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“Girlfriend? You sure?”
“Why not?… If you drop me at her house you can see her. Only I pray God she hasn’t gone on weekend today; it will be serious.”
“Why?”
“Because if she is not at home I will sleep on the road today.”
“I pray to God that she is not at home.”
“Why?”
“Because if she is not at home I will offer you bed and breakfast … What is that?” he asked the driver who had brought the car to an abrupt stop. There was no need for an answer. The small crowd ahead was looking upwards. The three scrambled out of the car and stumbled for the bush, necks twisted in a backward search of the sky. But the alarm was false. The sky was silent and clear except for two high-flying vultures. A humourist in the crowd called them Fighter and Bomber and everyone laughed in relief. The three climbed into their car again and continued their journey.
“It is much too early for raids,” he said to Gladys, who had both her palms on her breast as though to still a thumping heart. “They rarely come before ten o’clock.”
But she remained tongue-tied from her recent fright. Nwankwo saw an opportunity there and took it at once.
“Where does your friend live?”
“250 Douglas Road.”
“Ah! That’s the very centre of town—a terrible place. No bunkers, nothing. I won’t advise you to go there before 6 p.m.; it’s not safe. If you don’t mind I will take you to my place where there is a good bunker and then as soon as it is safe, around six, I shall drive you to your friend. How’s that?”
“It’s all right,” she said lifelessly. “I am so frightened of this thing. That’s why I refused to work in Owerri. I don’t even know who asked me to come out today.”
“You’ll be all right. We are used to it.”
“But your family is not there with you?”
“No,” he said. “Nobody has his family there. We like to say it is because of air-raids but I can assure you there is more to it. Owerri is a real swinging town and we live the life of gay bachelors.”
“That is what I have heard.”
“You will not just hear it; you will see it today. I shall take you to a real swinging party. A friend of mine, a Lieutenant-Colonel, is having a birthday party. He’s hired the Sound Smashers to play. I’m sure you’ll enjoy it.”
He was immediately and thoroughly ashamed of himself. He hated the parties and frivolities to which his friends clung like drowning men. And to talk so approvingly of them because he wanted to take a girl home! And this particular girl too, who had once had such beautiful faith in the struggle and was betrayed (no doubt about it) by some man like him out for a good time. He shook his head sadly.
“What is it?” asked Gladys.
“Nothing. Just my thoughts.”
They made the rest of the journey to Owerri practically in silence.
She made herself at home very quickly as if she was a regular girl friend of his. She changed into a house dress and put away her auburn wig.
“That is a lovely hair-do. Why do you hide it with a wig?”
“Thank you,” she said leaving his question unanswered for a while. Then she said: “Men are funny.”
“Why do you say that?”
“You are now a beauty queen,” she mimicked.
“Oh, that! I mean every word of it.” He pulled her to him and kissed her. She neither refused nor yielded fully, which he liked for a start. Too many girls were simply too easy those days. War sickness, some called it.
He drove off a little later to look in at the office and she busied herself in the kitchen helping his boy with lunch. It must have been literally a look-in, for he was back within half an hour, rubbing his hands and saying he could not stay away too long from his beauty queen.
As they sat down to lunch, she said: “You have nothing in your fridge.”
