Хеннинг Манкелль - The Man from Beijing

‘Find out how much the sack they put on the woman’s head weighs.’

‘About fifty kilos,’ the interpreter informed her after asking.

‘But that’s a horrific burden. Her back will be ruined before she’s thirty.’

The men merely laughed.

‘We’re proud of our women. They’re very strong.’

Hong Qiu could see in their eyes that they didn’t understand what the problem was. Women here suffer the same difficulties that our poor Chinese peasants have to put up with, she thought. Women always carry heavy burdens on their heads, but even worse are the burdens they have to bear inside their heads.

She returned to the bus with the interpreter. Shortly afterwards they set off — now they had an escort of motorcycles. Hong Qiu let the wind from the open window blow into her face.

She would not forget the woman with the sack of cement on her head.

The meeting with President Robert Mugabe lasted four hours. When he came into the room he looked more like a friendly schoolmaster than anything else. When he shook hands with her he was looking beyond her, a man in another world who just brushed against her in passing. After the meeting he would have no memory of her. She knew that this little man, who radiated strength despite being both old and frail, was described by some as a bloodthirsty tyrant who tormented his own people by destroying their homes and chasing them off their land whenever it suited him. But others regarded him as a hero who never gave up the fight against the remnants of colonial power he stubbornly insisted lay behind all of Zimbabwe’s problems.

What did she think herself? She knew too little about the politics to be able to form a definite opinion, but Robert Mugabe was a man who in many ways deserved her admiration and respect. Even if not everything he did was good, he was basically convinced that the roots of colonialism grew very deep and needed to be cut away not just once but many times. Not least of the reasons she respected him was she had read how he was constantly and brutally attacked in the Western media. Hong Qiu had lived long enough to know that loud protests from landowners and their newspapers were often intended to drown the cries of pain coming from those who were still suffering from torture inflicted by colonialism.

Zimbabwe and Robert Mugabe were under siege. The West’s indignation had been extreme when, a few years previously, Mugabe had forcibly annexed land owned by the white farmers who still dominated the country and made hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans landless. The hatred of Mugabe increased for every white farmer who, in open confrontation with the landless blacks, was injured by rocks or bullets.

But Hong Qiu knew that as early as 1980, when Zimbabwe, then called Rhodesia, was liberated from Ian Smith’s fascist regime, Mugabe had offered the white farmers open discussions aimed at finding a peaceful solution to the vital question of landownership. His overtures had been greeted by silence on that first occasion and then many more times over the following fifteen years. Over and over again Mugabe had repeated his offer of negotiations but had received no response, only contemptuous silence. His patience had finally run out, and large numbers of farms were handed over to the landless. This was immediately condemned by the West and protests flowed in from all sides.

At that moment the image of Mugabe was changed from that of a freedom fighter to that of the classical African tyrant. He was depicted just as anti-Semites used to depict the Jews, and this man who had spearheaded the liberation of his country was ruthlessly defamed. Nobody mentioned that the former leaders of the Ian Smith regime, not least Smith himself, had been allowed to remain in Zimbabwe. Mugabe did not send them into the law courts and then to the gallows as the British used to do with rebellious black men in the colonies. But a refractory white man was not the same as a refractory black man.

She listened to Mugabe’s speech. He spoke slowly, his voice was mild, he never raised it even when talking about the sanctions that led to an increase in the infant mortality rate, widespread starvation, and more and more illegal immigration to South Africa alongside millions of others. Mugabe spoke about the opposition in Zimbabwe. ‘There have been incidents,’ Mugabe admitted. ‘But the foreign media never reports the attacks on those loyal to me and the party. We are always the ones who throw stones or make baton charges, but the others never throw firebombs, never maim or beat up their opponents.’

Mugabe spoke for a long time, but he spoke well. Hong Qiu reminded herself that this man was more than eighty years old. Like so many other African leaders he had spent a long time in jail during the drawn-out years when the colonial powers still believed they would be able to face down attacks on their supremacy. She knew that Zimbabwe was a corrupt country. It still had a long way to go. But it was too simple to place all the blame on Mugabe. The truth was more complicated.

She could see Ya Ru sitting at the other end of the table, closer to both the minister of trade and the lectern where Mugabe was speaking. He was doodling in his notepad. He used to do that even as a child, drawing matchstick men while he thought or listened, usually small devils jumping around, surrounded by burning bonfires. Nevertheless, Hong Qiu thought, he is most probably listening more intently than anybody else. He is sucking in every word to see what advantages he can gain in future business between the two countries, which is the real reason for our visit. What raw materials does Zimbabwe have that we need? How will we be able to get access to them at the cheapest price?

When the meeting was over and President Mugabe had left the big conference room, Ya Ru and Hong Qiu met each other by the doors. Her brother had been standing there, waiting for her. They each took a plate and filled it from the buffet table. Ya Ru drank wine, but Hong Qiu was content with a glass of water.

‘Why do you send me letters in the middle of the night?’

‘I had the irresistible feeling that it was important. I couldn’t wait.’

‘The man who knocked on my door knew that I was awake. How could he know that?’

Ya Ru raised an eyebrow in surprise.

‘There are different ways of knocking on a door, depending on whether the person behind it is awake or asleep.’

Ya Ru nodded. ‘My sister is very cunning.’

‘And don’t forget that I can see in the dark. I sat out on my veranda for a long time last night. Faces light up in the moonlight.’

‘But there wasn’t any moonlight last night?’

‘The stars produce a light that I’m able to intensify. Starlight can become moonlight.’

Ya Ru eyed her thoughtfully. ‘Are you challenging me to a trial of strength? Is that what you’re up to?’

‘Isn’t that what you’re doing?’

‘We must talk. In peace and quiet. Revolutionary things are taking place out here. We have closed in on Africa with a large but friendly armada. Now we are involved in the landings.’

‘Today I watched two men lift a sack containing over a hundred pounds of cement onto a woman’s head. My question to you is very simple. Why have we come here with an armada? Do we want to help that woman to alleviate her burden? Or do we want to join those lifting sacks onto her head?’

‘An important question that I’d be happy to discuss. But not now. The president is waiting.’

‘Not for me.’

‘Spend your evening on your veranda. If I haven’t knocked on your door by midnight, you can go to bed.’

Ya Ru put down his glass and left her with a smile. Hong Qiu noticed that the brief conversation had made her sweat. A voice announced that Hong Qiu’s bus would be leaving in thirty minutes. Hong Qiu filled her plate once more with tiny sandwiches. When she felt she had eaten enough, she made her way to the back of the palace where the bus was waiting. It was very hot, the sun reflecting off the white stone walls of the palace. She put on her sunglasses and a white hat she had brought in her bag. She was about to enter the bus when somebody spoke to her. She turned round.