The Earth came closer, the concrete of the runway appeared.
The wheels touched, jumped a little, touched again, rolled, the engines howled.
The plane slowed down, turned, taxied towards the airport building, stopped.
I had arrived.
I unfastened my seatbelt, threw my winter coat over my arm, grabbed my hand baggage and struggled down the aisle toward the rear exit.
The African stewardess nodded to me with a smile, "Good morning sir, I hope you have a good flight".
"Thank you", I answered, and went carefully down the narrow step of the landing ramp.
I felt the heat like a blow, blinded by the bright sunlight, I joined the other passengers walking by toward the airport building.
Halfway between the plane and the building a young girl was standing, looking the passengers over carefully as if she was searching for someone in particular.
She wore a stewardess uniform, suddenly, she took a step in my direction and pronounced my name.
"How did you recognize me?"I said.
"I saw your picture on the back cover of one of your books, I am Miriam, I wrote you a latter once".
"Miriam?" I searched my memory.
"Did I answer?"
"Yes you did, You said that a broken engagement is a lesser evil than a divorce."
Now I recalled her letter, I put down my bags and looked at Miriam.
She was small, fine featured, had vivid brown eyes which sparked below her intelligent forehead.
Her long dark hair almost bluish black in colour was in a neat roll at the back of her neck.
"You wrote," I said with a smile, that you were afraid that your feeling for your fiance were not quite deep enough for marriage.,
"And you said I should listen to my feeling, Girls feel it usually sooner than the boys."
Now I remembered her case in full, She was a year older than her fiance, had four more years of and a better salary than he.
That worried her.
"But you see, I can't just leave him,  he loved me and in a way I love him too, Sometimes I don't know how I feel."
"Well Miriam, we can't talk here, can we continue as I go through passport control?"
She took one handle of my heavy bag and I took the other handle in my right hand.
I tucked my briefcase under my left arm and we started toward the building.
"Excuse me,"she said,  "but I have to talk to you, when our pastor told us that you would be here only four days, I decided to see you before the other come, I work for the airline, this is why I could come out here."
"Do you belong to pastor Daniel church?"
"Yes, he has also came to meet you, you will see him after you go through customs."
While we were lining up for the passport control,  I had the impression that she still wanted to talk.
She had made a real effort, it had taken a lot of courage for her to address me, so I didn't want to disappoint her.
"Miriam, I wonder why you got engaged to that young man in the first place before you know more about him?"
"In our country we can't talk to a boy and go out with him unless we are engaged, we can't have boyfriend.In your book you say one should not get engaged unless one is well acquainted with the other, but we can't get acquainted unless we are engaged."
It was my turn now to show any passport.
"Are you a tourist?" the officer asked me.
"I'm supposed to give some lectures in a church here."
"About what?" the officer asked me.
"Marriage."
He gave me a brief glance, then stamped my passport with out further comment.
Miriam and I walked over to the place where the checked baggage would be unloaded.
"If I leave him, she said, he would commit suicide".
"Suicide? You think he really means that."
"I don't know, but I'm afraid he does."
"Perhaps it would be good if I could talk to him."
"That would be wonderful, he well be in church tonight too."
"Then you must introduce him to me after the meeting."
"Thank you," she said with relief.
"Thank you very much," from the relieved tone of her voice I concluded that this had been her wish all the time to arrange a talk between her fiance and me.
My large suitcase arrived, Miriam spoke to the customs officer in the native language, he waved us on.
The door swung open and we entered the waiting room.
Pastor Daniel stepped forward, grasped both my arm in the African way of greeting, then hugged me.
"Welcome," he said, "You are very welcome indeed."
"Yes I finally made it," I said and put down my briefcase.
"I'm glad you're here, may I introduce you to my wife Esther?".
He  motioned me to a tall, intelligent looking woman in her middle thirties who stood behind him.
Esther wore a dark green dress with a black design and had a yellow scarf on her head.
On her left arm she had a baby and at her right hand a little boy, about three years old.
She left him and offered me her hand in the Western way, while looking aside shyly.
"Welcome to our country," she said.
The little boy stared at me curiously, but when I bent over to greet him, he hid behind his mother skirt, grabbing it with both hands.
"We watched you get off the plane," Daniel said. "We're in the restaurant on the first floor, you started your work exactly one minute after you arrived. Do you know Miriam before?"
"No, I didn't but we had corresponded, she recognized me from the picture on the back of my book."
Miriam was somewhat embarrassed by this time, she excused herself because she needs to go back to work and promised to be at church in the evening.