An hour and a half later Duniya came out of the courtyard clutching a crumpled sheet of paper from which she intended to call the roll of the women out-patients who had registered for the clinic and been issued numbers scribbled on paper tokens. She stood in the porch, half in the shade, half in the sun, more impressed than ever with the resilience of these women who had risen maybe as early as four in the morning in order to be here. She couldn’t dismiss Bosaaso from her thoughts and she felt put out by that.
The instant they saw Duniya, the patients stirred, sighing like a theatre audience reacting to the curtain rising. Anxious for the list to be called, they stared up at Duniya as though examining her thoughts. She wondered how many of them noticed a slight tremor in her face, like the twitching flesh of a horse anticipating the sting of a fly. “Number Fifteen, please!” she called.
A woman got up from her crouched posture, lifting from the ground the weight of an advanced pregnancy. Other women opened a door for her to pass through, looking on with envy as she presented her numbered token to Duniya, who checked it against the list. Telling the woman to go into the waiting-hall, Duniya turned to the crowd of women and shouted, “Number Sixteen, please!”
Some of the women urged Number Sixteen to kindly hurry, because they had been up very early, had walked all the way here on exhausted feet and hadn’t a chance in a million of finding transport home. Number Sixteen shaded her eyes from the dazzle of the morning sun, took her time getting up, then walked in a leisurely way towards Duniya. When the other patients suggested she hurry, the woman mumbled something to the effect that since the doctor hadn’t arrived, there was no point in rushing. Did they want her to lose her baby? Many displayed irritation by shaking their heads and saying unkind things about the region of the country the woman came from, whose people they described as slumberous. Duniya, for her part, stared sunnily squinting as she explained to Number Sixteen where to go, and then called: “Number Seventeen.”
Silence. Then snatches of disturbed whispering broke out. Some of the women stared myopically at the tokens they had been given. Unable to read, they sought help from those who could.
Duniya called the number a second and a third time, whereupon a woman squatting at her feet said, “Why not call another if Seventeen is either deaf or no longer here?”
“We must give her a chance,” Duniya insisted. She called the number as if everything depended on it, her eyes moving from one lethargic face to another. She might have been the teacher of a huge class, half of whose students had raised hands to answer an easy question.
Duniya was staring intently at a spot, now vacant, where earlier had been a young woman to whose face she could put no name but whom she was sure she knew. Or was she hallucinating?
The women had become impatient and there was a stirring in their midst. A very large woman got up to push her way to the front and said to Duniya, “Number Seventeen has gone; I saw her leave in a taxi. Why don’t you call the next number?”
“Eighteen must be her number,” another woman said sarcastically.
Duniya’s eyes scoured the area in front of her, now left, now right, now centre, until her gaze ended where the young woman with the elusive name had been. Even before speaking, Duniya knew she was being stupid; nevertheless she asked, “But why did she go?”
And there was a riot. The women out-patients raised their voices in complaint, some getting to their feet and others trying to calm things, making them sit down again. During an instant of respite, one of them asked someone else to come and help speed up the number-calling exercise, since this woman (meaning Duniya) had her head in the clouds.
Hibo, a senior nurse, together with a junior nurse, came out to the porch and quickly consulted with Duniya, who at first looked at them with incomprehension, perplexed about what had made her behave that way. All she managed to say was, “Yes, please.”
Questions throbbed in her forehead where her veins were fast swelling. Before long she regained her calm, watching the patients shove and kick one another while trying to get closer to Hibo and the junior nurse. The large woman was indeed Number Eighteen; Duniya kept her curiosity in check, resisted asking her to describe the young woman with Number Seventeen. By the time the big woman was told where to wait, the two nurses who had replaced Duniya had conjured the riotous women into peaceable entities.
After finishing this part of the formalities, the nurses asked one another, “What’s the matter with Duniya today?” Lost in noontime reveries, Duniya sat by herself, uncommunicative.
In all there were eight female nurses in the hall adjoining the principal obstetrician’s cubicle: six junior nurses and two senior ones, namely Duniya and Hibo. Two junior nurses shared a small table and the senior nurses had one each. They talked while copying details given to them by the patients, who withdrew once they had provided the required information. The card thus filled out would be taken to either Duniya or Hibo for initialling.
Duniya sat by herself, sucking in her cheeks; her body seemed to have undergone changes since morning, like a newly pregnant woman’s physique adjusting to the condition. Her mind drifted as she half-listened to the other nurses’ voices. Every so often she caught words that were as distinctly familiar as her own name, but most went past her, unheard. The nurses conducted their conversation in low voices, their movements sharp and weirdly frenzied, yet they went about their respective businesses with the participatory routine of ten people undertaking a job intended for fifteen.
Of Duniya the nurses made kindly, inquisitive overtures as to what might be bothering her, and asked if they could be any help. She assured them nothing was amiss; she was all right, really When some insisted she confide in them because as colleagues they had the right to know, Duniya hinted that it was a matter of a slight indisposition, nothing to worry about. Honest. They said no more, for fear of upsetting her. After all they were fond of her.
Out of reach of her ears, the nurses agreed among themselves that Duniya’s troubles must be bound up with one of her children or with personal frustrations arising from the fact that, although pushing thirty-five and already married twice, she had no prospect of finding another man, but had to raise her three children alone. The nurses concurred that Duniya gave the impression that secret-keeping was a luxury for which she was willing to pay handsomely Except for Hibo, the others kept their respectable distance.
Approaching, Hibo said something Duniya couldn’t catch. Hibo had the habit of talking conspiratorially, as if plotting the overthrow of an African dictator. Now her lips trembled, first the upper one, then the lower one, after which she scratched them one at a time as if an insect had stung them.
After a pause Duniya asked her to repeat what she had said. Duniya knew very well that Hibo’s mercurial brain was capable of inventing something new altogether instead of repeating what she had said; she might even refuse to speak, full stop.
Hibo held on to every syllable, as if letting them go meant allowing a part of her privacy to leave her as well; hesitantly she said, “Is it Nasiiba who’s causing you so much worry?”
“Why should she?” asked Duniya, thinking it absurd that her daughter would cause her any concern.
“I only asked,” Hibo said rather sheepishly.
“No,” said Duniya firmly.
Hibo’s eyes became a darker shade of brown as she considered what to say next. Then: “I meant to ask if Nasiiba is well?”
Worried but also displeased, Duniya half-sighed. “As far as I know, yes.” But she was not satisfied with her own answer.