William Boyd - On the Yankee Station - Stories

As a citron light spread over the jungle, Morgan reflected that they hadn’t made such bad progress. With the windows wound full down the speeding car had been filled with a cool breeze and Morgan barely sweated at all. As expected, the roads had been quiet. They had passed the still-guttering remains of a crashed petrol tanker and once had been forced off the road by a criminally overloaded articulated lorry, its two huge trailers towering with sacks of groundnuts, as its bonus-hunting driver, high on kolanuts, barrelled down the middle of the road en route for the capital and its busy port.

All in all a remarkably uneventful journey, thought Morgan as they raced through a town called Shagamu, which marked the halfway stage. But then it was only a matter of a few miles farther on, the sun’s heat concentrating, Morgan’s buttocks and the backs of his ample thighs beginning to chafe and fret on the plastic seats, that they had a puncture. The car veered suddenly, Morgan threw up his arms, Peter shouted “Good Lord!” and he pulled onto the laterite verge.

After the steady rumble of their passage on the tarmac, it was very quiet. The road stretched empty before and behind them, the avenue of jungle rearing up on either side like high green walls.

Peter got out and looked at the tyre, sucking in air through the prodigious gaps in his teeth. He grinned.

“Dis be poncture, sah,” he explained through the window.

Morgan didn’t budge. “Well, bloody fix it then,” he growled. “I’ve got a plane to catch, you know.”

Peter went round to the back of the car and threw open the boot. Morgan sat scowling, the absence of breeze through the car windows reminding him pointedly of the high humidity and the unrelenting heat of the early morning sun. He had a sudden agonising itch on his perineum. He scratched at it furiously.

Then Peter was back at the window.

“Ah-ah! Sah, dey never give us one spear.”

“Spear? Spear? What bloody spear?”

“Spear tyre, sah. Dere is no spear tyre for boot.”

Morgan climbed out of the car swearing. Sure enough, no spare. He felt an intolerable explosive frustration building up in him. This bloody country just wasn’t going to give up, was it? Oh, no, far too much to expect to catch a plane unhindered. He gazed wildly around at the green jungle before telling himself to calm down.

“You’d better take the wheel back to Shagamu.” He thrust some notes into Peter’s hand. “Try and get it fixed. And hurry!”

Peter jacked up the Consul, removed the wheel and trundled it back down the road to Shagamu. It was too hot to sit in the car, so Morgan crouched on the verge in what little shade it offered and watched the sun climb the sky.

A few cars whizzed past but nobody stopped. The highway, Morgan grimly noted, was particularly quiet today.

Two and a half hours later, Peter returned with a repaired and newly inflated tyre. It took another ten minutes to replace it before they were on their way once more. Morgan’s plane was due to leave in just over an hour. They would never make it. His face was taut and expressionless as they roared down the road to the airport.

The airport was situated on flat land about ten miles from the capital and was quite cut off, surrounded by a large light-industrial estate. As they drove past the small factories, freight depots and vehicle pools. Morgan again commented on the lack of traffic; everybody seemed to be staying away. Small groups of people gathered in the villages at the roadside and stared curiously at the cream Consul as it went by. Probably some bloody holiday, reasoned Morgan thankfully as he saw the signposts directing them to the airport. At least something was working in his favour.

Soon he saw the familiar roadside billboards advertising airlines and the exotic places they visited, and Morgan felt the first thrill of excitement at the thought of flying off home; the well-modulated chill of the aircraft, the crisp stewardesses and the duty-free liquor. He was straightening his tie as they rounded a corner and almost ran down a road-block.

The road-block consisted of three fifty-gallon oil drums surmounted by planks of wood. Parked to one side was a chubby armoured car, surrounded by at least two dozen soldiers wearing camouflage uniforms and armed with sub-machine-guns with sickle-shaped magazines.

Morgan stared in open-mouthed astonishment about him and at the airport buildings two hundred yards ahead. Four huge tanks were parked in front of the arrivals hall. Morgan noticed with alarm that several of the soldiers had levelled their guns at the car. Peter’s face was positively grey with fear. A young officer approached with a red cockade in his peaked cap. He politely asked Morgan to get out and produce his documents.

“What’s going on?” Morgan asked impatiently. “Is this some kind of an exercise? Terrorists? Or what? Look here”—he pointed to his identity card—“I’m a member of the British diplomatic corps and I’ve got a plane to catch.”

The young officer returned the documents.

“This airport is now under the command of the military government …” he began, as if reading prompt-cards behind Morgan’s head.

“What military government?” Morgan interrupted; then, as realisation dawned: “Oh, no. Oh, my God, no. A coup — it’s a coup. Don’t tell me. That’s all I need, a bloody coup.” He raised his right hand to his forehead in an unconsciously dramatic gesture of despair. He felt he was getting a migraine. A bad one.

Just then a BOAC staff car drove up from the airport buildings and a harassed official got out. After some conferring with the young officer he hurried over to Morgan.

“What on earth are you doing here, man?” he asked irritatedly. “Haven’t you heard about the coup? This place has been like an armed camp since six o’clock this morning.”

Morgan explained about his early start and the puncture. “Listen,” he went on agitatedly, “my plane. Have I missed my plane? When can I get out of here?”

“Sorry, old chap. The last plane left here at midnight. The airport’s closed to civil traffic. As you can see, there’s not a thing here. This is what usually happens, I believe. Nobody flies in or out for a few days until things have sorted themselves out. You know, until the radio blackout’s lifted, the fighting stops and the new government’s officially recognised.”

“But look here,” Morgan insisted, “I’m from the Commission at Nkongsamba. I’ve got diplomatic immunity, all that sort of stuff.”

“I’m afraid that doesn’t carry any weight at all at the moment,” said the airlines official in an annoyingly good-humoured manner. “Britain hasn’t recognised the new government yet. I’d hang on for a few days before you start claiming any privileges.”

“Hang on! Good God, man, where do you suggest I hang on?”

“Well, you can’t get back to Nkongsamba. They’ll have road-blocks on the highway now, for sure. And there’s a twenty-four-hour curfew on in the capital as well. So if I were you, I’d go to the airport hotel down the road. Show them your ticket. I suppose you’re in our care now, after a fashion, and they’ll bill the airline. I should think they’ll be glad of the custom. Everyone else has kept well away, stayed at home. In fact you’re the only person who’s turned up to catch a flight today. I suppose you were just unlucky.”

Morgan turned away. Unlucky. Just unlucky. Story of his life. He climbed morosely into the car and told Peter to take him to the airport hotel. Peter backed up with alacrity and they drove off.

The airport hotel was a mile away. They were stopped by a patrol on the road and Morgan again explained his predicament, flourishing his passport and ticket. He was sunk in a profound depression; the final bizarre revenge of a hostile country. The magnitude of his ill-fortune left him feeling weak and exhausted.