Zoe nodded. “What does it say?”
He translated the letter in paraphrase. It was summer—the year was unclear. Bella had been working the streets with Doris and a girl named Loveness. One evening a man in a Jaguar flashed a wad of cash and asked if they wanted to party. He took them to a bungalow where they found a group of seven men, all snorting white powder. It wasn’t long before the men turned violent. They held Loveness down, forced her to swallow a pill of some kind, and raped her repeatedly. Two of the men dragged Bella into another room, waved knives around, and joked about circumcising her. Fearing for her life, she kicked one of the men in the groin and plunged his knife into the other man. She fled the room and found Doris spreadeagled on the floor, crying. Loveness was nowhere to be seen. At this point, Bella did something with the knife that resulted in a great deal of blood—her description in Tonga was threadbare. Then she and Doris ran naked into the night. They wandered for a while, hiding in bushes when cars passed. At the edge of Kalingalinga, they found an old woman who took pity on them and gave them clothes. They never saw Loveness again.
When Joseph finished, Zoe didn’t speak for a long time. Her senses felt raw from the reading. “Doris took care of Kuyeya because Bella saved her life,” she said at last.
“It appears that way.” He stared at the notebook. “Do you know how Bella died?”
Zoe nodded. “Let me show you.” She flipped to the end of the notebook and watched over his shoulder as he read the words of Bella’s last entry.
Dear Jan,
I have AIDS. It is very advanced. My CD4 count is 42. That is why I have been sick so much. I have been coughing for months, sometimes with blood. I have fevers and sweats at night. I see terrible things in my sleep. The woman who tested me told me what I already knew. It is TB. She said I need treatment right away. I went to the hospital, but there were no doctors or nurses. Something happened in the government. They told me to come back in a week or two. I don’t know if I will be able to make the trip.
I took my last client in May. I don’t have strength to do it anymore. I am running out of money. If not for Doris, I would not have food for Kuyeya. I am very worried about her. Who will take her when I die? She is not like other children. She needs special care. Her heart is weak. She has bad eyesight. Who will pay for her medicine and get her new glasses? People do not understand her. They say she is cursed. I am afraid she will be abused. I trust Doris, but I don’t trust the other girls or the men who come here.
I don’t know why I keep writing. What do these words matter? There is nothing here but pain. And now death is coming. I will give what I have left to Kuyeya. I must go. She is having a nightmare.
Zoe stared at the period at the end of the last sentence and felt the sorrow afresh. Bella’s final letter was like her life—cut off prematurely, bereft of resolution.
“She was prescient about the men,” she said. “But she underestimated Doris. The irony is Doris was the reason she waited so long to get tested. Doris was suspicious of ARVs. She thought AIDS was invented by the West to kill Africans. Bella went to the ngangas to placate her. Then when she finally asked for help, the nurses were on strike.”
“The Ministry of Health scandal,” Joseph said softly.
Zoe nodded. The story was infamous in Zambia. In the winter of 2009, tens of millions of dollars had disappeared from the Ministry of Health, prompting international donors to suspend aid payments and health-care workers to abandon their posts in protest.
“I’m sure the kleptocrats who took the money never thought anyone would die,” she said. “They just wanted Ferraris and Swiss bank accounts.”
Joseph tensed when she said this. He looked as if he was about to reply, but the words never quite materialized. After a moment, he reclined his seat and closed his eyes, bringing an abrupt end to the conversation.
Zoe watched him carefully, puzzling over his reaction. It wasn’t Bella’s battle with AIDS that set him on edge. That would make sense, given his sister’s death. It was the embezzlement at the Ministry of Health. But why? Why did he seem to take the scandal personally? Finding no answer, she took out the inflight magazine and read until the pilot announced their final descent into Livingstone.
When the plane parked outside the terminal, the man in sunglasses was the first to disembark. He hefted his duffel bag and left the aircraft without a glance in their direction. By the time Zoe stepped onto the tarmac, he was halfway to the terminal. Seeing the purpose in his stride, she set aside her earlier suspicions. He’s just another passenger in transit.
She led the way into the terminal and finalized the rental of a Toyota pickup, ignoring Joseph, who had yet to speak. The attendant escorted them to the lot and gave her the keys.
“You drive,” Zoe said, handing them to Joseph.