Pigment Read Free Page A

answer.
    “What’s ‘deil’ mean?” she persists.
    Traffic moves and they are out of visual range of Creepy Man.
    “Come on, tell me.”
    “He could get a lot of money for you on the black market,” Kennen answers.
    “Very funny.”
    “Not at all.” He isn’t joking. He doesn’t want to tell her it means devil, that she is less than human to many people here; that she scares them and should be afraid of them and their ignorance, because they are afraid of her, just as they are of the albino children they are here to help; that since he’s been here, he’s had his eyes opened wider to the reality, to the horror of it. It’s one thing being overseas in a different world, a first world, and hearing of these atrocities and wanting to help and thinking you can. It’s another thing being in this place, completely seeing how small you are compared to the third world you’ve entered, a world with its own beliefs, its own systems, its own currencies, its own ideas of right and wrong.
    On the plane with that woman calling her ghost she still felt big, but this man calling her the devil and wanting to sell her, this was her first lesson in Tanzania.

 
    3
     
    Jalil

    July 13
     
    The haze over Los Angeles is thicker than usual. When you’re sitting still, in a suit, on leather seats, and the AC is broken, bumper-humping on the 101, it feels like a sauna. It’s just wrong being in the new Audi without any air. Car costs too damn much money to have the AC give out like that.
    The city barrels in his open windows, heavy with stagnation and the Mariachi tunes from the gardener’s truck to the left.
    Jalil is a man of action, not built for sitting in traffic. The silver that frosts his tightly cut hair doesn’t make him any more patient. He finishes reviewing a proposal on his tablet and puts it down on the passenger seat. He loosens his tie and reminisces about driving Aliya to the airport. What is it now?...Two months gone by already? He looks to his right at the empty seat and shakes his head. His phone rings. It’s an international number. He answers, “Yeah.”
    The voice on the line belongs to Rolf Teigen, a tall fifty-year-old Norwegian with a deep voice and heavy Oslo accent. He hasn’t seen Rolf in ten years, but they have strong history. Soldiers who serve in private wars make friends for life. Knowing that Rolf was in Tanzania, Jalil had sent him an email, introducing Aliya and letting him know she was coming to his part of the world -- an unspoken ask to look out for one of their own. “Jalil…” He sounds older than he had when they last spoke. There is tension in Rolf’s voice and the connection is full of static and breaks in and out. “I don’t know how to tell you this.”
    “What is it?”
    “She’s gone.”
    “What are you saying?”
    “She is missing. Your daughter is gone.” The connection trails off with an echo.
    “What do you mean gone? When?”
    “Three days or so. Jalil...”
    He cuts him off. “I’m on my way.”
    “It’s too late...”
    He barely hears Rolf’s last words as the line washes out with a roar of static. “Rolf?” There’s no human response, only more static. He tries again, “Rolf?” Nothing. He hangs up the phone. Three days. Three days is too long. She’s gone. Gone where? Did someone take her? Three days is a desert. He has to get there...If there is any hope. The trail is three days cold. He looks at the hopeless expanse of stopped cars in front of him and behind him. He pulls his passport out of the glove box as he nudges and honks his way to the shoulder, then speeds along the barrier. He exits onto the 10, and it has a solid herd of vehicles at a standstill. He ducks down at the next off-ramp and takes Venice across town. He looks again to the empty seat next to him, then back at the road.

 
    4
     
    In Her Footsteps

    July 13 (later)
     
    “Reggie, put your Mama on the phone.”
    “I got a new video game, Jalil. You have to come