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waited until the young Xhosa had left, then stroked the hand of this stubborn woman he loved so much.
    â€œThe person who attacked you,” he said, following the line of her veins. “You know him, don’t you?”
    Josephina closed her eyes, still smiling. She wanted to lie, but his hand felt so warm in hers.
    â€œYou know him, don’t you?” he insisted.
    She sighed from the depths of the bed, as if the past were present—Ali had the same hands as his father.
    â€œIt’s his mother I knew,” she admitted at last. “Nora Mceli. A friend of Mary’s.”
    Mary was the cousin who had taken them in when they had fled to Khayelitsha from the Bantustan of KwaZulu. As for her friend Nora Mceli, she was a
sangoma
, a healer, who had treated him once for a terrible sore throat. Neuman remembered a woman with eyes like an angry ox who, with the aid of a great many concoctions, had finally managed to tear out the ball of fire burning his throat.
    â€œWe lost touch after Mary died, but Nora had a son,” Josephina went on. “He was with her at the funeral. Simon. Don’t you remember?”
    â€œNo. Is that who attacked you—Simon?”
    Josephine nodded, almost shamefacedly.
    â€œDoes his mother still practice?”
    â€œI don’t know,” she said. “Nora and Simon left the township a few months ago, from what I heard. The last time I saw them was at Mary’s funeral. Simon must have been nine at the time. A sweet kid, but not in good health. I treated him once at the dispensary. The poor boy had a heart murmur, and suffered from asthma attacks. Not even Nora could do anything. Maybe that’s why they left the township. Ali”—here she squeezed his big male hand—“Nora helped us when we needed help. I can’t report her son. You do understand that? And besides, to attack an old woman like me, you really must be in a bad way, don’t you think?”
    â€œOr a complete coward,” he said, through clenched teeth.
    Josephina always had excuses for everyone. She’d been listening to too many sermons.
    â€œI’m sure Simon doesn’t remember me,” she said gallantly.
    â€œThat would surprise me.”
    With her rustling white dresses, her size, and her walking stick, Josephina was about as inconspicuous as the northern lights. He saw her cheap trinkets on the night table, her photos of him—she was all he had in this charnel house of a world.
    â€œWas Simon alone when he attacked you?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œDoes he belong to a gang?”
    â€œSo I heard.”
    â€œWhat did you hear exactly?”
    â€œJust that he was hanging out with other street kids.”
    â€œWhere?”
    â€œI don’t know. But if he’s wandering the streets like they say, something must have happened to his mother.”
    He nodded gently. Josephina yawned despite herself, revealing the few good teeth she still had left. The sedatives were taking effect.
    â€œO.K., I’ll see what I can do.” He kissed her on her forehead. “Now sleep. I’ll be back this evening, to see how you’re doing.”
    The old woman chuckled, at once sorry and delighted to be the center of attention.
    Nicolas adjusted the curtains, to make the room completely dark.
    â€œBy the way,” she whispered behind him. “What do you think of Miriam?”
    The young nurse was waiting outside the house, her slender figure standing out against the painted sky.
    â€œA real tub of lard,” he said.

3.
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    O scar and Josephina had their second child the day after the historic fight in Kinshasa in November 1973. That night, amid scenes of indescribable chaos, Muhammad Ali, the boxer who’d converted to Islam, had confronted George Foreman, who everyone thought was unbeatable. It wasn’t so much the world heavyweight championship that had been at stake in the fight as the assertion of