And they are ready to leave inside half an hour.
6
Salif, standing little on formalities, is brief in his farewell, and he takes his leave and carries the suitcases to the waiting limousine. The driver, with his windows down, is half asleep but sufficiently alert to release the button controlling the trunk. Salif puts the cases beside his aunt’s singularly heavy bag there — he can’t help being impressed by what a light traveler Auntie is, if this is all she has come with; but he won’t rush to make a judgment; he will wait and see.
Meanwhile, he hesitates, trying to decide whether to sit by the driver in front, which is his preference, or in one of the roomier rows in the back. If he is unsure where to sit, it is because he thinks that Dahaba is likely to make a hell of a fuss about whatever choice he makes. And for once, he does not wish to engage Dahaba in a squabble about seating. So he stays outside the vehicle, waiting and chatting to the driver, who is polite enough to turn off the radio news, which is in one of the local languages, most likely Kalenjin from the sound of it — Salif has sufficient Swahili and a smattering of Gikuyu. When he assumes he has waited long enough, he returns inside. Dahaba, from the look of it, is in no hurry to leave. As for Bella, she is hanging on out of good breeding, maybe because she is hoping that James will get here in time for them to say a proper good-bye. And so they waffle about something, which, in Salif’s view, is of no consequence, even though he won’t say it. Salif wants to avoid getting caught in Nairobi rush hour traffic. And so, leaving again, he says, “I’ll be in the car, Auntie, waiting.”
The pin dropping, Bella hugs and kisses Catherine, stressing how much she would have liked for the two of them to meet under different circumstances. Though she has no children of her own, Catherine clearly has both the maternal instinct and the disciplined oversight requisite to a boarding-school principal’s wife. And not for the first time Bella is effusive in her praise of Catherine and James and thanks them for providing a safe and comfortable home to Salif and Dahaba in these difficult times. She adds she is sorry not to have met James, but that she looks forward to doing so in the near future and requests that Catherine please give him her kindest regards. “I am sorry he is not here for me to thank him personally and I pray that he meets with good news at his village and that there is nothing to worry either of you.”
Eventually, Bella and Dahaba leave holding hands, and together they sit in the back, speaking today’s language of choice, Somali. When Salif opens the car door to sit by the driver and finds there is a clutter of maps and other paraphernalia on the seat, he hesitates, and this time it is the chauffeur who apologizes and moves his stuff.
Bella says, “Catherine is lovely, isn’t she?”
“Even though she has no children of her own,” says Dahaba, “she treats the children as though they were of her own flesh and blood.”
“I am sorry I haven’t met the principal.”
“There is plenty of time.”
And during a pause, Bella remembers hearing on a past visit Salif’s comparing his experience as a boarder to that of a prison inmate who knows all the ins and outs of the system. She had assumed that he hated being a boarder and was loath to return to it, but he had corrected her, saying, “On the contrary, I often have a different kind of fun when I am a boarder. The rules are clear. Mr. Kariuki is very strict but fair, and Mrs. Kariuki is very caring. What more can you want?” Now, Bella knows that the pair of them, one as the principal, the other as his spouse, have set the bar high. But she feels cut out for this sort of challenge.
And as if to put that confidence to the test, Salif and Dahaba begin to war with each other, as if on cue. He accuses his sister of dillydallying and telling stories of no importance whatsoever. “We are going to run into terrible traffic and will be lucky if we get there before dark.”
“I was just being polite.” Dahaba recruits Auntie Bella’s support, adding, “That was okay, Auntie, wasn’t it, and you were just being polite too, weren’t you?”
Bella says she thinks it is time the two of them have outgrown quarreling, bickering about petty things, and getting on each other’s nerves. “Especially you, Salif. She is your sister and is younger.”
“I hope Salif doesn’t think that by saying what you’ve just said you are taking my side on your first day here,” says Dahaba.
“Listen to her!” Salif says.
Bella says, “Maybe there is much sense in silence if your sister says something provocative. Especially when you are a guest in someone else’s house, someone who has hosted you and taken good care of you.”
But her words have little effect, and the words that emerge from their mouths, as noxious as raw sewage, put an end to the sweet good-byes. Bella decides not to intervene again, reasoning that perhaps this rowing is at least a distraction from thinking about their father’s death. She feels there is no point hassling them about their sibling rivalry, even if it is improper. Let them have their altercations. And in any case, their set-tos are nothing new. Bella remembers witnessing a terrible quarrel when she visited them a few years back. Aar had planned a beautiful day in the countryside near Naivasha, and Bella was packing a lunch for a picnic when the children got into a fight about whose turn it was to sit in the passenger seat. Salif insisted it was his turn first. In effect, Bella was partly responsible for the row, as she interfered with the smooth working of a system they had fine-tuned to a T: Salif or Dahaba would sit in the front seat beside their father on the way there, and the other one would have his or her chance on the way back. Aar, naturally, had suggested that Bella sit in the front for the entire ride, but she had foolishly offered to sit in the back because she wanted to speak privately to Dahaba because Aar suspected Dahaba was having “woman trouble.”
Distressed by the conflict, Bella had asked Aar in Italian to step in. But Aar had explained to her, also in Italian, his belief that as part of growing up children had to acquire for themselves the skill of learning when to fight and when to accommodate. “It is something you can’t teach them,” he said. “They must come to this understanding by themselves.” He quoted the Somali adage that with age children become good adults. Bella wasn’t convinced, but she let go, saying, “Who am I to challenge you on this?” And to make the peace, she got them to toss a coin.
But today there is no one else to intercede or decide if intercession is warranted. They ride in silence, watching the view and each other, apparently living alone in their thoughts. Now there is a ravine to the right, now a clear blue sky as the highway bends to the left, now an eagle descending to catch its prey and taking off again with its victim in the clutches of its talons. But the beastly row has left an ugly feeling in the car, and it is difficult to enjoy these sights. It isn’t until Dahaba begins to cry again, silently, that Salif reaches back and touches her shoulder in silent commiseration.
Then Dahaba asks, in much the same mode as Americans ask where people were when JFK was assassinated — or, for a new generation, where people were when the planes flew into the World Trade Center — where Bella was when their father was killed. This is a different question from the one Bella has been asked before. She did not learn of the death until she landed at Fiumicino, but she has done the math and she knows exactly what she was doing at the moment the bomb went off.
Bella is the first to believe in the therapeutic benefits to be gained from speaking openly about the circumstances around the death of one so close. But she is caught in a trap from which she does not know how to free herself. In truth, at the moment when Aar’s life was ebbing away, Bella was with Humboldt, her Afro-Brazilian lover. They had made love and were taking a breather. Humboldt had already come, and he was just beginning to assist her toward the longer, deeper orgasm they both sensed she had in her when she glanced at the clock and realized she was in danger of missing her plane. She hesitates; Dahaba says, “The question upsets you?”