I would come to Lubanda and dig a well or build a school or plant trees or do some other goodly labor. But in the end, I’d done no good at all. Then after less than a year, and in drear admission of my failure, I’d gotten on a plane, flown out of Lubanda, and never put anything at risk again. Now, walking across the empty plains, I thought of the last time I’d put myself in peril, remembered the red sun rising over Tumasi Road, where I’d endured a sleepless night, Martine’s lifeless camp only a few yards from me, the embers of her fire long ago grown cold. I’d stayed in my house, listening to the sounds of her awakening—getting water, lighting a breakfast fire. I’d waited until those sounds ended, then gone out, certain that by then she’d gone. “Good morning,” I said to Seso. He was squatting a few yards from the house, drawing figures in the dirt with a stick, an idleness that was new to him. As I approached, he glanced toward the road, the dusty Land Cruiser he’d driven back and forth to Rupala.
