“True.” I thought about this for a minute, then asked if he was sure that Nkemi’s days were numbered.
“Take my word for it, Julie. I have information that even the State Department doesn’t have at this point. By summer, Nkemi and his republic will be history.”
?
?I sort of liked Nkemi—and your brother too.”
“Don’t worry about those two. Before Halloween, they’ll both have good jobs teaching political science and African history in Paris or Brussels—though they’ll probably make their real money advising businessmen on who to bribe in the new regime.”
“Why couldn’t you have told me what I was waiting for all these years?”
“If I’d done that, you would have asked how long Mobutu was going to be in power, and I would have had to say, ‘Who knows? He might live to be a hundred.’ I didn’t think you’d like to hear that.”
“True.”
So the waiting’s over, and I’m two years older and wiser than the girl who wrote most of this book. I could easily go back and smooth over some of the rough spots that I know must be there.
But I think I’d better just leave it the way it is.