Two weeks later, in the mid-afternoon, Moses turned up just as Amy was changing Karla's nappy.
"Get the door for Amy," she said to Jo-Jo, a four-year old who was the only one of the children other than Karla, who was not in school.
Little Jo-Jo opened the door and then just looked over his shoulder at Amy.
"Who is it?" Amy asked.
"Mo-Mo," the toddler responded.
"C'mon in, Moses!" Amy shouted.
"I have someone, Winky. Can he come in too?"
"Sure, bring him in. I'll just be a minute with Karla."
Moses came in, followed by the man from the microbank in Kakamega. Amy recognised him from when she had taken Moses in to get his loan.
"This is Mr. Barasa from the bank," Moses said.
"Yeah, I remember him." Amy answered. "What brings you here, Mr. Barasa?"
"I asked him to come," Moses answered. "It's about that movie they made."
"Jambo," Mr. Barasa said, extending his hand.
"Jambo sana," Amy dutifully replied, shaking his hand.
"Moses says you helped him organise his finances. He's done a very good job of paying off the loan."
"Thank you," Amy said, knowing with certainty that Mr. Barasa had not come all the way from Kakamega to thank Moses for getting ahead on his payments.
"I have good news. People at our office in Chicago liked the video we made of Moses. They want to do more filming, but in America this time. It would be a wonderful experience for the boy, and we would look after him, take care of everything. He'll meet others like himself, coming from other countries, and one of them will be used to promote the bank all over the world next year."
The eye for which Amy had earned her nickname was twitching double-time, as evidence of her concern over this decision. She could see by Moses' face that he was overjoyed at what Mr. Barasa was saying. To her, it sounded a little too good; and she could not escape that bad feeling she had about anything to do with banks.
"The bank will pay for everything. We'll buy him new clothes, and he'll stay at a nice hotel in Chicago," Barasa continued. "Moses says he doesn't have a guardian, so we thought we should run this by you first. He says you're his best friend." The twitch slowed, but only slightly.
"How long would he be away? What about his sister... Rosy? He doesn't even have a passport." Questions flooded in, mostly negative ones, like Amy was looking for a good excuse to call off the trip.
"I know someone who can fast track a passport, and we'll pay you to look after his sister, if you would be so kind. Moses will only be away two weeks… maximum."
Amy was through with Karla, so she quickly washed her hands over a basin, in a stream of water from a plastic pitcher. She dried them on her dress as she entered the room where Moses and his friend were still standing.
"Please take a seat, and tell me about this," she said.
They all sat down.
The bank manager explained the need for more people to invest with the microbank. It would make funds available to help others like Moses, who wanted to start small businesses in developing countries. Shareholders did not receive as much on their investments with his bank, but they had the satisfaction of knowing that their money was being used to help people who would never be able to get a loan from traditional banks.
Branches all over the world had been asked, he explained, to watch for customers who would be a good advertisement for what the bank was trying to do. The amateur video that Mr. Barasa had made of Moses was one of three that had been chosen, and one of those three people would be named "customer of the year". If he was successful, people in many countries would hear Moses'
story, about how he had been able to support his younger sister, despite his disability and despite being without parents, all because the microbank had helped him get a bike... a ten-speed... to earn a living and pay off the loan. The fact that he was paying off his loan in half the allotted time would, according to the bank manager, impress the judges in Chicago even more.
"I don't know..." said Amy. "It's not really up to me to decide. Things are going so well for the boy right now. He's worked very hard to get that loan paid off. This could just take him away from what he's doing here."
"It's only two weeks, Winky," Moses pleaded.
"Would you like to see what we filmed?" Mr. Barasa asked. "I have a copy in my vehicle."
"Can we, Winky?" Moses asked.
"Yeah, sure, that would be fine," Amy replied. "Will it run off a car battery?
It's all the power we have."
"We can watch it on my laptop," Mr. Barasa said, as he stood to leave.
"What do you think about this, Moses?" Amy asked when Barasa was out of earshot. "Are you sure you want to go to another country? Things would be very different for you over there. I don't think you'd like it."
"Oh, I do want to go, Winky," Moses assured her. "Me, I want to see America... what it's like! Even if it's a misappointment, I'll be back before two weeks."
"Who would look after you?"
"Winky, no one looks after me now!" he laughed. "You think I need someone to bodyguard me? And these people are rich! They'll take care of me. Look at Mr. Barasa!" He pointed out the front window where the bank manager was just leaving his vehicle to return to the house. "See, that's a four-wheel drive he's got.
New as a hot loaf of bread! The bank gave it to him."
Mr. Barasa re-entered the house with a computer bag over his shoulder. The bag itself was impressive, with compartments for everything, and so was the computer. He carefully lifted it out of the bag, put it on the coffee table, and then slipped a DVD in the slot on the side. Amoment later, he had it playing the film clip that had been prepared for his head office. It was edited, of course, to include the best parts of what they had filmed.
Moses, who had not yet seen the film himself, watched with as much interest as Amy, who was genuinely curious about what her young friend had become involved in. Jo-Jo wandered over to the table and needed to be restrained from interfering with the computer.
"Me, I was in big troubles," Moses was saying at the start of the promotional clip. "I mean really big. And then I got this loan and it... it... revegetated me!"
Then he just grinned his biggest grin for the camera, and held it.
There were pictures of Moses waiting at the bike stand with the other drivers, a scene with a customer getting on his bike, then one with him riding off with the customer on the back of the bike. Over all of these, Moses' voice could be heard as he explained his situation.
"Me and my sister didn't have no one to look out for us when my mother died. We was just like that: no work and no food. But when the loan came, even I got a bike, a ten-speed. This is it here. I can't get started properly on a one-speed; but in a low gear on this bike, it's easy as cake." For the last few words the camera shifted back to where Moses was showing off his new bike. The image dropped down to a closeup of the gear sprockets.
Then it jumped forward to where he was letting his customer off at the destination, and the customer was fishing in his pocket for some money. The camera zoomed in on the money as it was handed over.
"Now we have food and even we have some extra for stormy times," he said as the final footage rolled. The clip finished with a repeat of the final words of the first scene: "It... it revegetated me!"
Moses' talent for using original words must have played some part in them picking him. But his total disregard for the obvious handicap of having only one arm was the clincher. People could see for themselves what a difference the loan had made to his life, and it would surely inspire more wealthy Westerners to invest in the bank, which boasted that it was not a charity... "just a way of helping others help themselves."
"When would you want him to go?" Amy asked, as the twitch returned to her eye.
"We can have the passport by next week," Mr Barasa said. "They want him in Chicago by June 15. They're planning a big dinner for some of our investors.
Moses will be a special guest."
Amy did not want to offend the bank manager, but she had to be true to her conscience; so she turned to Moses. "You know, boy, I can't tell you what to do," she said. "I'm not your mother; but truth is, I don't feel good about this. I hope you'll pray about it, and make a wise decision."
Amy often talked about praying like that, as if Moses just telephoned God every time he made a decision. He never quite knew what she expected him to do, but at least he knew when she did that, she wasn't going to stop him. Most of the time she was happy with his decisions too, so, in his mind, it wasn't such a big deal if she wasn't happy this once.
"Yeah, I'll go!" he said, turning to Mr. Barasa after only the slightest pause to represent "praying about it". Amy seemed more disappointed with his haste than with the decision itself; but she said nothing.