Passion by Florencia Bonelli

Author:Florencia Bonelli [Bonelli, Florencia]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781477849491
Publisher: AmazonCrossingEnglish
Published: 2014-01-21T05:00:00+00:00

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CHAPTER 12

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Perhaps, Nigel Taylor said to himself, his hurried return to the Great Lakes region was linked to matters that had nothing to do with Nkunda and his rebels and everything to do with Matilde. He had left the Congo on May eighth, and on the twentieth he was already on his way back. He had to admit that he had fallen crazily in love with the Argentinean doctor, so much so that he had forgotten about Al-Saud and his revenge and was only thinking about her, about sharing the space she occupied, breathing the air she breathed, getting a smile out of her, winning her approval. It hadn’t been a forced or premeditated process but an emotional one that, with insistent subtlety, had displaced the rage that had been lodged in his heart for years.

He had the leg for Tanguy, and he was going to propose that they take it to Masisi together to give it to him. He had paid a fortune so the orthopedist would make it quickly, and he couldn’t wait to give it to her to get his reward: a sweet look of admiration.

But he would have to wait to see her. That Thursday, the twenty-first of May, he would dedicate to Nkunda and in the afternoon, he would answer Gulemale’s invitation. He went into the tent, although the generator that provided electricity for air-conditioning made a terrible noise. It wasn’t even ten in the morning, and the Orientale province was like a sauna. His skin was sticky and sweaty.

General Laurent Nkunda was talking on a satellite phone but smiled when he saw him and invited him to sit with a wave of the hand. Although he was speaking in French, a language Taylor didn’t speak very well, he understood that Nkunda was talking to a coltan distributor in Brussels. In fact, he had just seen a plane take off which, according to Osbele, was transporting over five hundred kilos of the mineral so coveted by electronics companies.

“In Walikale,” the nurse said, meaning the city whose surroundings were especially rich in coltan, “they found a gigantic mine. The general made the men work hard and the yield was incredible.”

It wasn’t hard for Taylor to imagine what lay behind the euphemism made the men work hard. He knew that Nkunda, just like the Mai-Mai and the interahamwe, kidnapped children to enslave them in the mines under the guard of men armed with AK-47s and whips made of rhinoceros hide.

Nkunda was still talking on the satellite phone, and Taylor started to feel disgust toward the well-dressed man with lustrous, healthy skin in front of him. I’m no better than this Munyamulenge, he admitted to himself, because although he was aware of the abuses Nkunda perpetrated, he was going forward with the agreement. It wasn’t just the money involved; it was his job. He didn’t know how to do anything else.

“I apologize for making you wait, Mr. Taylor,” said the Congolese general with impeccable manners and a smile when he hung up the call.

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