As he sat regularly swallowing small mouthfuls of warm whiskey, he heard footsteps approaching in the corridor. The young Englishman came into the room, and without looking in Port’s direction sat down at one of the small tables. Port watched him order a liqueur, and when the barman was back behind the bar, he walked over to the table. “Pardon, monsieur,” he said. “Vous parlez français?” “Oui, oui,” the young man answered, looking startled. “But you also speak English?” pursued Port quickly. “I do,” he replied, setting his glass down and staring at his interlocutor in a manner which Port suspected was completely theatrical. His intuition told him that flattery was the surest approach in this case. “Then maybe you can give me some advice,” he went on with great seriousness.
The young man smiled weakly. “If it’s about Africa, I daresay I can. I’ve been mucking about here for the past five years. Fascinating place, of course.”
“Wonderful, yes.”
“You know it?” He looked a bit worried; he wanted so much to be the only traveler.
“Only certain parts,” Port reassured him. “I’ve traveled a good deal in the north and west. Roughly Tripoli to Dakar.”
“Dakar’s a filthy hole.”
“But so are ports all over the world, What I wanted advice about is the exchange. What bank do you think it’s best to use? I have dollars.”
The Englishman smiled. “I think I’m rather a good person to give you such information. I’m actually Australian myself, but my mother and I live mostly on American dollars.” He proceeded to offer Port a complete exposition of the French banking system in North Africa. His voice took on the inflections of an old-fashioned professor; his manner of expressing himself was objectionably pedantic, Port thought. At the same time there was a light in his eyes which not only belied the voice and manner but also managed to annul whatever weight his words might carry. It seemed to Port that the young man was speaking to him rather as if he thought he were dealing with a maniac, as if the subject of conversation had been chosen as one proper to the occasion, one which could be extended for as long a time as necessary, until the patient was calmed.
Port allowed him to continue his discourse, which presently left banking behind and went into personal experiences. This terrain was more fertile; it obviously was where the young man had been heading from the start. Port offered no comments, save for an occasional polite exclamation which helped to give the monologue the semblance of a conversation. He learned that prior to their arrival in Mombasa the young man and his mother, who wrote travel books and illustrated them with her own photographs, had lived for three years in India, where an elder son had died; that the five African years, spent in every part of the continent, had managed to give them both an astonishing list of diseases, and they still suffered intermittently from most of them. It was difficult, however, to know what to believe and what to discount, since the report was decorated with such remarks as: “At that time I was manager of a large import-export firm in Durban,” “The government put me in charge of three thousand Zulus,” “In Lagos I bought a command car and drove it through to Casamance,” “We were the only whites ever to have penetrated into the region,” “They wanted me to be cameraman for the expedition, but there was no one in Cape Town I could trust to keep the studios running properly, and we were making four films at the time.” Port began to resent his not knowing better how far to go with his listener, but he let it all pass, and was delighted with the ghoulish pleasure the young man took in describing the dead bodies in the river at Douala, the murders in Takoradi, the self-immolating madman in the market at Gao. Finally the talker leaned back, signaled to the barman to bring him another liqueur, and said: “Ah, yes, Africa’s a great place. I wouldn’t live anywhere else these days.”
“And your mother? Does she feel the same way?”
“Oh, she’s in love with it. She wouldn’t know what to do if you put her down in a civilized country.”
“She writes all the time?”
“All the time. Every day. Mostly about out-of-the-way places. We’re about to go down to Fort Charlet. Do you know it?”
He seemed reasonably sure that Port would not know Fort Charlet. “No, I don’t,” said Port. “But I know where it is. How’re you going to get there? There’s no service of any kind, is there?”
“Oh, we’ll get there. The Touareg will be just Mother’s meat. I have a great collection of maps, military and otherwise, which I study carefully each morning before we set out. Then I simply follow them. We have a car,” he added, seeing Port’s look of bewilderment. “An ancient Mercedes. Powerful old thing.”
“Ah, yes, I saw it outside,” murmured Port.
“Yes,” said the young man smugly. “We always get there.”
“Your mother must be a very interesting woman,” said Port.
The young man was enthusiastic. “Absolutely amazing. You must meet her tomorrow.”
“I should like very much to.”
“I’ve packed her off to bed, but she won’t sleep until I get in. We always have communicating rooms, of course, so that unfortunately she knows just when I go to bed. Isn’t married life wonderful?”
Port glanced at him quickly, a little shocked at the crudity of his remark, but he was laughing in an open and unaware fashion.
“Yes, you’ll enjoy talking with her. Unluckily we have an itinerary which we try to follow exactly. We’re leaving tomorrow noon. When are you pulling out of this bellhole?”
“Oh, we’ve been planning to get the train tomorrow for Bousif, but we’re not in any hurry. So we may wait until Thursday. The only way to travel, at least for us, is to go when you feel like going and stay where you feel like staying.”
“I quite agree. But surely you don’t feel like staying here?”
“Oh God, no!” laughed Port. “We hate it. But there are three of us, and we just haven’t all managed to get up the necessary energy at one time.”
“Three of you? I see.” The young man appeared to be considering this unexpected news. “I see.” He rose and reached in his pocket, pulling out a card which he handed to Port. “I might give you this. My name is Lyle. Well, cheer-o, and I hope you work up the initiative. May see you in the morning.” He spun around as if in embarrassment, and walked stiffly out of the room.
Port slipped the card into his pocket. The barman was asleep, his head on the bar. Deciding to have a last drink, he went over and tapped him lightly on the shoulder. The man raised his head with a groan.
VIII
“Where have you been?” said Kit. She was sitting up in bed reading, having dragged the little lamp to the very edge of the night-table. Port moved the table against the bed and pushed the lamp back to a safe distance from the edge. “Guzzling down in the bar. I have a feeling we’re going to be invited to drive to Boussif.”
Kit looked up, delighted. She hated trains. “Oh, no! Really? How marvelous!”