Thirty Girls (15 page)

So spoke the man heading a program of rehabilitation.

Jane asked him why the Ugandan army was not more successful in stopping the rebels.

It is a bit confusing, he admitted cheerfully. There are rumors that
the UPDF disguise themselves as rebels and are the ones perpetrating these things. So, you see, it becomes complicated. He frowned, giving it more thought. Then he brightened up. But just recently, after a skirmish, seventy-one clients were brought in.

Vocational training, Rodney said as they got back in the car. That means they repair bicycle chains.

Better than nothing, Pierre said, and slapped Jane on the backside. Get yourself in there. Pierre couldn’t go too long without a flirt.

They came to their next stop. Maybe it was always this quiet at the Ministry of Information, or just late on a Friday afternoon. An empty yellow and blue hallway led up a wide flight of stairs to more empty halls and more wide stairways. A large woman in a yellow dress glided past them, dreamlike.

In the small room where the press passes were handed out, a goateed man in a tweed jacket said he had run out of glue. He asked Jane the name of her sponsoring organization and left, to return some time later with a small white tub. He scooped the paste onto photos of Pierre and Jane into small pink booklets.

So, he said. Now you pay.

Jane was handed her press card.
Jane Wood. Herpes Magazine
.

Last stop was UNICEF, a slender white building surrounded by a fence of white iron bars in a chevron pattern. The one-car driveway was occupied, so they parked on the street. Rodney elected to remain in the car. I’ve seen all I need to, he said. The door and windows were covered with the same white bars. Knocking by Jane and Pierre produced no response.

Maybe it’s too late. Jane peered through a chink in one window. Wait. I see a light.

Pierre banged again. They waited. The street was quiet; no cars passed. The door opened.

Yes? An unsmiling Indian woman with shiny hair opened the door. She wore a narrow skirt with a crisp tailored shirt tucked into a tidy and professional waist.

Hey, yes, Pierre said, and started to move forward. The woman did not move. He stopped near her, smiling. Can we come in?

Who are you?

Jane told her. I called the other day? Jane said. Are you Rahna Puar? Jane had gotten her name from a human rights organization back in the States. Her title was Advocacy Officer, whatever that meant.

I am. The woman’s eyes, lined in kohl, were sizing them up. Jane felt she was transparent as an amateur. Come in, Rahna Puar said flatly. It was hard to tell whether she was acting the jaded professional or being simply unfriendly.

She led them up a narrow white stairway to a small room with one wall of windows and a round table filling the space. No one else appeared to be at the office. Covering two walls was a honeycomb of files and binders, and a large whiteboard in the center scribbled with indecipherable diagrams of initials and numbers. She left them and returned with four large black folders, which she dumped with a smack on the table. She was the staying-late girl, the expert, and looked unimpressed with her visitors.

So what can I do for you? she asked, long-suffering.

We were hoping for some advice, Jane began. We’re headed to the north this week and wanted any, you know, tips you might have.

Tips? The woman nearly spat it.

Warnings, suggestions … Jane’s hand stirred the air, as it did when she was at a loss for words. She brought the hand back to the table and felt the metal edge. Any foreigner passing through, Jane thought, ran the risk of scorn by those rooted and committed to a place, the ones who stayed, who knew the ropes.

Pierre stepped in. We were wondering how dangerous it is.

The woman didn’t roll her eyes, but her tone conveyed the same thing. It is a war zone, she said. It’s dangerous.

So … driving would be—? Jane said.

You’ll be fine, she said, enunciating her words with a musicality which somehow conveyed hostility. People do it all the time. She might as well have been saying, Good luck, suckers.

I’m sorry if we’ve interrupted you, Jane said. We don’t want to impose. While we’re there, is there anything we could do for UNICEF?

The woman looked unpersuaded.

Wait, Pierre said. Do you think it’s too dangerous?

The woman spoke coldly. I go up there once a week. Then perhaps Pierre’s charm made a tiny impression on her. She sighed. Okay, she said, looking away from him as if that was dangerous. Don’t travel at night. Make sure you see people walking along the road. If you don’t see people walking, then the rebels have been nearby.

Isn’t the military there, patrolling? Pierre said, with a melting look at her.

The UPDF? She looked at them with pity. Sure, they’re there. But this apparently was another thing about which they’d have to learn themselves.

When they got back to the lake, Jane found Harry helping Pat build a shed. They were both bare-chested, wearing hats. Harry waved and kept working.

That night they barbecued fish. An English doctor named Arthur Saxon showed up for dinner. He’d just started working in Kampala and had a terrible sunburn. He blushed a deeper pink when he saw Lana, surprised she was there—they’d met, did she remember, at a wedding in Dorset?

I think I do, she said, eyes flashing. I think I remember your brother, though. Vere?

Yes, Arthur said. You would.

Arthur also said he had read one of Jane’s books and told her that he liked it very much. Everyone appeared surprised to hear it and looked at Jane as if she’d undergone a transformation.

I thought you were a journalist, said Pat McAlistair. Jane hadn’t thought Pat noticed anything. He seemed one of those men propelled forward by unthinking exuberance. So now she was surprised.

No, she said. I’m just faking it.

Later they danced on the lawn. At one point Pat picked up his wife in his massive arms and carried her, running out of the circle of light made by the fire into the darkness toward the lake, and that was the last they saw of them.

Daphne had worked for a professor at the university in Kampala. Helga was an expert on trauma in children. She thought Jane should talk to Helga. Lana and Don begged off and went instead to the flea market where Lana had heard there were great deals on fabric. Harry and Pierre took Jane. They sat in front and Jane found that sitting between two men in a truck driving new roads gave her a splendid feeling in both body and soul.

Kampala was a city of hills, and they wound up the southern residential area on a bleached switchback alongside whitewashed walls interrupted by metal gates. In the distance was a green plain, then the lake, a soft navy blue which grew larger and mistier as they climbed higher. Near the top they turned at the appointed number up a short vertical driveway paved with a grotto of rocks, to a modern house perched at the edge of the hill.

The doorbell was answered by a woman with cropped gray hair and a square, handsome face. Helga wore no jewelry or adornment, presenting herself as simple, unfussy and efficient. Her lidded gaze suggested arrogance.

Tea is coming, she said in a German accent. Come in. Like many people in the healing profession, Helga had an unsmiling expression and a neutral tone of voice.

A large window took up one side of the house, framing the hazy air and ruffled lumps of trees. The lake beyond sparkled from this height like broken glass. They sat on a low sofa around a low table. Jane saw not one thing of color in the house. A young Asian woman appeared with a tray. She set it down, swinging a thick shiny braid off her shoulder.

This is Sunali, Helga said. When she looked at the girl, her face changed, softening into something private and warm. Sunali nodded, barely glancing at Harry and Pierre, and set down cups and lined up spoons and put out paper napkins with her small hands.

Helga turned to Jane, businesslike. So, you are going to see the children? Sugar?

Jane told her what story she hoped to report on.

Yes. The nuns, of course, We’ve all heard that story. It’s gotten a lot of attention. It travels well. Everyone likes it because it’s dramatic. I suppose it captures people’s imagination.

Well, it captured mine, Jane said. She wasn’t sure if she was being insulted.

You, Helga said, turning to Harry. What do you do?

Drive.

Helga nodded, looking at him solemnly. This was acceptable.

Helga hadn’t been back to the north in over six months, she said. She was too busy here, teaching. But things hadn’t changed up there, as far as she could see. She’d been in Uganda for eighteen years, but Kampala was changing. They saw all the construction going on. Then she talked about the disaster of Idi Amin. Did they know he deported most of the Indian population, who were, she pointed out, the economic strength of the country? And now, she said, we have Museveni. She shook her head. This apparently spoke for itself.

Are you from India? Pierre said to the beautiful girl.

No, Helga answered for her. She’s Samoan.

There was a long pause and Jane asked more about the children.

When you talk to them, Helga said, ask about their escape. They are able to speak of this with enthusiasm. The escape is the first time they are able to act on their own behalf after having been powerless for so long. The period of captivity they feel as a blur, it is how they manage it. You can ask them about the small bits of their daily life with the rebels and a bafflement descends.

I suppose they want to forget it, Jane said.

They still have a lot of violence in them, said Helga. It’s hard to dispense with such things. Not many of them get over it, you know.

May I have more tea? Pierre said, holding his cup up to Sunali.

As Sunali poured tea, Helga placed her braid on her back, holding it like a leash.

Of course one is not allowed to say it, Helga went on. One mustn’t even believe that there’s little hope for them. But it’s true.

Do they know you think that? Harry said.

The children? Oh, no. I just study them. The more we learn, the more we hope to help them. She left the braid on Sunali’s back and admired it there. Sunali kept still, accustomed to being admired.

Did you grow up in Uganda? Pierre said, taking his cup of tea. Sunali appeared deaf.

Helga spoke for her. She doesn’t speak English.

Swahili?

She speaks Samoan.

You speak Samoan? Pierre said to Helga.

Certainly. Sign language would have gotten a little tiresome after ten years.

The girl didn’t look more than twenty-five, Jane thought. She pictured them, as she was compelled to do whenever she saw a couple, in bed with each other.

As if sensing Jane’s observation, Helga tucked the hair behind Sunali’s ear and spoke in German. Sunali smiled. Of course she speaks German, Helga said.

Driving home, Harry said, Looks like Helga is doing a little child abduction herself.

That girl was giving me the eye, Pierre said.

Really? Jane said. She was so out of it. Things opened in one place and shut in another. Girls with allure had secrets. Was Helga kind or cruel? What were the secrets of girls with allure?

As they wound down the powdery roads, Harry took Jane’s hand and held it against his stomach. The world felt fine.

It was Sunday, and water skiers were drawing white Vs on the purple waters of the lake. Next door, coolers were being carried down to the yacht club where people had gathered for a barbecue. The men were pink with sunburn, and women in large T-shirts sat cross-legged in shorts, their painted nails relaxed on armrests, visors on their heads. The talk was of the buyer of Idi Amin’s compound around the corner and how he was planning to turn the land into a resort.

Behind the cows grazing at the far edge of the lawn, Harry could be seen practicing with his glider. Jane watched him. He stood on a low crest with the ribbed chute puffed out behind him. Now and then he took a step and would be lifted into the air, then land in slow motion, as if he were walking on the moon. From the screened window the Ink Spots were crooning
Someone’s rocking my dreamboat …

Aren’t you coming? Pat McAlistair strode across the scratchy lawn, bare-chested and barefooted. People always wanted you to join in.

So, some time later Jane found herself riding in a chipped outboard, where people one at a time were dragged tilted on a creamy wake. The thought came to her that this area of the lake was once full of bloated bodies floating downstream after an Idi Amin massacre.

It was her turn; she jumped in.

The water was warm and thin and dark like tea, with no salt taste. She struggled her feet into the cut-in-half rubber slippers attached to the water ski and crouched, white knees showing in the brown tea water. Hold your arms in, they yelled as she braced herself. The boat burst forward with a high rev and she kept stiff and was miraculously pulled up. The bottom of her feet skimmed the water surface as she followed the deafening noise of the motor. Water sprayed in a plume when she turned, the wind was hot on her wet skin. After a few spins, she released the wooden handle and sank slowly like a statue lowering in quicksand. The boat cut a sharp turn and returned to her, idling. Lana, in a black bathing suit with a neckline plunged to her belly button, jumped in. Jane slid her the ski.

The boat had been driven from a driftwood dock on the other side, but Jane could see the house from here. Can I get back this way? she said.

Sure, said Pat McAlistair, coiling the rope, looking with intensity at the other boats.

Jane swam toward what looked to be a bed of thick growth. Up close she saw it was the water hyacinths they’d been talking about, the vegetation clogging the shore and threatening to choke the inlets. The leaves of the water hyacinth were large and rubbery and the stems thick dark cords winding around each other. She began to pull herself through the tangle, unable to touch bottom. As she penetrated the bog, she had the odd sense, which came to her when traveling, of being slightly behind herself. It was as if the person thrashing through this woven marsh was ahead of her in the future and she, her real self, was watching and hadn’t quite caught up. She wasn’t far behind herself, she was within sight, but she wasn’t quite arrived at this new unknown place. She wasn’t, as the phrase went, in the moment. The sensation was unsettling, but also stimulating.
There was relief, as if a chance were still there for her, before she caught up with herself, to gather parts still at odds with each other and in the lag time to allow the scattered bits to be pulled together and nearer to being whole.