Local politics were also at work: you never bit the hand that fed you, or was most likely to feed you. Consequently, there was much turning of the other cheek and much patience in the hope that everything would turn out right in the end. After all, didn’t rivers flow toward the areas of least resistance? This force, this Western river coursing through our midst, was more likely to take up our burdens if we laid ourselves at its feet.
Ignorance was another ingredient in this concoction. There was little real-life knowledge about how the West, or the rich, carved out chunks of wealth for themselves. Hardly any of us knew how the magical Western economic machine, personified by this man, operated. The tendency was to glorify the unknown. So the Westerners, in this case Lageau, were glorified to a sickening degree at times. Most of us believed that Lageau was our God-sent conduit to the benefactors in the West. The doors he could open! The dreams he could fulfill! Fantasy perquisites ranged from pocket money to quality consumer goods to good meals, to begin with. From experience we knew that priests who had benefactors enjoyed a better standard of living than those who did not. They had decent cars, cash to spend and nice clothes. Occasionally, they also went for holidays abroad. Therefore, the magical hundred-percent-compensation scheme for having left both mother and father to follow Jesus flashed whenever Lageau’s blue eyes appeared.
A plethora of guessing games went on for quite some time. The priests were cautious; we were optimistic. Didn’t good things come to those who waited? A little more patience would certainly not kill us. And it surely didn’t, but neither did it bear the envisaged fruits.
Lageau demonstrated his aristocratic credentials in good time: he was impervious to opinion, anybody’s opinion. Tears of anguish flowed, falling into shards of dashed idealistic dreams. We felt a painful reluctance to revise our attitudes, our dreams and our scanty inventory of knowledge. No one wanted to admit that they had been wrong in expecting too much, for surely what could be too much for one who operated in a charmed circle of money power like Lageau? But reality had to be faced: Lageau said, “Some people think that there are money mines in Europe.” The wink which followed that statement made hearts jerk with excruciating pain. If there were no money mines in Europe, where the fuck were they? Here? In Siberia? Or in heaven? Shouldn’t he have said that money was not the problem but how to spend it? The wink, as we soon found out, had been a way of turning us into quasi conspirators, quasi confidants. He elucidated: “Priests come to me all the time begging for cars, hi-fis, money and benefactors.” This was delivered in the oblique manner of an aside. In reality, it was a condiment to flavor the harsh mathematical dish he was serving us. He taught us mathematics. When no laughter came, he winked, screwed his finger against his temple and awaited peals of laughter. We were supposed to laugh at the naive, greedy, materialistic priests, but the laughter that came was both lopsided and painful, because everyone realized that we were not conspirators and that, if anything, we were laughing at ourselves.
A dull, heavy feeling akin to bean-weevil-inspired flatulence permeated me and threatened to decapitate my keen interest in this man. All my feelers were out: this was my first encounter with somebody who had it all, and I wanted to learn as much as I could. I felt I had beaten Serenity to the finish line: I had come face-to-face with one of the “millionaires” he had met only in books. This was the first man to make me question the sense of power I had grown up with. In times of crisis, I always heard the cries of fifty babies in the background, reminding me of how special I was, had been. At the seminary, I often thought I was in the wrong company, among toddlers Grandma and I had delivered. I felt I knew something priests didn’t: I knew what to do at the hour life came into the world. Lageau was the first man to make me aware of another sort of power, a more devastating power that controlled millions of lives by remote control. I almost felt ashamed of myself: my former power lay in amniotic fluid and blood and the smells of birth. His power, however, glittered with the sharpness of silver and the richness of gold. It frightened me and held me hostage in its glare.
My faith in him, though, became dented very quickly: I have never been a man of faith. Weeks passed and the diet remained as revolting as before. My view was that any new leader worth his salt seized the initiative quickly, effected changes, even if only cosmetic, and swung people onto his side. The principle remained that a dictator was only as bad as his successor, but Lageau showed no sign of improving things, which was both very strange and sickening. Where was the money? Had he come empty-handed? If so, what was the difference between him and Mindi?
Just as discontent set in, Lageau seemed to divine the situation, and he deigned to ask what we thought about the seminary. I almost felt ashamed for having doubted the man’s democratic credentials. Since I had been bred on tyranny, my belief that all authority contained in it the seeds of tyranny could be excused. I noticed that my coseminarians were reluctant to open their mouths and speak up. I raised my hand, proud to be fearless. I went for the jugular. “Mens sana in corpore sano,” I said, quoting my Latin teacher. “My belief is that the bursar is aware of the deplorable food we eat every day. The beans are weevilled, tasteless and far from nourishing. The maggots in the maize flour have become very fat and look fatter on our plates. We would like to have better, more nourishing meals. We would like to have a more balanced diet. We would like the nuns to take more care with our food, especially on Sundays, when the rice is usually half-cooked and has pebbles in it. We would also request the bursar to buy the seminary a water pump to get water up the hill during the drought.”
Lageau, clad in light blue attire, looked at me and narrowed his left eye to a slit. I felt a bit uncomfortable. He then raised his eyebrows, as James Bond does before setting off an explosion with a remote-control bomb activated by his wristwatch. The thunderclap followed soon after: “Do you think that money grows on trees or runs in gutters in Europe? Let me tell you this: your total school-fees contribution amounts to only eight percent of the annual budget. We pay the lion’s share for your stay here. If anything, you should be grateful that budget cuts have not been effected over the years. I came here to work out a compromise deal between the seminary and its financiers and to make sure that the seminary does not close down for financial reasons. Thanks to sources in Europe, I cannot see that happening during your time.”
I quaked. My knees went rubbery, and my armpits trickled with sweat. If I had not been backhanded and guava-switched for challenging authority before, I would have gone on to ask him what the fuck his flamboyance was all about. Europe, his financier friends and his wealth did not mean a crock of shit to us as long as we ate pig food. Good food was the least he could do for us. We could always fetch our own water — many of us had done that all our lives. But the food! I could feel public opinion turning against Lageau.
The news spread quickly. His attempts to solicit opinion from other classes were met with indifference. There was an element of local wisdom in it too: people who just talked for the hell of it were never respected, especially if boasting was part of their repertoire. Lageau was now being seen as an empty braggadocio who did not even have the decency to make good his boasts by at least rewarding us with good meals. Lageau’s popularity sagged, and Kaanders, in his faded glories, regained his.