as Father Leopoldo in the shadowy cathedral.

  The rest of the day and the evening was spent in the borderland between dreams and consciousness. She changed into a dressing gown when Julietta brought her a tray of food, but hardly touched the food on the plate. She occasionally opened her diary, and picked up her pen in order to make an entry: but in the end she wrote nothing at all. She merely drew a map of the river that was flowing inside her head, the mountains decked in white, and the house where her father seemed to spend all his time filling the gaps and cracks so that they could endure the never-ending cold of yet another winter.

  After taking another large dose of sleeping tablets she managed to fall asleep. But all the time she dreamt that she was awake. Or at least that’s how it felt when she eventually woke up.

  70

  She was already standing on the veranda when dawn broke. There was an expectation within her that she tried to dampen down, but without success. She had never felt as strongly as this when she had been waiting for Lundmark, or Senhor Vaz. But she certainly felt that way now.

  Moses didn’t show up. After having waited in vain all morning, she decided he must have already gone back to the mines. He hadn’t meant what he said about coming back to her house. She didn’t feel he had deceived her: he had been certain that she would understand his decision. He didn’t want her money. All he wanted was to return to the mines, where he felt at home.

  However, at around noon a little boy came to the front door of the house and handed in a sealed envelope with Ana’s name on it. Julietta carried it up to her room. Ana asked her to leave before she opened the envelope. She didn’t recognize the handwriting, but it was—as she had hoped—from Moses. He asked her to go to Beira and try to find his and Isabel’s parents, and tell them that she was dead. It was a mission he wanted to entrust to her, and was sure that Isabel would have felt the same.

  She put the letter in her desk drawer, and locked it. As usual, she hung the key round her neck.

  The letter had made her both upset and disappointed. Why had Moses chosen to give her a task that he ought to have carried out himself? Had she misjudged him, just as she had misjudged O’Neill? Did Moses lack the courage his sister had possessed? She felt increasingly despondent, but at the same time wondered if she had misunderstood his motives for bestowing the honour of undertaking this journey upon her. She didn’t even know who to talk to, in an attempt to understand better. Could Felicia be of help again? She was doubtful, and chose in the end to speak to Father Leopoldo, who had met Isabel after all, and might be able to explain Moses’ behaviour.

  She found him sitting on a chair in the cathedral, listening to the children’s choir practising. Ana recalled her first visit, and tears came into her eyes. She wasn’t sure if this was a result of the children’s singing, or of the memory of that first time she had ever entered the cathedral.

  Father Leopoldo noticed her, and took her into a room where the priests kept their vestments. The singing of the children’s choir could be heard faintly through the thick walls. She told Father Leopoldo about Isabel’s burial and Moses’ letter.

  “Why is he asking me to go and look for her parents?”

  “Perhaps he wants to show them the greatest respect he can think of: sending a white woman to inform them about a death. How often does a white woman or man do something like that for a simple black miner?”

  “But he was her brother, surely?”

  “I think he wants to honour her memory by asking you to do it.”

  “Then why didn’t he say so? Why did he promise he would come back, and then simply send me a letter?”

  “In a way he did come back. He wrote down his plea to you.”

  Ana was still doubtful, despite the fact that there was something convincing about Father Leopoldo’s voice. She thought that he might well have understood better than she had why Moses had done what he did. Then Father Leopoldo asked her cautiously how she had reacted to Isabel’s death. She told him the truth: her sorrow still hadn’t hit her with full force, and she was afraid of the moment when it eventually arrived.

  “What are you going to do now, Senhora? You have frequently talked about leaving here.”

  “I don’t know. But I do know that I must soon make up my mind.”

  The conversation was interrupted by Father Leopoldo being summoned to listen to a confession. Ana walked through the empty church. The choir had stopped singing and the children had left. Then she noticed somebody sitting in the darkness next to the big entrance door. It was Senhor Nunez. He was waiting for her. I’m being watched all the time, she thought. There are so many who see me without my seeing them.

  Nunez stood up and bowed. She raised her hand.

  “Don’t say anything! Give me a moment to think!”

  Nunez nodded and sat down again. Ana flopped down on a chair after having turned her back on Nunez.

  She stared out through the open door, straight into the bright sunlight. And she made up her mind almost immediately. She didn’t need to hesitate any longer. She knew what she wanted to do.

  She turned her chair to face Nunez.

  “I’m going to sell my establishment,” she said. “I want payment in English pounds, and I want the whole amount in one go. You must promise to observe the same rules and procedures as apply now. I don’t care what you do after the women who are working there now have moved on. I don’t believe in the children’s home you spoke about.”

  “I shall respect your demands, of course. But I’m still thinking about that children’s home.”

  Ana stood up.

  “You don’t need to lie to me. Come round to my house tomorrow afternoon, and bring the money with you.”

  “But we haven’t agreed on a price yet.”

  “I’m not going to name a price—but I’ll tell you if you come with too little money. In that case I’ll sell to somebody else. A lawyer will have prepared a contract. I want the whole affair to be settled immediately.”

  She didn’t wait for a response, simply stood up and left the cathedral. Now I’m the one who’s leaving the underworld, she thought; but in contrast to Isabel,
I’m still alive.

  The following day Andrade drew up two contracts. One was for the sale of Ana’s house, for which he was to pay £4,000, with all the furniture included in the deal. He also promised to keep all the staff on for at least a year, and after that to pay Anaka’s and Rumigo’s pensions.

  The other contract concerned the sale of the brothel business to Senhor Nunez. To Andrade’s surprise Ana requested him to leave a line blank for the selling price to be written in. Nor did the contract include any mention of the brothel being converted into a children’s home.

  At three o’clock in the afternoon Nunez arrived. He offered £4,000 for the establishment. Ana said that she wanted £5,000, as she was convinced that was the sum he had in his fat leather briefcase. Nunez smiled and agreed. All aspects of the sale were completed in less than an hour.

  “Four days from now you can take over everything,” she said. “Before then you are not allowed inside the premises. And you are not allowed to breathe a word about our deal until I’ve spoken to everybody who works here. Where have you got all your money from?”

  Nunez smiled and shook his head.

  “Revealing my source of income is not a part of our deal.”

  “Elephant tusks? Lionskins? Secret diamond mines that nobody knows about?”

  “I’ve no intention of answering your question.”

  “As long as you are not a slave trader,” said Ana.

  “What will happen to the chimpanzee?” Nunez asked, pointing at Carlos who was sitting on top of the tall cupboard. “Is he a non-specified part of our agreement?”

  “He’s coming with me,” said Ana. “His future is my responsibility, not yours. I hope you also noticed that I didn’t require that the brothel should be converted into a children’s home. Why should I demand something that you have no intention of doing? I want you to leave now. We’ve concluded our business, and don’t need to talk to each other.”

  Nunez eyed her up and down. He suddenly appeared sorrowful.

  “I don’t understand why you distrust me,” he said. “Just like you I am upset about the way in which we treat black people. Maybe I’m not good through and through, but I hate the contempt we show towards these people. It is lunacy to believe that such an attitude can continue for ever and a day—an illusion, and very stupid.”