Aminatta Forna - The Hired Man

She blinked. I added, ‘For the windows. The wood is rotten. A few more winters and you’ll have to replace them all.’ I turned and addressed myself to the boy, who was eating at the table. ‘Duro. Pleased to meet you.’ I put my hand out.

Laura covered her mouth. ‘I’m so sorry. I forgot to introduce you.’

The boy looked up and seeing my hand offered his own, though his grip lacked any kind of enthusiasm. ‘Hi,’ he said, withdrew his hand and dropped his gaze back to his bowl.

We drove into town in Laura’s car. Outside the bakery was a queue, the latecomers getting in before lunchtime closing. ‘You need to come into town early for the best bread,’ I told Laura.

She craned her neck to see beyond the line of people. ‘There’s hardly anything left,’ she said. ‘Let’s go to another shop.’

‘This is the only one.’

She looked at me and laughed. ‘Really? Somebody needs to open another one. They’d make a fortune.’

‘There used to be another one.’

‘Don’t tell me it closed for lack of business.’

‘The people went away.’

She glanced at me and shrugged. ‘Oh well, nothing to do but wait. I expect you have things you need to do.’

In the Zodijak I drank an espresso. No Fabjan. After fifteen minutes I returned to the bakery where I found Laura at the counter talking loudly and pointing with fluttering hands. The woman behind the counter faced her squarely, blankly refusing to join in the game of sign language. I stepped past the waiting people.

‘Duro. Thank goodness.’

‘What would you like?’

‘I’d like a loaf of bread. Can you ask if there is any wholemeal?’

I doubted there would be such a thing but I translated anyway. The woman, who had been married to a cousin of mine for a while, replied in Cro. ‘No.’

‘No,’ I repeated. ‘There is only white bread.’

‘Can I order some wholemeal, maybe for tomorrow?’

I translated.

‘What do you think?’ replied my cousin’s ex-wife, again in Cro, which of course was all she spoke.

‘She apologises,’ I said to Laura. ‘Unfortunately they’re too busy to take special orders. You can only have what’s here. As you see, they have a lot of customers.’

‘OK, well I’ll take one of those.’ Laura pointed at a large loaf and the woman put it into a bag. ‘What’s in those pastries? Is it jam or chocolate?’

‘Gold coins,’ replied the woman. She pointed at the three types of pastries. ‘Gold coins in here. Lost treasure in this one. The last one’s chocolate, we ran out of treasure.’

Somebody behind tittered.

‘Custard,’ I told Laura. ‘Like sort of crème patissière. Not so good. The last one is chocolate. They’re the best.’

‘Then I’ll have three chocolate. What would you like, Duro? Have one on me.’

‘Thank you.’ I gave the order.

‘Lucky you,’ said the ex-wife. She raised an eyebrow. I ignored her.

‘How much?’ Laura asked, glancing between me and the woman.

‘800 kunas.’

Laura turned to me and shook her head slightly. ‘Sorry, what did she say?’

‘8 kunas,’ I said, and helped her with the coins.

We were back in the car. Laura apologised. ‘Thanks, Duro. I don’t think she was being very friendly.’

‘It’s just her way.’

‘I thought I’d offended her.’

I said, ‘She is an angry person; her husband left her.’

‘I’m not surprised. Is that the hardware shop?’ She slowed the car.

‘No, there’s another shop where the prices are better. Turn left here.’

We entered the shop and went to the back where the tiles were stored. I picked up two packs of ten. The prices in both shops were much the same, but Fabjan was part-owner of the other one and I had no interest in making any more money for him. I took a few other things we needed and said to Laura, ‘What colour paint do you want — for the windows and the door?’ When Laura hesitated I said, ‘Can I make a suggestion?’

‘Of course.’

‘Simplest if you choose the same colour. Makes the job easier. Where the wood is sound I rub it down, no need to burn the paint off.’

‘OK,’ agreed Laura. ‘It’s a beautiful colour. Almost the colour of cornflowers. You never see it in England, the sky’s too grey, I suppose. You need the sun to bring out hues like that.’

‘People say the colour keeps insects away, mosquitoes especially.’

‘That’s the second time I’ve heard that. In the southern states of America they have a very similar shade of blue, haint blue, it’s called. You see it everywhere, especially on verandas and porches. They say exactly the same thing, that it repels mosquitoes. Then in Savannah somebody told us that the real reason for the blue was that it kept away restless ghosts and spirits, an old slave superstition, apparently. That’s why it’s always on the outside of the house.’ She laughed.

I said, ‘Here in many villages we have a festival where the men dress up in masks and animal skins to chase the evil spirits from the woods. If you are here in February, you will be able to see it.’

Back at the house I spent twenty minutes sorting the tool shed and storing the things we had bought. When I went back inside Laura’s daughter Grace was cleaning the windows. ‘ Dobar dan ,’ I said and startled her. Her head jerked up, she glanced at me and quickly away.

‘Hi,’ she said. A tiny squeak accompanied the word and an odd little humming, like the sound of a tuning fork.

Outside I heaved the ladder into position and climbed onto the roof. To make each repair I had to slide the flat bars into position, descend to fetch a tile, climb back up to fit it. I threw the broken tiles down. It would have been a help to have somebody with me, to pass me the tiles, and the obvious candidate was Laura’s son, of whom there was no sign. Even with the hindrance of going up and down the ladder, I got on with the job. Solitude suits me. I am not given to the camaraderie of the building site with its undercurrent of aggression and where, if you choose to work rather than shirk, you are asking to be picked on by the others. I’d worked enough sites not to let it bother me; I got on with the job and I could take care of myself. But given the choice I’d rather work alone. I often thought I would like to be a writer, alone in a room. But for that I would have needed to go to college. I was good at history, languages. But my father dissuaded me: no jobs, unless you came from certain families and even then — did I know how people lived in the cities? So-called professionals, three generations in the same small apartment, endlessly partitioning rooms into smaller and smaller spaces. Work with your hands, he said. That way you will be your own master, hold onto your destiny and always eat. My father was right.

‘Where did you learn to speak such good English, Duro?’ Laura asked while we sat together over the kitchen table. She handed me a beer. Earlier in the afternoon a fridge had been delivered and now it was the end of the day the beer was almost cold enough.

‘I worked for a while on the coast,’ I said.

‘What did you do there?’

‘Many things. I was a waiter. Once I was a handyman in a hotel. Mostly I worked the boats.’

‘Did you travel?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘It was not so easy then as it is now. And besides I had little money. What of you?’

‘A bit, yes — on holiday mostly. The furthest I ever went was to Pakistan, to visit a friend who was working there. People stared at me the whole time. We went to a restaurant one evening and I was the only woman in the whole place. Their women aren’t allowed out, and then even when they are they have to be covered, you know, their faces. White women attract a lot of attention.’