The Garbage King by Elizabeth Laird

Author:Elizabeth Laird [Laird, Elizabeth]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780330478021
Publisher: Pan Macmillan

11

Tiggist was scared all the time of offending Mrs Faridah, but she couldn’t help feeling a bit sorry for her too. Mrs Faridah was looking tired and worn. Her husband’s voice, weak but demanding, constantly called her into the sickroom. There were phone calls also from Addis Ababa, where her brother-in-law seemed to be having problems in running the shop.

Tiggist was learning to watch Mrs Faridah closely, trying to judge her moods, working out her own strategy for staying out of trouble. She was careful now not to show too much affection to Yasmin when Mrs Faridah was around, and pushed the little girl towards her mother whenever she could.

Salma watched her with amusement.

‘You worry too much,’ she said one morning, as they sat together in the courtyard, washing sheets in a tub of water. ‘Mrs Faridah would be mad to get rid of you. You’re brilliant with kids. Yasmin’s so good when she’s with you.’

The little girl had been trying to climb on to Tiggist’s lap. Tiggist wiped her soapy hands on her skirt, and put her arms round her. Then she buried her face in the soft skin between Yasmin’s neck and her plump little shoulder, and made a funny growling noise. Yasmin squealed with delight and wriggled free. Tiggist looked round anxiously in case her mother had heard, then relaxed as she remembered that Mrs Faridah had gone out to the market.

‘Aren’t you scared in case she gets angry and sacks you?’ she asked Salma.

Salma shrugged.

‘She can’t. Mr Hamid’s mother employs me. Anyway, I wouldn’t put up with anything from her. I’d just go home to my mother.’

Tiggist said nothing. Salma glanced up from the stained pillowcase she’d been scrubbing and saw the desolate look in her friend’s face.

‘Oh sorry,’ she said. ‘My big mouth again. Here, help me with these sheets.’

The girls wrung out the sheets, twisting them between their hands and sending showers of drips down to wet the concrete. They were draping the first one over the washing line, which ran from the old tree in the corner of the compound to a hook in the side wall of the house, when they heard someone rattling the compound’s iron gates.

‘I’ll go,’ said Salma.

She ran across the concrete courtyard and opened one of the gates. Tiggist, who had bent down to pick up the second sheet, looked up curiously.

A young man was standing there. He was greeting Salma in the usual Ethiopian way, tapping his right shoulder against her right one, then his left shoulder against her left one, then they touched right shoulders again. Now he was reaching into his pocket and bringing something out, putting it into Salma’s hands.

Salma’s got a boyfriend! Tiggist thought incredulously. She never told me!

The young man was too far away to see clearly, but he looked really nice. He wasn’t handsome exactly, a bit too thickset and heavy-browed for that, but even at this distance it was easy to see that there was something solid and kind about him.

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