The Flower Plantation (16 page)

20

JULY
1991

As dry season turned to wet, I struggled to grow used to the absence of Beni, whom Mother still forbade me to see. I wondered how she was, and spent much of my time alone in my room, feeling empty without her. I'd imagine holding her hand, and sometimes, early in the morning or late at night, I'd imagine kissing her too. When I thought about kissing her, things began to happen to me physically that I didn't want Mother to know about. If Father had been home I might have thought of a way of explaining to him, but he spent more and more time away, and we rarely saw each other.

Despite my loneliness, the ceasefire continued and my old routine gradually fell back into place. One Thursday I went out to Sebazungu's office to find him going through the filing cabinet. I saw his black-leather glove with one fingertip missing poking out through the files.

“Today you add up the hours,” he said, slamming the drawer shut and throwing the sign-in sheets onto the table. The sheets that were used by the staff to log in and out each day. I lifted them grudgingly – the anger I had directed at
the witch was now aimed at him. I could never forgive him for killing Monty or snaring gorillas.

Sebazungu left and I went through the sheets, trying to figure out the signatures and the thumbprints of those who couldn't write. I added up how many hours each member of staff had worked and multiplied this by their hourly pay. Sebazungu would then give everyone their pay on Friday. When I was almost finished, Joseph popped his head round the curtain.

“Sebazungu?” he said, and I pointed in the direction of the cutting shed.

He went off, his boots slapping against his calves, and returned a moment later with the key to the filing cabinet. With a screech from the drawer he took out a file. Sebazungu's fingertip-less glove fell to the bottom. Joseph locked the cabinet and left with a grin that exposed his gappy teeth. I finished my calculations, gave the totals to Sebazungu and went to my room, where I remained for the rest of the day, thinking about Beni.

That night, after dark, when the house was quiet, I heard footsteps outside and, not long after, the faint screech of the filing cabinet. I guessed it was Joseph doing his nightly rounds and putting back the file he'd removed earlier. But when I went to the kitchen for a glass of water and I looked out into the yard, I saw Joseph sound asleep in his lookout surrounded by empty beer bottles. Feeling tired I thought no more
about it; I flung Romeo some scraps and went back to bed.

The next morning, when Mother didn't arrive for our English lesson, I went outside and found her talking to Sebazungu and Joseph, who was holding on to his pay packet.

“Oh Arthur, thank goodness. Let's have English class here today,” said Mother with a wink that implied a game just between her and me. “Grab a pen and a piece of paper from the office and hurry back.” I did as she asked and returned a moment later. “Sebazungu, I'd like Arthur to practise translation from Kinyarwanda to English. He'll write down whatever you and Joseph say.” That wasn't something we usually did in English lessons, but it sounded like fun, so I went along with it. This is what they said:

JOSEPH
: Madame, I have been given the wrong pay.

SEBAZUNGU
: He is lying. He is trying to deceive you.

Joseph tried to respond, but Mother stopped him. She read what I had written and let out a weary sigh, then asked me to get the sign-in sheet for the week. She did the calculation in her head and took Joseph's pay packet, which she counted. “He's right: it is short,” she said.

I wrote that down in Kinyarwanda and showed it to Joseph, who could read a little but couldn't write. Then they said:

SEBAZUNGU
: Madame, that is because he has already spent it on beer.

JOSEPH
: That is not true.

SEBAZUNGU
: He is a thief. This morning there was money missing from the filing cabinet – and my leather gloves have also gone. He stole in the night. Who else could have done it? I'll bet his dirty prints are all over the drawer.

Joseph said nothing. I thought about writing that Joseph had been asleep when the filing cabinet had been opened in the night, but I didn't want him to get in trouble for sleeping on duty.

“Well, let's see, shall we?” said Mother, and we all went to the office to examine the filing cabinet.

There on the cabinet was Joseph's distinctive thumbprint from where he'd opened it the day before. I looked in the bottom of the drawer to prove that the gloves were there – but they weren't.

“Joseph,” said Mother. “Go home. I will talk to you this evening.”

With Joseph gone, Sebazungu explained to Mother that his stolen gloves had one fingertip missing – and if she saw anyone wearing them, could she tell him? I wondered who else had access to the filing cabinet other than Sebazungu, knowing he was the only one with a key. I went back to my room to think about Beni. After that, the day went along as normal, until just before dinner, when Celeste knocked
on the living-room door. I couldn't remember Celeste ever interrupting before dinner.

“What is it, Celeste?” asked Father, who was home from work and reading his paper on the sofa.

“It is no good,
bwana
.”

“What's no good?” said Father impatiently. I could tell he'd rather have Mother deal with the staff, but she was trying to make dinner, because she still hadn't found anyone to replace Fabrice.

“Ms Laney,” said Celeste, and she looked at the floor.

“What's she done now?” Father put down his paper.

“Nothing,
bwana
.” Celeste paused.

“Well?”

“Ms Laney, she is dead.”

“What?”

Celeste did not repeat herself. She said only, “It is true,” and continued to look at the ground.

“Where is she?” Father's face was the same colour as the grubs I used to find in the cabbage patch – a creamy white. He sat quite still for a moment, as if he was dead too.

“Visoke.”

Father put on his coat and picked up a torch. I did the same.

“No, no, Arthur,” he said. “You stay here with your mother.” He zipped up his coat and went out the back door.

“Albert,” said Mother from the kitchen when she heard Father leaving. “What's the matter?”

“Some trouble up the mountain,” he answered. “Stay here and call for Dr Sadler.”

Mother called Dr Sadler, and then we ate the plain pasta and salad she'd made, in front of the fire Celeste had prepared before she'd gone home. We watched the flames crackle and spit.

“I wonder what's going on,” Mother said to the flames. I thought of writing “the witch is dead”, but I guessed she wouldn't believe me, so I didn't. I doodled in the back of my book instead.

When the flames were growing shorter and the embers brighter, the sound of Dr Sadler's car broke the quiet. The beams from his headlights crossed the living-room ceiling as he pulled up outside.

“Everything OK?” he asked Mother when he entered.

“We're fine, Edward. Albert says there's trouble on the mountain. I don't know anything else.”

It was then that the back door opened and Father came into the living room. Romeo jumped and sniffed around him as though he hadn't seen him in days, but Father ignored him.

“Everything all right, Albert?” asked Dr Sadler when Father sat down by the fire without saying a word, staring into the embers.

“Albert,” said Mother, but Father shook his head.

“I'll make tea,” said Dr Sadler, and he went to the kitchen.

Mother, Father and I sat in silence while he was gone. Father continued to stare into the fire, Mother squeezed her fingers, I tickled Romeo.

“Take some,” said Dr Sadler, when he came back, pouring Father a steaming cup of tea. “You need something hot and sweet.” Father hid his face in his palms and then rubbed them slowly down his face.

“She was just hanging there,” he whispered.

“Who?” asked Mother.

“Laura,” said Father.

Mother and Dr Sadler looked at each other as though Father had gone mad.

“She was hanging from a branch with a broken neck.” Tears welled in Father's eyes. Mother sat on her chair as if she was glued to it.

“Laura's dead?” she asked.

Father nodded.

“Where is she?” asked Dr Sadler.

“In the cutting shed. Joseph and I carried her down.”

“What happened?”

“She was gagged, tied up and hung. Probably poisoned too,” said Father. I imagined the witch hanging like an antelope from a noose. “I found this glove in a stump close to the scene.” Father produced Sebazungu's black-leather glove with one fingertip missing. My blood turned cold.

“Oh God,” said Mother, and she held out a shaking hand. Father gave her the glove. “This is Sebazungu's. He tried to tell me this morning that Joseph had stolen it from the filing cabinet.”

Why I didn't either write something down or attempt to say something at that point remains a mystery to me. I knew Joseph hadn't stolen Sebazungu's gloves. Joseph wasn't the killer. Sebazungu was.

Mother went out to the yard, where she dismissed Joseph immediately. Poor Joseph knew nothing of what she was saying. It was only after Father got up from the fire and went outside to translate that he knew he was being accused of theft and murder, and that he no longer had a job.

21

The next day Dr Sadler called Ms Laney's family in America from our phone to say she had died. He didn't mention the bit about her being gagged, tied up and hung. He told them she'd been drugged with digitalis – which, he said, “would have made her sleepy, so she wouldn't have felt a thing”.

I was the only one who made the connection between Ms Laney's death and Monty's. Sebazungu had hung Ms Laney, after poisoning her with digitalis, and now I knew for certain that the witch hadn't killed Monty: Sebazungu had. I figured, that Sunday at the clearing, Simon must have been trying to hide Monty's body for Sebazungu and Thomas was trying to stop him. Nobody knew Sebazungu was a killer. It was the biggest secret of my life.

Dr Sadler told Father that Ms Laney's family had said, “She was happiest in Rwanda, and that's where she'd want to remain.” Father received the news with a nod and took a swig of whisky from his glass. After a long discussion, they agreed that although Ms Laney's camp had been destroyed by soldiers, it was still the best place for her grave, close to the gorillas she loved so much.

Ms Laney was buried two days later. Very few people came to her funeral, on the plateau where wild primroses used to grow. Dr Sadler, Father, Mother and I stood together in the damp mist. Sebazungu stood on one side of the priest and Simon stood on the other, in his floppy hat (even though the sun wasn't shining) and blue dungarees. I couldn't understand how Sebazungu could stand by Ms Laney's grave looking sad after killing her with his own hands.

There was also a small group of men in camouflage gear by the graveside whom I didn't recognize. I thought they might be soldiers, but Father told me they were gorilla trackers who'd worked with Ms Laney. Being a gorilla tracker sounded like a great job: spending your day following the gorillas through the mountains must have been as exciting as studying butterflies. If I hadn't already decided on being a lepidopterist I might have decided to be a gorilla tracker instead.

We gathered round the hole where Ms Laney's body lay. Rain formed puddles in the tarpaulin that was wrapped around her body. The priest began to talk. He spoke so quickly in Kinyarwanda that it was hard to follow, but his voice sounded as if he didn't much care.

Once the priest had finished and we'd bowed our heads in prayer, Dr Sadler cleared his throat and said he'd like to add something. Over her grave he told the story of Ms Laney's life in Rwanda, of how she'd always battled for what was
right – and not necessarily for what was popular – such as the end of poaching and Tutsi prostitution. When he spoke of those things he looked directly at Sebazungu, who stared straight through the doctor as though he wasn't even there.

Dr Sadler said he hoped the rumours and myths surrounding Ms Laney's life, such as her poisoning men and snaring and caging gorillas would go with her to her grave. At that point I looked away from the doctor and into the hole: I didn't want him to know I had been guilty of thinking those things about a dead lady.

“And now,” said Dr Sadler, when he had finished his speech, “I invite Albert, an admirer and fellow researcher of Laura's, to draw the service to a close.”

Father took a step forward, but Mother put out a hand to stop him. His face was so drawn you could make out the bones of his skull. He obeyed Mother, and instead of talking he simply laid a bouquet of flowers he had picked himself on top of Ms Laney.

I didn't know what to feel at the funeral. Looking into the hole, all I could think about was Beni and how much I wanted to be able to tell her that the witch had been killed and how, whatever Beni had been doing with Sebazungu at the hotel, she must not trust him any more.

When the funeral was over and Dr Sadler had left the house, having drunk several pots of tea and eaten almost an entire packet of biscuits, Mother sent me to bed. I lay in the dark, with only the glow from Nyiragongo to light
my room, and thought of Beni. I heard my parents' voices coming from Mother's room. I knew the conversation must be important, as Father rarely went into her bedroom.

Father's voice wasn't loud and bright the way it usually was – instead it was soft and dull, as if someone had turned a switch off inside him.

“I only wanted to say a few words,” he said.

“You would have said something you'd have regretted. Made it obvious that you and she were—”

“What?”

“You know ‘what', Albert. I've been putting up with it for years. You sneaking off at every opportunity to be with her. I might have drunk too much in the past, but I'm not blind.”

“Martha—”

“Don't give me explanations or apologies. I dealt with it years ago. There's no point in going through it again.”

“I—”

“Since Arthur was born I haven't been a proper wife, we both know that. It would be foolish to think your needs weren't being taken care of elsewhere. I accept that. I just didn't want the staff to find out by you blurting something out over her grave.”

I wondered what Mother meant by not being a proper wife since I was born. Was it my fault they didn't talk much to each other or that Mother had drunk a lot?

“God knows how much business she lost Sebazungu by ranting and raving about the prostitutes at the hotel, and
everyone knows she dismantled his snares,” continued Mother. “I just don't think it's wise that he should know you were involved with her, that's all.”

“For Heaven's sake, why not?”

“Because I don't trust him any longer, Albert. Something's changed. I don't know what.”

I wanted to run through and tell Mother all about Sebazungu killing Ms Laney and poaching gorillas, but before I had the chance Father said finally: “You think I'm in danger from Sebazungu.”

“I don't know what to think – and that's the point.”

He said no more and went to his room.

I lay in the dark, not thinking about Beni but of Father instead. Mother was worried that Father was in danger from a murderer. That knowledge, that responsibility pinned me to my bed like a butterfly with a pin through its thorax. For once I wasn't fighting the words I wanted to say, for once the words didn't well within me or suffocate me. For once I had no words inside me at all.