On the riverside of promise (5 page)

Ludwig drew on his cigarette once more, this
time exhaling briskly and adding hastily:

“Good. That’s good. Thank you.”

Ethan nodded in silence before the doctor
went on:

“I just want to help these people, and stay
alive in the process. Is it too much to ask?”

“No, I suppose it’s not.”

Ludwig then put out his cigarette in the dirt
and wiped his forehead once more. He seemed to mumble to
himself:

“Good man. A good man.”

Ethan noticed and asked the doctor, his voice
right on the edge of doubt:

“How can you tell?”

Ludwig looked at him with some reluctance
before replying:

“I can’t. But I have hope.”

* * *

Space inside the Land Rover was at a premium.
Not an inch of space had gone to waste; it almost seemed like the
passengers inside were intruding on the cargo space and not the
other way around. Ethan had come up with a very comfortable-looking
seating arrangement on top of a sack of rice, along with a wooden
crate against his back and a couple of flour bags to put his feet
up on. He and the doctor were riding along together at the rear of
the small convoy of Land Rovers.

Ludwig was sweating profusely, and kept
dabbing his forehead and face with a small hand towel. It only made
his suffering a little less unbearable and a little more obvious.
Ethan had been sleeping on and off, the car’s continuous jerks and
road bumps having developed into a sort of lullaby. Their driver
was invariably focused on the task at hand, barely uttering a word.
Ludwig could not stop himself from asking, straining his voice to
be heard over the roar of the diesel engine. Even though at
previous times he hadn’t received an answer he could make good use
of yet, his pitch had an air of optimism about it:

“Are we going to stop any time soon,
Olufemi?”

The driver’s answer was curt and to the
point, as had been the case previously as well.

“Yes.”

Ludwig, who would otherwise consider an
endless talker a nuisance at best, appeared to be edging on
aggravation. Olufemi’s brusqueness felt like he was doing the
doctor a favor by even considering an answer.

The doctor made another effort to engage in
conversation or at least learn some hopefully interesting
information about their whereabouts:

“Well, could you refine that somewhat? How
soon exactly, is soon? More or less, of course.”

Olufemi paused for a moment before answering
in his usual, quietly dry manner:

“Before nightfall.”

Ludwig nodded to himself and tried to clear
his parched throat with little success and barely a spit. Ethan had
a contemplating look drawn upon his face, his gaze darting from
bush to grove. He held his camera in hand, the inadvertent swarm of
flies seemingly rather fond of him. Ludwig tried to catch his
attention, engage in some kind of discussion to relieve himself of
the dullness:

“That camera… It’s a Leica, right?”

Ethan turned to face Ludwig with a furrowed
brow, and having been caught unawares asked rather plainly:

“I’m sorry?”

Ludwig repeated himself, this time almost
shouting:

“The camera. It’s a Leica M3, right? Some
very good equipment you have there.”

Ethan shrugged indifferently, effortlessly
shooting down Ludwig’s hopes. A prolonged silence followed once
again, regularly interrupted by the creaks and croans of the Land
Rover’s chassis. As the evening wore by, flies began to give their
place to mosquitoes. The grassy hills rushed by, lush with
vegetation, filled with tall, thin trees and distant mangroves. The
swampy savannah drew distant with every passing minute.

Ethan turned and addressed Olufemi in Yoruba
with a ghastly accent, but decent enough to be understood. The
driver suddenly burst into laughter and started talking vividly
with him. A torrential flow of Yoruba was intermixed with laughs,
giggles and extravagant hand gestures. Ethan was responding in kind
and judging by his tone, sometimes asking, sometimes filling in and
sometimes simply nodding. Olufemi even made eye contact with Ludwig
once, before breaking down in laughter once more before finally
being able to settle down to his invariably dull and sullen mood.
Ludwig looked at Ethan with eyes that shone rather irregularly and
a voice slightly reminiscent of gritted teeth:

“Care to share, Richard?”

The last word sounded unusually venomous for
the good doctor. Ethan countered the doctor’s irate mood with a
radiating smile. He explained:

“He thinks you talk too much.”

Ludwig raised his brow and nodded, right
before instinctively slapping his arm, failing to kill a mosquito.
Before Ludwig could have had the chance to retort in a manner
unbecoming of a doctor, Olufemi suddenly cut in:

“For a doctor. We dem almost there. See now,
the clearing.”

Both of them looked up ahead to where the
road steered off course and into a dirt path that seemed to lead
slowly upwards onto a small ridge. Ludwig asked then with barely
conceiled exhilaration:

“Is that where we stop for the night?”

Olufemi gave a nod instead of answering
properly, while Ethan was looking more and more at the sky, its
rosy and purple hues lighting up the gathering clouds, dressing
them in the imagery of cotton candy. While the last light could be
seen falling around them, Ethan said with some disappointment:

“It’s going to rain like the devil, that’s
for sure.”

The driver nodded his silent agreement, while
Ludwig said with the slightest hint of irony:

“I thought Brits liked rain.”

To which Ethan commented wryly:

“We like rain alright. It’s all that water we
could live without.”

Olufemi started laughing again and this time
Ludwig managed to crack a smile. Ethan laid back on his sack once
more while the first droplets of water gathered on the windshield.
Ludwig retorted with a grin:

“And the rest of us could be spared your dry
sense of humor as well.”

Ethan lit up a cigarette and inhaled deeply
before answering:

“Well said.”

As Ludwig joined him, the small droplets
rapidly grew into a proper tropical storm, causing even Olufemi to
exclaim:

“Dis dey proper fuck.”

Ethan was about to translate when Ludwig made
himself heard over the din of the storm:

“I think I get the idea, Richard.”

Visibility had been reduced to the car up
ahead, only thanks to the powerful headlights. The caravan was
moving at a walking speed, carefully treading on a
dirt-turned-into-mud path barely wide enough to call a road.
Olufemi made some colourful remarks about the driving conditions,
to which Ethan pointed out they should be happy they weren’t being
shot at.

Ludwig stabbed Ethan with a gaze unusually
hard and firm for such a seemingly light-mannered man and asked
him:

“Would it make good press?”

Ethan shrugged and before he had time to
answer, a blinding flash lit the area in front of them and in the
blink of an eye they felt the surging overpressure of a shockwave
on their eardrums. A wall of dirt and mud seemed to go up in the
air, lifting with it the chassis of the Rover in front of the
column. Ethan’s shouts were barely heard through buzzing
eardrums:

“Landmine! Stop, stop! Get out, now!”

Olufemi panicked and let go of the wheel,
their car bumping on the Rover in front. The flaming debris of the
destroyed Land Rover could be seen, lying on the edge of the road
upturned and torn apart. Pandemonium ensued.

“What was that?” Ludwig asked with a slight
tremor in his voice. The answer from Ethan came accompanied by a
powerful shove:

“Landmine or RPG! Now move! Out of the
car! And stay low!”

Olufemi was faster to comply, opening his
door and rushing out, frantically searching for more flashes or
explosions, but none came. Ludwig sloppily made his way out of the
doors in the back of the Rover over the assorted bags and crates,
while Ethan opened the window behind him and drew himself out in a
fluid motion.

He shouted to the bewildered people in the
caravan, some of which had already stepped outside their Rovers,
dazed and confused:

“Get out! Lay low and don’t move!”

Ethan’s eyes were frantically looking for
signs of movement in the torrential rain, the light from the
headlamps the only source of illumination. There were no muzzle
flashes, launch trails or smoke. Lots of shouting and confusion,
but the characteristic hammering sound of AKs was absent. This was
not an ambush. Ethan’s voice took on an authoritative yet calming
tone:

“Calm down. Stay put. No-one’s shooting at
us. It was a landmine. Tell the people next to you to calm down and
stay put.”

Everyone was drenched to the bone. All around
him, Ethan could see faces frozen in sheer terror, some of them
shaking visibly. Olufemi had started shouting calls to the other
drivers in Yoruba, when Ethan’s instincts kicked in; he quickly
walked over him and put a hand to his mouth. Olufemi was surprised
and looked at Ethan sideways, giving him a look of frustrated fear.
Ethan put one finger to his mouth while shaking his head, and let
go of Olufemi’s mouth:

“No shouting, not in Yoruba. Understand,
mate? Not around these parts.”

Olufemi could only nod. Rather baffled though
he was, he motioned with his hands to the other drivers who by now
had his attention to lay low. With fear and hesitation as plentiful
as the rain pouring down on them, the drivers complied, some of
them already on their knees and praying.

Ethan felt the heavy rain on his head, tried
to wash away everything else and focus on the moment. He needed to
calmly tell these people what to do next, when Ludwig came up from
behind him, the sound of his approach muffled by the rain and the
din from the people in shock. Ethan’s eye simply caught a shadow
approaching. He twisted around sharply, grabbed Ludwig from one arm
and placed his foot to act as a pivot. Before having time to
actually see Ludwig, he was already throwing him down on the dirt,
still grabbing his arm.

Ludwig splashed in the mud yelling, markedly
scared and half-witted:

“It’s me! It’s me! Scheisse!”

Ethan breathed deeply, letting some of the
adrenaline wear off before picking up Ludwig and offering his
apologies:

“Sorry I jumped on you. It’s a conditioned
reflex.”

Ludwig could not help but shout irately:

“Conditioned reflex?!”

“Just so happens, yes. Never mind that, we
need to get these people off the road. Someone fucked up the
itinerary. Olufemi!”

The driver turned and nodded. He looked
shaken but he was evidently quick about his wits. Ethan leaned
slightly towards him, shouting to be heard and pointing at the
column of immobile rovers and the frightened crowd:

“Step on the Rovers’ tracks. Tell the rest of
the drivers to get the people back inside. See if anyone’s wounded,
get the doctors working on them. We’ll be safe as houses then.”

Olufemi nodded and carefully started walking
towards the first Rover, while the people were shouting out
questions to no-one in particular. Ethan started walking up the
front of the column, carefully passing by people and telling
everyone to be calm and emphasising that they were probably
safe.

Once he reached the debris of the first
Rover, he saw the people in the second car frozen still. They had
bled out of their ears, probably deaf and scared to death. Ethan
took a closer look: the driver was still clutching his wheel, all
tensed up and in shock. The explosion had shattered the windshield
and amidst the water that had pooled inside there was what remained
of a severed, blown away arm. The driver had fragments of glass all
over his face and his eyes were a bloody mess.

Ethan shouted to Ludwig:

“Ludwig! Grab a first aid kit and come up
front! Face injury! Try and stay on the tire tracks!”

Ludwig nodded affirmatively and disappeared
in the back of the Rover. Ethan grabbed the blind man from one arm
and told him nothing. He simply squeezed him gently and felt the
man’s blood pumping like a flooded river.

Once Ludwig arrived he shot a quick glance at
the blown up vehicle and quickly turned to say something to Ethan
who shook his head in denial:

“Not a chance, mate. I’m sorry. Enough
explosives to throw five thousand pounds six feet in the air. It’s
a bloody miracle this one’s lost just his eyes instead of his head.
The others are in the back, scared shitless, a bit deaf probably
but otherwise in one piece.”

Ludwig nodded appreciatively and focused on
the task at hand, trying not to think about the people in that
first Rover. His motions were calm and professional, as if he was
working in an examination room. Ethan urged him to hurry up, and
took a few steps forward towards the small crater which had
effortlessly turned into a pool. He took out a flashlight from one
of his pants’ pockets and a large leaf-shaped knife from an ankle
belt.