|
Night in a Drum
A Short Story by Emmanuel Sigauke
Once, when
he was drunk, I asked him why he liked making baboon stools
and he said that he hated the creatures, notorious corn
thieves which not only stole, but also left their dirt in
the fields.
“And you
know their dirt just looks like ours,” he said, reminding me
never to tell Mai he had told me this dirt thing. I never
told Mai about baboon dirt, but on the day I ended up in Mai
Ranga’s drum I swear I could have told her if she had been
home.
The trouble
on this day began with me getting another adze, thinking I
could help by making my own animal stool, but I wasn’t going
to carve a baboon. I had a hare in mind, so I drew a picture
on the ground. Mukoma saw it and said, “You can’t waste my
tree on a hare. Hares are weak, smart yes, but very weak.
Make a baboon!”
I got to
work, making a baboon. Right when its head was appearing,
the adze missed the wood and sliced some skin off the top of
my foot, sending blood squirting everywhere. The sight
scared me and I started bawling. When Mukoma saw the wound,
his face swelled into a cloud of anger. I stopped screaming,
remembering that he hated signs of weakness in a man. He had
told me I should always deal with problems like a man.
I went silent
and wiped my tears; then I stood up and started limping
away, but when I felt his eyes crawling on my legs, I
straightened up and walked like I was just fine.
“Make sure
you don’t waste that trip,” he said softly, and I heard him
clearly, but this time I decided to do things differently.
Instead of
fetching a Mupani whip, I went to a Mubondo tree. I thought
Mubondo whips were stronger, but less painful—they looked
so. I also thought Mukoma would smile when he saw that I had
shown some clever thinking by choosing a stronger whip. But
boy was I wrong when I returned and showed it to him. He
didn’t have to say anything. The look on his face told me I
had to go back to look for the usual Mupani.
Mupani whips
were killers, so painful I often wondered if they had been
created just to cause me pain. Even Chari, my friend whose
father beat often, used to say Mupani was just for
straightening bad boys. He told me he was not a bad boy, but
that his father whipped him to put Mupani trees to use. I
did not agree with him and I told him that we also used
Mupani for firewood and for the roofing poles. I liked
Mupani wood fire, but hated the burn of the whip on my body.
I returned to
home, whip in hand, and stood on the edge of the compound.
Mukoma sat, adze abandoned, smoking. When he did not raise
his head to look at me, I knew there was no room for
forgiveness, so I tiptoed towards him, slowly, extending my
arm to hand him the whip; soon this—the beating itself—would
be over, and I would put salty water on my wounds and go to
gather the goats and enclose them in their pen. But
something told me to stop— stop walking, stop handing him
the whip, stop everything.
Mukoma threw
the burnt-out cigarette stub on the ground, looked at me
with red eyes, then at the whip, and I knew I had done
something really wrong. The whip didn’t satisfy him, but he
was not telling me to go try again, which I had hoped he
would. I looked at his hands and noticed that they were
swelling into fists. And his legs were shaking, as if they
were being delayed for something they were itching to do.
Fear was filling me up like air feels a balloon.
I heard no
voice, I saw no sign, but I immediately took off, and heard
the mess of wood and half-carved heaps toppling over as
Mukoma sprung up to chase after me.
“I’m gonna
kill you, blarry fool!” he bellowed.
The wind got
hold of my arms and legs and I flew like I had grown some
wings. Soon I realized that I wasn’t flying because when I
glanced back Mukoma was panting right behind me. I pick up
speed, meandered, jumped over something, turned left, turned
right, and heard a heavy thud on the ground behind me, like
the falling of a big tree. I looked back and saw a miracle,
more than a miracle: Mukoma was rolling on the ground,
holding his leg, but soon he was up again, cursing and
pointing, and I sped away. I kept running without looking
back, unsure where I was going. When I looked back again I
didn’t see him, so I slowed down and looked ahead of me.
There he was, nicely standing by a tree in front of me. He
extended his arms in a welcome pose, smiled, and said,
“Hello Tari.”
Top of page |
Page
2/5 | Next Page
|
