BAA Opening Pages

Baa & the Angels: Opening Pages

“Hurry!” Sabine urges her sister.

Seven year old Therese is dawdling. She is watching the children who don’t go to school. They don’t wear school uniform or carry rucksacks. They wear patched clothes and carry large, yellow jerry cans. They are going to the river to fetch water.

Sabine is fuming. If only she could leave Therese behind! But she is nine, she is the big sister. Baba insists that they should walk to school together because of THEM. Baba’s voice becomes an angry hiss when he talks about THEM. Beads of sweat gather on his forehead, and Mama’s eyes become wide and frightened like those of a cornered antelope.

“What do THEY look like?” Sabine ventures to ask.

Baba picks up an overripe mango. “They are like this mango! They look all right on the outside, but inside they are rotten all through! And there’s a stone for a heart. See?”

He flings the mango out of the door. It splits open, spilling the rotting flesh on the ground. “That’s what THEY’re like! The Congo is full of THEM. The Congo is getting torn apart!”

Night-time, when it is dark, is the time when Sabine is most afraid of THEM, but even going to school is scary. She keeps a close watch on the shadows behind the houses in case one of THEM is hiding there. She looks out for snakes, too, but she is much more afraid of THEM.

The sun is climbing the sky, scorching the ground and sizzling the branches of the avocado trees.

“Hurry!” cries Sabine.

Soon she is near enough to the school to hear the usual sounds of children waiting for lessons to begin: laughing, shouting, and the dull thud of shoes against the battered football. But everything is quiet! Lessons must have started, but if that is the case, why can’t she hear the teacher’s deep voice and the chanting responses of the children?

She forgets Therese, she begins to run. Now she can see the school building, with its wrinkled tin roof spread over white painted walls. She pulls up with a jerk, Therese close behind her. Sabine hears strange, unfamiliar sounds. Strident, guttural shouts. A desk flies out of the school and lands on the worn earth. Papers spill out on to the ground.

Suddenly a harsh cry slices through the air. A hard-faced man with a gun tucked in his belt strides towards them.

“Hey, you! You want school?”

Sabine feels a lightning stab of fear. She grabs hold of Therese and bolts. There is a loud bang. Something flies past Sabine’s ears and rifles through the trees.

Mocking laughter rings through the air.

“I’ll give you school!”