of course they did, I had no experience, but I was devastated. I was going to join the Peace Corps, but you can't control where you're assigned. I didn't want to end up in India or Peru. I wanted to come here." She half-laughs. "So I finally made it here. And I hated it."
Jacob doesn't ask why. She supposes the reasons to hate Africa are self-evident.
"I should have come when I was younger. I bet I would have loved it then. When I moved to San Francisco we hitchhiked all the way, me and my friend Rebecca, Buffalo down to Mexico, then back up the coast. We'd sleep outside, go days without showering, get in cars with strange men, we wouldn't care. Then in SF I was a real wild child, drugs, parties, go to bed at three, wake up at six and report to the ER. I was tough, back in the day, I could handle anything. Believe it or not."
"I don't doubt it," Jacob says.
"Yeah. Well. Not any more."
Veronica thinks of the Ugandan guard who bled to death not five feet away from her, the day they were taken. If that had happened seven years ago Veronica would have rushed to his aid immediately, no matter what else was going on, she would have at least tried to save his life. She's a nurse, that's her job, her duty, to help the sick and wounded. Instead she just stood there, stunned and useless, while he bled to death.
"I've been thinking about how long they'll have to keep us here," Jacob says. "Assuming everything goes right. Let's just assume that for the moment."
Veronica swallows. "Yes. Let's."
"I figure at least a few weeks. Probably a more like a month."
"A month?"
"Sorry. But Gabriel has to reach civilization, contact our embassies, show proof we're here and still alive, negotiate terms, make ransom arrangements. I've been here long enough to know nothing in Africa happens fast. Plus the whole time he has to be paranoid about them tracking him back to us. It'll probably be days before -"
Jacob falls silent for a moment as several figures step through the waterfall.
"Shit," Jacob mutters. "I was just going to say, before we even see him again."
Gabriel is instantly recognizable by his height. He is accompanied by a figure wearing a pale hooded robe that looks Arabic, not African. Veronica sits up with surprise, her weakness momentarily erased by adrenalin, and begins to pull her shirt back on. The others too stir and turn towards their visitors. Gabriel looks cold and distant. Veronica can't see the other man's face at all through the shadow of his hood.
"Stay where you are," Gabriel instructs them.
They obey. The hooded figure inspects each of them in turn. He seems to take a particular interest in Derek. When the hooded man comes near Veronica she tries to watch him carefully without looking directly at him. His robe is wet from the waterfall, and she can see through his half-fallen hood - actually a headscarf - that despite his dress he is dark-skinned, ethnically African not Arab.
"How are things going?" Derek asks Gabriel, his voice controlled. "Is there anything we can do to help?"
"Quiet," Gabriel orders, distantly, as if instructing someone else's dog.
The man in the robe finishes his inspection, and their visitors depart.
It is Jacob who breaks the silence. "Well. That was unexpected."
"That was not good." Derek's voice is grim. "That was very not good. That was a dishdash."
"A what?"
"Dishdash. What he was wearing. An Arab robe."
"He was black, not Arabic," Veronica says.
"Exactly. Ethnically African, culturally Arabic. Pretty small group of people fit that description, almost all of them in the Horn of Africa, which happens to be a thousand miles away over some of the nastiest terrain on earth. So what the fuck is this joker doing in Central Africa? And what the double fuck is he doing looking at us?"
Veronica realizes that the anger in his voice is masking fear. For the first time since their abduction, Derek sounds frightened.
"Maybe he's a trusted third party," Michael offers. "An arbitrator. To verify that we're okay and help both sides negotiate."
"Maybe. And maybe he is the other side."
Veronica blinks. "What does that mean?"
"I mean maybe Gabriel isn't trying to ransom us back to governments. Maybe dishdash man was here to inspect the goods he's about to buy. Us."
"Us?" Tom asks, puzzled and alarmed. "Why would he be buying us?"
Derek's smile is mirthless. "Why indeed. What kind of Arabic-influenced organization would want