The Darling (45 page)

Your loving husband,

Woodrow Sundiata

The brief letters from the boys were in pencil on lined tablet paper a lot like the paper I had torn from Bettina’s tablet for my letter to Woodrow. I quickly read the letters and put them into my backpack and then looked at the four Polaroid photos, splotchy and already fading, as if the Liberian heat and humidity had partially spoiled the film. I merely glanced at them—one photo was of Dillon, Paul, and Willy standing together on the lawn stiffly at attention, unsmiling in their Sunday school suits, with the huge, red bougainvillea behind them; the other three were of each boy in the same spot alone. I put them into my backpack with the letters. Which is how I still have them in my possession today.

Dear Mammi,

School is very fun. My new teacher is Mrs. Mbeko and she is very fat, but I like her. She makes jokes all the time. Pappi bought two new dogs. They are named Bruno and Muhammad Ali. They are mastiffs and are both brothers, but not twins like Willy and Paulie. Bruno is bigger than Muhammad Ali. He weighs
125
lbs. Pappi won’t let us play with them yet because they are to be watchdogs and should not become friends with anyone, even the people they are watching. Jeannine is the one who feeds them. Bruno killed a cobra in the garden. I miss you. I hope you will come home soon. Love,

Dillon

Jeannine. Always Jeannine. My shadow self. It was probably she who stood in front of the boys with the camera and snapped the pictures. It was probably she who urged them to write to their Mammi, then gave the letters and pictures to Woodrow one evening and suggested that he send them to me. She was better at being me than I was.

Dear Mammi,

How are you? I am fine. We went to the beach. School is nice now. It rained every day so far. Our new dog Bruno ate a spitting cobra. It was six feet long. Love,

Paulie

Spitting cobras lurk in every flower garden. They aim their poison at the eyes of man or beast and can hit their target from ten feet away. A large, courageous watchdog can kill it, but may die itself as a result. Everything that lives in Liberia and that you kill will eventually kill you for it. Something rots beneath the soil and taints the air above it.

Dear Mammi,

How are you? We miss you a lot. What is America like? Pappi showed on a map where you live now. Is it nice there? I hope it’s not too cold! I have to go now. Goodbye! Love,

Willy

The leaves had fallen to the ground, and autumn was becoming winter. I had forgotten how unjust and autocratic the approach of a northern winter seems. I said to Bettina that the bare branches of the trees in the small park that she and I crossed every day on the walk to and from her school looked like the scrawny arms of beggars.

“Yeah, right,” Bettina said.

“They do. And they’re asking the sky for the return of light and warmth. They’re begging for the simple kindness of the sun. But it’s abandoned them for the tropics.”

She shook her head and said, “You are such a bummer, Don. You sound like winter is something to feel good about. But what you’re
really
saying is a total bring-down.”

“Yeah, right.”

Dear Woodrow,

Your letter and the photos and the letters from the boys arrived today. Thank you for doing that. They made me very happy and also very sad, as I’m sure you can understand. I’ve put the photos in little frames and keep them on my dresser where they are the first thing I see in the morning and the last thing I see at night.

I am glad to hear that our American friend is trying to be of help. I do want badly to come home and will do anything that President Doe requires of me. At the same time I don’t want to do anything that puts you or the boys in danger, even if it means we must continue to live apart like this.

Thank you for your kind words about my father. I am sure that, had you two met, you would have been friends. You are alike in many ways and would have understood one another. I have shipped a Sony VCR and video camera to you at the ministry. I hope you’ll use the camera to make videos of the boys, so that someday when I return I can watch them. Perhaps you could make videos and send them to me now, and I could watch them here. You could set the camera in front of the boys and let them talk to me directly, right into the camera. They might like that better than writing letters to me. Woodrow, I want you to know that if the president will allow me to return to my family, I will be his loyal supporter and will do everything in my power to help him and the people of Liberia. Please convey these exact words to him. It can’t hurt to do that, and it might help. Please give my love to the boys and my thanks to Jeannine for taking such good care of them in my absence. I am writing to them myself and will mail the letters to them separately so they’ll each have the pleasure of opening their own mail sent all the way from the United States. (And what’s this about the new dog killing a cobra in the garden?)

Your loving wife,

Hannah

I tried several times to write an answer to Dillon, Paul, and Willy, but could not do it. I couldn’t locate the right voice, a voice as natural and easy as theirs. In correspondence as much as conversation, one takes on the tone of one’s correspondent. That’s how it has always been for me, anyhow, and is probably why I am reluctant to open a conversation. He who writes or speaks first gets to set the tone. And my sons had written first. I kept putting off the moment when I would finally have to write back to them, until days became weeks and it was almost too late to answer without having a plausible excuse for the delay. And then came the letter from Woodrow.

My dear wife,

I received your most recent letter yesterday and last night conveyed to President Doe your assurances stated therein. To my amazement he expressed a sincere desire to have you return to Liberia. He also apologized for what he said must have been a misunderstanding on our part. He claims never to have wished for you to be separated from your husband and children. He is a man who often changes his mind and policy, but I believe he is sincere in this matter and does indeed want to welcome you back, as he said, “into the official family of Liberia.” No doubt the American ambassador, Mr. Wycliffe, was helpful in changing the president’s mind.

It may be too late by the time you receive this letter, but if possible, could you be home for Christmas? It would be very nice for all of us if you could. It would especially please the boys.

By the way, this morning I stopped by the American embassy and spoke with our friend there. I wanted to confirm that your return would in no way trouble the U.S. authorities. He assured me that you are free to travel anywhere in the world and that he very much looked forward to seeing you here again.

Your loving husband,

Woodrow Sundiata

It was the last letter that I would ever receive from him, although I did not suspect it at the time, of course. I read it and immediately packed my clothes into my backpack and began to compose what I would say to Bettina when she got home from soccer practice and noticed my pack by the door and asked where I was going, and what I would tell Carol that night when she got home from work. I would tell them both the same thing, the essential truth, that I was leaving them in order to join my family and to prepare for the liberation of my country from a cruel dictator. It would make no sense to either of them, but they both would accept it as natural and inevitable. I had come into their lives like a pale ghost, and now I was leaving like one.

Chapter IV

I
FLEW FROM
B
OSTON
to New York in an early January snowstorm that delayed the flight three hours, then sat on the runway at JFK for another three hours before taking off, and landed in Robertsfield the next morning in bright sunshine with a sparkling blue sky above and palm-lined, white sandy beaches below. As the wheels touched down, the passengers, most of them Liberians returning from the States, suddenly bloomed with applause, and I happily joined in. We were safely home again. We’d come to where we knew we belonged.

Woodrow and the boys and Jeannine and Satterthwaite were gathered together to greet me at the terminal—my African family, which from that moment and for the coming years I regarded as my only family. My true family. My best family. For all its tensions, disconnections, divisions, and conflicts of interest, this little tribe was my claque and cohort. I hadn’t realized it at the time, but on the day I helped break Charles out of prison, I had cast my lot, not just with him, but with them as well. And I could do this, of course, nowhere but at my home in Monrovia. So when Samuel Doe, for reasons then unknown to me, offered me the chance to return to Liberia, I had no choice but to accept it.

I’d made up my mind long before the plane landed at Robertsfield, however, that things would not be the same as they had been. A consequence of my having tied my fate to my little household’s fate was that I now felt empowered to make demands and take on responsibilities that I had never made or taken before. And I planned to set a few wrong things right very quickly.

After the hugs and kisses inside the sweltering, crowded terminal, we piled into the Mercedes, set the air conditioner to blowing, and headed for Monrovia, Satterthwaite driving and Jeannine beside him in front, Woodrow, the boys, and me crowded into the back. We rode in a pleasant, well-behaved silence that I found both amusing and peculiar, as if everyone were waiting for me to do exactly what I fully intended to do—take charge. As if, for reasons both known to me and unknown, they each individually felt guilty, and in the months of my exile, to the degree that they had been collectively weakened by guilt, I had been strengthened.

I was not imperious, merely firm and clear. “Satterthwaite,” I said to him. “I’ll no longer need you to drive me and the boys. I’ll be doing my own driving from now on,” I announced. “And if for some reason I need someone else to drive the car, I’ll arrange it through the ministry or hire someone from town myself.”

“Yes, m’am,” Satterthwaite said and did not turn or even glance at me in the rearview mirror.

Woodrow noisily cleared his throat. “Are you sure, Hannah darling? Satterthwaite’s quite—”

“I’m sure,” I said, cutting him off. “I’m an excellent driver. Requisition another car for your own use, if you want. I’ll keep this one strictly for household needs. I’ll need it all day every day, anyhow. For taking the boys to school and picking them up and for shopping. And for my work,” I added.

“Your work?”

“Yes. And, Jeannine, I won’t be needing you to help me with the boys. I’ll look after their meals myself. It’s quite enough if you’ll just do the housekeeping. Especially since you should be going to school now yourself. I’ll pay you an hourly wage and will pay all your school expenses. But I’ll have to ask you to find another place to live.”