Harmattan (5 page)

‘Ask for Ken,’ the younger fisherman added. ‘He’s staying in the little house right beside the
dispensaire
.’

They returned to their work and we thanked them for their help and went on our way, continuing without stopping again until we came to the village.

It had been quite some time since I had visited Goteye; the last time had been with Abdelkrim when he had been visiting a friend who had also later joined the Nigerien Guard. It was much larger, wealthier and closer to the river than Wadata, and although, at times, there was some rivalry between the residents of the two villages, usually concerning rights of pasture and competition for firewood, this was good-natured, for the most part.

A wide, open space – known locally as the quadrangle – formed the centre of Goteye, and at one end of this area stood the village’s own school, comprising not just one small, open-sided reed structure like the one at Wadata, but four sizeable mud-brick buildings, each with a tin roof. Hordes of rowdy boys were playing soccer in front of the school and eventually, after a great deal of taunting and name-calling from them, we received directions to the
dispensaire
.

As we approached the building, I began to question my resolve to have the mulatto photograph Miriam and me for Katie and Hope. Miriam was clearly faltering too, but we goaded each other on nervously. We had come too far to give up now.

A girl no older than Fatima stopped pounding millet to stare at us as we passed; on her back a tiny baby slept soundly, despite the violent, jerking movement of the girl’s work.

A smaller group of boys - each leading a thin, scruffy dog by a filthy scrap of twine - whistled at us, one of them calling out, ‘Wadata witches!’ I did my best to ignore the boys, but the dogs intrigued me. In Wadata there were very few dogs. Most of our older folk considered them vermin and, in an effort to despatch as many of them as possible, poisoned meat was regularly left out in our village. My parents discouraged any contact with such animals, but I had started to think of them somewhat differently ever since a little troop of strays had befriended Adamou and his mob. Furthermore, Katie and Hope had sent me a photograph of their own dogs: these animals were not scruffy nor were they thin. They had squat little bodies and long droopy ears and, with their large, round eyes set in baby-like faces, they were unlike any dog I had ever seen before.

Like its school, Goteye’s
dispensaire
was considerably grander than Wadata’s.

Sushie had a small consultation room, but all of her treatments were administered from behind a rattan screen in her modest compound. It was a proper, covered veranda, serving not only to provide shelter from the sun, but as a waiting area for patients. Two screened windows looked out onto the veranda and beneath them were narrow window-boxes filled with sweet-smelling, unfamiliar yellow blooms. On either side of the entrance, a row of tatty, wooden chairs were occupied by women and girls of various ages.

‘
Foyaney
.
Mate fu?
You’re a long way from home, girlies,’ one of the older women said as we climbed the concrete steps to the veranda. ‘What brings you here?

Have you fallen pregnant?’

‘
Bani samay walla
. No, Mother,’ I answered, respectfully but a little embarrassed too. ‘We are looking for Monsieur Ken.’

‘Monsieur Longueur!’ a girl about my age exclaimed.

All of the women laughed, even though several of them looked so frail that the effort might cause them harm.

‘Oui, Monsieur Longueur,’ Miriam said.

‘
Toh
. And what do you want with Monsieur Longueur, Missies?’ the older woman asked.

‘We heard that he had a magic camera – one that can make pictures instantly!’ I said.

‘He has a camera alright,’ said another woman, scowling. ‘It’s never out of our faces. But magic? I don’t know about…’

‘Black magic, more like’” the first woman interrupted. ‘He’s forever stealing souls with that damn thing!’

I guessed, from the look on her face, that she did not really believe these words.‘
Walayi!
I heard it’s not the American’s
camera
that’s magic!’ someone else chipped in.

A great deal of thigh slapping and sniggering followed.

‘You’ll find him round the back,’ said the woman who had scowled, now with a mischievous look in her eye. She gestured with her thumb. ‘He’s staying with the
Peace
Corps
nurse…’

A chorus of laughter erupted across the veranda as she continued to pump her thumb up and down suggestively.

We found Monsieur Longueur sitting at a plastic table in the compound behind the
dispensaire
. He was writing in a notebook and did not see or hear us approach. I immediately spied the camera, lying on its back, next to a half empty bottle of Bière Niger. We stood beside his table for what seemed like a very long time before he looked up, and when he finally did so he was clearly startled by our presence.

I had never before seen anyone who looked quite like this man. I had seen
mulatto
people before, of course, but this man’s features were very fine, his skin almost gold in colour – lighter even than that of the Touaregs of the far north, who occasionally passed through Wadata. His hands were large, but elegant like a woman’s, his fingernails scrupulously clean. He wore fine, metal-rimmed spectacles and a beautifully stitched khaki shirt with matching trousers. His shoes – jutting out from beneath the table, at the end of incredibly long legs – were also well made.

Despite the fact that he was seated, it was obvious that he was, indeed, a very tall man. When he had composed himself, he set down his pen, gave a little wave, then smiled, warmly, through a tightly cropped black beard. ‘Hi,’ he said.

We greeted him, in Djerma but realised, almost immediately, that he was not at all familiar with our language. He shrugged – his kind, clear eyes indicating that he was willing to try to communicate with us. I tried Hausa, but the result was the same.

When he spoke again, in English, I recognised occasional words from our sessions in front of Monsieur Letouye’s television. Miriam then pointed at Monsieur Longueur’s camera, but the response was not what we had expected.

‘Ne pazz doo cadeaux,’ he said, abandoning his mother tongue.

His French was not good, but I suddenly realised what he had presumed and felt disappointed and a little insulted that he should think of us as
barkarko
. Beggars indeed! I shook my head, vigorously, and mimed the action of looking through a camera, while Miriam pointed again.

‘Do you think he only speaks one language?’ I said.

Monsieur Longueur
–
Ken – mumbled and reached for the camera, then held it towards us, questioningly. Still his words meant nothing to us, but we knew, nevertheless, that they formed a question.

I tried again. ‘We want a picture,’ I said. ‘A magic picture – like the one you took of my brother.’ I racked my brain to remember some simple, English word that the stranger might usefully recognise. It was no good. ‘La photo,’ I said, giving up on English, as Miriam once more pointed at the camera and then at herself.

Monsieur Longueur pushed his seat back and stood up. I had to stop myself from gasping out loud. Truly, he was the tallest man I had ever seen: taller than Abdelkrim, taller than Sergeant Bouleb, taller than any Touareg. He set the camera down and, nodding furiously, indicated that we should stand facing the cooling sun.

When he was satisfied with our positions, he picked up the camera and proceeded to fiddle with its various buttons and dials, before lifting it to his right eye and pointing it at us. There was a smart click, followed quickly by another. I looked at Miriam and giggled foolishly. To our surprise, Monsieur Longueur then placed the camera on the table again and sat back down in his chair.

We remained, uneasily, in our positions, wondering what might happen next.

Monsieur Longueur rested his chin in one hand and looked at us, quizzically, then seemed to realise that we did not yet consider our business there concluded. He raised his eyebrows and shrugged.

Once more Miriam and I both gestured towards the camera. ‘La photo,’ I repeated.

Monsieur Longueur gabbled something incomprehensible. Then – in a frustrated flurry of Djerma, French and English – we all gabbled together. I wished that Richard was there with us.

When at last the frenzy ceased, we heard a loud clatter of pots and pans from within the little
wiki
at the far end of the compound. Monsieur Longueur stood up and beckoned us to follow him towards the open door.

Inside the house, an ancient, gnarled old woman was preparing food on a gas stove. The room was small with a very low ceiling, but enough light seeped in from the doorway and a long, narrow window to the left to reveal a display of locally carved masks. On the opposite wall, a beautiful and complex tapestry hung above the rickety table at which the old woman toiled. Mosque-like motifs and diamond patterns, in the colours of my country’s flag, had been worked onto a backdrop of thin orange cloth with painstaking care. Someone had obviously paid a great deal of money for this item. A sweet, unfamiliar scent lingered in the room, despite the heavier smells of cooking. Clearly, this was the home of the
Peace Corps
nurse. Smiling
,
Monsieur Longueur spoke to the woman, falteringly, his head cocked to one side to accommodate the ceiling. ‘Azara…,’ I heard – the same name as my mother.

‘…
les photos…cadeaux…comprendre
…’ Everything else evaded me.

It was evident that Madame Azara, too, was struggling with Monsieur Longueur’s use of French. Her reply was terse, slightly agitated, but I guessed that she was quite used to such clumsy exchanges.

At last she turned to us and addressed us in our own tongue. ‘Wadata girls, eh?’ We nodded. ‘Yes, Mother.’

‘He took your pictures – our Monsieur Longueur, no?’

‘Yes, Mother.’

‘And what else do you want from him exactly? He’s very busy, and so am I!’ she said, not unkindly.

‘Well,’ I said, ‘we were just hoping that he would give us the photographs now. Yesterday he photographed my brother and then gave him the picture straight away.’‘
Toh
.’ She faced Monsieur Longueur again and explained what I had told her.

Monsieur Longueur put his hands up and, looking at us apologetically, shook his head. ‘C’est different! C’est different!’ he said.

The ‘magic camera’ belonged to Madame Garrison, the large African-American woman who had been on the ferry with Monsieur Longueur, Madame Azara told us. Both of them worked for an aid agency called
Africare
, which had its central office in Niamey. Madame Garrison had, it seemed, been delivering Monsieur Longueur to Goteye, to enable him to make a report on the needs of the village, but she had set off for the city again, earlier that day, taking her camera with her.

‘A good, kind-hearted lady,’ Madame Azara said, as if addressing herself, which was just as well, for by now I was only half listening. ‘She took my daughter with her in her truck. My poor daughter is pregnant. She will visit the hospital, buy some goods and see her husband who is working in Niamey. They have not seen each other for six months! I pray to God that Madame Garrison will find some work there for my daughter too.’ She motioned for us to wait and hobbled through another doorway.

When she reappeared, she was proudly clutching a small, rectangular object in her leathery hand. ‘Look,’ she said, handing it to Miriam. ‘I had my picture taken too!’

None of this helped Miriam or me, of course. Secretly, I was a little angry with all of these people, even though I knew that such feelings were not really fair.

Monsieur Longueur assured us that he would send copies of our photographs when he had had them printed, but I was skeptical.

As we were making our farewells, Goteye’s
Peace Corps
nurse appeared, introducing herself as Maggie. Like Sushie, she was pale-skinned and spoke perfect Djerma. Unlike Sushie, she was not tall and elegant; rather, she was short and breathless, with the kind of plump, round body that men like my father wished for their daughters. Her hair was yellow and thin, but she had a pretty face and deep, warm eyes.

‘You must eat with us before you return to Wadata,’ Maggie said.

The smell of Madame Azara’s cooking wafted around us; I guessed they were having couscous and
mouton
, probably with chillies and peppers. Miriam looked hard at me, her eyes imploring. I knew what she was thinking.

‘We should probably get going,’ I said, ignoring both Miriam and the voice in my stomach. ‘It’s getting late.’

‘It’s a long way,’ said Maggie. ‘Eat with us and then I’ll drive you back.’

It was tempting, but I felt uncomfortable, not to mention disappointed.

Suddenly I just wanted to get away from that place. ‘Thank you,’ I said, awkwardly, ‘but no.’ Maggie shrugged. ‘
Toh
.
Kala a tonton
. Tell Sushie I said hi.’

The gangs we had seen earlier had now joined forces and were playing a rough game of
langa-langa
, each boy hopping on one leg while holding the ankle of the other. One of the dogs had pinned a weaker animal down and was tearing at its throat, while the others ran excitedly through their owners’ legs, their leashes trailing behind them. As we passed the quadrangle, the barrage of abuse began all over again.

‘Did you get your syphilis treated, girlies?’ one of the boys called out.

We did our best to ignore such filthy remarks, but inside I was seething. I considered showing them just how furious I felt: the gesture I had in mind was recognisable anywhere in the world – we had seen it used often on Monsieur Letouye’s television – but instead we kept our dignity and did not so much as look at them. A little further on, we met a group of women and girls returning from the river. They had been drawing water and each of them carried a large gourd or a plastic bucket on her head. In addition, some carried extra containers in their hands also. It was a chore which Miriam and I had to carry out many times each week in Wadata. We all prayed that the scheme for a water tower for Wadata would be approved. I was envious of these Goteye women and the short distance they had to travel from the river. I was envious of their smart
dispensaire
, their big school, their window-boxes, their quadrangle, their houses, their food, their Monsieur Longueur. I was also reminded that to make this journey we had shirked our own chores and that we might well have to answer to our fathers for doing so.