Page 109 of Never

Hakim took off his belt.

Kiah wondered why Abdul was so attached to his cotton sash.

Hakim wound the belt around the pulleys, buckled it, then tightened it. He took a five-litre plastic demijohn of water from inside the bus and topped up the radiator, which hissed and bubbled and then calmed. He got back inside the bus and started the motor, then returned outside to look under the hood. As Kiah could already see, the belt was doing its work, rotating the cooling mechanism.

Hakim slammed the hood shut. He was in a furious temper.

He returned to the bus, holding his jeans up with one hand. He sat in the driving seat and started the engine. The passengers reboarded. Hakim revved the engine impatiently. When Esma’s father-in-law, Wahed, hesitated before putting a foot on the steps, Hakim suddenly moved the bus forward, then braked hard. ‘Come on, hurry up!’ he snarled.

Kiah was already in her seat, with Naji on her lap and Abdul next to her. ‘Hakim is in a rage because you got the better of him,’ she said.

‘I’ve made an enemy,’ Abdul said regretfully.

‘He’s a pig.’

The bus pulled away.

Kiah heard a low buzzing sound. Looking surprised, Abdul took out his phone. ‘We have a connection!’ he said. ‘We must be getting near Faya. I didn’t realize they had connectivity.’ He seemed inordinately pleased.

The phone was bigger than she remembered, and she wondered if he had two. ‘You can phone your girlfriends now,’ she said teasingly.

He looked at her for a moment, not smiling, and said: ‘I don’t have any girlfriends.’

He busied himself on the phone, and seemed to be sending messages he had written earlier and stored. Then he hesitated, made a decision, and called up some pictures, and she realized he had surreptitiously photographed Hakim, Tareq, Hamza and some of the people they had met on the way. She watched out of the corner of her eye as he tapped the screen for a minute or two. He made sure no one could see his hands except Kiah.

She said: ‘What are you doing?’

He tapped again, then turned off the phone and put it back inside his robes. ‘I sent some photos to a friend in N’Djamena with a message saying: “If I get killed, these men are responsible.”’

She whispered: ‘Aren’t you worried that Hakim and the guards might find out what you sent?’

‘On the contrary, it would warn them off.’

She thought he was speaking the truth, but at the same time she felt sure it was not the whole truth. Today she had discovered another surprising fact about him: of all the people on the bus he was the only one who was not afraid of Tareq and Hamza. Even Hakim obeyed them.

Abdul had a secret, she had no doubt about that, but she could not imagine what it might be.

Soon the town of Faya came within sight. She asked Abdul if he knew how many people lived here – he often knew that kind of thing – and sure enough he did. ‘About twelve thousand,’ he said. ‘It’s the main town in the north of the country.’

It looked more like a large village. Kiah saw a lot of trees and many irrigated fields. There had to be a good deal of underground water to sustain so much agriculture. The bus passed an airstrip but she saw no planes and no sign of activity.

Abdul said: ‘We’ve come about six hundred miles in seventeen days. That’s only thirty-five miles a day – even slower than I expected.’

The bus stopped outside a substantial house in the middle of the town. The passengers were shown into a broad courtyard and told this was where they would eat and sleep. The sun was going down now, and there was plenty of shade. Some young women appeared with cold water for them to drink.

Hakim and the guards went off in the bus, presumably to buy a new fan belt – plus a spare, Kiah hoped. She knew from previous stops that they would park somewhere safe, and either Tareq or Hamza would stay in the bus all night. Surely, she thought, no one would want to steal such a rattletrap? But they seemed to regard it as precious. She did not care, as long as it turned up in the morning to continue the journey.

Abdul, too, left the house. He would go to a bar or café, she guessed, and he might also keep an eye on Hakim and the guards.

In a corner of the courtyard was a hand-pumped shower behind a screen, and the men were able to wash. Kiah asked one of the serving girls if the women and Naji could wash in the house. The girl went inside, then came to the entrance and nodded. Kiah beckoned Esma and Bushra, the only other women on the bus, and they all went inside.

The underground water was very cold, but Kiah was grateful for it, and for the soap and towels generously provided by the invisible owner of the house – or, more likely, his senior wife, she guessed. She washed her underwear and Naji’s clothes. Feeling better, she returned to the courtyard.

When it got dark torches were lit. Then the serving girls brought out mutton stew with couscous. Hakim would probably try to charge everyone for this in the morning. She did not let that thought spoil her pleasure. She fed Naji the couscous in the salty sauce, with some of the vegetables mashed, and he ate heartily. So did she.

Abdul returned as the torches were being extinguished. He sat a couple of yards from Kiah with his back to the wall. She lay down with Naji, who fell asleep instantly. Another day, she thought; a few miles closer to France; and we’re still alive. And with that thought she went to sleep.

CHAPTER 17