Dream of Darkness, page 11
It was alien and sinister and dark as Africa.
OP ANTENOR CO-OP 17/33/7 RESTRIC (NON-ATT)
DOC 77 AA/FE
ORIG a dream of darkness TYPSC (PHOTOC)
Chapter 10
In 1975 my wife died in tragic circumstances. She was found dead, by her burnt-out car, in a deep gully off the Jinja road. Suggestions that this might have been one of the arranged ‘accidents’ by which Amin’s hatchet men tried to cover up some of their more notorious murders seem to me to have no foundation. There was no reason for my wife to be a target; the timing, with the OAU conference in progress in the city, would have been stupid; and in any case there was no attempt to disguise this as an accident. The police put it down to the activities of a notorious band of kondis to whom, paradoxically, the increased security demands of the conference had given greater freedom of movement. Ali Towelli, Head of the PSU, admitted to me himself that the protection of delegates was making such demands on his manpower that other spheres of work had to be neglected. This semi-apology rang ironically in my ears in the light of subsequent events. But I have to say that the PSU, licensed killers though they certainly were, seemed to pursue this enquiry with real diligence, indeed with greater diligence than I cared to know about. No one was brought to trial but Towelli assured me that the perpetrator had almost certainly been punished, by which I assume he meant that there had been a general slaughter of kondi suspects.
After the funeral, my sister, who was paying us a visit at the time, took my daughter back to England. I, myself, was naturally devastated by what had happened and would have flown back with them, except that my masters had other ideas. One thing was clear, whether I went or stayed – it was far too dangerous for Ocen to remain in the house. Paula, our houseservant, was an old Bagandan woman, fat and lazy, but with the precious virtue of keeping her mouth shut. There was no way, however, that she could be involved in looking after a fugitive Acholi. This task had been Sarah’s. With Sarah gone, and the PSU’s attention focused closely on my household, it was imperative to get Ocen out.
Apiyo was contacted and she made arrangements immediately for Ocen to join her. She was hiding out in a friend’s house, so overcrowded that one more or less would hardly be noticed. It wasn’t the place for a man needing nursing, but Ocen was nearly recovered now and in another couple of weeks the plan to smuggle him back to Zambia would be complete.
I also contacted Archie Archbell in Nairobi to let him know what had happened to Sarah. And I told him I wanted out. I needed time to reassemble my life. I needed time to see that my little girl was adjusting to the loss of her mother. I needed time away from this mad-house called Uganda, a madhouse I had been crazy to bring my family into.
Archbell flew to Entebbe within hours of hearing from me.
‘So you need time,’ he said. ‘How much? A week? You can have a week.’
‘A week? I need a year at least,’ I protested. ‘I want a temporary UK assignment.’
‘Impossible. We need you here too badly.’
‘What the hell for? Isn’t it time we were thinking about breaking all connection with Idi, official and covert? He’s close to running amuck. This OAU conference has been like a three-ring circus. You must have seen the pictures of those half-witted whites carrying him around on a litter? And did you hear about the bombing display he laid on over the lake? There was an island, supposed to be Cape Town. Every single bomb missed! I gather they had a hard time hitting the lake. Guweddeko’s been sacked as airforce chief. I reckon he’ll be dropped in the lake himself, before long.’
‘All right,’ interrupted Archbell. ‘But we can’t break before the black states do, otherwise they’ll all cry imperialism and form a common front.’
‘Then we’ll wait for ever,’ I protested. ‘Christ, they even put up with being made to sit and watch Idi get married to his go-go dancer! Unity, economy, sheer bloody terror, I don’t know what it is, but Zambia and Tanzania apart, there’s no sign of opposition. And all the time he’s getting more and more tied up with the Libyans. No, it’s not just me that should be wanting out. HM Government en masse ought to be setting an example to the world and packing their diplomatic bags. Once the public realize what’s been going on here, they’ll be sick to their stomachs we stayed so long, appeasing a lunatic.’
Archbell replied (I made careful notes immediately after the meeting, as I always did when something seemed particularly important): ‘All right, so he’s a fucking lunatic, but he’s still our lunatic. Back home, we’ve got all those bloody socialists thinking they’re cracking the whip. Well, they won’t last. Most of them are commies and we’ve got some of our best boys working night and day to get the proof. Meanwhile, we’ve got to keep our money on Amin. All right, he’ll have to go eventually, but if he goes now, HM Commie Government will co-operate with their black Marxist friends, Kaunda and Nyerere, in sticking Obote, or even someone to the left of him, back in power. All I’m saying is, we need to buy time till we’ve got a nice pro-Western black boy ready to take over, and a good true blue majority to make sure he does.’
‘You’re very sure the Tories are going to get back in next time,’ I said.
‘That big wet nana, Heath, managed to make the unions popular last time, didn’t he? But don’t you worry. Things have been arranged so that nothing like that will ever happen again.’
‘They can do that? With Labour holding the strings?’
I was genuinely amazed. Archbell laughed and winked. ‘Depends what’s at the end of those strings, doesn’t it? They haven’t managed to stop oil getting to Rhodesia or arms to SA, so why should they have any better luck with votes? The bastards aren’t fit to govern!’
It wasn’t till later that I was to discover the full extent of the covert aid to the Rhodesians and the South Africans and how far it went beyond oil and arms. All that concerned me now was that the bastard had cunningly got me sidetracked into a policy discussion.
I said bluntly, ‘Archie, I’m not in a fit state to carry on here. And Sir Joe will want me home to talk about … what happened.’
He replied, ‘I’ve been in touch with Sir Joe. He agrees with me. There’s no one fitter. Idi still respects you, that’s clear. Look at that message of condolence. Look at the way the PSU are investigating Sarah’s death. You’re our best hope of keeping some control of the man. If you. go, there’s no possible replacement, you must know that.’
I knew that outright refusal was tantamount to resignation in the Service. I continued arguing. I even told him that I’d been concealing a political fugitive in the house, hoping to persuade him that I might already be compromised in security terms.
He looked furious as I revealed this breach of regulations, but all he said was, ‘Give me details. I’ll check it out.’
‘How, for God’s sake?’
‘You think you’re the only one who can see Amin’s on a downhill course? There are a few wise heads in the SRC who know the day will come when they’ll be needing a few favours themselves.’
I gave him the details, but, to tell the truth, I was already resigned to staying. Something had finally given way inside of me. I was into the penumbra of despair, and in that strange light, all landscapes are the same. I might as well rot in Kampala as anywhere else. And despite what I said about Sir Joe, I had no real desire to face my father-in-law just now.
Two final blows completed my disintegration. First, as Ocen and Apiyo moved out on the first stage of their trek to Zambia, they were spotted by a PSU patrol, who opened fire. Ocen was killed and Apiyo seriously wounded. She was taken straight to PSU Headquarters for interrogation, where she died within an hour. When I heard the news, I was sufficiently roused to remember Bill Bright. I’d brought considerable pressure to bear on the authorities to have him released, and several weeks earlier I had been assured that his papers would be processed as soon as he recovered from a debilitating fever he’d contracted. I understood the shorthand by now and knew this meant they were just waiting till the more obvious marks of their brutality had faded. Now, I drove out to Nagaru to check on his progress and to bear him the tragic news.
The commandant told me gravely that Bill already knew. In fact, as Apiyo had died in the Headquarters, they had brought Bill from his cell to identify the body. I then asked if I could see him.
The commandant said, ‘You must have seen him already! His release order came through today and we loaned him a car to drive back to Kampala. You must have passed him on the way.’
‘I didn’t notice him,’ I said.
‘It is a busy road,’ said the man. He rose and shook my hand.
‘I would like to commiserate with you on your own sad loss, Mr Ellis. And to thank you, for all the assistance you have given the PSU. This is the way a multi-racial society should work, isn’t it?’
Then he lowered his voice and added, ‘Incidentally, I hope your friend Mr Bright was in a fit state to drive. He was naturally very distressed. We offered him a chauffeur but he insisted on driving himself.’
Then he smiled slightly. I knew at once what he meant. And when I saw the ambulance and the police cars by the roadside as I returned to Kampala, I didn’t even slow down.
The news of his death was in the paper the next day. The news of mine never made the headlines, as I was still walking around and functioning normally, but it wasn’t till after Entebbe, a year later, that I started to come back to life.
12
The advance towards her mother’s death was slow and circuitous. Sairey preferred to accept Vita’s line of approach with blind faith. Too close a questioning would be like glancing over your shoulder to make sure the ghost you were raising from the underworld was actually following. But at last they were into 1975 and the house in Kampala.
The curtains were drawn, but it’s light outside and the bright sunshine sneaks in to edge the bed with light. There’s a figure in it, a man. He is asleep. He moves as I enter, but doesn’t wake up. I squat in a corner and watch.
Is he black or white?
Black. But his arms and chest are wrapped in white bandages, very white against his black skin.
How long do you sit?
A long time. Then Mummy comes in. She has a basin with steam rising from it. She doesn’t see me, but sits on a chair by the bed. After a short while, the man wakes up. He says something and she says something back. I can’t hear what. Then she begins to unwrap his bandages. Next, she starts to wash him from her basin. It hurts, for he cries out, and she says, ‘Sorry’, and I see her gently rub his shoulder like she rubs me if I’ve got a pain and she wants to make it better. I must have moved then, for she turns and looks at me. Then, smiling, she comes to pick me up and takes me to the end of the bed. The man looks up at me. There is a hole in the upper part of his arm and it looks red and angry. Mummy says, ‘This is your Uncle Ocen come on a visit. He’s Allan’s uncle really, but I don’t suppose he’ll mind sharing him.’ I say, ‘Where’s Allan?’ And she laughs and says, ‘You miss your lapidi, do you? Don’t worry. You’ll see him again soon, I promise.’ And I feel perfectly happy because whatever Mummy promises always comes true.
When the tape finished, Sairey let the silence wash over her till the birds on the roof and the wind in the eaves and the internal creakings of the old house forced their way to the surface and her mind to the present.
Vita knocked. Somehow, she seemed to know the exact moment when Sairey was ready. As she came in, Sairey said, ‘Can I really remember all that?’
‘I’ve told you. Nothing is forgotten, just mislaid. Old people, as the short-term memory fades, often find the most distant past coming up sharp and vivid.’
‘But the words … are they what Mummy actually said?’
‘It’s interesting,’ said Vita, studying the file containing her close analysis of all Sairey’s sessions. ‘Whenever your mother is speaking, you seem to give the minutest detail. Often, I catch her turn of phrase, her actual intonation. All this points to accurate recall.’
She spoke in her usual calm, measured manner, but Sairey thought she detected an undercurrent of emotion. It occurred to her that in some ways, all this was perhaps just as painful for Vita as for herself. Once thought, this idea was so obvious that she instantly dropped the perhaps.
She said, ‘You mention intonation. Why don’t I sound like a four-year-old child, then?’
‘You’re thinking of those movies again,’ said Vita. ‘Yes, there have been cases where psychological regression has been induced so completely that infant speech patterns have appeared. In some cases, I don’t say all, I suspect that these are not so much an echo of how the subject actually spoke at the regressive age as the way in which the conscious mind, now temporarily reduced to the status of the subconscious, imagines the subject would have spoken at that age. Even where childhood recordings exist for comparison, this proves little except that the subject has had something to mimic. For me, the stress is always on bringing to the surface what is hidden below, not sending the subject to walk on the bottom of the sea.’
This powerful image came out with a vehemence which made Sairey guess that Vita was rehearsing a case made out already, in the company of her peers.
She said, frowning, ‘If the conscious is still playing a role, is that why you gave me Mummy’s letter to read? I mean, would I have remembered about Ocen if I hadn’t been reading about him just recently?’
Vita said, ‘Who knows? The mind is not a fixed state. Everything new alters the whole of it. Everything you do, everything you read, can affect, not the truth, but the order and the intensity of your recollection.’
Sairey thought of Bill Bright’s tortured scribblings, still hidden in her bedroom. Three days had passed and she still hadn’t made her mind up what to do. Archbell, Kanyagga, even Aunt Celia, these were all little hooks drawing her back into a world which, from her present vantage point, looked even more confusing than it had in the past. Basically, she felt she would be foolish to attempt to deal with that world before she was ‘better’, whatever that meant. And getting better was in Vita’s gift, no one else’s, of that she was certain. Hence the need for blind faith. But even the faithful are not entirely free from the irritation of uncertainty.
‘Vita, is this really getting us anywhere?’ she asked sharply. ‘I mean, what’s the use of memories when half the time I don’t understand what it is I’m remembering. What was Ocen doing wrapped up in bandages in our house, for instance? What does it all mean? Why can’t we just hop straight to the point where Mummy died and see what my memory makes of that?’
‘Because after a landslide, you’ve got to clear away a whole scatter of rubble before you get near the point of maximum damage,’ said Vita. ‘Sairey, you’ve been looking a bit strained these past couple of days. Why don’t you have a day in town, do some shopping, have lunch with your father? Too much rural tranquillity can be as nerve-jangling as too much traffic.’
The suggestion came like a thought-reading.
‘Yes,’ said Sairey briskly, like a young woman who could easily make up her mind. ‘I’d like that. I’ll ring Daddy straightaway.’
When the Masham Square phone was answered, Sairey didn’t recognize the voice, and hesitantly repeated the number.
‘Sairey, is that you? It’s Allan Bright.’
‘Of course, I’m sorry, I didn’t recognize … how are you?’
‘Working hard. Your father’s out, I’m afraid, but Mrs Ellis
‘No, I wanted Daddy. I’m coming up to town and hoping to bum a lunch from him.’
‘You could always bum a sandwich off me in St James’s Park. Cheese and pickle, very thick. Yes? No? Hang on. You’re in, or out of, luck. That’s your father now, so you’re saved from making a decision. Here he is. Bye.’
A moment later Nigel Ellis came on the line. He sounded his usual breezy self, ‘Lunch, darling? Why not, though it may be brief. I’m meeting someone for a drink in the Ritz at noon, so let’s make it their restaurant at quarter to one, shall we?’
For once trains, taxis and traffic were all on her side and she was walking into the Ritz at half past twelve. It was not a place she was familiar with, and as she made her way hesitantly through the foyer it was with some relief that she glimpsed her father in a tall-backed chair leaning forward to talk to someone she couldn’t see. He looked up, spotted her, glanced at his watch, then made a gesture which probably meant she should go and make herself comfortable elsewhere till the time of their appointment came. Pique and curiosity drove Sairey on, and when he saw she was not to be deterred, he spoke to his companion, then rose to his feet.
‘Hello, darling. I never thought I’d see the day when any woman in my life was on time, let alone early. You know Mrs Marsden, I think.’
Sairey found herself looking down at the thin wispy woman she’d met in the park with Vita.
‘Hello again. Your father tells me you’re staying with Vita Gray down in that draughty hole of hers in Essex. How is she?’
‘She’s fine,’ said Sairey.
‘Good. She’s an interesting woman. You should get her to talk to you about Lawrence’s sub-text. Some marvellous insights among all the psychoanalytical claptrap. Now I must be on my way, Nigel. I’ve a paper to prepare.’
‘Please, don’t let me interrupt,’ said Sairey belatedly.
‘No such thing. I think we’d exhausted what there was to say. Goodbye, dear. Remember me to Vita.’
She gathered up a handbag, a scuffed briefcase and a Fortnum and Mason carrier bag and went out with a list to starboard, like an overladen dhow.
‘What on earth were you talking to her about?’ said Sairey.
‘I hope this isn’t what passes for good manners in Essex,’ said Ellis dryly.
‘Oops. Sorry. It was rather rude. But it’s just that I didn’t know you had any burning interest in academic Eng. Lit. That’s what she is, isn’t she? Some kind of professor.’
