Page 114

He moved back to look at her, but she kept her gaze averted and got up and turned on the radio and increased the volume, filling the room with the sound of a Beatles song; she would no longer discuss this desire to join the army.

“We should build a bunker,” he said, and went to the door. “Yes, we certainly need a bunker here.”

The flat glassiness in his eyes, the slump to his shoulders, worried her. If he had to do something, though, better he build a bunker than join the army.

Outside, he was talking to Papa Oji and some of the other men who were standing by the compound entrance.

“Don’t you see those banana trees?” Papa Oji asked. “All the air raids we have had, we went there, and nothing happened to us. We don’t need a bunker. Banana trees absorb bullets and bombs.”

Odenigbo’s eyes were as cold as his response. “What does an army deserter know about bunkers?”

He left the men and, moments later, he and Ugwu started to map out and dig an area behind the building. Soon, the young men joined in the work and, when the sun fell, the older ones did too, including Papa Oji. Olanna watched them work and wondered what they thought of Odenigbo. When the other men cracked jokes and laughed, he did not. He spoke only about the work. No, mba, move it farther down. Yes, let’s hold it there. No, shift it a little. His sweaty singlet clung to his body and she noticed, for the first time, how much weight he had lost, how shrunken his chest looked.

That night, she lay with her cheek against his. He had not told her what made him stay home to cry for his mother. She hoped, though, that whatever it was would loosen some of the knots that had tightened inside him. She kissed his neck, his ear, in the way that always made him pull her close on the nights that Ugwu slept out on the veranda. But he shrugged her hand off and said, “I’m tired, nkem,” She had never heard him say that before. He smelled of old sweat, and she felt a sudden piercing longing for that Old Spice left behind in Nsukka.

Even the miracle of Abagana did not loosen his knots. Before, they would have celebrated it as if it were a personal triumph. They would have held each other and kissed and she would have tickled her cheek with his new beard. But when they heard the first radio announcement he simply said, “Excellent, excellent,” and later he watched the dancing neighbors with a blank expression.

Mama Oji started the song, “Onye ga-enwe mmeri?” and the other women responded “Biafra ga-enwe mmeri, igba!” and formed a circle and swayed with graceful motions and stamped down hard as they said igba! Billows of dust rose and fell. Olanna joined them, buoyed by the words—Who will win? Biafra will win, igba!—and wishing Odenigbo would not just sit there with that empty expression.

“Olanna dances like white people!” Mama Oji said, laughing. “Her buttocks do not move at all!”

It was the first time Olanna had seen Mama Oji laugh. The men were telling and retelling the story—some said the Biafran forces had laid ambush and set fire to a column of one hundred vehicles, while others said there had in fact been a thousand destroyed armored cars and trucks—but they all agreed that if the convoy had reached its destination, Biafra would have been finished. Radios were turned on loud, placed on the veranda in front of the rooms. The news was broadcast over and over, and each time it ended many of the neighbors joined the voice intoning, To save Biafra for the free world is a task that must be done! Even Baby knew the words. She repeated them while patting Bingo’s head. Alice was the only neighbor who had not come out, and Olanna wondered what she was doing.

“Alice thinks she is too good for all of us in this yard,” Mama Oji said. “Look at you. Did they not say that you are a Big Man’s daughter? But you treat people like people. Who does she think she is?”

“Maybe she’s asleep.”

“Asleep indeed. That Alice is a saboteur. It is on her face. She is working for the vandals.”

“Since when have saboteurs had it written on their faces?” Olanna asked, amused.

Mama Oji shrugged, as though she would not bother convincing Olanna of something she was sure of.

Professor Ezeka’s driver arrived hours later when the yard was emptier and quieter. He handed Olanna a note and then went around and opened the boot and carried out two cartons. Ugwu hurried indoors with them.

“Thank you,” Olanna said. “Greet your master.”

“Yes, mah.” He stood there still.

“Is there anything else?”

“Please, mah, I am to wait until you check that everything is complete.”

“Oh.” Ezeka’s crabbed handwriting had listed all he had sent on the front of the sheet. Please make sure the driver has not tampered with anything was scrawled at the back. Olanna went inside to count the cans of dried milk, tea, biscuits, Ovaltine, sardines, the cartons of sugar, the bags of salt—and she could not help the gasp when she saw the toilet tissue. At least Baby would not have to use old newspapers for a while. She wrote a quick effusive thank-you note and gave it to the driver; if Ezeka had done this to further show how superior he was, it did not dampen her pleasure. Ugwu’s pleasure seemed even greater than hers.

“This is like Nsukka, mah!” he said. “Look at the sardines!”

“Please put some salt in a bag. A quarter of that packet.”

“Mah? For who?” Ugwu looked suspicious.

“For Alice. And don’t tell the neighbors what we have. If they ask, say an old friend sent books to your master.”

“Yes, mah.”

Olanna felt Ugwu’s disapproving eyes following her as she took the bag over to Alice’s room. There was no response to her knock. She had turned to walk away when Alice opened the door.

“A friend of ours brought us some provisions,” Olanna said, holding out the bag of salt.