Rare Earth Read Online Free

driver, then extracted two hundred dollars from his money belt. “Tell him there’s another five bills for him and his workers if he can deliver this stuff in three days.”
    Charles did so, then replied, “He says, the problem is not him and not his trucks, but the depot bosses.”
    â€œTell him to hang tight. I’m going to make a couple of calls and get him a name.” Marc moved over to the sergeant and offered another cash payment. “Tell Sergeant Kamal, he and his men were a pleasure to work with. This money is my way of saying thanks.”
    The sergeant made the money disappear. “This is payment for what we have done, or what is yet to come?”
    Marc grinned. “I am liking this man more and more.”
    Charles asked, “Am I to translate this also?”
    â€œSure thing.” Marc crossed the compound, climbed the stairs, and knocked on the admin building’s doorframe. He could see the French aid worker seated behind the desk on the room’s opposite side. But Valerie gave no sign she was aware of him. Marc pushed open the screen door and entered. “I’ve shifted the food with the closest use-by dates to the empty godown.”
    She continued to stare out the main room’s rear window. The back area was dominated by a massive baobab tree. Beyond that stood a lone concrete hut, housing the generator and fuel tank. Marc could hear the generator’s low throbbing through the open window. When Valerie gave no response, Marc crossed the room. “I need to use your satellite phone.”
    Marc hefted the heavy apparatus off her desk. She glared at him, but did not speak. The device was warm and slightly moist. Marc assumed she had just finished a call, probably complaining to someone about what he had done. He wiped the phone on his shirt and dialed the number at the top of his own manifest. He made his request, got the required name, cut the connection, and replaced the phone. “I’m thinking it would be a good idea to delegate responsibility to the elders. And Charles, if he’ll do it.”
    â€œYou are here a few hours and you think you know everything.” She plucked a cigarette from the pack on her desk. The large central office stank of stale smoke. “How positively American.”
    â€œIs there a photocopy machine or printer that works?”
    â€œI want nothing to do with you or your questions.” She lit her cigarette and blew a long plume toward the rear window. “Your superiors at Lodestone must be very proud.”
    Marc searched the offices and found a new printer-scanner in the second room. He took out his passport and made fifty copies of the page with his photo. When he returned to the front room, Valerie was still there, still blowing smoke at the baobab tree beyond her open window. Marc left the building without another word.
    Charles seemed to have been waiting for him, which Marc took as a good sign. Together they walked to the collection of three ramshackle huts that made up the elders’ compound. The buildings were identical to all the others Marc saw, made from plastic sheeting and ragged tarpaulins and dried tree limbs and thorn bush. The trio of structures opened into a small inner yard where chickens pecked. The elders remained seated on little stools as Marc and Charles entered. The center stool was occupied by the youngest of the group, the man with a predator’s latent force.
    Marc handed over all but one of the photocopied sheets and launched straight in. “There are bound to be weaker and older members of this community who might not receive their share. I want you to take responsibility for getting them food. I’d suggest you use these printouts. One of you sign a photocopied page and have Charles do the same. Sergeant Kamal and his men will hand over a sack of grain for each signed form.”
    The young chief took the pages, inspected them, and entered into a solemn