name.'
Besides discovering that his name was Gilberto, Louise was informed that he had a wife and six children and believed in the Catholic God. She had noticed a faded colour photograph, pinned to the sun visor in his cab, of the increasingly ill Polish Pope.
'Tell him I need to rest. He must not talk all the time during the journey.'
Gilberto reacted to the instruction as if he had been given an extra sum of money, and closed the back door quietly after her. The last Louise saw of Lucinda's family was her mother's desperate face.
They arrived in Xai-Xai late in the afternoon, after a puncture in a front tyre and a temporary repair tying the exhaust pipe to the chassis with a piece of string. Gilberto had not uttered a word during the journey, but had repeatedly turned the music from the radio up louder and louder. Louise tried to rest. She had no idea what was in store for her, but knew she would need all her strength.
The memory of what had happened to Umbi would not go away. Several times during the journey she considered telling Gilberto to stop and go back. Panic was only just under the surface. She had the feeling that she was on her way into a trap that would slam shut and never release her again. But all the time she could hear Lucinda's voice in the telephone. I'm dying.
Just before they came to the bridge over the river, the photograph of the Pope came loose and fell onto the floor between the seats. Gilberto stopped to pin it back up again. Louise became increasingly irritated. Did he not realise that time was short?
They drove through the dusty town. Louise had still not made up her mind what to do. Should she continue to Christian Holloway's village and leave the taxi there? Or should she go to the beach hotel first, and find somebody else to take her to the village? She opted for the hotel. When she got out of the taxi the first thing she heard was the melancholy and monotonous sound of the albino's timbila. She paid Gilberto, shook hands with him and carried her bag into the hotel. As usual there were plenty of empty rooms. The keys were hanging in neat rows behind the reception desk, hardly any were missing. She noticed that the receptionist did not recognise her, or pretended not to. He asked for neither her passport nor a credit card. She felt both invisible and trusted at the same time.
The receptionist spoke good English. Yes, of course he could call her a taxi; but it would be better if he had a word with one of his brothers who had an excellent car. Louise asked for it to pick her up as soon as possible. She went up to her room, stood in the window and gazed at the remains of the beach kiosk. That was where Umbi had had his throat cut after talking to her. She almost vomited at the thought. Her fear had acquired claws. She managed to wash despite the fact that the bathroom tap only produced a thin trickle of water, then forced some food down her: grilled fish and a small salad that she toyed with on her plate extremely hesitantly. The timbila sounded more doleful than ever, the fish was full of bones. She sat for some time with her mobile in her hand, wondering whether to phone Artur. But she decided not to. The only thing that mattered at the moment was to respond to Lucinda's cry for help. Always assuming it was a cry for help? Perhaps it was more of a battle cry, Louise thought.
The albino stopped playing his timbila. She could hear the sea now, roaring, wild. The breakers came rolling in from India, from the distant coast of Goa. The heat was not as extreme here by the sea as it had been in Maputo. She paid her bill and left the dining room. A man in shorts and an overwashed shirt with a Stars and Stripes motif was waiting by the side of a rusty old lorry. He greeted her with a smile, and said that his name was Roberto, but for some reason Louise found impossible to understand, he was always known as Warren. She climbed into the passenger seat and explained where she wanted to go. Warren spoke English with the same South African accent as his brother in reception.
'To