Next stop Karara Gentre. One drink, and then home to Baby. Only one drink. The boy must be hungry. Karara Centre is one of the very few places in town where it's fun all month. The beer is cheaper, the air warmer, stuffier, more friendly. There are a few drunks sleeping at various tables. As a token to the bad tirnes, no one in sight drinks Pilsner or Tusker or any factory brew. They are all on Karara. Just the thing for a murderous hangover. Ben sidles to the counter. Still munching on his chips, he climbs on to a stool and looks around. Ocholla is not here. 'What will you ever give me?' a harlot demands, going for the chips. Before he can withdraw, she dips her murky hand into the packet and scoops some nut. He is too sober to get annoyed. He hands her the remaining lot. He has eaten the sausages anyway.

,Vultures,' a fairly drunk man on his left says of the woman. Ben smiles and wonders why the bugger is interested. All across the counter they are drinking Karara and liking it. There is a big crowd for this time of month. A collection of regulars and a few disgusted invaders from tourist class hotels who can no longer keep up their patronage there due to the critical financial dip. They look as nut of place here as their twisted ties and dusty suits. They talk loud and try to look like home, but patrons can tell them a mile off. They are phonies. ,Cigarette?' Ben's neighbour turns to him. He is an outsider all right. His battered suit screams so. The same bum at the end of the month would be smoking cheap cigars and drinking double something or other. Now he accepts Ben's modest cigarette and turns to beg for fire from another drunk an the other side.

Ben has enough money for only two Pilsners. The price of the two can buy him three, four Kararas. He has not drunk the liquid for a long spell. He orders. The waiter slaps it on the table. A wet glass follows. They never have them dry. He shakes out the dripping water and filIs it slowly, careful not to stir the sediment at the bottom of the bottle. That stuff is slow poison. lt is such slow poison Ben does not remember one person who was killed by it. He sips. It tastes like concentrated acid. He closes bis eyes and empties the glass. When he reopens them, the man on bis left smiles. 'Strong stuff' he says to Ben.
An understatement, he smiles back. The damned stuff is like aviation. A bit of it makes you zoom into the streets. A bit more than that grounds you for a few days. He refills the glass, swallows at a go and orders another bottle. The acid gets to work in bis belly. He shudders. ,Buy me a beer,' the begging harlot has already finished his chips. She could have eaten up the paper bag as well.