What is an ant? Siafu gets up in the morning, carries his dirt and food, and then he does the same the next day and every day until he dies in the mud that he came from. What chance does Siafu have? He has teeth to bite the stamping foot, but what good would it do to take a last bite before he dies? Apart from a bite, his back, and his legs, the ant has nothing. Don’t call me Bingo; call me Siafu the Ant! I carry all day. At the end of every day, I am as empty as I was when I began. I could not even bite the stamping foot. Mrs. Steele stamped: “Little Siafu, give me that contract!” Wolf stamped: “Siafu, you’z my runna!” Peg Leg stamped: “This is paradise for an ant.”
Mama said, “Bingo, run!” Then she lay still and died. Call me Siafu. I am Ant. I die as I live—nothing with nothing.
I slept again, but without dreaming. A siren woke me up sharp. Police, I thought. Wolf called Gihilihili, and they have come to take me away. When I had the chance, I should have killed Wolf; I should have killed his Drink Hut. I would be free now. But I did nothing. Senior Father, the broken stick, taught me, “You never kill.” I am Siafu, the frightened ant; I never kill.
It was not a siren but the phone by the bed. The Thaatima’s voice was slow and controlled. “Mrs. Steele will meet you downstairs at ten. You will need to come down with your bag packed and then we’ll leave. Bingo, that’s just over half an hour from now.” He did not mention breakfast. Now that he had what he wanted, he did not care.
I drank the last two vodkas from the room fridge, packed my things in the red suitcase, and left the room. The cleaner’s cart was down the corridor. I held my breath—Charity! But it was Brick-Ugly Cleaner. She laughed when she saw me.
Mrs. Steele was already downstairs when I got there, standing in the lobby. She wore the dress she had on the first time I saw her—bright white with large black spots. Her gold hair was tied back. Around her neck she wore white pearls; on her feet, black hooker shoes. She smiled at me the way she did when she first saw me at the orphanage, as if I was a painting she wasn’t sure she wanted. Anyway, I was on my way to America. Maybe I would get a truck—it was in the contract. She raised her eyebrows. “Come on, Bingo, let’s go and meet your Thomas Hunsa, and then we will head to the airport.”
I walked out of the Livingstone carrying my red suitcase. The morning air outside the hotel was cooker-hot and filled with construction, street noise, the smells of sweat and diesel. The Mercedes was already there waiting. My head hammered with the city construction. Mr. Edward held the door and Mrs. Steele got into the car. A hotel boy in a red jacket took my suitcase and put it in the car boot. It went on top of Mrs. Steele’s suitcase. It is an old (low-class) trick to lip tourist bags from open car boots like this, so I watched the boy shut the boot. Then I followed Mrs. Steele into the car.
As I got in, Mr. Edward reached out his hand business style. “Goodbye, Mr. Mwolo.”
I shook his hand. “Ya, Managa Edward.”
Mr. Edward went on, “I hope that your stay was excellent, Mr. Mwolo.”
I looked up at Mr. Edward. “Ya, is good. Ah, one thing,” I said. “Can you’z tell tha night cleana there a spida in tha room.”
Mr. Edward smiled. “I will be sure to tell Miss Charity that.”
Mrs. Steele called, “Bingo, we need to go.” I got into the car, but before Mr. Edward shut the door he said, “The freedom fighter Soweto Plato once said from his prison cell,
A man’s word may speak of bravery, but action shows his valor.
A prison is a plot of land; it is the love inside that matters.”
Mr. Edward, the best-dressed man in Nairobi, could speak philosophy forever.
After the door shut, it was just Mrs. Steele and me and Nairobi’s hammering. “Where your lawyer?” I asked.
Mrs. Steele said, “Scott has gone to the airport to sign the shipping documents and check us in for the flights. You and I need to finish off the contract—I still need the Master to sign. Then we will package the paintings and join Scott at the airport so that we can fly straight out”—she swallowed and looked away—“to our new life.” On Mrs. Steele’s lap was the thick Thaatima’s contract with my signature and the Thaatima’s signature on it. Mrs. Steele just needed Thomas Hunsa’s. The car was still. She looked at me sharply. “So, where to, Bingo?” she said. “Where is the Master?”
“Hastings,” I said back to her.
Mrs. Steele said, “Driver, take us to Hastings.” But Mr. Alex did not move.
I leaned forward and screamed “Hastings” in his ear. His hat moved just a flicker, and then the car.
The Mercedes drove away from the hotel and onto Kenyatta Avenue, slower than Slo-George thinking. A brown truck-van came up right behind us with DHL in large letters painted on its side. Below the large letters were the words “Delivering Heavenly Love. Always there when you need it!” Somehow it did not surpise me that the caretaker drove the van, his long white pipe hanging from his bright red lips. He seemed to be in charge of all important deliveries.