Page 41 - Labelle Gramercy, Detective

Road Kill

these events usually devolved into drunken excesses of maudlin
emotionalism. The departing one was considered a “lucky duck” by
those left behind to face yet another hot season or two, and this
triggered in them waves of envy, homesickness and previously
unexpressed hostile opinions of every other American in town.
Jolibanans, as one might imagine, were not invited. I wouldn’t have
attended, in any event: someone had to keep up a respectable front—
for his own good, if not the flag’s. Ascent in the Foreign Service was
slow but sure, an easy climb up a narrow cliffside path for a sturdy
mountain goat; descent following a false step was precipitate.
But now I had official business to conduct, and a reason to
intrude upon the festivities. I turned left off the paved road onto one
of the recently-graded lanes of the Quartier Nouveau, my tires
scrunching and holding to the unmetaled surface. Someone in the
Ministry of Transport probably had a few million CFA tied up in
speculative real estate here, and prospective clients might balk at
investing in an inaccessible villa. Just another way in which Durer was
a lucky duck, I grumbled. His house was unmistakable, despite the
absence of street lights, street signs and address numbers. Most
American villas were an oasis of light in the city’s desert of night.
The few roadside stalls and native households able to tap into
Falidougou’s fitful power supply burned nothing brighter than a five-
watt bulb; one compound like Durer’s, with major appliances and
dozens of bright security lights blazing away until morning, used as
much electricity as an entire quartier of African homes.
Parked in front of the USAID project manager’s tall wrought iron
and cinder-block fence were an assortment of American-owned
vehicles, all splattered with mud from the drive through
neighborhoods with roads more like my own. Durer’s gardien, a
wizened old man in a dirty blue gown and an embroidered cap, sat
under one of the ornate carriage lamps mounted at the gate. Like
others of his profession he kept a makeshift weapon at hand; in his
case it was a rusty knife-blade lashed to the end of a pole. I got out of
my car and greeted him perfunctorily; his eyes were elsewhere as he
returned my compliments in a raspy guttural version of “Bonsoir,
chef.” I went quickly through the rudimentary garden to the house,
where sounds of merriment were in full evidence: loud rock music

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