Paul Theroux - My Secret History

She did not like me much. A year before, sitting together at the Staff Club — we were alone — I said, “Let’s lock up this place and go to my house for a drink.” She knew what I meant. But when I made love to her she howled, “Graham! Graham! Graham!” and I stopped, withdrew, couldn’t go on. She punched me and began to cry with frustration, but what could I do?

Graham was her husband, a junior lecturer in the Geography Department.

Her name was Alma. She always wore big loose dresses, even though she was rather small. She chain-smoked, sitting hunched at the bar holding her cigarette like a monkey clutching a nut. I liked her indifference to things, the way she simply came along when I said, “Let’s go.” I had been shocked to hear her say her husband’s name — surprised when she raised her voice. She sometimes brought her little baby to the Staff Club, and he sat drooling in a stroller while she drank. She had a degree in mathematics but was refused a job in the Math Department because the head of it, an old-timer named Tarpey, said he didn’t want a bloody woman on the staff. So Alma did the bar accounts, adding up the chits we signed.

“It’s about time you settled your bill.”

“I’ve been away,” I said. “England, actually.”

“I don’t believe you,” she said. “You’re not due for leave for another year.”

“I wasn’t on leave. I was on vacation.”

“What a waste of money,” Alma said. “You could’ve gone to Mombasa.”

“Where’s that poppsie of yours, Andrew?” Crowbridge said.

“I don’t have a poppsie.”

“That Nubian,” he said.

“She’s not a fucking Nubian,” I said.

Potter said, “I think the really attractive ones are the Batoro. Fort Portal is full of crumpet.”

“And Kabale as well,” Kwasanja said. He was from Kabale.

They began one of the standard Staff Club discussions: which African women were the prettiest.

“Who’s barman?” I said. “I’d like a beer.”

Crowbridge stepped behind the bar and took a bottle of Indian Pale Ale out of the vibrating refrigerator.

“And a double gin for me,” Okello said.

Pouring the second tot, Crowbridge held the almost empty bottle up for all to see, showing us that there was less than a tot swilling at the bottom.

“Barman’s tot,” he said, and added it to his glass.

“We should have real music,” Potter said. “We should have food. We could do sandwiches. We could do a five-bob lunch.”

“Bring it up at the next meeting,” Alma said.

“I am buying you one bottle of beer,” Okello said, moving to the stool next to Alma’s and placing the bottle in front of her.

“Thanks very much, but you’re not getting anything from me,” Alma said. She was pleased with herself and sucked smoke out of her pinched cigarette.

Did she remember howling Graham! Graham! Poor Godby, everyone fucked his wife, while he was home looking after their baby. I had the impression that after all this drinking and screwing, the Godbys would go back to England and live a quiet little life in a place like Walton-on-Thames, as though nothing had happened.

People lived in a wild and reckless way here, but they seldom got hurt. Africa had a reputation for danger, but the worst of it was the boredom, the long nights, the yearning for something else, the stories I had heard before. Yet there was always Mombasa.

Crowbridge said, “I have to go. Who wants to be barman? Potter?”

“I will do it,” Okello said, as Potter shrugged.

“Mind you sign the chits,” Crowbridge said. “Don’t make a pig’s breakfast of it.” And he left. I had not realized how drunk he was until I heard him start his car, and grind his gears, and go humping and bumping through the grass.

“You were in Nyasaland, Andrew, weren’t you?” asked Potter, and without waiting for a reply, went on, “There’s masses of patchouli there. The department needs some.” He was in the Botany Department. “Know anyone there who’d send me some?”

I tried to think of someone. There was not a soul. I did not write to anyone there, I could hardly remember their names. The Americans were gone. The Africans I knew could barely write. I had left them all behind. I seemed to be going from world to world.

“There must be someone,” I said, knowing there wasn’t.

Kwasanja was singing to a record,

Malaika

Nakupenda malaika

Namini fa nyenye …

Then he signed his chits and left — another drunken car, bumping through the grass.

Okello poured himself a drink from the newly opened bottle of gin. In the same motion he raised the bottle to his mouth and took a long swig, his Adam’s apple pounding.

“Christ on a bike!” Potter cried.

“Barman’s tot,” Okello said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“You’re signing for that, Festus!”

It was the first time I had ever heard Okello’s Christian name.

Mungai said, “When I was in London they did worse things than that.”

“This club is losing money,” Potter said. “Ask Alma. She does the books. Is it funny, Alma?”

“I wouldn’t know,” she said. “I’m going home.”

“And me, I am going,” Okello said, following her through the door, to the darkness and damp grass.

Mungai said, “Over Christmas she wanted me to poke her. We went to Wireless Hill in my car. I tried, but I couldn’t!”

“That’s no way to talk about Alma Godby,” Potter said. “You’d better be careful, mate.”

“I am drunk,” Mungai said. He was smiling, perhaps thinking of Alma in his car on Wireless Hill.

“That’s no bloody excuse.”

“I am going home,” Mungai said, and staggered out.

“The bastard didn’t sign his last chit,” Potter said.

The song Malaika stopped. There was silence.

“Over Christmas she wanted me to poke her,’ ” Potter said angrily, mimicking Mungai. “What’s wrong with these people?”

He began tidying the bar, putting bottles away, banging them down. I did not share his anger. I too had tried to poke Alma Godby.

“How did you know Okello’s name is Festus?”

“He was a student of mine,” Potter said. “They’re all former students. Kwasanja read economics and did a degree in political science at LSE. Mungai was one of Peter’s students. He’s a bright chap. He drinks too much and he talks too much, but then,” he smiled, “so do we all.”

I took another beer out of the refrigerator, and opened it, and signed for it.

Potter was absorbed in the Argus . I tried to imagine what sort of students Okello and Kwasanja had been. Probably very hardworking and optimistic, preparing themselves for Uganda’s independence and following the advice of their young teachers, Crowbridge and Potter. Now they were all drunks, taking turns with Alma Godby.

“Quiet tonight,” Potter said, looking up from the paper.

“Where is everyone?”

“There’s a jazz night in town,” he said. “At that bar near the museum.”

“What’s a jazz night?”

“Loud music and cheap wine,” Potter said. “Gramophone records. Waste of time, if you ask me.”

He began filling his pipe, pushing tobacco in with his thumb. Then he paused, stared into space for a minute, and smiled.

“This is much cozier,” he said.

He arranged his things on the bar counter, his tobacco and pipe, his matches, his knife, his tamper, newspaper, glass of gin, bottle of tonic; he was like a man working at a desk, becoming very orderly, the way some drunks in the club did.

I said nothing, only watched, remembering the earth tremor.

“Oh, yes. Festus was a very bright chap,” he said. “Years ago.”