Hwang Sok-yong - Princess Bari

“Is there anywhere you can hide out for a few days?” I asked.

The gravity of her situation seemed to hit her all at once.

“ Ya Allah … They could be here tomorrow!”

She pressed her hands to her chest and shook her head in panic. She seemed to freeze for a moment, then sprang up and opened the door.

“I’ll call the woman I work for to see if I can stay with her. Who knows? Since I’m already looking after her house and children, she might prefer it that way …”

After she left, I paced nervously. I didn’t know whether or not I should run away somewhere until things had calmed down. Soon there was a knock at the door. I checked the peephole before opening it. It was the Nigerian woman again.

“She said I can stay with her for a few days. Luckily, her husband is away on business. She said to come to the house first to discuss it. Also, I called my husband’s friend. He said he’ll go to the detention centre tomorrow to try to get visiting hours with my husband.”

“That’s good! I’m sure your husband will be back in no time.”

She threw her arms around me and murmured: “Thank you. Why can’t the rest of the world be like our building?”

After the door closed behind her, I paced some more and then came to a decision. I left the flat and went straight up to the second floor. I paused in front of Grandfather Abdul’s door long enough to catch my breath, and tapped the bronze knocker. I heard him clear his throat, and then there he was. He lowered his reading glasses and peered down at me.

“Well, look who’s here! Come in, Bari.”

I sat down across from him, but couldn’t speak right away. I had my head down, deep in thought. He didn’t rush me but simply waited, a soft smile on his face. Finally I explained why I’d come home early from work. I told him what had happened to the Nigerian couple across the hall from me. His smile vanished and he nodded, his brow furrowed.

“This country is very concerned with ‘public safety’,” he said.

I didn’t understand what he meant.

“It’s the same everywhere you go. The powerful wealthy do whatever it takes to shore up their privilege. This crackdown is one example of that. I suppose you don’t have a passport either, Bari?”

“Technically I do …”

“But of course, it’s forged.”

Although I was still wary about trusting people, one thing I’d learned over the course of my travels was that if you needed help from a good person, you could best earn their trust by being honest with them. I told Grandfather Abdul where I was really from, and briefly described my journey through China and all the way here. He nodded now and then, and waited with a smile whenever I got worked up and had to pause to catch my breath. When I ended with my arrival in London, he sighed.

“Indeed. Let’s consider what it is that keeps tearing the world apart. I came to London under very similar circumstances as you. I’m sure it’s the same for the Nigerian couple. But I believe you’re right, that you’d better be ready for the worst tomorrow. I don’t think anyone else will be affected, though I worry about the young Filipino man on the first floor. By the way, have you had dinner yet? I can’t imagine you’ve had a chance to eat.”

“Oh! Luna will be hungry when she gets home!”

“Hold on, now. I have some tandoori chicken. Let’s eat that with chapatti . I’m tired of eating dinner alone. It would be nice if you could join me.” He put some marinated chicken in the oven and warmed up chapattis in a dry pan.

While we were eating, Grandfather Abdul said: “You can stay here at night, but it’s best if you go somewhere else during the day. I’ll ask Ali to drive you somewhere.”

“But Ali works nights. Doesn’t he need to sleep during the day?”

“It’s fine. He won’t be getting much work while this is going on. I’ll just tell him to take a few days off.”

When I went downstairs, Luna was already home and washing rice for dinner. She stir-fried some meat and vegetables, then suddenly turned and pointed the wooden spatula at me.

“Where on earth have you been?’ she yelled. “I was so worried about you!”

I told her that I had gone to see Grandfather Abdul, and quickly filled her in on what Uncle Tan had told me at the nail salon and what happened to the Nigerian couple next door. She stopped cooking and turned off the stove.

“I don’t know what all the fuss is about,” she said. “This has been happening for years. My mother went through the same thing before I was born, and I dealt with it once as well. What do you think? That Immigration is going to come bust down our doors and search through every flat and check everyone’s papers?”

“Luna, I need to pack a few things. You can tell them my clothes are yours. I’ll leave some toiletries and a change of clothes in Grandfather Abdul’s flat.”

Early the next morning, while Luna was still asleep, I packed a small bag and went upstairs to Grandfather Abdul’s flat. He told me Ali would be there soon to pick me up, but I was still nervous; so he called Ali to make sure he was on the way. It turned out he wasn’t even awake yet. Grandfather Abdul shouted at him.

“What are you still doing in bed? I just spoke to you about this last night! Get over here now!”

After he hung up, he paced around the flat with his hands clasped behind his back and kept returning to the window to look down at the street.

“He needs to get here before the Border Agency opens …”

Nearly an hour went by before Ali came thumping up the stairs and banged on the door.

“Why are you so late?” Grandfather Abdul said. “Do you want her to get arrested?”

Ali didn’t seem to have grasped the situation. He grumbled sullenly: “It took a while to get my friend to loan me his car. Doesn’t she need a car if she’s moving flats?”

“When did I say she’s moving flats? I asked you to take some time off of work and take care of Bari for a few days!”

Ali caught my eye and grinned, his white teeth showing. Once we were out of the house and in the car, I felt more relaxed. I figured the Nigerian woman had also left home early to hide out at her housekeeping job. Grandfather Abdul said he’d warned the Filipino man, who worked as a hospital janitor. In any case, he had no desire to see any of his neighbours arrested or deported. He also didn’t want Mr Azad, the landlord, to blame him when there was less rent to collect that month. The car that Ali had borrowed was a banger: the door was crushed in, and the bumper was nearly falling off.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“I figure we’ll go to my flat first,” Ali said as he slowly made his way out of my neighbourhood.

He probably didn’t know the whole story, but I assumed that Grandfather Abdul had told him that I didn’t have a work permit and was in danger of being deported.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “The minicab company I work for is also crawling with illegal immigrants. Some of them don’t even have driver’s licences.”

I didn’t say anything at first, just sat there sullenly in the passenger’s seat and muttered to myself: “Why do we have to have borders, anyway?”

Ali lived in Shepherd’s Bush, in West London, a neighbourhood filled with people of different races, much like where I lived. It wasn’t far from Holland Park, where Lady Emily lived. A single street separated the two neighbourhoods, yet they were completely different. The road split off into five directions, and was centred around an ugly, garbage-strewn park with patches of dirt showing through the grass. It reminded me of an unwashed puppy. Narrow alleys led back between the shop buildings along a curving market street. Ali’s flat was located down one of the alleys, in a three-storey building with an unlit entrance.