William Boyd - A Good Man in Africa

Surprise registered for a moment on Murray’s face. ‘Well…yes, then. I didn’t know you were a golfer, Mr Leafy?’

‘Morgan, please.’ Murray didn’t take up the friendly invitation. ‘Yes, I’m quite keen,’ Morganlied. ‘Funny we’ve never met on the course. When are you free?’

Murray shrugged. ‘Whenever suits you. Look, I must be going, my daughters are in the car. We’re off to the cinema,’ he added in explanation. ‘ The Ten Commandments .’

‘Fine,’ Morgan said, relief flooding his voice, at last he had some success to report to Adekunle. ‘Shall we say this Thursday afternoon. Four?’

‘Good,’ Murray agreed. ‘See you then, first tee.’ He said goodnight and walked back to the car park. Morgan watched him go, he suddenly felt weak from the tension. You bastard, he thought, if you only knew what you are putting me through.

He went shakily into the club, which was busy and, he noted with Scrooge-like displeasure, manifesting signs of Christmas everywhere you looked. The streamers, the baubles, the ruffled bells reminded him once again of his foolish undertaking to personify the spirit of this season himself and for a full minute he raged inwardly against the Fanshawes, mother and daughter. Outside in the club’s garden, spotlights lit up the barbecue. White-jacketed stewards gathered around three huge bath-sized grills made from oil-drums divided longitudinally. These were filled with glowing charcoal and above this hundreds of kebabs sizzled on wire netting laid across the drums. Morgan noticed Lee Wan, a Malay biochemist from the university ladling out punch. A cheerful friendly little man who organized pantomimes and children’s parties. He was also a seasoned reprobate, and, under his tutelage, Morgan had been introduced to Nkongsamba’s club-brothels some two months after his arrival in the country. He thought about joining the queue for the kebabs but his appetite had left him and he was beginning to wish he hadn’t come, the bustle and the seasonal gaiety were too overpowering in his present mood.

His eye caught a noticeboard with an arrow-shaped sign on it saying ‘Teenage disco, this way’. Morgan sighed, a mixture of longing and exasperation. With the advent of the Xmas holidays the expatriate population of Nkongsamba was sizeably increased by the arrival of all the sons and daughters from boarding-school in Britain and Europe. For a month the tennis courts and the swimming pool were taken over by these youthful hedonists. They would lie in groups around the pool’s edge, like basking seals, smoking and drinking, gambolling sexily in the water and occasionally kissing with shameless abandon. Late one evening he had wandered into one of the club’s teenage discos — some of the girls were breathtakingly attractive — and had found the room in total darkness. Three couples swayed on the dance floor in a position of vertical copulation and the perimeter armchairs were occupied by hunched and entwined combinations of two. Morgan had never, never been to a party like that in his life, far less when he was their age, and the unjustness of it all made him tremble with inarticulate envy.

A few of these teenagers wandered about the club now, casually dressed in jeans and T — shirts, laughing and joking. Morgan caught a glimpse of Murray’s son standing on his own, friendless apparently, eating a kebab. He gave him a wave but the boy didn’t react. Little creep, thought Morgan, as he turned and headed for the bar. He wanted a drink badly.

The expatriate community needed little excuse to come out in their droves to celebrate and the ‘Bumper Xmas Barbecue’ was no exception. Morgan responded to the smiles and nods of recognition as he threaded his way through the press around the bar. The noise of conversation was intense and people had a flushed excited look. There were a few Kinjanjans among the predominantly European crowd, but not that many. The club was fully integrated but its black members seemed to keep away on the whole. They had better places to go, thought Morgan, wondering what was going on at the Hotel de Executive. He looked at his watch: just after nine — he would give Hazel a ring to make sure she complied with his 10.30 curfew. Then he remembered there was no phone in the flat; there was nothing to stop her staying out all night for all he’d know about it. He felt a violent rage building up inside him: calm down, he told himself, calm down. Just because he was being blackmailed by an unscrupulous politician, just because the girl he wanted to marry had got engaged to his subordinate, just because his mistress was out getting up to God knew what with her ‘brother’, there was no reason for him to lose his rag, was there? Come on, he said to himself with withering scorn, be reasonable, it could be worse, couldn’t it?

He ordered a large whisky from the steward and asked for the telephone. This was placed on the end of the bar for him and he edged his way round to it, stealing a sip from his glass, and dialled his home number.

‘Allo?’ It was Friday, Morgan’s house boy. He came from Dahomey and spoke French; his command of English was erratic.

‘Friday,’ Morgan said, ‘it’s master here.’

‘Masta ‘e no day. ‘E nevah come home yet.’

Morgan turned his face away from the crowd, the anarchic fury exploding in his head caused him to squeeze his eyes shut as tightly as he could manage.

‘Listen, you stupid bugger, it’s me,’ he rasped into the receiver. ‘ C’est moi, ton mattre .’

‘Ah-ah.’ Friday exclaimed, ‘Sorry-oh, masta. Desole .’ He went on with a stream of apologies.

‘Never mind, never mind,’ Morgan rapped out. ‘I’ll be home at ten. Tell Moses I want an omelette. Yes, when I come in — a cheese omelette.’ That should make them sick, he thought with evil satisfaction.

‘Excuse, masta, can I go? My brother he…’

‘No you bloody well can’t,’ Morgan shouted, slamming down the phone. To his surprise he felt his hands shaking. Make them wait in for me, he thought blackly, they’ll just watch my television, eat my food and drink my booze. It was a full-time job getting your own back on the world, he reasoned, you couldn’t afford to weaken.

He heard someone call his name, and looked up. To his dismay he saw the grinning faces of Dalmire and Jones at the other end of the bar. They were beckoning him over. ‘Over here, Leafy,’ he heard Jones shout beerily. It sounded like ‘Woava yur, Leefi.’ God, he thought, that Welsh accent’s got to go. He pushed his way sullenly round to where they stood. Dalmire and Jones were a little tipsy. They were still in their golfing clothes and had obviously been drinking since the end of their game. Morgan thought they were like a couple of schoolboys who’d slipped away from an outing and dodged into a pub.

‘Hello there, Morgan old man,’ Dalmire said heartily, resting a hand on Morgan’s shoulder. His speech was a little slurred, his normally even features slackened by the alcohol. ‘What’ll it be?’

‘I’ll have another whisky please,’ Morgan said, trying to drive the coldness from his voice. He emptied his glass and put it on the bar. ‘Large, if you don’t mind.’

‘A pleasure, squire,’ Dalmire averred.

‘Bloody ‘ell,’ Jones said, shaking his round dark head in admiration. ‘You can certainly put ‘em away.’ He giggled stupidly. Morgan noticed beer froth on his upper lip. Dalmire slapped Morgan powerfully on the back.

‘He’s a good man, is Morgan,’ he said thickly. Morgan wished he wouldn’t use that ghastly rugger-club expression. ‘Bloody good man,’ he continued challengingly. ‘Fed me gin at half past three this afternoon. Bugger keeps it in his filing cabinet.’ There was an explosion of laughter at this from Jones. Morgan glowered.