Blood Before Dawn

CHAPTER 1 APRIL 1979

CHAPTER 1APRIL 1979

I’d always known that one could get into trouble just standing on a street corner, but never like this. We had just finished a late breakfast at a new Lebanese restaurant on Gurley Street in center city Monrovia, and were actually standing on the corner of Gurley and Benson when a crowd—more of a roaring mob—swept down the street like a tidal bore. Judging from the signs and posters coming toward us, the throng seemed to be heading in the direction of the Executive Mansion. We watched for a moment, fascinated, just as one might stare at a growing flood, then realized, too late, that we were caught up in this human deluge. We tried to run, but we were already submerged in the tumbling waters of human flesh and the roar of human voices.

Sam and I glanced at each other. “What the hell?” All we could do was lock arms and flow with the mob.

I had returned to Liberia because I needed to raise a lot of cash quickly, and the best way I could do that was to drop in on some of my old friends in the diamond business. It was the beginning of the wet season in West Africa—not the best time to arrive or, in fact, to do anything there. My wife, Sam, had insisted on coming with me. I told her I didn’t think it was a good idea—Sam is one of the toughest people I know. You just don’t say no to her, not even a maybe. Then, too, I knew she was better at this sort of thing than I was.

It had been twelve years since Sam and I were in Africa, but Sam appeared not to have aged a single day. She still had the same thick red hair that she had cut short for the trip. It would be easier to manage in the heat and humidity of Liberia. Her eyes were still clear and green with the same laugh wrinkles at the corners, and the attractive bridge of freckles across her nose and upper cheeks had not faded. I knew that with her intelligence and insight we had a much better chance of succeeding.

The flights to Liberia had been long and arduous despite Pan Am’s latest jet transport airplanes. Sam and I learned a new term on this trip: “jet lag.” We experienced it by first falling asleep during the taxi ride to the Ambassador Hotel. Then, after a surreal check-in at the hotel, we went up to our room in a dreamlike state and, without removing our clothes or taking a shower or any of the normal things people do before retiring for the night, collapsed onto the bed and immediately fell deeply asleep until early the next morning when our unexpected adventure began.

The noisy mob, brandishing posters reading, “OUT WITH TOLBERT!”, “STOP OPPRESSION NOW!”, “WE WANT RICE!” swept us up into their superheated mist and carried us along like two pieces of entwined flotsam. We tried but could not move against the flow. Sam and I began to move laterally through the crowd like two small animals trying to swim across a rushing river.

The noise was deafening until I heard the gunshots in the distance, and the crowd grew silent for a very brief moment. Then screaming started, drowning out all other sounds except the staccato rhythm of automatic gunfire. Sam and I fell facedown onto the pavement, making ourselves as flat as possible. A man, an older man with gray hair, fell on his back in front of us, blood spurting from the front of his head like a small red fountain. As his blood pressure dropped, the gushing slowed to a trickle and the man lay dead. Blood covered his face, slowly filling his right ear. A woman tripped over us and fell, shrieking, still holding on to her protest sign.

Finally, the firing stopped. Soldiers ran toward us, rifles in hand. I couldn’t make out what they were saying. They stopped along the edge of the street and shouted at us. They wanted us to leave, and made aggressive waving motions with their free hands. Several people stood up, hesitated as though waiting for something to happen, then started to run. There was no more firing. I looked over at Sam. Her red hair was disheveled and her face was contorted into a snarl, and through gritted teeth she shouted, “I wish I had my goddamn Uzi!”

“I think they want us to go!” I hissed back to her. “I’m making a run for it. Are you ready?”

She nodded. We stood up slowly. The soldiers, now nearby, were motioning for us to move. I took Sam’s hand and we started running. By this time, most people had gotten to their feet; that is, those who were not dead or badly injured. We ran with the crowd, stopping only once to help someone who had fallen. After that, we didn’t stop running until we got to the Ambassador Hotel several blocks away. The front doors were locked, but people were inside crouching behind chairs and flowerpots.

“Let’s try the back!” I shouted.

We ran around to the beach bar. The patio was deserted. The entrance to the interior bar was also locked—of course it would be. I picked up a barstool and raised it to smash the glass door. Just as I got the stool over my head, the back door opened slightly and Joe, the bartender, peeked out from inside.

“Mr. Ken,” he said quietly from the partially opened door, “please don’ do dat. Ya know, it be expensive to get glass.”

I pulled the door fully open with a jerk, nearly yanking Joe out onto the pavement. Sam and I rushed in and closed the door behind us. Joe stayed next to me the whole time and quickly locked it.

“Well, if it isn’t ‘Set-em-up Joe’!” I exclaimed. “I’ve never been happier to see anyone in my life! But you don’t think these locked doors will keep them out, do you?”

“Yah ah do. For dhey is notin’ fo’ dem here. Dhey after food. Dhey starving and dhey after Tolbert’s head on a stick. Dhey don’t wa notin’ else. So, why you hee, Mr. Ken. It be almos’ ten yee now. You come to fly again?”

“Long story, Joe. Long story.”

It was strangely quiet when we got to the hotel lobby. It was dotted with a mixture of Europeans, Americans, some Latin Americans, and Africans—mostly men. Sam was still breathing in gulps of air. Her red hair was wet and clinging to her head and ears.

“What the hell happened out there?” she asked in a raspy voice.

“Somebody started shooting,” I said.

“You think it was the soldiers?”

“I don’t think so. They seemed to want us to get away. They seemed to be protecting us.”

“That’s odd. Then who was doing the shooting?” Sam asked.

“De police. Dhey do de shootin’. Dhey be Tolbert’s policeman. He personal bodyguard. De Army not his.”

It was the hotel desk clerk speaking softly from behind the counter.

An unnatural quiet had settled around us as I looked out on the now empty street. Hotel guests who had been crouching behind the furniture started to stand up. One of the men was an Asian, and from his clothes and appearance I guessed (correctly, as it turned out) that he was Chinese.

He did not seem as concerned or as frightened as the others. Having witnessed our entrance into the lobby and seeing that we were Westerners, he walked toward us and addressed us, bowing slightly.

“You are American?”

“Yes,” I said. “And you are?”

“I am Chao Zhan, Assistant Deputy Minister for Agriculture for The People’s Republic of China.”

He extended his hand. And I took it. It was small and damp.

“Mr. Chao,” I said and nodded.

“Ah, so you have been to China?”

“No, why do you ask?”

“You addressed me correctly. In China, the surname is always pronounced first. The opposite from Western culture.”

“Let’s just say it was a lucky accident and leave it at that.”

Sam was standing next to him and I noticed visible discomfort on her face. I put my arm gently around her and introduced myself, and Sam as my wife. I then offered to buy Mr. Chao a drink—Joe had signaled that the bar was now open.

Mr. Chao had all the graciousness of a trained diplomat. His lips smiled and he seemed to nod in agreement at nearly every sentence. We chose one of the tables in the far corner, near the window. Guests were beginning to drift out of the lobby and meander to the hotel bar. Most were laughing grimly as though they had just watched a horror movie and realized with great relief that they were now safe.

Mr. Chao ordered a small bottle of mineral water.

“I never drink alcohol before six,” he said, “and even then, I seldom partake except for social purposes. Excessive alcohol consumption is discouraged in The People’s Republic.”

Sam and I, on the other hand, felt like we had both narrowly escaped death, which we had, so we needed something fortifying—maybe even life affirming.

“So, Mr. Chao,” I said, taking a sip of a large gin and tonic, “what happened out there?”

Mr. Chao smiled slightly and poured his mineral water very carefully into a tall glass. “I think it was an old-fashioned food riot. We often experienced them during the Qing Dynasty. In those days, the rich controlled all sources of wealth and production. Workers over the years attempted to march to the estates of the rich, which were surrounded by walls and strong gates, and demand lower prices. Many workers were killed, and some thrown into rivers or dungeons.”

“Not like today, huh, Mr. Chao?” Sam said, not bothering to conceal her sarcasm. Mr. Chao continued smiling and sipped his mineral water.

“There are no food riots in China today, madam. The Party sees to it that all workers’ needs are cared for.”

“But China has had food riots,” Sam said.

“Unfortunately, madam, that is true, as I have said, during the Qing dynasty. The workers and peasants wanted only what was rightfully theirs.”

“If my memory is correct, Mr. Chao,” Sam added, “that was in the seventeenth century, wasn’t it?”

Mr. Chao smiled without showing his teeth. “In fact, it was 1644 to 1911.”

“Yes,” said Sam, “and there was a Royalist attempt to bring the Qing back to power in 1917, but it was aborted and failed.”

“Your knowledge is astounding, madam, but in China the past and the present are one. We do not dismiss events which came before as irrelevant. It is all the same to us. The class struggle will always go on.”

There was a distant explosion, startling everyone at the bar, but no secondary explosions or gunfire.

“Mr. Chao,” I said, “you must know something about this food riot?”

He nodded slightly. “President Tolbert, it seems, is not quite as wily as his predecessor, President Tubman. It is my understanding, I am sure one can get different versions, that President Tolbert’s Secretary of Agriculture, Florence Chenoweth, raised the import tax on rice significantly. Some say it was meant to stimulate local rice cultivation, but I think it was to channel more money into the Treasury and into the pockets of the President and other members of his family.”

“What do you mean, ‘his family’?” I asked.

“His daughter owns considerable rice-growing land; his son is also heavily invested, as is, I believe, his brother, Frank Tolbert, who is also a member of the Senate. I suspect they were not among the rioters.” Mr. Chao snickered such that small droplets of mineral water dribbled from his mouth. He went on. “President Tolbert, in his blind ambition to please the Western powers, especially the United States, forgot the power of the workers and peasants. Have you heard of the Progressive Alliance of Liberia?”

“No,” I said.

“The acronym is PAL. It was formed a few years ago and is led by one Gabriel Matthews, an activist who espouses a quasi-Marxist ideology. I would consider it a ‘grassroots movement’, as you Americans say, to address government corruption and other such abuses of power.” He put his hand over his mouth. “I have said too much,” he muttered.

“I suspect you’re right,” Sam said. “What do you think will happen now?”

“I imagine President Tolbert will remove the tax, but, as you Americans say, ‘the cat is out of the bag.’”

He turned to look at the ocean and then asked quietly, “What does that mean, I wonder?”

His thoughtful moment was interrupted by renewed bursts of automatic gunfire. A few people ducked beneath the bar, then reemerged, laughing nervously.

I told Mr. Chao about our experience with the soldiers we saw in the street.

“They were acting strangely,” I said, “and not shooting at the demonstrators. Some actually helped us get out of the way. But then there were also people who’d been hit and were dying in the street. So, there must have been some soldiers who were shooting.”

“The President does not trust his Army. The enlisted ranks are made up of poorly paid and badly treated indigenous people while the officer corps is comprised mostly of the upper class, especially the high-ranking officers. The enlisted men are in sympathy with the struggles of the people and will not fire on them. It is reminiscent of the Russian Revolution, no? Tolbert suspected this, so he asked the President of Guinea for support, who obligingly sent him a detachment of troops. I’m told that they can be particularly ruthless and cruel.”

Sam wanted to know how many troops were sent.

“I don’t know exactly, but I imagine it’s enough to protect Tolbert’s Executive Mansion and his home in Bentol City.” Mr. Chao shook his head slowly as people do when they believe the outcome is inevitable. “Using foreign troops against your own people can never be justified, but,” Mr. Chao shrugged, “he doesn’t have to worry about re-election—does he? Did you know he’s planning on hosting the Organization of African Unity in a few months? He’s already cleared away some small houses on beach property to build acceptable accommodations for the delegates, and I understand he’s sparing no expense to house diplomats and other well-placed persons. Quite an expenditure.”

“That won’t go down well with the workers and peasants,” Sam said with a smirk.

“I imagine,” Mr. Chao said, “that the struggle is just beginning. This is how all capitalist systems will end—in chaos, confusion, and complete destruction.”

“Surely Capitalism can adjust,” Sam said. “It has done so in Europe and America.”

“Only by much struggle and hardship and by adopting some measure of socialist principals. Take your President Roosevelt and his New Deal. He was criticized as being a socialist by your Wall Street bankers and the opposition party. But had he not done that, America would be arm in arm with the Communist world today.”

“Are you saying that President Roosevelt saved Capitalism, Mr. Chao?” Sam asked.

“Madam,” Mr. Chao said with a slight smile. “President Roosevelt said so himself.”

Sam looked toward the front window of the hotel. The street was littered with the detritus of riot and destruction, but the rioters were gone. Even the bodies of the dead had been removed.

Sam motioned toward the outside. “Do you think those people will embrace Communism as their savior, Mr. Chao?”

Mr. Chao leaned back in his chair, took another sip of his tea. “I think they may have already, madam. They just don’t know it.”