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"Why did the rain not come sooner?"
"Go to sleep my son."
"Did he kiss her?"
"Go to sleep. Go to sleep now."
Joseph awoke to see Ibrahim's face at the side of the truck. It was dawn.
"Joseph, Joseph! Wake up. Come quickly, my friend."
"What is it?"
"A fire. There's been a fire."
Joseph sat up in the seat of the truck. "Isaiah! Where's Isaiah?"
"I don't know. Perhaps he went to look. Everyone's down there."
"Down where?"
"At the restaurant. Where we were last night."
"How can there be a fire?" Joseph stepped out of the truck and looked around him. It was no longer raining, but great pools of water filled the dips and potholes in the street.
"It's an extraordinary thing. Come look." Ibrahim was already running down the alley to the main street. Joseph followed, past the tank at the corner, past the Baptist Mission. He caught up with Ibrahim across the street from the restaurant, where a crowd had gathered. He scanned the crowd for Isaiah but did not find him. There was no sign of damage to the building. A couple of boys with kalashnikovs hung around the door. The crowd eyed them warily from time to time, but their attention was fixed on a strange figure huddled in the doorway. His clothes were mostly gone and what remained hung in blackened rags from his body. Sparse tufts of hair clung to the scalp which was all that was visible of his bowed head. The fingers of one of the hands which covered his face were stripped of skin, leaving the bare pink flesh exposed to the sun. As they watched, a boy emerged from the restaurant carrying a bandage. He knelt beside the man and tried gingerly to wrap the bandage round his hand. The burnt man groaned and pulled his hand away. With his other hand he slapped the boy across the face, so that the boy dropped the bandage and retreated out of range. Suddenly the man raised his head and let out a terrible roar of pain and fury that made the young warriors take a step back in fright. Some in the crowd took a step back too, but it was not because of the roar. It was the man's face. From the bridge of the nose to the eyebrows the skin had been completely burned away. His eyes were two black holes in an expanse of raw pulpy flesh. His lips too were stripped of skin. He opened his mouth to roar again, and Joseph saw gold glint in the morning sun.
Next to him, Ibrahim was talking to a small man whom Joseph recognized as the keeper of the little grocery outside which they were standing.
"A most amazing thing," the man was saying, his hands whirling excitedly. "The Captain drank many beers last night and much whisky. They say he often does. His men sometimes buy it for him in my shop. Brandy too. The good stuff. He was sleeping at the table this morning. Everyone else had gone, or was asleep too. Suddenly there was a great commotion. People shouting, screaming. I was getting ready to open the shop. I saw it all. He came rushing out of the restaurant and he was on fire. There were flames everywhere. His shirt, his trousers, his hair. They say that he must have spilled a whole bottle of whisky all over himself to burn like that."
"Somebody must have knocked over a lamp," said Ibrahim.
"Perhaps. Nobody saw it happen. When he came out, it was as if he was dancing. Whirling and screaming. Dancing round and round in the rain. If it had not been for the rain, he would have burned completely. Perhaps it would have been better for him so. "
Joseph felt a nudge at his leg. "Isaiah! Where have you been?"
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