Half of a Yellow Sun, Americanah, Purple Hibiscus: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Three-Book Collection
your certificates in waterproof bags …’
More people spoke. Then it was over. People were mingling, laughing, and talking and exchanging more ‘in case of war’ tips. Richard knew that Olanna was nearby, talking to a bearded man who taught music. He turned, casually, to slip away, and was close to the door when she appeared beside him.
‘Hello, Richard. Kedu?’
‘I’m well,’ he said. The skin of his face felt tight. ‘And you?’
‘We are fine,’ Olanna said. Her lips had a slight glisten of pink gloss. Richard did not miss her use of the plural. He was not sure if she meant herself and the child, or herself and Odenigbo, or perhaps we was meant to suggest that she had made peace with what had happened between them and what it had done to her relationship with Kainene.
‘Baby, have you greeted?’ Olanna asked, looking down at the child, whose hand was enclosed in hers.
‘Good afternoon,’ Baby said, in a high voice.
Richard bent and touched her cheek. There was a calmness about her that made her seem older and wiser than her four years. ‘Hello, Baby.’
‘How is Kainene?’ Olanna asked.
Richard evaded her eyes, not sure what his expression should be. ‘She is well.’
‘And your book is going well?’
‘Yes. Thank you.’
‘Is it still called The Basket of Hands?’
It pleased him that she had not forgotten. ‘No.’ He paused and tried not to think about what had happened to that manuscript, about the flames that must have charred it quickly. ‘It’s called In the Time of Roped Pots.’
‘Interesting title,’ Olanna murmured. ‘I hope there won’t be war, but the seminar has been quite useful, hasn’t it.’
‘Yes.’
Phyllis came over, said hello to Olanna, and then tugged at Richard’s arm. ‘They say Ojukwu is coming! Ojukwu is coming!’ There was the sound of raised voices outside the hall.
‘Ojukwu?’ Richard asked.
‘Yes, yes!’ Phyllis was walking towards the door. ‘You know he dropped into Enugu campus for a surprise visit some days ago? It looks like it’s our turn!’
Richard followed her outside. They joined the cluster of lecturers standing by the statue of a lion; Olanna had disappeared.
‘He’s at the library now,’ somebody said.
‘No, he’s in the senate building.’
‘No, he wants to address the students. He’s at the admin block.’
Some people were already walking quickly towards the administration block, and Phyllis and Richard went along. They were close to the umbrella trees that lined the driveway when Richard saw the bearded man, in a severely smart, belted army uniform, striding across the corridor. A few reporters scrambled after him, holding out tape recorders like offerings. Students, so many that Richard wondered how they had congregated so quickly, began to chant. ‘Power! Power!’ Ojukwu came downstairs and stood on top of some cement blocks on the grassy lawn. He raised his hands. Everything about him sparkled, his groomed beard, his watch, his wide shoulders.
‘I came to ask you a question,’ he said. His Oxford-accented voice was surprisingly soft; it did not have the timbre that it did over the radio and it was a little theatrical, a little too measured. ‘What shall we do? Shall we keep silent and let them force us back into Nigeria? Shall we ignore the thousands of our brothers and sisters killed in the North?’
‘No! No!’ The students were filling the wide yard, spilling onto the lawn and the driveway. Many lecturers had parked their cars on the road and joined the crowd. ‘Power! Power!’
Ojukwu raised his hands again and the chanting stopped. ‘If they declare war,’ he said. ‘I want to tell you now that it may become a long-drawn-out war. A long-drawn-out war. Are you prepared? Are we prepared?’
‘Yes! Yes! Ojukwu, nye anyi egbe! Give us guns! Iwe di anyi n’obi! There is anger in our hearts!’
The chanting was constant now – give us guns, there is anger in our hearts, give us guns. The rhythm was heady. Richard glanced across at Phyllis, thrusting a fist in the air as she shouted, and he looked around for a little while at everyone else, intense and intent in the moment, before he too began to wave and chant. ‘Ojukwu, give us guns! Ojukwu, nye anyi egbe!’
Ojukwu lit a cigarette and threw it down on the lawn. It flared for a while, before he reached out and squashed it underneath a gleaming black boot. ‘Even the grass will fight for Biafra,’ he said.
Richard told Kainene how charmed he had been by Ojukwu even though the man showed signs of early balding and was vaguely histrionic and wore a gaudy ring. He told her about the seminar. Then he wondered whether to tell her that he had run into Olanna. They were sitting on the veranda. Kainene was peeling an orange with a knife, and the slender peel dropped into a plate on the floor.
‘I saw Olanna,’ he said.
‘Did you?’
‘At the seminar. We said hello and she asked about you.’
‘I see.’ The orange slipped from her hand, or perhaps she dropped it, because she left it there on the terrazzo floor of the veranda.
‘I’m sorry,’ Richard said. ‘I thought I should mention that I saw her.’
He picked up the orange and held it out to her but she did not take it. She got up and walked to the railing.
‘War is coming,’ she said. ‘Port Harcourt is going crazy.’
She was looking in the far distance, as if she could actually see the city in its frenzy of excessive parties and frenetic couplings and speeding cars. Earlier that afternoon, a well-dressed young woman had come up to Richard at the train station and taken his hand. ‘Come to my flat. I never do it with oyinbo man before, but I want try everything now, oh!’ she had said, laughing, although the delirious desire in her eyes was serious enough. He had shrugged his hand free and walked away, strangely sad at the thought that she would end up with another stranger in her bed. It was as if the people in this city with the tall, whistling pines wanted to grab all they could before the war robbed them of choices.
Richard got up and stood beside Kainene.
‘There won’t be war,’ he said.
‘How did she ask about me?’
‘She said, How is Kainene?’
‘And you said I was well?’
‘Yes.’
She said nothing else about it; he did not expect that she would.
Ugwu climbed out of the car and went around to the boot. He placed the bag of dried fish on top of the larger bag of garri, hoisted both onto his head, and followed Master up the cracked stairs and into the dim building that was the town union office. Mr Ovoko came up to meet them. ‘Take the bags into the store,’ he told Ugwu, pointing, as if Ugwu did not know from all the times he had come in the past to bring food for the refugees. The store was empty except for a small bag of rice in the corner; weevils crawled all over it.
‘How are things? A na-emekwa?’ Master asked.
Mr Ovoko rubbed his hands together. He had the lugubrious face of one who simply refuses to be consoled. ‘Nobody is donating much these days. These people keep coming here and asking me for food, and then they start to ask for jobs. You know, they came back from the North with nothing. Nothing.’