Yasmina Khadra - The African Equation

‘You should have stayed at home.’

‘There wasn’t anything at home. I was like an old boat in a disused harbour, taking in water while waiting for a buyer. Except that nobody was buying. Nobody where I lived had any money. They couldn’t even afford a rope to hang themselves with. I was fed up with taking in water. After a while, I told myself, if I was going to sink, I might as well sink at sea. At least, nobody would see. So I raised anchor and set sail.’

‘You chose the wrong sea.’

‘Maybe the sea doesn’t exist, maybe it’s just a mirage. In any case, I don’t see the difference. Here or somewhere else, it’s all the same.’

‘No, it isn’t.’

‘For me it is.’

‘I’m sure you’re a good person. Your place isn’t among these people. What they’re doing is a serious crime, and they don’t realise. They kidnapped us and kidnapping is against the law. They’ll be severely punished.’

‘They don’t give a damn about the law. They don’t even know what it is. All they know is how to kill and loot, and they seem to enjoy that.’

‘Don’t you agree with what they’re doing?’

‘I don’t have an opinion. Nobody asks me anyway.’

‘So why join them?’

‘It’s just the way it is.’

‘There’s such a thing as choice.’

‘I don’t have a choice.’

‘Yes, you do … Nobody’s forcing you to go along with this bunch of … of reckless idiots … What’s your name?’

My question threw him. He thought it over, frowning and pulling at the tip of his nose, which was thin and straight, then lifted his chin and said bitterly, ‘What’s a name? A trademark, that’s all. My family’s name doesn’t even mean anything. I’ve learnt to get along without it. I sometimes forget it … Here, they call me, “Hey, you there!”’ He took off his glasses and wiped his face on his vest. ‘That doesn’t make me much of a person either … But I’m patient. One day, they’ll give me a combat name. There’s no reason why not. I’m a warrior and I risk my life like the others … Everyone has a nickname — why not me?’ He started biting his nails again. ‘I’d get a kick out of having a nickname,’ he added in a feverish breath. ‘That would make me someone … A nickname that sounds good, that you can’t easily forget … Blackmoon, for example … I’d like that, Blackmoon. Plus, it sounds like me.’

‘Well, Blackmoon, you’re not someone who’s good for nothing.’

‘You don’t know me.’

‘You don’t need to spend lots of time with people to know them. I’m sure you’re a reasonable person.’

‘It’s true, I’m not wicked. The bad things I’ve done were to defend myself. It isn’t that I have regrets or that I’m trying to clear myself. I’d have liked things to happen differently, but what’s done is done, and there’s no point bringing it back.’

‘I agree, except that you can also redeem yourself.’

‘What do you mean?’ he asked with a frown.

‘You can be of use to us. You can help us to escape.’

He shook his head as if he had just received an uppercut to the chin. ‘What?’ he said in a choked voice. ‘Help you to escape? What are you talking about? What do you take me for? I talk to you for a while, and you immediately think you’ve got me in your pocket. I was only having a chat. Here, apart from Joma, nobody says a word to me. And even Joma doesn’t talk to me, he just tells me off … Why do you take me for a sucker?’

‘Don’t take it badly. I wasn’t—’

‘Shut up!’ he yelled, getting to his feet, his sabre at the ready. ‘I try to be nice to you, and you try to trick me. Why should I help you to get out of here? What’s in it for me? What will I do after that? And who’ll help me when the guys get their hands on me? We’re in Africa, damn it! Wherever you hide, they always track you down. And besides, do I look like a traitor?’

He was incensed. His sabre hovered above the back of my neck.

Taken aback by the violence of his about-turn, I no longer knew how to react. His cries echoed in the cave like explosions. I was afraid the others would hear and come to see what was going on. Suddenly, in the same way as he had lost his temper, he calmed down. In a flash, he was again the boy who liked football. I was flabbergasted. Who was I up against? Who were these people who were furious one moment, placid the next. I looked at the boy in amazement, at the sabre he had now lowered, and his eyes which were recovering that disturbing acuteness that had made me so ill at ease.

He threw me even more when he said, in a moderate, even conciliatory tone, ‘You mustn’t take me for an idiot. It isn’t good. I may not look up to much, but I have my self-respect.’

‘I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to be unpleasant—’

‘Shut up. Just because I’m not shouting doesn’t mean I’m not angry. Stop amusing yourself by taking me for a fool. Joma says that white people think Africans have mush for brains. But they’re wrong … We’re just as intelligent as you, even if you’re more calculating than the devil.’

He sat down again, placed his sabre on its side, brought his knees up to his chest, folded his arms over them and was still. Only his jaws continued to move. I wondered if he was entirely in his right mind or if he was a brilliant actor.

After a long silence, he looked up and said, ‘Do you think Beckenbauer’s still alive?’

I thought it best not to restart the conversation.

The following day, it was another boy who brought us food. Blackmoon didn’t set foot in the cave again. I saw him from time to time, passing the cave entrance, but not once did he lift his eyes in my direction.

In the afternoon, Hans at last emerged from his lethargy. Standing on his unsteady legs, shivering with fever and hunger, he tried desperately to free himself of his chains.

‘What’s the matter?’ I said.

He was unable to utter a sound. He stared in terror at a corner of the cave while his Adam’s apple leapt in his throat. His voice emerged, quavery and unrecognisable.

‘A snake … There’s a snake over there …’

I thought he was hallucinating, then, following his gaze, I noticed a shadow moving a few paces from us. My blood froze. A conical head the size of a hand glided over a stone; a snake more than three metres long, plump and hideous, had wriggled out of a crack, its eyes shining through the gloom. Hans started screaming for help.

‘Whatever you do, don’t move!’ said a guard alerted by Hans’s cries for help.

The snake slid over a bump on the ground and, attracted by the cries, came towards us, its tongue quivering. I was petrified with horror. The reptile lifted its head as far as Hans’s belt, then recoiled; I closed my eyes, my heart pounding fit to burst … Nothing happened. I opened my eyes again; the snake slithered towards a hole, slid into it and disappeared.

‘Get us out of here!’ Hans screamed, his nerves at breaking point. ‘Get us out of here!’

Two of our kidnappers cautiously approached the crack through which the snake had vanished. Joma joined them. All three stood looking at the hole.

‘We won’t stay a moment longer in this nest of madmen!’ Hans cried.

‘I have nowhere else to put you,’ Joma said.

‘But there’s a snake,’ I said, beside myself.

‘It wasn’t a snake, it was the spirit of the cave,’ he said, with a seriousness that left us speechless. ‘It’s the guardian of the place. If it had wanted to harm you, it would have gobbled you up like two hard-boiled eggs.’

With this, he ordered his men to block up the hole and, without another word, abandoned us to our fate.

Four days spent waiting for the return of Chief Moussa!