Tom Cain - Dictator

When Justus finally returned home he discovered the reason for their silence. Overwhelmed by grief and rage, he screamed out curses against Henderson Gushungo, and cried out to God for vengeance. As the sun set behind the western hills, he began digging Nyasha’s grave, completing the task by the light of a torch. She was buried wrapped in a blanket, and as a handful of refugees gathered round him, Justus said a few prayers to speed his wife’s soul on its way. When he asked the people what had happened to his children, no one knew. They had been taken away, two more recruits to the ranks of the disappeared. What difference did it make where they had disappeared to?

Late that night, in a brief moment of calm before the tears and fury consumed him again, he thought of the one man on earth who might be able to help him. He had always kept in touch with Carver, marking every Christmas with a long letter detailing his children’s progress as they made their way up the school ladder. Less regularly, Carver had replied, but the Englishman had always shown him friendship and respect. Justus could not afford to make an international mobile phone call, but what did that matter now?

He had a number for Carver. So he dialled it and hoped for the best.

Twenty-four hours after Carver’s arrival, he was back in Klerk’s drawing room, standing in front of the elephant painting. But this time he had his back to the charging tusker. His attention was focused on Wendell Klerk, Patrick Tshonga and Zalika Stratten. Carver wasn’t normally given to public speaking. But he had to admit he was getting a buzz out of feeling the anticipation in the air. He knew the answer they all wanted from him. But he was going to make them wait till he was good and ready to give it to them.

Terence had provided drinks, as always. Carver swilled his whisky in the glass, putting his thoughts in order as he watched the motion of the golden liquid. Then he said, ‘A long time ago, a couple of years before I went into Mozambique to get Zalika, I spent some time in a clinic near Geneva. I’d done a job that started going wrong right from the start, and only ended up worse. I imagine you knew about that, Mr Klerk.’

He nodded. ‘I was aware you’d been in a bad way, ja.’

‘Well, then, I’m sure you also knew that my case was handled by a psychiatrist called Geisel, Dr Karlheinz Geisel. Once I started functioning a little better – stopped being a vegetable, basically – we used to have therapy sessions. He said he had a problem with making me better. He was worried that once I was well, I’d just go back to doing things that he thought were morally inexcusable. So it troubled his conscience, feeling like he was my enabler.’

‘And your point is?’

‘I’ve spent the weekend listening to you three going on about your precious land of Malemba. Now you’re going to listen to me.

‘Geisel and I got into the whole question of killing. How did it feel? Could you ever justify it? I came up with an imaginary situation for him. Suppose you’re put in a time machine and taken back to Germany, 1936. You’re at the airport in Berlin. Adolf Hitler is getting on a plane. Someone sticks a detonator in your hand and tells you that there’s a bomb on the plane. All you have to do is push the switch, the bomb goes off and Hitler dies. No World War Two. No Holocaust. Trouble is, there are other people on the plane. Nice, clean-living folk: the crew, a couple of pretty stewardesses, maybe some cute, smiley little blond kids from the Hitler Youth. So if Adolf dies, they die too. Question: do you push the button?’

‘Of course!’ snapped Klerk. ‘A few lives against tens of millions. What’s the problem?’

‘Geisel had a problem,’ said Carver. ‘He wasn’t the one who was going to kill all those millions. But he was going to kill all the people on the plane. Their deaths would be down to him. So he wanted time to think about it. I said, “You don’t have time. You’ve got to do it now or never.” Then I gave him all this macho crap about how he’d screwed up the job. It was too late, the plane just took off, and now Hitler’s alive and seventy million people are going to die. I remember I told him, “That’s why I don’t waste too much time worrying about the things you like to worry about. In my line of business, there isn’t time.” ’

‘That’s the right attitude,’ said Klerk, approvingly.

‘No it isn’t. That’s the attitude that ends up with people in black uniforms with silver skulls on their caps and SS badges on their shoulders, shoving Jews into cattle trucks: “Don’t worry. Don’t think about morality. Just obey your orders and do the job.” See, it took me a while to grasp that Geisel was right. None of us ever knows what the consequences of our actions will be down the line. All we can look at is what’s in front of us, and ask ourselves, “Is this the right thing to do, right here, right now? Can I justify it to myself?” Maybe I’m going soft in my old age, but as much of a mad, genocidal, fascist bastard as Gushungo is, I can’t justify killing him in cold blood. So my answer is that I’m not going to take your job, Mr Klerk… Mr Tshonga… Zalika. You want the old bugger dead so much, you go and kill him. See how that works for you.’

Klerk shook his head in disbelief and disgust. ‘You telling me that you’ve lost your nerve, Carver?’

‘No, just my interest in other people’s dirty laundry.’

‘Please, Sam, it’s not like that,’ Zalika pleaded. ‘This is a matter of principle, of saving lives. It’s totally justifiable.’

‘You think so? From where I’m standing it looks like one man who wants power, another man who wants money and a woman who wants revenge for a ten-year-old crime, and, oh, while we’re at it, can I have all my land back? All those dying, suffering people you keep going on about aren’t the reason for killing Gushungo. They’re the excuse.’

‘So what about everything I told you yesterday?’ Klerk asked. ‘You going to throw all that back in my face?’

‘What, that killing Gushungo and Mabeki will do more for Zalika than any shrink ever could? Like it’s some kind of therapy? Trust me, it isn’t.’

‘I see. Well, if that’s what you think, Carver, there’s no purpose in extending your stay here any further. Terence will arrange a taxi to take you to the airport. I’m sure there will be a flight that’s going somewhere near Geneva.’

‘Thanks. That’s all I need. I appreciate the hospitality, Mr Klerk. It was good seeing you again. You too, Zalika. Mr Tshonga, I wish you the best of luck with your next election.’

Tshonga gave a gentle, knowing smile. ‘Thank you, Mr Carver. But somehow I do not think it will come to that. I believe I have not seen the last of you.’

‘I wouldn’t count on it.’

‘Think about it, Sam,’ Zalika urged. Then her voice turned much harder as she added, more like an ultimatum than a request, ‘Think very carefully about what you’re throwing away.’

Carver had thought about that. He’d very nearly discarded all his rational, carefully marshalled arguments for turning down the job, just for the chance to be next to Zalika Stratten. It had taken a serious effort of will to turn his back on everything she had to offer. He had no answer for her now; no explanation that would justify his rejection of her.

Klerk, meanwhile, having got nowhere playing hardball, tried the softly-softly approach. ‘There are still a few days before the Gushungos fly to Hong Kong. If you change your mind, the offer’s still open.’

Carver nodded in acknowledgement. ‘I’ll find my own way out,’ he said.

Carver didn’t leave Campden Hall quite as quickly as he’d anticipated. Just before he got to the front door, he heard a low, urgent voice behind him: ‘Mr Carver! Please! Wait!’