Jigsaw Read Online Free PDF Page B

inscribed.
    When the visit was over – it had taken slightly more than ninety minutes – he waved and stepped back inside the limousine, accompanied by the smiling Mpande.
    â€˜You have made them happy,’ he said to Barron.
    â€˜Perhaps.’
    â€˜No perhaps. When you provide hope, you are also providing a lifeline to joy.’
    Barron settled back in his seat for the trip to Durban. He stretched out his legs and noticed that a streak of pale red dust adhered to the turn-ups of his white trousers.
    His hotel suite had a view of Durban harbour in which ships of varied registration lay at anchor. The sun was slipping out of the sky but the intensity of the day’s heat hadn’t dwindled. The sky over the harbour was hazy. The windows of the suite were warm to touch. He poured himself a glass of iced water and sat at the table by the window, where the air-conditioning unit was located.
    He spread before him several folders which contained information about some future projects. Apart from the educational trust fund north of Durban, he had plans to raise finance for a glaucoma clinic in Haiti, and an agricultural research centre in the Guantánamo Province of Cuba – if he could ever find a way of bypassing Fidel’s leaden bureaucracy. He skimmed through the files, evaluating the reports of experts and bankers which were written in the kind of droning English guaranteed to induce sleep. Tired of reading, he pushed the folders to one side, then looked at his watch. It was a few minutes after seven; he was due to leave South Africa in an hour.
    He rose, wandered the room, listened. At seven-fifteen precisely he heard the sound of Nofometo knocking on his door – a distinctive two raps, a pause, then three further raps. Barron unlocked the door and Nofometo, a lean black man whose face was scarred from the lobe of his right ear to the corner of his mouth, a yellowy zigzag disfigurement, entered the room. Nofometo wore a red T-shirt and baggy beige shorts; he had simple open sandals on his bare feet.
    They shook hands. Nofometo walked to the table, opened the folders, scanned the pages, laughed. Barron had always thought Nofometo’s laugh suggestive of an exotic bird.
    â€˜You are still busy doing good, I see,’ Nofometo said. He had the accent of a man educated in an English public school. He lay down on the sofa and put up his feet. He closed his eyes and added, ‘You are too perfect, Tobias. A perfect man in an imperfect world. How do you manage it?’
    â€˜Practice,’ Barron said.
    Nofometo opened his eyes, the whites of which were faintly pink. He twisted his face, looked at Barron. ‘A perplexing saint. Saint Tobias. Saint Toby has a better ring to it, I think.’
    Barron sat in an armchair facing his visitor. He said nothing.
    â€˜Don’t I merit a welcoming drink? Have you mislaid your manners?’ Nofometo made a clucking sound of disapproval.
    Barron smiled. ‘I have a plane to catch.’
    Nofometo swung himself into a sitting position. He tapped his bare knees with his fingertips. He took from the back pocket of his shorts a folded brown envelope. He gave it to Barron, who opened it and scanned the two handwritten sheets of paper inside.
    â€˜Fine,’ he said.
    â€˜Now you are going to ask about money,’ Nofometo said.
    Barron said nothing. He had times when he enjoyed silences and the small discomfiture of other people. He stared quietly at the black man. Nofometo got up from the sofa and walked to the table, where he filled a glass from the jug of iced water. He took a sip and ran the back of one hand across his lips. ‘The usual wire transfer,’ he said. ‘Into the usual bank, I assume?’
    â€˜You have the account number.’
    â€˜Scorched into my heart,’ said Nofometo. He gazed at the envelope in Barron’s hand. ‘When can I expect delivery?’
    â€˜Three or four days.’
    Nofometo