The Chicken Thief

Fiona Leonard

Copyright 2011 Fiona Leonard

Cover Design Copyright 2011 Heather Frank

Cover Photograph Copyright 2011 Nyani Quarmyne

Smashwords Edition

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 1461174562

ISBN-13: 978-1461174561

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For Teya Beth

“Only from the heart can you touch the sky.”

Rumi

Prologue

Government House, 4 September

The President leaned against the window frame and stared out across the lawn. The sun was nearly gone and already the moths were gathering around the light above his window.

Twenty-five years watching the seasons change from this window; watching the rains wash away yet another dusty year, and now it seems this may be my last. If the vultures have their way, by the time the skies clear I’ll be gone.

Aides came and went; the President barely registering their passing.

I told him there was a letter, Gabriel; a letter from your own hand. After all this time I offered Jim Coultard the chance to reach back into the past and hold onto your memory once more. I listened as he stopped breathing. I’m sure his heart stopped too for a moment. But he so desperately wants to believe and that will keep him alive for now.

I need him to believe. I need him to give me what you would not. A name; that was all I asked from you. And yet for twenty-five years you refused. I have as much right to it as you and I will do whatever it takes to get it.

I wish it did not have to come to this. Once we were fighters, sitting fearlessly in the darkness, waiting to kill. Now I am an old man relying on others to finish what I have begun.

I have waited twenty-five years; I can wait a few days more. But know this, Gabriel, I killed you once. I am not afraid to do it again.

Chapter One

Alois smelt the intruders before he saw them; or rather he smelt their anger first. He knew the smell of anger well. He had learned to smell it coming, and to duck and run. The chickens knew too; they were restless, wings brushing against the wire that caged them in. They knew something was wrong, and yet it was not him they smelt. He had been here many times before. Even though tonight his bag was lighter than it should have been, Alois pulled himself back up into the branches and waited.

On average, Alois stole five to ten chickens per night. Five was a good take, easily achieved: ten and his spirits soared. He kept it tight, spacing each grab, with no more than two chickens per house. Any more than two and he figured he might as well be running bare-arsed down the road and in the front door of police headquarters. No bird will stay quiet forever while its sisters disappear head first into a flour sack. Solidarity amongst chickens had been the death knell of many a careless thief.

For all the town was overrun with thieves, he’d still had to learn the trade the hard way. He often wondered why there always seemed to be a manual for something you could easily work out how to do yourself, but with the important stuff, you were out there alone in the dark, trying to decide what the hell to do next, with someone taking pot shots at your head.

A lot of it was simple like – it pays to be fast. Any idiot could guess a thief needs to be fast, which was probably why the streets were full of snatch-and-grab thieves with speed but no smarts. The trick was knowing when to stand still and when to walk, even though your heart wanted to explode in your chest. Then there were skills only a chicken thief needed to know – important lessons like – never carry a full bag of birds over a fence. The weight slows you down; plump bodies slapping against your back as you climb. He’d discovered, too, that if you think too much you can feel a head here, a foot there; death lingering between your shoulder blades. Far better then to leave the bag behind so your arms and conscience can move freely. Besides, he found comfort in the sight of the waiting bag; hooked over a branch, swinging slowly with the passing of time. Placed right, it was only a quick grab on the way out: jump, snatch, run and you’re gone.

Sometimes he’d simply had to learn from his mistakes. The first time he hung his bag he’d jumped back over the fence to find no more than a hook and a few bloody threads. It had been a lesson well learned. Ask yourself, do you chase a pack of dogs through the night, bellowing with rage, until the entire neighbourhood wakes? Or do you check your anger, resolve to hang higher next time and keep well clear of that end of town?

Most nights Alois carried four or five bags; one sturdy weave to store the chickens and a few lighter empties for each new house. At the beginning he carried only two bags, one to store, and one for the catch. But the birds weren’t stupid. After the first time death fell from the sky they knew. The first house of the evening would be fine, but by the second and third the smell of death was a neon sign announcing his arrival. The squawking would begin before his feet touched soil. When he’d first heard it, he had crouched in the dirt and watched them, listening to their cries until he understood their fear. From then on, out of respect, he approached with clean flour bags, and always with a handful of grain in the bottom.

These days, despite his reason for being there, the chickens greeted him. They strode forward, heads raised towards the bag. With one hand he tossed mealies into the dust, waiting until the heads were down foraging for the corn and then with the other he reached into the mass of feathers. Talk of ‘rubbing someone the wrong way’, always made him smile. Surely the first person to have spoken those words was talking about a chicken – such a phrase could only have come from someone whose fingertips had caressed the soft down at the rise of a breast and known the harsh resistance of feathers on end.

Tonight there were no greetings. The chickens shuffled warily in the dust, awake when they should have been settled in their nests. Alois watched from above, as their heads turned towards the car slipping through the gate. It rolled slowly along the driveway with its lights off, turning before the house so that it faced the gate, ready for a quick escape. He knew it was worse when they came through the gate. That meant it was planned, someone who knew how such things worked had been intentionally careless: a lock not rammed home, a wire disconnected to allow the gate to slide silently on its tracks.

The chickens were silent now, too. Alois had always believed they were far smarter than most people gave them credit for. They guided his way. Everyone in his family spoke of chickens. As a child when he asked his mother why she didn’t eat she replied ‘The hen with baby chicks doesn’t swallow the worm’. Later, years after he had become a man, when he stooped to come through the doorway and his mother’s hair had turned grey, Alois would say, ‘I’m not a baby chick any more, now you can eat.’ Still his mother would only smile and ladle an extra spoonful onto his plate.

Here, at least, in the darkness of the gardens, the chickens served Alois well; calling to him as he ran through the lanes behind the houses. They were there in the slap of his feet as he bounced on the branches of the trees that carried him down onto the soft bending grass.

He saw the irony in climbing a wall to steal a chicken. This was Africa, after all, a land where chickens run free; a vast continent where even in city streets the urban chicken is there dodging between your feet. It would be easier to simply reach down and pick one up on the way to the store – ‘a loaf of bread please, and a bag to put my chicken in!’

But those chickens were different, they were the fighters; scroungers who ran through the streets. He couldn’t kill another soul scratching to stay alive. Over the walls the chickens were fat and slow. They had lost the cunning of the streets. They were content with their lot, stopping all the while to look up into the sky. None of the chickens where he lived ever looked up, they were too busy running.

Tonight, from his vantage point in the trees, Alois had a clear view of the driveway below. The car doors opened and five men slid out. They circled the house, perhaps looking for a window that had been left open. Then one, distracted by a sound, froze and turned towards the garden. In the moonlight Alois heard a woman’s scream; instinctive, loyal to the family who slept in the house. She tried to run, but the man caught her between the vegetables, a hand in the centre of her back pushing her down into the dirt that snaked between the tomato plants; soft fruit splitting with each blow.

There were lights on now, the family wakened by her screams. Alois could see shadows running along the corridors, ducking as windows smashed in their wake.

He counted down, waiting for the alarm. He’d seen it often enough before to know. Rich people react differently to fear. They call for help. There are no alarms in mud huts. You fight or you run.

As the last numbers passed his lips, Alois closed his eyes. He hoped they had triggered a silent alarm; that they were hiding, locked away behind a heavy door. He had heard no screams, so, perhaps…

The men came out of the house, arms laden, arrogance in each step. Televisions, computers and silver piled high. They passed each other on the drive, moving back and forwards like removalists, laughing and joking; working quickly, easily finding what they had come for.

As the car door slammed shut one man called out, tossing beers to his friends. They spun the bottle tops into the garden as they climbed into the car. This time they turned the head lights on. The sudden flash caught Alois by surprise, bathing him in a wash of light. Instinctively he scrambled from the branches and began to run.

Only a fool would run the top of a wall without knowing what lay ahead. In some neighbourhoods there was nowhere to put your feet. Here the walls were old and wide, but they rarely ran smoothly. On some, broken glass was set into the concrete; jagged peaks that glinted in the moonlight. On others, razor wire snaked from pillar to pillar. All were deadly, and in darkness it mattered little which trap you ran into. He was glad now for the nights when he had run these walls just for fun. In his line of business surprises were unwelcome. It was always better to plan for the unexpected.

He ran knowing his father would have been disgusted – not with those men, but with Alois, for believing he was somehow better. You are all thieves. You bring shame to your families regardless of what is in your bag.

He didn’t know if they had seen him. But he wasn’t waiting to find out. As one wall ended he jumped, stretching forward, legs cycling in midair.

He was falling before he had time to register he had screwed up. He had jumped wide and missed the wall completely. Instinctively he tucked his shoulder and rolled, trying to break his fall.

It wasn’t the worst fall he’d ever had. Every breath of air was on the outside of his body but a tentative inspection revealed no broken bones. He probably hadn’t hit his head either, because the swear words rocketing around his skull seemed well enough formed. And his brain must still be working, for he could clearly make out the face of the man crouching beside him pointing a gun at his head.

Chapter Two

Alois worked hard to steady his breathing, counting slowly, one eye on the white face in front of him, one on the muscles in the man’s hand. The gun never wavered, and yet the man’s eyes darted across Alois’ face.

Nine, ten, eleven...Alois counted silently to steady his nerves.

‘Here again so soon? I thought my chickens graced your table only a few nights ago!’

Fourteen…‘I never eat them!’ Alois bit his lip.

The man allowed the flicker of a smile. ‘Ahhh, so your mouth works as well as your hands. Don’t eat them, eh? Perhaps I have misjudged you all these evenings. What is it the French say? ‘Tasty is the chicken that is fed by someone else’. And here I thought you were just a thief, albeit an excellent one. But perhaps you are an entrepreneur.’ He rocked back on his heels. ‘You didn’t realise I knew? You are the highlight of my week. It is not everyone who gets to watch an artist at work in his own backyard.’

Twenty-one, twenty-two…Alois looked straight at the other man, holding his gaze for several seconds. Then, ever so slightly, Alois allowed his eyes to flicker, and drew a look of fear onto his face as he glanced over the man’s shoulder. Instinctively the man turned his head, following Alois’ gaze.

As the man turned, Alois leapt to his feet and ran, all the while listening for the gun shot, the bullet slicing through the air past his head, or perhaps closer.

‘Wait! I need to talk to you!’

He ducked between two rows of mealies; the curling leaves of the towering corn concealing his flight, following the furrows, raising his head only when lights from the house lengthened shadows in the dirt before him.

He dodged around the clothesline, dipping his head beneath the shirts and trousers that floated like ghosts around his shoulders and leapt the path, avoiding the crunch of gravel beneath his feet, finally, stopping in the shadow of an alcove; a wall now between him and the back door. Madness! He had escaped his prison cell only to run around to the front door of the jail and let himself back in.

He could hear footsteps coming along the path. He knew the man couldn’t hear him. His mother had always claimed Alois could breathe through his ears.

‘Damn!’ The muttering voice swore. Alois could hear a pair of shoes kicked off against the wall. A hand jiggled a sticking door. He was only a few feet away.

‘What do you want from me?’ Alois demanded.

There was silence on the other side of the wall. Alois shifted his weight, once again ready to run.

‘I thought you would be long gone.’

In the first seconds of running, Alois too had thought his feet would keep going. His head was already halfway home before he realised his heart and feet were heading in different directions.

‘Perhaps you are waiting to finish the job. Well go ahead, take as many chickens as you want, I won’t stop you.’

‘What do you want from me?’ Alois repeated. There had to be a reason. Only a fool would shout Wait! at a thief and expect him to turn. A tourist may be stupid enough to believe a thief would stop, that he had so many choices in his life he would be prepared to return what he had just stolen. But not this man, not Jim Coultard.

Alois had watched this man for many years. Coultard was a fascination; a solitary man who spent long evenings in the garden reading or simply staring into the darkness. His gate never opened to the cheap women who visited many of the neighbours, or to expensive women for that matter.

‘I need your help.’

Alois almost laughed at the thought. ‘An honest man does not ask for help with a gun in his hand!’

‘Are you really that naive? In my experience, a stranger will not help a man unless there is a gun pointed at his head.’

‘Then your world is a sorry place. You ask for my help and act like you’ll kill me if I refuse.’

Coultard sighed. ‘You’re right. I apologise.’ They stood in silence for several seconds. ‘What’s your name, Chicken Thief?’

‘Alois. And yours, old man?’

Sometimes it’s worth wasting air asking a question you already know the answer to. This man, Jim Coultard, was professor of history at the university, a longtime resident of the city. He was a man with no television, three cars, a cupboard full of scotch, and a gardener with a taste for cheap beer and long tales. Alois knew a lot, but, more often than not, it is better not to admit what you already know.

‘Jim Coultard. James Alexander Coultard to be exact. A name worthy of Prime Ministers and nobles, a name conferred with the true weight of family history, guaranteed to elicit at least one “I knew your father!” in any gathering, but alas, worn by a small man, full of sound and fury…’ Alois listened to the sound of Coultard skimming rocks along the path. ‘But I am of little interest to anyone these days.’ He paused. ‘I have watched you for a long time, Chicken Thief. Do you mind if I call you that? It is how I know you. “Alois” I will have to get used to that. You are good, Chicken Thief. I admire the skill you bring to what you do. And clearly my chickens like you. Once a week you steal their own and yet, when they see you, they gather at your feet. I pay for every morsel of food that passes into their beaks and yet they don’t give me the time of day.’

‘Maybe they don’t want your money.’

‘Perhaps. Do you want my money?’

‘No.’ Alois looked at the stars, wondering how he had come to this point, standing so close to a man who only a moment ago had threatened to shoot him through.

‘Only my chickens?’

‘Yes.’

Coultard laughed. ‘Well, you are honest. That’s a good start.’ He cleared his throat and for a moment there was silence. ‘I need your help. I need you to collect something for me.’

The anger rose in Alois’ throat. Perhaps he had misjudged Coultard after all. ‘If you want an errand boy, find someone else. There are plenty of children who will do that for you.’ He tensed, ready to run.

‘Wait! No! That’s not what I mean. Can you drive?’

‘Yes.’

‘Where did you learn to drive?’

Alois was surprised to hear the answer coming from his own lips. Perhaps he had hit his head on the way down. Surely he used to have more smarts between his ears. ‘I used to work at the Ministry of Finance. Those who could drive made more money.’

‘You worked for the Ministry? Then how did you come to be stealing chickens? Did they fire you?’

It was a question his mother had asked him many times. Now, for the first time, without hesitating he gave an honest answer. ‘No, but the Ministry taught me to steal, they made me put on a suit and steal from people who could not afford it. I may still be a thief, but this way is more honest.’

Alois had seen the pride in his father’s eyes when news came from the Ministry of Finance saying Alois had got the job. Pride was something his father didn’t get to experience very often. On the first day of work, while Alois’ mother heated water for their tea, his father had sat on the end of his son’s bed watching Alois dress. Alois had turned his back on his father, embarrassed beneath the old man’s gaze. He had felt like a child as his body slid into the polyester suit. But then he heard the old man’s heart well up until it spilled down his cheeks and Alois’ anger had drowned in the shame that stirred in his own chest. Alois had left the house before the kettle boiled.

Through the heat of morning he’d watched his feet on the pavement, dragging along the concrete. He’d felt them grow slower and slower the closer they came to the Ministry. As he walked he’d felt his soul slowly dissolve and seep through the seams of his cheap shoes. He’d stopped on the footpath outside the building and looked at his shoes, waiting, reluctantly, unwilling to move forward. And he’d noticed all the other shoes around him, all the same, stumbling forward, in the same direction, scuffed with the pride of the person who had pushed them out the door, who would be waiting when they returned. Alois and his feet had longed to run free.

On his first day he’d knocked a file down the back of a bookshelf. While everyone was at lunch he’d unpacked the bookshelf; fear of getting in trouble on his first day had given strength to his shoulder. That was when he discovered a window no one had noticed. It was small by office standards, perhaps why it had been relegated to a life of obscurity. Even still, it was forbidden for someone so junior to claim such a prize.

Not wanting to lose his precious gift, he’d moved the bookshelf back into place but positioned it so that it was slightly away from the wall. When Alois stood up from his desk, stretching to return the files to their shelves, he could catch a glimpse of the tree tops that ran in the street below. He imagined his feet running across the leaves until he came to the laneway that disappeared behind his house.

Alois waited until his father died before he told him how he hated the Ministry. Finally at dusk, as his mother and his cousins carried their sadness away from the cemetery, he had leaned against the mound of dirt that covered his father and allowed his heart to break open. Rose had wanted to stay with him, had held his hand longer than she needed to, but he’d sent her away; Rose, whom he loved more than anything else in the world.

Alone then, with his head in his hands, he told his father of the pain that crept through his chest each morning before he opened his eyes. He spoke of the tightness in his throat every time he breathed dust from the files he sorted day after day, while thick-lipped men laughed in the offices above his head.

Later that night, when the night birds were finding their voices and the dogs came scavenging, he found a rusting petrol drum and for the first time, with his hands on metal that still held the heat of the day, he cried. When at last he had no more tears, he built a fire in the drum and gave over to the flames the grey, polyester suit that had buttoned so tightly across his chest; the suit that had once been his father’s. As the flames flickered, he had felt the first taste of freedom.

Coultard’s voice softened. ‘Ran away from the Ministry, eh? Shows you’ve got brains. How old are you?’

‘Twenty-five. How old are you?’

Coultard snorted. ‘What cheek! You have some nerve, boy. But I will tell you. I am over twice your age. For a few years now I have known what it is like to be on the other side of fifty.’

‘And what is it like?’

‘It is a mysterious world full of dragons, crones, and vultures, all poised ready to pick at your bones,’ Coultard replied.

‘And madness?’

‘That too.’ He laughed. ‘I like you, Alois. Twenty-five, eh? Born at Independence? You learned to walk with this new country of ours.’

‘What do you want me to collect?’ Alois asked.

‘A letter; news of an old friend.’

‘That shouldn’t be hard.’

Coultard hesitated. ‘In theory, no. But this friend…it’s complicated.’

Alois rolled his eyes. The night was late and he had no desire to stand in the shadows waiting for the dew to settle on his arms. ‘Where do I need to go?’

‘I have the address. It’s on the other side of the city. You need to be there at dawn. A man will meet you. He has the letter, but if you’re late he will burn it.’

It seemed simple enough, perhaps too simple. ‘I don’t understand. Why don’t you go and get it yourself?’

‘Because I am an old man, and it’s complicated.’

‘So you said. But fifty is not so old.’ Alois thought of his mother and all that she carried on her head without so much as a flicker of strain. He remembered the day he had met her on the road carrying a sack of potatoes. He had offered to carry it, but then had crumpled under the weight. He’d crumpled even further as his mother had laughed and swung the bag back onto her head.

‘My bones admit to fifty odd years but my heart is over a hundred. I will pay your young body well.’

Alois rocked forward, instinct telling him to run. Then he rubbed his eyes. You’re a fool! The voice in his head was angry. The man wants to pay you to do something simple and you’re hesitating. But it can’t be simple if he won’t do it himself, he argued with himself. ‘What aren’t you telling me?’

‘The letter is from a dear friend, Gabriel. It’s hard to believe such a letter exists, but if it does, then I am not the only one who is looking for it. This is a matter of some urgency. You would need to leave now, within a couple of hours at the latest.’

See, I told you, Alois muttered to the voice in his head, this is an errand for a fool. ‘Who else would be interested in the letter?’

‘Men from the Government.’

‘Ours?’

‘Maybe.’

‘Why?’

‘It’s not important.’

‘Will they shoot me if I get in their way?’

‘Perhaps.’

‘Then it’s important.’

‘I will double what I intended to pay you, in return for no questions.’

‘You haven’t said me how much you intend to pay me, so that’s hardly a good offer.’

‘Five hundred dollars, US.’

‘Is that your starting price or double?’ The question popped out before his brain had had time to process Coultard’s words. Alois had never seen that much money. It was an obscene amount, and yet he’d asked this man if he intended to double it. ‘If I can’t ask questions I won’t go.’ Alois looked up at the stars. You see father? I am not a fool. I am a man whose soul can’t be bought easily.

‘You are a tough businessman. That was my starting price, but I will double it happily.’

Alois leaped to his feet. For the first time he had been caught off guard. Jim Coultard had come round the wall without Alois hearing him and now stood, a few feet away, tall and scruffy, in his socks. There was no sign of the gun.

Coultard ran his hand through his hair, and for a second it held in place, then a shock of blonde hair collapsed across his face. ‘My chickens were right to trust you. You are wary because I offer you money.’

‘No, because you would send me off blind. You may as well shoot me now. I never climb a tree without first looking in the branches,’ Alois replied.

Coultard nodded. ‘Very well. I will do as you ask. I will tell you what you need to know. But you must be patient, for I can’t tell it quickly.’

‘It’s you saying we need to hurry. I have all the time in the world.’ Alois tried to infuse his words with a confidence he didn’t really feel.

The older man chuckled. He moved to lean against the wall, arms wrapped around his chest. ‘I had hoped we could do this quickly. I thought you might just take my money and do what I asked without question. Many a fool would have. But then, I suppose I would rather not hire a fool. OK, then, I will tell you what I can. What do you want to know?’

Alois felt his mind go blank. He struggled to find something intelligent to say. ‘Why don’t you call Gabriel and ask if he knows anything about the letter?’

‘Gabriel is dead, murdered before you were born.’

‘Who killed him?’

‘I have no evidence to incriminate anyone.’

Alois sighed. ‘Who is, or was, Gabriel?’

Coultard rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand. ‘That’s an excellent question and one many people have asked over the years. Gabriel was my friend. In my mind, that is answer enough, but I accept it is not enough for your purposes.’ He smiled and looked up at the sky, his face softening at the memory.

‘One day, a few years before Independence, Gabriel appeared in my tutorial at the university; not formally enrolled; a walk-in. I was a young graduate student, trying to earn some extra money, and those tutorials made me feel like I had knowledge to share.

‘From that first day, Gabriel was always there, day in, day out, always asking questions; smart questions, not to embarrass or belittle, but to know, to explore, to go deeper. It was within my rights to refuse entry to a student who wasn’t enrolled, and wasn’t paying tuition, but what teacher would turn away such a diligent and motivated student? And I was flattered of course! At the beginning of every class I sought out that face. For months my wonderful student was there challenging me. Then one day, nothing. There was only an empty chair.’ He shifted and groaned, leaning down to rub his knees. ‘This is madness, Chicken Thief, I am too old to stand around like this; my bones are not as young as yours. Come, follow me.’

Alois hesitated, and then slowly, reluctantly, followed the man around the side of the house, keeping a safe distance, so that by the time he reached Coultard, the older man had already had settled into a deckchair beneath a frangipani tree.

Coultard patted the arm of the chair beside him. ‘Come, sit. This is a good story, one I never tire of telling, or at least I would never tire if there was ever anyone to tell. Now, where was I? Yes, Gabriel disappeared from my class. I thought that was it and I confess I was disappointed and confused, wondering if there was something I said or did. I shouldn’t have flattered myself, it was nothing to do with me, Gabriel was meant for bigger things than my humble classroom.

‘Over time we started to hear messages from the bush, stories about the struggle. One day I was in a bar and there was a man, telling a story of a freedom fighter, one of the bravest fighters the struggle had known. He showed me a piece of paper, a speech this fighter had given. I read only the first few lines and already I knew. It was several years later but I knew those words; the familiar sentiment, the emotion poured into each sentence. “Gabriel!” I must have spoken out loud, although I can’t remember uttering a word, for the man put his hand over my mouth and whispered, “You know this Gabriel?” I nodded. He sat back in his chair and shook his head, looking at me with something like respect. Then he whistled softly and bought me a beer.

‘It was like that. Gabriel was coming, everyone believed it. Ask any taxi driver and he would tell you. One day, out of the bush, Gabriel would appear and everything would change. Of course there must have been other names mentioned too. Maybe that was the only one I heard, because it was the only name I knew.

‘And so I, we, waited, for the day when Gabriel would come. Always we were waiting, hearing only stories, meeting people who spoke of attacks Gabriel had masterminded; meticulously planned and executed. But the day never came, and then, six years later, Gabriel was dead.’ For the first time Jim turned and Alois could see his face. ‘A plane crash.

‘Those were terrible times. People were dying, people we all knew. Everybody felt the losses. Those who could were trying to end it all – there were secret meetings, in and out of the country. They didn’t want Gabriel’s death to ruin everything, so it was glossed over. It wasn’t only Gabriel, many good men died on the plane that day.

‘I went there. I needed to grieve, but no-one could tell me anything. After a while it was like a relic, you know? Like the bones of saints they would sell off in mediaeval times. I half expected people to be selling scraps of cloth on street corners! Some people wanted a shrine, as if they needed a place to worship. I wanted it to be decent; somewhere people could go to remember.

‘For a long time it was a matter of principle. I was angry at the world, angry Gabriel was dead, that someone could let it happen. Now I’m an old man, and not so angry. But still there are things in my life I need to wrap up, to see to an end, a way to be free of it all. I’ve searched for a long time.’ For a while he was silent, and then he spoke again, his voice softer. ‘Even now I have a nightmare. It’s always the same. I dream of Gabriel boarding the plane, reaching to buckle the seatbelt. I walk down the aisle trying to get to the right row. But when I find it there is nothing, just a column of dust that collapses to the ground. I try to catch it as it falls, but it pours through my fingers, falling, and then I’m on my hands and knees trying to gather it up, scrabbling around the seat, on the floor. I keep calling for a broom or a brush, something, anything to contain it before it disappears. Then I am paralysed by what I am about to do; sweeping into a dustpan all that remains of a living soul.

‘This afternoon…’ He shook his head, brushing a hand across his eyes. ‘...to once again hear that name, you cannot imagine how I felt. To think perhaps...maybe finally after all these years I might have a thread to hold onto...’ He reached into his pocket and pulled out a scrap of paper, smoothing the creases against his leg. ‘I received a call, from a man. He told me he had a letter from Gabriel. Can you even begin to imagine what that moment was like?’

‘But Gabriel’s dead, right? Why are you so excited?’

‘I forget you are still young, Chicken Thief. How do I explain it to you? If Christ came again that would be a miracle. But even to find his bones would be something; proof it was all true, that all the stories meant something.’

‘So you think it’s a letter from Gabriel?’

‘No, I think it’s a load of rubbish. I have to believe that.’

Now Alois was confused. ‘Why?’

‘Are your parents living?’

‘My father is dead.’

‘For how long?’

‘Three years.’

‘Alois, imagine you heard someone had just now found a letter from your father addressed to you. Imagine that on your way home tonight your cousin came running up to you and told you a letter was lying on your bed waiting for you. Of course you feel joy at the thought, you run to see, crying because a part of him has come back to you. But then you get to your house and see your cousin sitting there laughing because he has fooled you. There is no letter. How would you feel? I would rather pay you a thousand dollars to have someone laugh at you instead of me. That thousand dollars will let me shed my tears in peace.’

Alois shrugged. For a thousand dollars, I would not mind who laughed at me. ‘Is this place far?’

‘It’s about an hour and a half from here in the north east corner of the city, near the army base. Here,’ he passed a piece of paper to Alois, ‘I’ve written down the directions.’

Alois held the words up against the light. He looked at Coultard. ‘Why? Why me? If money is no problem, why are you asking me?’

Coultard smiled. ‘I’ve watched you. You’re careful, organized. I know you’re there, walking around in my garden and yet I barely see you or hear you. You think fast, as you’ve demonstrated this evening, and’ he hesitated, ‘maybe, I want to help you.’

‘I don’t need your help!’

‘Do you intend to be a chicken thief forever?’

‘I will cut my own throat before I set foot in an office again.’

Coultard stood up. ‘Look, I am running out of time. There are not many hours until dawn. If you won’t do it then tell me now because I need to find someone else. I will pay you whatever you want. Or, if you want something other than money then tell me and I will get it for you. But please understand, this is terribly important to me.’

Alois sat down and rested his head on his arms. His head felt as if it weighed a tonne. ‘I will need a car.’

‘You want me to buy you a car?’

‘No, to drive to this place. Something that won’t break down. I don’t have a car, and if I have to take a bus anything could go wrong.’

‘Of course, of course.’ A look of relief swept across Coultard’s face.

Alois shook his head. Man, what have I done? Only a fool tests the depth of the water with both feet! This is madness!

‘And you know how to drive?’

‘Yes. I told you. If I find the letter, should I bring it back here?’

‘Yes, bring it here. I have every confidence in you. I will pay you for your troubles and then you can leave and never look back.’ Coultard looked up from his list. ‘Alois?’ He reached to shake Alois’ hand. ‘Thank you. Here.’ He put his hand into his pocket, pulled out a bundle of keys. ‘You can take the jeep.’

‘Now?’

‘Sometimes, Chicken Thief, you take a while to catch on despite your smarts. I told you, this is urgent.’ He got to his feet and walked back up the driveway towards the garage. ‘Come on!’ At the garage he hauled on the door, groaning softly as he pulled on the handle. ‘Back it out.’

‘OK.’

Alois looked at his watch. An hour ago he’d had plans. He’d been two chickens away from his quota, and on the homeward stretch. Now, here he was, holding the keys to a car owned by a man who, until now, he’d seen only from the branches of a tree. What’s more, he was one day away from being a thousand dollars richer, one day away from his dreams, for simply collecting a letter. Every one of his dreams was there, spread out just beyond his fingertips and yet, even now, part of him still longed to run for the wall.

He turned the keys in the ignition and backed the car out of the garage. Maybe this is one of those moments when the world tilts my way for a second and everything slides into my hands. All right, Mr Coultard, I will take your car. I will return with your letter. I will get out of the car, hand it over and then climb back over the wall as I had intended. Only this time I will have a thousand dollars in my pocket.

Alois sat in the driveway with the engine idling. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine his mother’s face when he walked into the kitchen and showed her the money. She would hit him for sure. There was no way she would believe he had earned the money. Perhaps he should ask Coultard to come with him, or, at the very least, to write a letter.

He was startled by a knock. Coultard waited while he rolled down the window then he pressed a wad of money into his hand, ‘Here, for petrol and food. Travel well.’ He placed his hand on Alois’ arm. ‘Be safe. Oh, and Chicken Thief?’ He pointed to the sack of chickens Alois had dropped. ‘I’ll put these in the freezer until you return.’

.

Chapter Three

As he drove, Alois looked around the car properly for the first time: a blue jeep with an early onset of rust – reliable but not ostentatious. It was the car of a hardworking man who was proud to have wheels to take him where he needed to go. Dirty too, which was good. Otherwise everyone would wonder how he had water to waste on a car.

Alois glanced at his watch. He needed to make one more stop before he left the city, one more window to climb through and a bed to disturb. He had never discussed his night time activities with his mother. For all he enjoyed what he did in the evenings, he was not ready to see it through her eyes. A single disapproving look and he would not be able to run and climb as he needed. And yet he suspected that she knew. Every night she waited up for him. He knew she was lying awake in the darkness listening for his footsteps. He had spent enough sleepless nights over the years to know the different sounds of her breathing. Tonight, as with every other night, he would climb through his open window, trying not to catch his clothes on the splinters that always worked loose from the frame, and fall heavily onto the floor. As a child he had hated the mattress on the floor, especially in winter when the cold would creep under the door and head straight for his face. But on these nights he was pleased not to have the squeak of springs to contend with. He would shuffle around in his room, toss his boots noisily in the corner, then climb into bed and wait until he heard her go to sleep. Then he would climb back out the window, boots in his hand and be gone.

He drove slowly in the darkness. Streetlights would be installed one day, but that day wouldn’t be any time soon. In election years people talked about the coming of light, but they never bothered during the years in between. Better to save your breath and learn to navigate with your eyes closed, knowing instinctively how to avoid the dogs sleeping on the blind corners, knowing the location of every shabeen and the likely trail of bodies, too drunk to make it over the first rock they came to. If you were careful you could also avoid the women out looking for their husbands, ready to drag them home by their ears. See one of them coming and you’d better turn and run.

The road he lived on had become busier with each passing year. Many cars now drove along it, stopping and starting as their engines or brakes gave way. Still he parked down the road away from the house just to be certain.

Had his reflexes not been so good, Alois probably would have spared himself a lot of pain. If he hadn’t caught a glimpse of the hand reaching to grab his shirt he may have allowed himself to be pulled from the car without injury. Instead he twisted instinctively, his face crunching into the door frame as he ducked his head. As the pain exploded in his face a hand pulled him upright and slammed him back against the rear door.

‘You stole a fucking car?’

There were only two people in the world who would come after him in the middle of the night for stealing a car. His mother would never say ‘fuck,’ though.

‘I didn’t steal it!’ Alois said, his words muffled by his hands and the pain in his nose. As his fingers crept across his face, the pain began to give way to a seeping numbness. Great, it was probably broken. He tried to breathe but the pain resurfaced, splintering through all the bones in his face. He rolled the edge of his sleeve around his fist in an attempt to stop the bleeding. ‘Jesus Christ, Harry, I think you broke my nose!’ He crumpled slowly to the ground.

Tousled blonde hair came into view as Harry crouched in front of him. ‘What? Turning big bucks with this poultry business of yours, huh? Or wait, maybe someone gave you the keys to a jeep as a gift and sent you out into the night? I’m not that stupid! Stealing chickens is one thing, but a car? What the hell were you thinking? You’re better than that for God’s sake!’ Harry stood up and started pacing again. Cowboy boots and long legs passed into Alois’s field of vision every couple of seconds. He tried to focus. He could see two, maybe four pairs of jeans. He closed his eyes and leaned back on the car.

He’d been by Harry’s flat that afternoon and found the note in the refrigerator.

Her name is Dominique. She’s French-Canadian, lives three blocks from the President’s residence and I weep with gratitude every time she undresses. Her flatmate is in Johannesburg therefore for three glorious days I will not see daylight. Oh, and Alois? Get the hell out of my freezer. If you so much as touch the maple syrup in the fridge– a gift from Dominque – I will cut your fingers off one by one and stuff them down your throat.

Your comrade in arms (preferably Dominique’s)

Harry.

The frozen paper, wedged between boxes of leftovers had brought a smile to his face. It had been over a year since such a note had appeared in Harry’s freezer. In all the time they’d been hanging out together, he’d never seen Harry go home with a woman he’d just met. Usually he left alone, hands shoved deep into his pockets, whistling into the night. There was never a shortage of women — all women loved Harry — but he didn’t seem to notice. Sometimes, in the hours before closing Alois would tilt his bottle and nudge his friend with the sweating glass. ‘Eh, what about that one?’

But Harry would simply shrug. Occasionally he would make a show of squinting through the rimless glasses that perched on his nose and mutter, ‘No, too tall’, or too short, or too old, too something; excuses tossed without really looking. It could have been a broad-shouldered rugby player for all Harry noticed. This had been going on so long Alois had begun to wonder if Harry liked women at all. Dominique must be something.

Standing in Harry’s flat, freezer door still open, Alois had let the cold air wash over him while his fingers searched blindly across the top of the freezer for the pen and paper left in the dust for such purpose.

‘I’ll leave you a message.’ Harry had said the first time. World cup soccer was being televised live and they’d been arranging to meet up in a bar downtown.

‘How?’ Back then he hadn’t had a phone. Only rich people had phones. Not like now when you could buy a phone for next to nothing.

Harry had laughed. ‘I’ll leave a note in my freezer.’

‘How the hell will I get a note out of your freezer?’

Harry had hesitated for a moment, looking quizzically at Alois as if he didn’t quite understand the question, then he said, ‘Next time you’re wandering around my house, you can detour through the kitchen.’ He’d punched Alois in the arm. ‘Don’t look innocent. I know you go there when I’m travelling. It has to be you. Name one other thief in the whole of the country who would break into my house for the sole purpose of reading my Coetzees?’

Alois had been devastated. ‘I’m sorry.’ He hadn’t known Harry well back then, but he’d known enough to be terrified that the friendship was over. Being handed over to the police was bad, Harry handing him over was much, much worse.

‘Don’t be stupid, man. You can borrow my books whenever you want. You don’t have to wait until I’m away.’

‘I’d never borrow them! What if I lost one?’ Harry had assumed it was about the books. Of course it was, up to a point. But it was more than that. It was being able to walk through Harry’s life, to see a different world, one he would never inhabit.

Harry didn’t seem to mind. ‘Then you’re welcome to read them here whenever. By the way, I’ll be in Mozambique on Thursday and there’s a new Yvonne Vera in the study. Oh, and there’s a spare key under the terracotta fetish at the front door.’

He never worked out how Harry knew he broke into the apartment. For a while it became a competition. Alois set out to read, then replace without a trace. It never worked. The next time they met, Harry would nail the book every time. Once Alois had suspected it was dust and so he’d cleaned every shelf to conceal his choice. When he’d returned Harry had only laughed and pulled a thin volume of Doris Lessing from the shelf. It wasn’t fingerprints; he’d tried wearing gloves. In the end he gave up, content to be transparent.

If it had been anyone else, Alois might have poked around while Harry was out — opened doors, looked in cupboards — but he couldn’t do it here. Instead, Alois would choose a book then sit on the floor against the windows and read until the sun toppled into the car park behind the office block over the road. Occasionally, as he turned a page, he would glance down into the street at the people picking their way along the footpath. In the shade of café umbrellas a small boy always sat, wire toys spread on the concrete before him; motorcycles, airplanes and cars with wheels that spun on a painted axle. At Christmas he sold wire trees; red and green wire bent in on itself. Sometimes the boy would glance up at Alois in the window and wave.

This afternoon, in Harry’s apartment he’d removed Harry’s ode to Dominique from the freezer and left his own note in return.

Harry,

Why would I touch your syrup? Hell knows where that bottle has been! But I drank your beer and licked the cheese. Maybe Friday night, huh? If you can still walk!

A.

The freezer seemed a long way away from where he sat now on the side of the road, blood trickling down his sleeve. He could do with some ice right now. Alois took his hand away from his bleeding nose and opened his mouth carefully, taking his time with each word in case his face disintegrated. ‘Was that Dominique on your couch?’

Harry stopped pacing and bent down to stare at him. ‘When?’

Alois rerolled his shirt sleeve trying to find somewhere not soaked with blood. He looked up carefully hoping to bring Harry’s face into focus. ‘This afternoon. I went by your apartment. There was a woman asleep on the couch.’

At first Alois hadn’t noticed her. It had just looked like a jumble of blankets. Then she’d rolled and the blankets had fallen onto the floor. She’d looked tiny. Harry’s couch was long, bought to ensure his six foot frame would have room to stretch out in front of the television and she barely filled half of it.

He’d frozen, terrified she was about to wake and interrogate him or scream or call the police, or whatever it was women did when they found a strange man creeping around their kitchen. Then her breathing had settled to something resembling a snore and, after a few minutes, when his heart had stopped racing, he’d taken the liberty of a closer inspection.

Her brown hair was cropped, barely brushing the curve of her shoulders, t-shirt tight across her chest – Free Mandela. He’d considered leaving her a note letting her know Mandela was out. Comfortable jeans, button fly. Why would a woman do that? Name one man who would happily go back to a button fly. It was way too much trouble. You’ve already got your hands full and then you’re struggling to do up your fly. Although, when you’re drunk, at least if the buttons are done up you know everything’s packed away and not going to fall out.

‘A woman on my couch today?’ Harry asked. ‘Black or white?’

‘Black.’

Harry pulled a photo from his pocket. ‘Is this her?’

Alois shook his head gingerly, wishing he could smile. Harry was like that. You’d be talking about someone and he’d pull a photo of them from his back pocket. But then, photos were his life. Alois had seen Harry’s photos from the street. That’s why he’d come to the apartment the first time. Although he’d done it properly then, he’d rung the bell and all. He’d never broken into a stranger’s home. But then, when the door opened he’d felt trapped, standing on the doorstep, feeling stupid. He’d stood there, not knowing what to say, until Harry had asked him in and poured a drink. They’d sat out on the veranda in silence for a while, until the words grew between them.

There was one photo in particular, a doorway, opening out onto bush, a surfboard leaning on the wall. And a dog; Jake, Harry said. It was taken in California, back when Harry was looking for himself; before he got completely lost and wound up here.

Jake was a respite from the wars waged along the wall. With a beer in his hand Harry would recite them like a rosary – ‘Somalia, Sudan, Uganda, Eritrea, Congo, blah, blah, blah. The roll call of Africa, my friend. Pick a country and I’ll tell you when the war started.’ No matter which country he started with he always left out the big one — Rwanda. The Rwandans weren’t framed. They were in a box in the cupboard under the stairs.

Alois had only seen them twice. He’d packed them away the day when Harry had tried to escape permanently from all that he had seen. That day, after the medics had bandaged Harry’s wrists and taken him away in an ambulance, Alois had gathered the photos up, only glancing, not wanting to see.

For the first hour after Harry had come home he wouldn’t look Alois in the eye. Then finally he asked, ‘Where’d you put them?’

‘In the cupboard in your room.’

‘You should have burnt them.’

‘Not mine to burn.’

‘You gotta move them for me. I can’t be in the same room, can’t listen to them all night. Please?’

‘OK.’ Alois had gathered them into an old crate. That time he dared look at Harry’s nightmares: children running; the tears of women; the old man with scars webbed across his back; a cow scrambling up a river bank, a bloody watermark splashed across its rump.

By the time he’d finished moving the photos, Harry was on the kitchen floor leaning against the table. ‘I was the best photographer out there, they knew that, couldn’t fault my work, but not one paper, not one paper would publish them. Before that they took everything, they trusted me. I sent them what I saw. Maybe we were looking at different things. It was Vietnam that did it. They saw pictures bring down a government so they closed their eyes. They knew what was happening; we knew, we saw and we did nothing. You don’t see our soldiers in those photos.’ Leaning against the refrigerator, Alois had rubbed the heaving back until Harry slumped to the floor, curled up and faded into sleep. It was the first time he’d ever known Harry to be small. Finally Alois had slept too, on the couch, not wanting to leave him there alone. When he woke Harry was cooking breakfast, showered and shaved and striding around the kitchen. He’d smiled, flipped eggs and they’d never mentioned it again.

Alois wiped the blood from his hand and tilted the photo in Harry’s hand so he could see. ‘Nope, nothing like her. Is that Dominique?’ He wished he had a photo of Rose he could pull out of his pocket like that.

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