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‘Yes. I was there and saw it with my own eyes,’ he was saying. ‘I would not have believed it had somebody else told me. I saw the box opened and a python inside it.’
‘Do not repeat it,’ said one of the others. ‘It cannot be true.’
‘That is what everybody says: it cannot be true. But I saw it with my own eyes. Go to Umuachala now and see the whole village in turmoil.’
‘What that man Ezeulu will bring to Umuaro is pregnant and nursing a baby at the same time.’
‘I have heard many things, but never till today have I heard of an abomination of this kind.’
By the time Edogo reached home his father was still in a very bad temper, only that now his anger was not so much against Oduche as against all the double-faced neighbours and passers-by whose words of sympathy barely concealed the spitefulness in their hearts. And even if they had been sincere Ezeulu would still have resented anybody making him an object of pity. At first his anger smouldered inwardly. But the last group of women who went in to see his wives, looking like visitors to a place of death, inflamed his wrath. He heard them in the inner compound shouting: ‘E-u-u! What shall we do to the children of today?’ Ezeulu strode into the compound and ordered them to leave.
‘If I see any one of you still here when I go and come back she will know that I am an evil man.’
‘What harm have we done in coming to console another woman?’
‘I say leave this place at once!’
The women hurried out saying: ‘Forgive us; we have erred.’
It was therefore a very irate Ezeulu to whom Edogo told his story of what he had heard at the Nkwo market place. When he finished his father asked him curtly:
‘And what did you do when you heard that?’
‘What should I have done?’ Edogo was surprised and a little angry at his father’s tone.
‘Don’t you hear him?’ asked Ezeulu of no one. ‘My first son, somebody says to your hearing that your father has committed an abomination, and you ask me what you should have done. When I was your age I would have known what to do. I would have come out and broken the man’s head instead of hiding in the spirit-house.’
Edogo was now really angry but he controlled his tongue. ‘When you were my age your father did not send one of his sons to worship the white man’s god.’ He walked away to his own hut full of bitterness for having broken off his carving to come and see what was happening at home, only to be insulted.
‘I blame Obika for his fiery temper,’ thought Ezeulu, ‘but how much better is a fiery temper than this cold ash!’ He inclined backwards and rested his head on the wall behind him and began to gnash his teeth.
It was a day of annoyance for the Chief Priest – one of those days when it seemed he had woken up on the left side. As if he had not borne enough vexation already he was now visited, at sunset, by a young man from Umunneora. Because of the hostility between Ezeulu’s village and Umunneora he did not offer the man kolanut lest he should have a belly-ache later and attribute it to Ezeulu’s hospitality. The man did not waste much time before he gave his message.
‘I am sent by Ezidemili.’
‘True? I trust he is well.’
‘He is well,’ replied the messenger. ‘But at the same time he is not.’
‘I do not understand you.’ Ezeulu was now very alert. ‘If you have a message, deliver it because I have no time to listen to a boy learning to speak in riddles.’
The young man ignored the insult. ‘Ezidemili wants to know what you are going to do about the abomination which has been committed in your house.’
‘That what happened?’ asked the Chief Priest, holding his rage firmly with two hands.
‘Should I repeat what I have just said?’
‘Yes.’
‘All right. Ezidemili wants to know how you intend to purify your house of the abomination that your son committed.’
‘Go back and tell Ezidemili to eat shit. Do you hear me? Tell Ezidemili that Ezeulu says he should go and fill his mouth with shit. As for you, young man, you may go in peace because the world is no longer what it was. If the world had been what it was I would have given you something to remind you always of the day you put your head into the mouth of a leopard.’ The young man wanted to say something but Ezeulu did not allow him.
‘If you want to do something with your life, take my advice and say not another word here.’ Ezeulu rose threateningly to his full height; the young man decided to heed his advice and rose to go.
Chapter Five
Captain T. K. Winterbottom stared at the memorandum before him with irritation and a certain amount of contempt. It came from the Lieutenant-Governor through the Resident through the Senior District Officer to him, the last two adding each his own comment before passing the buck down the line. Captain Winterbottom was particularly angry at the tone of the Senior District Officer’s minute. It was virtually a reprimand for what he was pleased to describe as Winter-bottom’s stonewalling on the issue of the appointment of Paramount Chiefs. Perhaps if this minute had been written by any other person Captain Winterbottom would not have minded so much; but Watkinson had been his junior by three years and had been promoted over him.
