A wealthy woman poses as a maid to find her son…

PART 2:

 You, you’ve been here for what?  One month. I’m not trying to take your  place, Mariama. I just want to do my  job well. Oops! Redo it and faster this  time. Dinner is in 1 hour. 25 years  running my own company and here I am  restarting a dish because a jealous  woman needs to feel important. But I’m  not here for my pride, I’m here for my  son.

 Careful, are you okay?  Yes Mr. Mamadou, sorry, I’m clumsy  today.  Don’t apologize, you’ve been working  since dawn, I saw you. Let me help you  to the kitchen, no one will know. A  boss who carries his servant’s tray.  We’ve never seen that in this house.  My father always said a man who doesn’t  know how to carry a tray doesn’t  deserve to have his things carried  later.

 I don’t know where he got that  idea, but it stuck with me. He doesn’t  know who I am. He doesn’t know that  it’s my blood flowing in his veins. And  yet, without me teaching him anything,  he grew up good. It wasn’t Mamdiara who  gave him that heart. It’s something he  was already born with. We must act  before next month’s general meeting.

 If  Mamadou gets the shares the old man  Diop promised him before dying, Astou  and I lose all control over the company . The original will must disappear.  I’ll take care of it. Honestly, this  new maid Day, she’s as slow as a  stranded snail. Mamadou should fire her . Day has been working since dawn  without a minute’s break.

 A little  respect costs nothing. Mind your own  fabrics, you neighborhood peddler. Look  what you’ve done with your poorly  measured starch. This dress costs more  than you make in a year, old woman. I  am sorry, miss. I will have it cleaned  immediately. My mother is right. People  from Joal really don’t know how to do  anything properly.

 Astou, that’s enough. Apologize.  Since when do you defend the staff,  little adopted brother? I’m sorry about  earlier. Astou has no right to talk to  you like that. No one has that right.  You shouldn’t sit here, sir. This is  not your place.  My place is where people are treated  with respect. Here, drink.

 You haven’t  eaten anything since this morning. I’ve  been watching you. You know, in this  house, I have been treated as an  outsider for 25 years, even if I bear  the name Diop. So, I recognize  loneliness when I see it in someone  else.  You are a good person, Mamadou. One day , your kindness will return to you a  hundredfold. I promise you that.

 I wish I could believe that. Boss, go  up on the north scaffolding to check  the level yourself. It will only take a  minute.  Mr. Mamadou, lunch is getting cold and  that wood doesn’t look right to me.  Maybe you should wait for the engineer.  Since when does a cook know about  scaffolding? Since we’ve seen enough  fish sheds collapse in Joal.

 To  recognize rotten wood. Sir, I must go.  I just remembered something. Mustapha  fled like a coward. We can no longer  count on him.  A construction accident, it was so  simple, though. No one would have asked  any questions. The construction site is  too visible, too loud. We need  something more discreet, something that  happens in the privacy of this house,  where no one thinks to look for a  culprit.

 What exactly are you thinking of? For  Friday’s dinner, Mamadou Diara is  hosting the whole family for the late  Elaji’s anniversary. No one will  notice a sudden illness amidst so much  emotion. Mariem, this plate fell on the  floor earlier. I saw it. Take it back,  I’ll redo it immediately. Thank you,  you’re the only one here who  remembers I don’t like too much chili .

 I pay attention to everything  concerning you, Mr. Mamadou, more than  you imagine. Don’t take that car  today, Mr. Mamadou.  I have the general assembly in an hour,  I don’t have time to… Trust me. Just this once, take a taxi,  I beg you. Hello, I’d like a taxi. To

 the Villa Diop, please. That’s right,  I’m waiting. Thank you. Three times.  Three times, this man has escaped what  should have passed for a simple tragedy . It’s as if he had an invisible  guardian angel in this house.  So, we stop playing with chance, we  attack what really matters: the paper,  the will.

 Without legal proof of his  shares, it won’t matter if he’s alive  or dead, he’ll have nothing left.  The general assembly is in 3 days.  Tomorrow evening, I will replace the  documents. During the family dinner, I  will do it. No one will notice.  The general assembly is in 3 days.  Tomorrow evening, I will replace the  documents. No one will notice. Tough.

 Once the original will is destroyed and  replaced by the forged copy, he’ll be  out on the street and I’ll be far  away, married to a man with a real  future.  The general assembly is in 3 days.  Tomorrow evening, I will replace the  documents in the safe. No one will  notice. Put that will back, Mr. Fal.  A cook daring to give me orders? Go  back to your kitchen before I have you  fired on the spot.

 I know every line of  that will, Mr. Fal, and I also know  what you and Sorna were plotting last  night in that hallway. Dear, what are  you doing in my father’s office with  the safe open? Before talking about the  will, there is an older truth I must  reveal in this house. Mamadou, 25 years  ago, a young girl from Joal gave her  newborn son to a good man named Idiope,  praying every night since to see him  again one day.

 This bracelet, my  adoptive mother always told me, it came  from a woman who loved me more than her  own life.  That woman is me, my son.  Huh.  I am Awa, your mother. Dear Sornin, you  wanted to steal my inheritance the very  night heaven returned my mother to me.  Get out of this house, both of you, and  never hope to set foot in this company  again.

 Mamadou, I can explain  everything. Astou pushed me. I  Do not drag me into your lies, dear.  Forgive me; I spent 25 years treating  this child like an intruder in his own  home. Out of sheer pride of blood, I  was wrong. All these years, you thought  of me every day.  Every day, my son; there wasn’t a  single night I didn’t wonder if you  were cold, if you were hungry, if  someone rocked you when you cried.

 Tell me about my father, about Ibrahima . But he was afraid, Mamadou, afraid of  his own father, afraid of the village’s  shame. Fear makes small men out of  those who could be great. I don’t hold  it against him anymore. Without that  fear, you might never have become who  you are today, raised by a man like  Elhaji Diop.

 All these years trying to earn  Mamdiara’s love while my real mother  was searching for me without stopping.  You never needed to earn my love, my  son. You had it from your very first  breath on that dusty road in Joal.  there awa awaar and it can’t be  tantumba here is mamadou my son It is  here that everything began on this sand . And it is here that I tell you today

 what I could never tell you back then.  Welcome home, my son.  Your mother, when she sold roasted  peanuts in this very square, was  already negotiating like a  businesswoman. I knew she would go far.  So, that’s where I get my stubbornness  in business.  From me for the stubbornness, from your  adoptive father for the generous heart.

 You are the fruit of two kindnesses, my  son, even if the path between them was  long and painful. Fatou, I must tell  you the truth. The scandal has splashed  onto the company. Cher’s lawyers are  challenging everything in court. I may  lose everything while the justice  system decides.  Then we will eat simple rice.

 Mamadou,  you helped me fix the roof of my shop  without ever asking for anything in  return. It is not your bank account  that I learned to love. Just a few more  steps. You are going to love this.  Mamadou, where are you taking me like  this? Toward the whole truth. Day, you  are Mamadou’s mother, the businesswoman  from Mbour that everyone is talking  about.

 I came to this house as a simple  cook to observe the hearts of those  surrounding my son. Yours, Fatou, has  never changed, rich or poor. You stayed  when all seemed lost. You loved me  before even knowing my real last name.  Fatundai. Will you marry me? Yes,  Mamadou, a thousand times yes. Since  you’ve been here, I sleep less at  night.

 Not because I’m afraid, but  because I’m thinking of you. You walk  into the room and everything stops.  Even my shadow becomes softer.  25 years earlier, on a dusty road in  Joal, I thought I’d lost my son  forever by giving him to a stranger out  of love and necessity. I didn’t know  that destiny was patiently weaving the  path to our reunion.

 You are the one I  want.  Not tomorrow, not later.  It’s you.  Right now.  It’s you that I love.  It’s you that I want. If the world  falls apart, I am staying with you. I  have known people who spoke too loudly.  Why do you speak so little?