“It looks like you could use a drink,” he said softly.
She accepted the wine without a word and watched the river move in the wind. Near the bulrushes on the opposite bank, a hippopotamus stretched its jaws. In a tree not far away, a heron took flight.
“My mother used to say that light turns water into music,” she said, trying to salvage the moment. “I always liked the metaphor.”
Joseph was quiet for a while. “My mother died when I was five. I barely remember her.”
His spontaneous confession surprised Zoe. “I was fourteen,” she said. “She was on a humanitarian mission to Somalia.”
He studied her thoughtfully. “Then Africa owes you a debt.”
“No. She told me Africa saved her.”
“Do you know what she meant?”
“The way she told it, she grew up in a glass house,” Zoe said. “Her father was a shipping magnate. She almost never saw him. Her mother was from an old Boston family. She spent money and had affairs. It was a shallow life. After college, she traveled for a while and then went to Kenya with the Peace Corps. She said it was like being reborn. She might never have come home if her parents hadn’t died in a boating accident.” She paused. “I take it you’ve heard of the Catherine Sorenson Foundation?”
He nodded. “That’s her?”
“She liquidated the entire fortune. She kept two things: a house on Martha’s Vineyard and this ring.” Zoe held up her hand to the sun, allowing the diamonds to catch the light. “It’s funny—almost all of my memories of her have something to do with Africa. She wasn’t much of a homemaker. Trevor and I spent a lot of our childhood with nannies. But when I got old enough, she brought me with her. Her passion for this place rubbed off on me.”
Joseph regarded her without speaking.
“What are you looking at?” she asked, feeling self-conscious.
“My grandmother once told me that the souls of the seers are like the grass of the savannah. They only appear to die. Then the rains come and they return. When I look at you, I wonder if I’m looking at her.”
His words pierced Zoe like a surgeon’s blade. All her life men had praised her, but their words had been insubstantial things, and she had never believed them. With a single insight Joseph had redeemed the very notion of a compliment. She faced the river again, trying to hide the blush on her skin.
“You have a law degree,” she said. “Will you practice?”
He shook his head. “I want to be Inspector General of Police.”
She whistled. The IG was the top law-enforcement official in Zambia.
“The system rarely works for the poor,” he explained. “I intend to change it.”
“That’s a tall order,” she said. “Why do you think you’ll succeed?”
“Because I made a promise.”
“To whom?”
He looked suddenly reflective. “I think I will tell you someday. But not yet.”
She turned her gaze toward the sun, sinking into the haze above the horizon, and thought of Darious sitting smugly in the dock, of Frederick Nyambo pulling strings and Magistrate Kaunda dancing like a marionette, of the threat delivered by the man in sunglasses.
“To justice,” she said, holding up her wine glass, “no matter what it takes.”
He touched his bottle against her glass. “I’ll drink to that.”
chapter 13
Lusaka, Zambia
September, 2011
On Election Day, Zoe awoke in a sweat-stained tangle of sheets. She had spent the night—indeed the past three nights—slipping in and out of dreams. It was as if probing the mysteries of Charity’s past had unlocked a hidden vent in her subconscious, releasing a torrent of memories. One moment she was on her father’s yacht helping Trevor hoist the mainsail; the next moment she was walking the streets of Johannesburg, fearful of a mugging; after that, she was in Joseph’s truck in Kanyama, gang members pounding on the roof. The coup de grace—and the thought still lurking in her mind—was Clay Randall’s hands pressing her into the hot Vineyard sand.
She threw aside the mosquito net and stumbled into the bathroom. Don’t go there, she thought, staring at her reflection in the mirror. She showered and put on shorts and a linen shirt over her swimsuit. In honor of the election, Mariam had given everyone the day off. She ate a bowl of cereal and then called Joseph. She had seen him only once since their return from Livingstone. When he didn’t answer, she left him a message.
“Hey, it’s Zoe. I’d love an update about the magistrate. Give me a call.”