Solo

Port Dunbar was only forty miles away – as the crow flies – but it might as well have been 400 such was the impenetrability of the marshy forest with its maze of watercourses lying in between. The air felt heavy and moist and, in the far distance, he could see a thin column of smoke rising, hanging in the air, dense as a rag, as if reluctant to disperse into the atmosphere. Another flight of MiGs ripped by, heading north this time, wing racks empty. Mission completed, and no doubt their pilots were looking forward to another evening in the bar of the Excelsior Gateway, Bond thought. It seemed like another world.
    He was sitting on a cane chair on the veranda with his second whisky on the go when he saw the headlights of the 1100 sweep into the gated compound. Blessing seemed pleased. The fisherman – named Kojo – would meet Bond tomorrow evening at 6 p.m. by the wharves at Lokomeji and take him out, ostensibly for a spot of night fishing – looking for Zanza carp. Lokomeji sat on the edge of a small inland lagoon that merged into the tracery of creeks and inlets that wormed their way through the forest. Kojo was familiar with every twisting inch of the waterways, Blessing said; he’d been fishing at Lokomeji, man and boy, and knew exactly where to put Bond safely ashore in Dahum.
    ‘Good,’ Bond said. ‘So what’ll we do tomorrow? Maybe we could go back to the highway – I wouldn’t mind checking out those British soldiers.’ He smiled. ‘I am a journalist, after all – might make a good story.’
    Blessing advised caution. ‘We should stay put,’ she said. ‘The whole of Lokomeji knows there’s an Englishman staying at Cinnamon Lodge. You’re a rare bird here. Talk of the steamie.’
    Bond was amused by the Scottish expression, no doubt picked up from her father, but she was right of course. He thought of the whole empty day ahead of them tomorrow, confined to Cinnamon Lodge, and rather wished he’d brought his unfinished Graham Greene with him. Still, he considered, another twenty-four hours in Blessing’s company was hardly purgatorial.
    They were alone in the dining room once again, Cinnamon Lodge’s only guests, and were served a surprisingly tasty, peppery fish stew with dago-dago dumplings. Bond even ate the pudding – baked bananas with a rum and butter sauce. After supper they drank more whisky on the veranda from Bond’s bottle of Johnnie Walker.
    ‘You’ll make me tipsy,’ Blessing said. ‘I’m not used to whisky.’
    ‘Best drink for the tropics,’ Bond said. ‘It doesn’t need to be chilled. You’re meant to drink it without ice, anyway. Tastes the same in Africa as it would in Scotland.’
    They went upstairs together. Something had changed in the mood between them, Bond sensed – perhaps the evening wasn’t quite over yet. He decided to kiss her on the cheek as they said goodnight.
    ‘I know you’re the head of station,’ he said, ‘and I probably shouldn’t have done that, but you did well at that roadblock today. Quick thinking.’
    ‘Thank you, kind sir,’ she said, a little sardonically. ‘I have my uses.’
    Bond lay in bed thinking about the plans for the following night – the crossing of the lagoon and trusting this man, Kojo, to deliver him safely. And what then? He supposed he would make his way to Port Dunbar and introduce himself as a friendly journalist, provide himself with new accreditation, and say he was keen to report the war from the Dahumian side – show the world the rebels’ perspective on events. Again, it all seemed very improvised and ad hoc. He wasn’t used to such—
    Blessing knocked on his door.
    ‘James, I’m really sorry to disturb you, but only you can help me with this.’
    ‘Just coming.’
    Bond pulled on his shirt and trousers and opened the door. Blessing stood there in a long white T-shirt that fell to her thighs and was looking at him a little sheepishly.
    ‘There’s a lizard in my room,’ she said. ‘And I can’t sleep knowing that it’s there.’
    Bond followed her down the corridor to her room. To his vague surprise it was larger and better furnished than his and it had a ceiling fan that was turning energetically, causing the gauze of her mosquito net to billow and flap gently. Blessing pointed: high up on the wall by the ceiling was a six-inch, pale, freckled gecko – motionless, waiting for a moth or a fly to come its way.
    ‘It’s just a gecko,’ Bond said. ‘They eat mosquitoes. Think of it