again several months later, Agnes was seated at an outdoor table at the club bar, waiting for Carol to finish her swim lessons. To pass the time, she was chatting with an Austrian couple. Hans was here to conduct research on birds in Eastern Province, and Greta was here to accompany him. They were new to Lusaka, which made them somewhat tolerable, though they didn’t speak English well. Agnes was trying to describe Ronald’s research in simple terms.
‘It’s about testing the Kariba Dam. It’s important to have a sort of switch to turn it…off—’
‘Eggnest! Are you boring these people with your little l’oeuf story?’
Agnes sputtered happily. She couldn’t believe he’d remembered. Lionel explained the l’oeuf/love joke to the couple, who laughed in a puzzled, half-understanding way.
‘Might I have a cigarette with you?’ Lionel asked them. ‘I am hiding from my wife.’
So he was married too. Agnes felt more relieved than disappointed.
‘But naturally!’ Hans said. ‘Have your seat!’
Lionel sat next to Agnes, lit a cigarette and handed her his pack of Pall Malls.
‘Trying to cut down,’ Agnes demurred, patting her belly. Ronald had been appointed dean of engineering at UNZA. He had celebrated by promptly getting her pregnant again.
Greta squealed into Agnes’s ear: ‘Another baby? Oh, it is so good! It is a boy this time?’
While Hans asked Lionel what he did for work, Greta dove into a covetous conversation with Agnes about how far along she was (four months) and whether her ‘condition’ would be passed down (Agnes was finding Greta less tolerable by the minute) and why ‘the blacks’ here insisted on using cloth nappies instead of disposables. Agnes tried to engage in good faith but the topic was too dull, Greta’s English too blunt (‘how they getting the shit off?’). Agnes longed to hear more of Lionel’s rumbling voice. She caught snatches of his work history – a position at Leeds, a stint in Tanzania – and when he said he was teaching at the University of Zambia, she turned to him, interrupting Greta mid-sentence.
‘UNZA? That’s where my Ronald works! I mean, my husband. He’s in engineering.’
‘Ah. Well, I’m in humanities and social science. We’re unlikely to run into each other.’
‘You belief in these different classes?’ Hans butted in.
‘Dear Hans, class is everywhere,’ said Lionel. ‘Look around. We’re at a tennis club.’
Hans gave a forced laugh but pressed his point. ‘I refer to classes of study. You belief…’
Greta resumed chattering about babies and bums and rashes and creams. Agnes sank back in her chair with a wan smile. She had almost given up when Lionel leaned in and whispered in her ear.
‘It’s all a bit Evelyn Waugh in Africa, isn’t it?’
Agnes giggled. She had never read Waugh but she knew what he meant about the Etonian atmosphere – wealthy whites sipping Pimm’s Cups and G&Ts, complaining about the sun and the service. ‘There isn’t much else to do, though, is there?’
‘Well, actually. I have a sort of…social club going at the university,’ he said. ‘Perhaps you’d like to join us? With your husband, of course.’
* * *
Ronald claimed he was far too busy in his new deanship to join some trivial little club. Agnes was too embarrassed to bring Grace – both by the girl’s illiteracy and her own dependency on her. So, the following Friday, Agnes put on one of the two dresses she could still fit and a cloche hat and asked the driver to take her to campus alone. She didn’t often come to UNZA but she knew the route well. She could tell when they were on Lubumbashi Road (potholes, the crêpey rustle of bougainvillea); when they were passing through the back gate (a pause, a creak as the barricade rose); and when they reached the Goma Lakes (eucalyptus trees that sounded like the sea and smelled like Shiwa Ng’andu).
Agnes got out with her cane, wandered over to a group of chatting students and asked if someone might guide her to the right classroom. A young woman led her through what seemed like a concrete maze: up and down sets of stairs, along open walkways, through dank corridors. Finally they arrived. Agnes thanked the student and stepped tentatively into the classroom, removing her hat. She heard chairs scraping and papers rustling and whispering giggles.
‘Welcome!’ Lionel boomed warmly from the front of the room. ‘We’re just starting.’
Agnes smiled and felt for the nearest chair, sliding her cane under it as she sat. She was handed a solid rectangle – an unusually small book. She slid