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‘But when a man has spoken the truth and his children prefer to take the lie…’ His voice had risen with every word towards the dangerous pitch of a curse; then he broke off with a violent shake of the head. When he began again he spoke more quietly. ‘That is why a stranger can whip a son of mine and go unscathed, because my son has nailed up his ear against my words. Were it not so that stranger would already have learnt what it was to cross Ezeulu; dogs would have licked his eyes. I would have swallowed him whole and brought him up again. I would have shaved his head without wetting the hair.’
‘Did Obika strike the first blow then?’ asked Akuebue.
‘How do I know? All I can say is that he was blind with palm wine when he left here in the morning. And even when he came back a short while ago it had still not cleared from his eyes.’
‘But they say he did not strike the first blow,’ said Edogo.
‘Were you there?’ asked his father. ‘Or would you swear before a deity on the strength of what a drunken man tells you? If I was sure of my son do you think I would sit here now talking to you while a man who pokes his finger into my eyes goes home to his bed? If I did nothing else I would pronounce a few words on him and he would know the power in my mouth.’ The perspiration was forming on his brow.
‘What you say is true,’ said Akuebue. ‘But in my thinking there is still something for us to do once we find out from those who saw it whether Obika struck the first blow or…’ Ezeulu did not let him finish.
‘Why should I go out looking for strangers to tell me what my son did or did not do? I should be telling them.’
‘That is true. But let us first chase away the wild cat, afterwards we blame the hen.’ Akuebue turned to Edogo. ‘Where is Obika himself?’
‘It appears that what I said has not entered your ear,’ said Ezeulu. ‘Where…’
Edogo interrupted him. ‘He went out with Ofoedu. He went out because our father did not ask him what happened before blaming him.’
This unexpected accusation stung Ezeulu like the black ant. But he held himself together and, to everybody’s surprise, leaned back against the wall and shut his eyes. When he opened them again he began to whistle quietly to himself. Akuebue nodded his head four or five times like a man who had uncovered an unexpected truth. Ezeulu moved his head slightly from side to side and up and down to his almost silent whistling.
‘This is what I tell my own children,’ said Akuebue to Edogo and the two boys. ‘I tell them that a man always has more sense than his children.’ It was clear he said this to mollify Ezeulu; but at the same time it was clear he spoke truth. ‘Those of you who think they are wiser than their father forget that it is from a man’s own stock of sense that he gives out to his sons. That is why a boy who tries to wrestle with his father gets blinded by the old man’s loincloth. Why do I speak like this? It is because I am not a stranger in your father’s hut and I am not afraid to speak my mind. I know how often your father has pleaded with Obika to leave his friendship with Ofoedu. Why has Obika not heeded? It is because you all – not only Obika but you all, including that little one there – you think you are wiser than your father. My own children are like that. But there is one thing which you all forget. You forget that a woman who began cooking before another must have more broken utensils. When we old people speak it is not because of the sweetness of words in our mouth; it is because we see something which you do not see. Our fathers made a proverb about it. They said that when we see an old woman stop in her dance to point again and again in the same direction we can be sure that somewhere there something happened long ago which touched the roots of her life. When Obika returns tell him what I say, Edogo. Do you hear me?’ Edogo nodded. He was wondering whether it was true that a man never spoke a lie to his sons.
Akuebue wheeled round on his buttocks and faced Ezeulu. ‘It is the pride of Umuaro,’ he said, ‘that we never see one party as right and the other wrong. I have spoken to the children and I shall not be afraid to speak to you. I think you are too hard on Obika. Apart from your high position as Chief Priest you are also blessed with a great compound. But in all great compounds there must be people of all minds – some good, some bad, some fearless and some cowardly; those who bring in wealth and those who scatter it, those who give good advice and those who only speak the words of palm wine. That is why we say that whatever tune you play in the compound of a great man there is always someone to dance to it. I salute you.’
Chapter Ten
Although Tony Clarke had already spent nearly six weeks in Okperi most of his luggage, including his crockery, had arrived only a fortnight ago – in fact the day before he went on tour to the bush. That was why he had not been able until now to ask Captain Winterbottom to his house for a meal.
As he awaited the arrival of his guest Mr Clarke felt not a little uneasy. One of the problems of living in a place like this with only four other Europeans (three of whom were supposed to be beneath the notice of Political Officers) was that one had to cope with a guest like Winterbottom absolutely alone. Of course this was not their first social encounter; they had in fact had dinner together not very long ago and things did not altogether grind to a stop. But then Clarke had been guest, without any responsibilities. Today he was going to be host and the onus would rest on him to keep the conversation alive, through the long, arduous ritual of alcohol, food, coffee and more alcohol stretching into midnight. If only he could have invited someone like John Wright with whom he had struck up a kind of friendship during his recent tour! But such a thing would have been disastrous.
Clarke had shared the lonely thatch-roofed Rest House outside Umuaro with Wright for one night during his tour. Wright had been living in one half of the Rest House for over two weeks then. The Rest House consisted of two enormous rooms each with a camp-bed and an old mosquito-net, a rough wooden table and chair and a cupboard. Just behind the main building there was a thatched shed used as a kitchen. About thirty yards away another hut stood over a dug latrine and wooden seat. Farther away still in the same direction a third hut in very bad repair housed the servants and porters who were sometimes called ‘hammock boys’. The Rest House proper was surrounded by a ragged hedge of a native plant which Clarke had never seen anywhere else.
The entire appearance of the place showed that it had not had a caretaker since the last one vanished into the bush with two camp-beds. The beds were replaced but the key to the main building and the latrine was thereafter kept at hea
dquarters so that whenever a European was going on tour and needed to lodge there the native Chief Clerk in Captain Winterbottom’s office had to remember to give the key to his head porter or steward. Once when the Police Officer, Mr Wade, had been going to Umuaro the Chief Clerk had forgotten to do this and had had to walk the six or seven miles at night to deliver it. Fortunately for him Mr Wade had not suffered any personal inconvenience as he had sent his boys one day ahead of himself to clean the place up.
As he walked round the premises of the Rest House Tony Clarke felt that he was hundreds of miles from Government Hill. It was quite impossible to believe that it was only six or seven miles away. Even the sun seemed to set in a different direction. No wonder the natives were said to regard a six mile walk as travelling to a foreign country.
Later that evening he and Wright sat on the veranda of the Rest House to drink Wright’s gin. In this remote corner, far from the stiff atmosphere of Winterbottom’s Government Hill, Clarke was able to discover that he liked Wright very much. He also discovered to his somewhat delighted amazement that in certain circumstances he could contain as much gin as any Old Coaster.
They had only met for very brief moments before. But now they talked like old friends. Clarke thought that for all the other man’s squat and rough exterior he was a good and honest Englishman. He found it so refreshing to be talking to a man who did not have the besetting sin of smugness, of taking himself too seriously.
‘What do you think the Captain would say, Tony, if he were to see his young Political Officer being nice and friendly to a common road-maker?’ His big red face looked almost boyish.
‘I don’t know and don’t much care,’ said Clarke, and because the fume of gin was already working on his brain, he added: ‘I shall be happy if in all my years in Africa I succeed in building something as good as your road…’
‘It’s good of you to say so.’
‘Are we having a celebration to open it?’
‘The Captain says no. He says we have already overspent the Vote for it.’
‘What does it matter?’
‘That’s what I want to know. And yet we spend hundreds of pounds building Native Courts all over the division that nobody wants, as far as I can see.’
‘I must say though that that is not the Captain’s fault.’ Clarke was already adopting Wright’s half-contemptuous manner of referring to Winterbottom. ‘It is the policy of Headquarters which I happen to know the Captain is not altogether in agreement with.’
