A Quiver Full of Arrows (6 page)

Tentatively, they had come to the conclusion
that if the present regime stayed in power, there need be no serious concern
over payment, as the President had earmarked the new city as a priority
project. They had even heard a rumour that the army would be willing to
lend-lease part of the Service Corps if there turned out to be a shortage of
skilled labour. Eduardo made a note to have this point confirmed in writing by
the Head of State during their final meeting the next day. But the labour problem
was not what was occupying Eduardo’s thoughts as he put on his silk pyjamas
that night. He was chuckling at the idea of Manuel Rodrigues’ imminent and
sudden departure for Brazil. Eduardo slept well.

He rose with renewed vigour the next
morning, showered and put on a fresh suit. The four days were turning out to be
well worth while and a single stone might yet kill two birds. By eight-forty-five,
he was waiting impatiently for the previously punctual colonel. The colonel did
not show up at eight-forty-five and had still not appeared when the clock on
his mantelpiece struck nine. De Silveira sent his private secretary off to find
out where he was while he paced angrily backwards and forwards through the
hotel suite. His secretary returned a few minutes later in a panic with the
information that the hotel was surrounded by armed guards.

Eduardo did not panic. He had been through
eight coupe in his life from which he had learnt one golden rule: the new
regime never kills visiting foreigners as it needs their money every bit as
much as the last government. Eduardo picked up the telephone but no one
answered him so he switched on the radio. A tape recording was playing:

“This is Radio Nigeria, this is Radio
Nigeria. There has been a coup. General Mohammed has been overthrown and
Lieutenant Colonel Dimka has assumed leadership of the new revolutionary
government. Do not be afraid; remain at home and everything will be back to normal
in a few hours. This is Radio Nigeria, this is Radio Nigeria. There has been
a...”

Eduardo switched off the radio as two
thoughts flashed through his mind.

Coups always held up everything and caused
chaos, so undoubtedly he had wasted the four days. But worse, would it now be
possible for him even to get out of Nigeria and carry on his normal business
with the rest of the world?

By lunchtime, the radio was playing martial
music interspersed with the tape recorded message he now knew offby heart.
Eduardo detailed all his staff to find out anything they could and to report
back to him direct. They all returned with the same story; that it was
impossible to get past the soldiers surrounding the hotel so no new information
could be unearthed. Eduardo swore for the first time in months. To add to his
inconvenience, the hotel manager rang through to say that regretfully Mr. de Silveira
would have to eat in the main dining room as there would be no room service
until further notice. Eduardo went down to the dining room somewhat reluctantly
only to discover that the head waiter showed no interest in who he was and
placed him unceremoniously at a small table already occupied by three Italians.

Manuel Rodrigues was seated only two tables
away: Eduardo stiffened at the thought of the other man enjoying his discomfiture
and then remembered it was that morning he was supposed to have seen the
Minister of Ports. He ate his meal quickly despite being served slowly and when
the Italians tried to make conversation with him he waved them away with his
hand, feigning lack of understanding, despite the fact that he spoke their
language fluently. As soon as he had finished the second course he returned to
his room. His staffhad only gossip to pass on and they had been unable to make
contact with the Brazilian Embassy to lodge an official protest. “A lot of good
an official protest will do us,” said Eduardo, slumping down in his chair. “Who
do you send it to, the new regime or the old one?”

He sat alone in his room for the rest ofthe
day, interrupted only by what he thought was the sound of gunfire in the
distance. He read the New Federal Capital project proposal and his advisers’
reports for a third time.

The next morning Eduardo, dressed in the
same suit as he had worn on the day of his arrival, was greeted by his
secretary with the news that the coup had been crushed; after fierce street fighting,
he informed his unusually attentive chairman, the old regime had regained power
but not without losses; among those killed in the uprising had been General
Mohammed, the Head of State. The secretary’s news was officially confirmed on
Radio Nigeria later that morning. The ringleader of the abortive coup had been
one Lieutenant Colonel Dimka: Dimka, along with one or two junior officers, had
escaped, and the government had ordered a dusk to dawn curfew until the evil
criminals were apprehended.

Pull offa coup and you’re a national hero,
fail and you’re an evil criminal; in business it’s the same difference between
bankruptcy and making a fortune, considered Eduardo as he listened to the news
report. He was beginning to form plans in his mind for an early departure from
Nigeria when the newscaster made an announcement that chilled him to the very
marrow.

“While Lieutenant Colonel Dimka and his
accomplices remain on the run, airports throughout the country will be closed
until further notice.”

When the newscaster had finished his report,
martial music was played in memory of the late General Mohammed.

Eduardo went downstairs in a flaming temper.
The hotel was still surrounded by armed guards. He stared at the Beet of six
empty Mercedes which was parked only ten yards beyond the soldiers’ rifles. He
marched back into the foyer, irritated by the babble of different tongues
coming at him from every direction. Eduardo looked around him: it was obvious
that many people had been stranded in the hotel overnight and had ended up
sleeping in the lounge or the bar. He checked the paperback rack in the lobby
for something to read but there were only four copies left of a tourist guide
to Lagos; everything had been sold.

Authors who had not been read for years were
now changing hands at a premium. Eduardo returned to his room which was fast
assuming the character of a prison, and baulked at reading the New Federal
Capital project for a fourth time. He tried again to make contact with the
Brazilian Ambassador to discover if he could obtain special permission to leave
the country as he had his own aircraft. No one answered the Embassy phone. He
went down for an early lunch only to find the dining room was once again packed
to capacity. Eduardo was placed at a table with some Germans who were worrying
about a contract that had been signed by the government the previous week,
before the abortive coup. They were wondering if it would still be honoured.
Manuel Rodrigues entered the room a few minutes later and was placed at the
next table.

During the afternoon, de Silveira ruefully
examined his schedule for the next seven days. He had been due in Paris that
morning to see the Minister of the Interior, and from there should have flown
on to London to confer with the chairman of the Steel Board. His calendar was
fully booked for the next ninety-two days until his family holiday in May.

“I’m having this year’s holiday in Nigeria,”
he commented wryly to an assistant.

What annoyed Eduardo most about the coup was
the lack of communication it afforded with the outside world. He wondered what
was going on in Brazil and he hated not being able to telephone or telex Paris
or London to explain his absence-personally. He listened addictively to Radio
Nigeria on the hour every hour for any new scrap of information. At five
o’clock, he learned that the Supreme Military Council had elected a new
President who would address the nation on television and radio at nine o’clock
that night.

Eduardo de Silveira switched on the
television at eightforty-five; normally an assistant would have put it on for
him at one minute to nine.

He sat watching a Nigerian lady giving a
talk on dressmaking, followed by the weather forecast man who supplied Eduardo
with the revealing information that the temperature would continue to be hot
for the next month. Eduardo’s knee was twitching up and down nervously as he
waited for the address by the new President. At nine o’clock, after the
national anthem had been played, the new Head of State, General Obasanjo,
appeared on the screen in full dress uniform. He spoke first ofthe tragic death
and sad loss for the nation of the late President, and went on to say that his
government would continue to work in the best interest of Nigeria. He looked
ill at ease as he apologised to all foreign visitors who were inconvenienced by
the attempted coup but went on to make it clear that the dusk to dawn curfew
would continue until the rebel leaders were tracked down and brought to
justice. He confirmed that all airports would remain closed until Lieutenant
Colonel Dimka was in safe custody. The new President ended his statement by
saying that all other forms of communication would be opened up again as soon
as possible. The national anthem was played for a second time, while Eduardo
thought of the millions of dollars that might be lost to him by his
incarceration in that hotel room, while his private plane sat idly on the
tarmac only a few miles away. One of his senior managers A Quiver of ArrouJs opened
a book as to how long it would take for the authorities to capture Lieutenant
Colonel Dimka; he did not tell de Silveira how short the odds were on a month.

Eduardo went down to the dining room in the
suit he had worn the day before.

A junior waiter placed him at a table with
some Frenchmen who had been hoping to win a contract to drill bore holes in the
Niger state. Again Eduardo waved a languid hand when they tried to include him
in their conversation. At that very moment he was meant to be with the French
Minister of the Interior, not with some French hole-borers. He tried to
concentrate on his watered-down soup, wondering how much longer it would be
before it would be just water. The head waiter appeared by his side, gesturing
to the one remaining seat at the table, in which he placed Manuel Rodrigues.
Still neither man gave any sign of recognising the other. Eduardo debated with
himself whether he should leave the table or carry on as if his oldest rival
was still in Brazil. He decided the latter was more dignified. The Frenchmen
began an argument among themselves as to when they would be able to get out of
Lagos. One of them declared emphatically that he had heard on the highest
authority that the government intended to track down every last one of those
involved in the coup before they opened the airports and that might take up to
a month.

“What?” said the two Brazilians together, in
English.

“I can’t stay here for a month,” said
Eduardo.

“Neither can 1,” said Manuel Rodrigues.

“You’ll have to, at least until Dimka is
captured,” said one of the Frenchmen, breaking into English. “So you must both
relax yourselves, yes?”

The two Brazilians continued their meal in
silence. When Eduardo had finished he rose from the table and without looking
directly at Rodrigues said goodnight in Portuguese. The old rival inclined his
head in reply to the salutation.

The next day brought forth no new
information. The hotel remained surrounded with soldiers and by the evening
Eduardo had lost his temper with every member of staffwith Ilk Coup whom he had
come into contact. He went down to dinner on his own and as he entered the
dining room he saw Manuel Rodrigues sitting alone at a table in the corner.
Rodrigues looked up, seemed to hesitate for a moment, and then beckoned to
Eduardo. Eduardo himself hesitated before walking slowly towards Rodrigues and
taking the seat opposite him. Rodrigues poured him a glass of wine. Eduardo,
who rarely drank, drank it. Their conversation was stilted to begin with, but
as both men consumed more wine so they each began to relax in the other’s
company. By the time coffee had arrived, Manuel was telling Eduardo what he
could do with this god-forsaken country.

“You will not stay on, if you are awarded
the ports contract?” inquired Eduardo.

“Not a hope,” said Rodrigues, who showed no
surprise that de Silveira knew of his interest in the ports contract.

“I withdrew from the short list the day
before the coup. I had intended to By back to Brazil that Thursday morning.”

“Can you say why you withdrew?”

“Labour problems mainly, and then the
congestion of the ports.”

“I am not sure I understand,” said Eduardo,
understanding full well but curious to learn if Rodrigues had picked up some
tiny detail his own staff had missed.

Manuel Rodrigues paused to ingest the fact
that the man he had viewed as his most dangerous enemy for over thirty years
was now listening to his own inside information. He considered the situation
for a moment while he sipped his coffee. Eduardo didn’t speak.

“To begin with, there’s a terrible shortage
of skilled labour, and on top of that there’s this mad quota system.”

“Quota system?” said Eduardo innocently.

“The percentage of people from the
contractor’s country which the government will allow to work in Nigeria.”

“Why should that be a problem?” said
Eduardo, leaning forward.

“By law, you have to employ at a ratio of
fifty nationals to one foreigner so I could only have brought over twenty-five
of my top men to organise a fifty million dollar contract, and I’d have had to
make do with Nigerians at every other level.