Professor Ezeka’s hawk-faced secretary slowly looked at Olanna, from her carefully brushed wig to her shoes, and said, “He’s not in!”
“Then ring him right now and tell him I am waiting. My name is Olanna Ozobia.”
The secretary looked surprised. “What?”
“Do I need to say it again?” Olanna asked. “I’m sure Prof will want to hear about this. Where shall I sit while you ring him?”
The secretary stared at her and Olanna stared back steadily. Then she mutely gestured to a chair and picked up the phone. A half hour later, Professor Ezeka’s driver came in to take her to his house, tucked onto a hidden dirt road.
“I thought a VIP like you would live in the Government Reserved Area, Prof,” Olanna said, after she greeted him.
“Oh, certainly not. It’s too obvious a target for bombings.” He had not changed. His fastidious sense of superiority lined his voice as he waved her in and asked her to wait for him while he finished up in his study.
Olanna had seen little of Mrs. Ezeka in Nsukka; she was timid and barely educated, the kind of wife his village had found him, Odenigbo had said once. Olanna struggled to hide her surprise, then, when Mrs. Ezeka came out and hugged her twice in the spacious living room.
“It’s so nice to see old friends! Our socializing these days is so official, this government-house event today and another one tomorrow.” Mrs. Ezeka’s gold pendant hung low on a chain around her neck. “Pamela! Come and greet Aunty.”
The little girl who came out holding a doll was older than Baby, perhaps about eight years old. She had her mother’s fat-cheeked face, and the pink satin ribbons in her hair swayed.
“Good afternoon,” she said. She was undressing her doll, prising the skirt off the plastic body.
“How are you?” Olanna asked.
“Fine, thank you.”
Olanna sank into a plush red sofa. A dollhouse, with tiny exquisite doll plates and teacups, was set out on the center table.
“What will you drink?” Mrs. Ezeka asked brightly. “I remember Odenigbo loved his brandy. We do have some rather good brandy.”
Olanna looked at Mrs. Ezeka. She could not possibly remember what Odenigbo drank because she had never visited in the evenings with her husband.
“I’d like some cold water, please,” Olanna said.
“Just cold water?” Mrs. Ezeka asked. “Anyway, we can have something else after lunch. Steward!”
The steward appeared right away, as if he had been standing by the door. “Bring cold water and Coke,” Mrs. Ezeka said.
Pamela began to whine, still tugging at the doll’s clothes.
“Come, come, let me do it for you,” Mrs. Ezeka said. She turned to Olanna. “She’s so restless now. You see, we should have gone abroad last week. The two older ones have gone. His Excellency gave us permission ages ago. We were supposed to leave on a relief plane, but none of them landed. They said there were too many Nigerian bombers. Can you imagine? Yesterday, we waited in Uli, inside that unfinished building they call a terminal, for more than two hours and no plane landed. But hopefully we’ll leave on Sunday. We will fly to Gabon and then on to England—on our Nigerian passports, of course! The British have refused to recognize Biafra!” Her laughter filled Olanna with a resentment as fine, as painful, as the prick of a new pin.
The steward brought the water on a silver tray.
“Are you sure that water is properly cold?” Mrs. Ezeka asked. “Was it in the new freezer or the old one?”
“The new one, mah, like you tell me.”
“Will you eat cake, Olanna?” Mrs. Ezeka asked, after the steward left. “We made it today.”
“No, thank you.”
Professor Ezeka came in holding some files. “Is that all you’re drinking? Water?”
“Your house is surreal,” Olanna said.
“What a choice of words, surreal,” Professor Ezeka said.
“Odenigbo is very unhappy in his directorate. Can you help transfer him somewhere else?” The words moved slowly out of Olanna’s mouth and she realized how much she hated to ask, how much she wanted to get it over with and leave this house with the red rug and the matching red sofas and the television set and the fruity scent of Mrs. Ezeka’s perfume.