Somewhere along the way today, I’d stepped away from a terrible, terrible murder investigation and into an unbelievable holocaust. How was this possible in our world? Thousands dying like this every day?
Adanne put a hand on my shoulder. “Alex? Are you ready to go? We should move on. You are here for the Tiger, not for this. There’s nothing you can do about this.”
I could hear in her voice that she’d seen all this before, many times probably.
“Not yet,” I said. “What needs doing around here? Anything?”
Emmanuel’s quick answer was not what I expected.
“That depends. Can either of you handle a rifle?”
Chapter 83
FOR THE NEXT few minutes, Adanne explained what should have been obvious to me—that the simple act of gathering firewood was one of the most dangerous parts of life at Kalma.
Janjaweed patrols were always present in the desert, and not far from the camp. Anyone venturing out took the risk of being raped, shot to death, or both. The wood gatherers, desperate women and their children, depended on AU escorts when they could get them; mostly, though, they were forced to take their chances alone. No firewood meant no way to feed your family.
Emmanuel secured me an older model M16, which had been retrofitted with a decent scope.
“Don’t hesitate to fire,” he told me. “Because, I promise you, the Janjaweed will not. They are skilled fighters, even while riding on horses or camels.”
“I won’t hesitate,” I promised, and I felt Adanne grab hold of my elbow, then let go.
“You’re sure about this, Alex?” she asked. “You want to get involved?”
“I’m sure.”
An hour or so later, we set out with an intrepid group of two dozen women wood gatherers.
Several had swaddled babies on their backs. One had brought a donkey with an old fork-shaped cart for carrying wood.
I needed to do this, to help in some way if I could. I knew this about myself: It was my nature. Adanne came too because, she said, “I feel responsible for you now. I brought you here, didn’t I?”
Chapter 84
YEARS OF WOOD foraging, moving farther and farther from the camp, had turned this into a long and scary walk.
I used the time to talk with as many of the women as possible. Only one, it turned out, had any information about the missing boys and possibly the Tiger.
“She says there is a hut in her sector,” Emmanuel told me. “Three boys were sharing it. But now they are gone.”
“I thought that wasn’t unusual,” I said.
“Yes, except they left their things behind. She says a large man in fatigues was sighted in the camp. She was told he was the Tiger.”
“Did any of the missing boys have parents in the camp?” I asked.
“No parents.”
“And did anyone see the boys leave?”
“They left with the enormous man.”
After two hours of walking, we finally came to a long line of low, skeletal brush. The women spread gathering cloths on the ground and set to breaking down the brush. Adanne and I pitched in while Emmanuel kept watch for Janjaweed patrols on the horizon.
Without translation, we were mostly reduced to eye contact and gestures as we worked side by side with the gatherers. The women seemed oblivious to the scratches that appeared up and down their arms. They easily outpaced us newcomers and tried not to laugh at our clumsiness.
One young mother and I fell into a kind of unspoken communication, making faces at each other like little kids. She stuck out her blue-tattooed lip. I held up two sticks like antlers. That one got a real laugh out of her. She put her hand up to her mouth, not quite hiding a brilliant white smile.