The Trade (A Hans Larsson Novel Book 2) by Thrall Chris

Author:Thrall, Chris [Thrall, Chris]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Serf Books Ltd
Published: 2016-04-18T16:00:00+00:00

- 50 -

The woman shuffled toward the check-in desk at Banjul International Airport. The air was stifling in the Gambian capital. She mopped her brow with a Kleenex and cursed the flies landing on her golden-brown skin.

It had been a two-day boat journey from Kankaba, a small city sprawling along the banks of the Upper River, where the All Saints Home for Abandoned Children sat. The woman’s skin itched from the mosquito bites she’d received while sleeping on deck. She prayed she hadn’t contracted malaria again. It would be the fifth time in as many years, and she’d spent enough time lying in sweat-soaked bedsheets with a fever raging so high death seemed the better option.

In front of her in the check-in queue was a loud, fat, sweating Mandinka wearing white robes and a skullcap, and, dressed in a gold sari and turban, his equally as vocal and ample wife. The woman waited patiently as the Mandinka couple attempted to haggle over the luggage allowance with the pretty Fula behind the desk. Repeatedly she told them that the bulky collection of food and other goods piled high in cardboard fruit boxes on their trolley was eighty kilos over the airline’s limit. Each time the man tried to bluff his way out of the additional fee by handing her his kora, a stringed instrument made from a calabash and cow’s hide, and suggesting she take it as payment.

Finally the role play ended, and the Mandinka pulled a fat roll of banknotes from a faux-crocodile-skin shoulder bag and slapped down half of what he owed. The petite Fula feigned a polite smile, opting for discretion over valor and the chance to move the annoying couple on.

The woman placed her passport and ticket on the counter and was soon walking through the departure lounge toward her gate. On the flight she mused as passengers broke out pack lunches of fish, chicken, rice and beans before takeoff, raising an eyebrow at the footprints some confused individual had planted on the toilet seat. The woman spent the flight reflecting on the circumstances that had conspired to put her in this position.

Born in Mali to Christian missionaries, a Mozambican father, an American mother, she had studied law at the University of Bamako in the capital and had gone on to serve as a junior government official. She fled the country during the buildup to the brutal Northern Mali Conflict, when Tuareg rebels declared war on the government and issued a hit list with her name on it. She had crossed Senegal to seek political asylum in Gambia, settling in Kankaba, where with her university education she was ideally suited to take over the running of the children’s home, a neglected operation surviving on sporadic handouts and UN food parcels.

Since arriving at the home, she had accessed several funding streams, allowing for a complete overhaul of the building, its dormitories, classroom and kitchen. She’d gotten computers and Internet installed and set up a website displaying staff profiles, pictures of the orphanage and a Sponsor a Child link.

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