Dirty Feet - Edem Awumey [30]
“What have you been up to, Zak?”
“What have I been up to?”
“Yeah.”
“Let’s say I haven’t been able to make a career change like you. I’m still . . . you know.”
“And the others? What about them?”
Zak coughed.
“The others . . . Some stayed, some got out; a lot of them are dead.”
“You mean eliminated.”
“Dead. Camilio was found in a ditch with his stomach ripped open; Martin, burned to a crisp behind the wheel of his car . . .”
“Maybe accidents?”
“Lika hanged himself. Leo got married to a colonel’s daughter. Now he’s got a nice house and a big family. Upward mobility, you might say. Tino, the old guy, the veteran, he’s retired and spends his days on a seafront terrace drinking pastis. Carno lost his mind and walks around naked in the alleys of the old market. Faustin is getting contracts in North America; John’s on the run. That pretty much covers the old crew. How far are we from the wood? You know, Askia, the sooner this gets done the better. Sorry, friend.”
34
HE PARKED AT the edge of the wood. Zak ordered him to get out of the car and walk ahead of him. This is what Askia did, and they advanced through the trees. A milky moon in a clear night sky. Zak told him to turn around and step towards him. He obeyed. Zak, his arm fully extended, held his pistol level with Askia’s head. Askia walked towards him. He could not see his face: the other man had lowered his hat over his eyes. A trace of wind came up. Askia concentrated on the wind, on its trace. He received a blow in the stomach. He did not register anything akin to pain. He found himself down on his knees. Then Zak’s voice sounded: “You’ve gone soft, Askia. All I did was push you. Lie down.”
Now he was lying on his back, immobile, with the cool grass underneath him. Already dead. Zak swore: “Damn it, I still have to do this bit! I don’t like taking pictures of the stiff, but — and you know this — I have to bring back proof that I finished the job. Oh well, you’re almost dead anyway. They won’t notice the difference. I’ll take the pictures and then . . . There’s no way I’m going to put a stiff in my camera.”
Askia was struck in the face by a kind of light, a flash. Zak repeated this a dozen times. Capturing the moment. Askia heard one more click, the flash. Zak sighed. “Goodbye, my friend.”
Askia closed his eyes. Waited. The shot hit him right in the face. The shot. Zak’s booming laughter, his voice:
“Gotcha! Admit it, Askia, I really had you.”
“. . .”
Zak was in stitches.
“Tell me, do you really believe I’d go through that whole song and dance to finish you off? Hey, you should have seen yourself. Come on, tell me, what does it feel like? Eh? What’s it like living your last moments?”
“. . .”
“You don’t want to get up?”
Askia could barely grasp what was happening. He lay glued to the grass, trying to persuade himself that this could not be a joke — Zak was toying with him, playing with his nerves. Then Zak told him that he too had deserted. He had had enough — the routine of murder had worn him out. But what had finally pushed him over the edge was what he had said in the taxi: the guys started to disappear. Mysteriously. He didn’t understand. There were rumours about goings-on inside the Cell. It felt strange to go over to the other side, to become the prey, he said. Like a wedge of cold iron in your gut. He had been obliged to slip into a woman’s body. A disguise to get across the border in the north. After that, a long journey: Bobo-Dioulasso, Bamako, Niamey, Tripoli, Tunis, Malta, Athens . . . How had he managed? He would tell him another time. Askia was stretched out on the grass. His face was suddenly struck by a light, but from a different source. He opened his eyes. The headlights of