to bring himself down to Adrian’s level. His PR consultant could see this quite clearly; James couldn’t. ‘It’s a crazy idea,’ he said, ‘quite mad, and I don’t believe we should do it.’
‘Crazy or not, the idea is everything. And that’s why you employed Talcott & Burles, remember? You wanted us to make you famous. That was your brief, James, and that’s what this idea will achieve.’
Balcombe perked up a little at this remark, but only momentarily. Like many weak people, he could be stubborn. ‘I could forbid it, you know.’ It was a feeble rejoinder.
‘Of course you could, but you won’t, will you? That would be stupid, and you know it. You missed out on Live Aid and Band Aid, with most of the money going to the big charities like Oxfam, Save the Children and World Vision. You don’t want that to happen again, and this will make sure it doesn’t. Believe me, you’ll have the other charities, even the juggernauts, knocking on your door, begging for a slice of the action. They’ll go crazy with jealousy.’
James smiled at this possibility, but persisted with a final, weak, ‘I still have grave doubts about such a project’. But he had already begun to sound as if he was exhausted by their disagreement.
At that point, Adrian knew he’d won. He didn’t relent though. ‘I’ll say it again, James, this is why you employed us, to raise your profile. It’s our area of expertise, it’s the only reason we took on your business in the first place – on a pro bono basis, I have to remind you.’ The executive director looked pained by this reminder. It perhaps made him conscious of having a somewhat lowly status in the corporate world. ‘You need this kind of publicity; it’s the only way Africa Assist can survive.’
‘I’d remind you that we’ve been doing all right for a few years now.’
‘All right isn’t good enough. The world is changing. You have to stay ahead of the game, otherwise you’re finished.’
Finally, James Balcombe gave the project his very half-hearted support, but only on condition that his trusted assistant, Dave Parker, worked closely with Adrian on its planning and implementation. Adrian had little time for Dave, considering him an ineffectual and sycophantic nobody, too busy agreeing with everything his boss said to ever be capable of doing anything worthwhile by himself. But he didn’t see any problem working alongside him; he’d be harmless.
Three weeks later he received a call from Anne. She’d found someone. She described him to Adrian over the phone, her voice fading in and out as if she were speaking to him outdoors in the middle of a snowstorm. The static was dreadful.
Two days later, he flew out of London.
Early in the morning, the sun just rising above the horizon, Adrian flew with Tim back to Korem. One of the staff at the airstrip drove the two men the short distance to the clinic.
Anne Chaffey stood with them on the verandah and pointed out the young man in the distance. He stood well away from the clinic, against the perimeter fence, as if he wished to separate himself from those camped in its immediate vicinity. ‘He likes to keep to himself,’ she said, placing a wide-brimmed straw hat on her head. ‘Perhaps it’s because he came here by himself. Bit of a wanderer, too,’ she added, as if they were lucky to find him still there.
‘Goes walkabout, does he?’ laughed Tim. ‘We have fellas like that in Australia; always heading off into the back of beyond.’
The lone figure stood immobile, oscillating in the harsh light, as black and insubstantial as a Giacometti ink drawing, almost transparent in the waves of rising heat, like a wisp of blackened paper dancing above the heat of a bonfire. He was so fragile, he looked to Adrian as if he might suddenly waft upwards into the sky.
‘Stay here, please,’ said Anne, and she set off towards the distant figure, picking her way carefully between those who were sitting and lying in front of the clinic, then marching with a speed that belied her age across the open ground. She spoke to the young man for a minute or two. Finally, they started to walk back towards Adrian and Tim where they waited in the shade of the building. Adrian was reminded of an old couple in an English country garden, walking side by side, taking a quiet afternoon stroll around the grounds after an extended lunch.
The nurse’s companion was soon almost close enough to be properly seen. Adrian studied him with a rising sense of excitement. He had that economy of movement characteristic of those who are starving, as if intent on saving what little energy he had left. One arm hung loosely by his side, while in his other hand he was grasping a long wooden pole, a rough walking staff. He towered over the nurse, his tightly curled black hair making him appear even taller. She barely came up to his chest.
Adrian wondered what he should do. Should he advance and greet them? Should he start talking to Tim, who was now sitting on the edge of the verandah smoking a cigarette? Should he behave as if the stranger were barely of interest to him? Should he look at him, or was it more polite to turn away? He wanted to do the right thing, but out here, in these surroundings, what was the right thing? He had no idea, so he stood there, undecided, with the air of a schoolteacher watching the approach of two naughty children.
Tim moved to his side. ‘Looks little more than a kid.’ Some cigarette smoke drifted in Adrian’s direction, and he flapped a hand irritably.
‘Sorry, mate’ – said more with amusement than apology. ‘Want one?’
Adrian grunted, and briefly shook his head. He detested being called mate, the warm, antipodean familiarity not just enveloping him in its damp embrace, but dragging him down to uncouth colonial levels, and making the heat of their surroundings even more unbearable.
The Ethiopian had his head down as he walked, as if he didn’t want to look at them. Or is it deference? Adrian asked himself. His legs were long, more than half his height. They were the legs of a leopard, almost out of proportion to the rest of his body. He loped across the ground, seemingly without effort, making Anne look slow and ponderous.
The nurse stopped in front of them, and the stranger copied her. ‘Adrian, Tim, this is Mujtabaa.’
‘G’day, mate.’
Adrian muttered something about being pleased to meet him, but realized that his words were unlikely to be understood. He considered shaking hands, but decided against it – probably too English, he told himself. The young man bowed his head three times, slowly and solemnly, and the four of them stood in silence facing each other on the very edge of the desolate crowd outside the whitewashed clinic, incongruous, thrown together by one man’s outrageous and improbable dream.
The Ethiopian was wearing a large, shroud-like, thin cotton cloth around his body like a dress. A smaller piece of the same material half-covered his head, like a hood. Round his waist was a garment like a skirt, tied at the right hip and reaching to his calves. A double-edged dagger, with a blade that must have been about 16 inches in length, hung from his waist, across the front of his body, in an ornate scabbard. He wore several amulets around his neck, and had a goatskin waterbag slung from his left shoulder. His skin and clothes were both tinged with salt, like a fine, white dust.
As if reading Adrian’s thoughts, Anne said: ‘This is how he arrived here from the Danakil. As instructed
