Kirinyaga Page 18

  “Perhaps,” he said. “But she is living on the hill now, and all the Kikuyu who are not living on the hill are suffering.” He paused thoughtfully. “Perhaps it is time to discard some traditions, rather than punish the whole world because one old woman chooses to ignore them.”

  “No!” I said heatedly. “When we lived in Kenya and the Europeans came, they convinced us to discard a tradition. And when we found out how easy it was, we discarded another, and then another, and eventually we discarded so many that we were no longer Kikuyu, but merely black Europeans.” I paused and lowered my voice. “That is why we came to Kirinyaga, Ndemi—so that we could become Kikuyu once again. Have you listened to nothing I have said to you during the past two months?”

  “I have listened,” replied Ndemi. “I just do not understand how living on this hill makes her less of a Kikuyu.”

  “You had no trouble understanding it two months ago.”

  “My family was not starving two months ago.”

  “One has nothing to do with the other,” I said. “She broke the law; she must be punished.”

  Ndemi paused. “I have been thinking about that.”

  “And?”

  “Are there not degrees of lawbreaking?” said Ndemi. “Surely what she did is not the same as murdering a neighbor. And if there are degrees of lawbreaking, then should there not also be degrees of punishment?”

  “I will explain it once again, Ndemi,” I said, “for the day will come that you take my place as the mundumugu, and when that day arrives, your authority must be absolute. And that means that the punishment for anyone who refuses to recognize your authority must also be absolute.”

  He stared at me for a long moment. “This is wrong,” he said at last.

  “What is?”

  “You have not called down the drought because she has broken the law,” he answered. “You have brought this suffering to Kirinyaga because she disobeyed you!”

  “They are one and the same thing,” I said.

  He sighed deeply and furrowed his youthful brow in thought. “I am not sure of that.”

  That was when I knew that he would not be ready to be the mundumugu for a long, long time.

  On the day that the drought was five months old, Koinnage made another trip to the hill, and this time there was no yelling. He stayed and spoke to Mumbi for perhaps five minutes, and then, without even looking toward me, he walked back to the village.

  And twenty minutes later, Mumbi climbed up to the top of the hill and stood before the gate to my boma.

  “I am returning to Koinnage's shamba” she announced.

  An enormous surge of relief swept over me. “I knew that sooner or later you would see that you were wrong,” I said.

  “I am not returning because I am wrong,” she said, “but because you are, and I cannot allow more harm to come to Kirinyaga because of it.” She paused. “Kibo's milk has gone dry, and her baby is dying. My grandchildren have almost nothing left to eat.” She glared at me. “You had better bring the rains today, old man.”

  “I will ask Ngai to bring the rains as soon as you have returned to your home,” I promised her.

  “You had better do more than ask Him,” she said. “You had better order Him.”

  “That is blasphemy.”

  “How will you punish me for my blasphemy?” she said. “Will you bring forth a flood and destroy even more of our world?”

  “I have destroyed nothing,” I said. “It was you who broke the law”

  “Look out at the dry river, Koriba,” she said, pointing down the hill. “Study it well, for it is Kirinyaga, barren and unchanging.”

  I looked down upon the river. “Its changelessness is one of its virtues,” I said.

  “But it is a river,” she said. “All living things change—even the Kikuyu.”

  “Not on Kirinyaga,” I said adamantly.

  “They change or they die,” she continued. “I do not intend to die. You have won the battle, Koriba, but the war goes on.”

  Before I could answer her she turned and walked down the long, winding path to the village.

  That afternoon I brought down the rains. The river filled with water, the fields turned green, the cattle and goats and the animals of the savannah slaked their thirst and renewed their strength, and the world of Kirinyaga returned to healthy, vigorous life.

  But from that day forth, Njoro never again addressed me as mzee, the traditional term of respect the Kikuyu have always used to signify age and wisdom. Siboki built two large containers for water, each the size of a large hut, and threatened to harm anyone who came near them. Even Ndemi, who had previously absorbed everything I taught him without question, now seemed to consider and weigh each of my statements carefully before accepting it.

  Kibo's baby had died, and Mumbi moved into her boma until Kibo regained her health, then built her own hut out in the fields of Koin-nage's shamba. Since she was still officially living on his property, I chose to ignore it. She remained there until the next long rains, at which time she became so infirm that she finally had to move to the hut she had formerly occupied. Now that she needed the help of her family she accepted it, but Koinnage later told me that she never sang again after the day she left my hill.

  As for myself, I spent many long days on my hill, watching the river flow past, clear and cool and unchanging, and wondering uneasily if I had somehow changed the course of that other, more important river through which we all must swim.

  6

  THE LOTUS AND THE SPEAR

  {OCTOBER 2135}

  Once, many eons ago, there was an elephant who climbed the slopes of Kirinyaga until he reached the very summit, where Ngai sat atop His golden throne.

  “Why have you sought me out?” demanded Ngai.

  “I have come to ask you to change me into something else,” answered the elephant.

  “I have made you the most powerful of beasts,” said Ngai. “You need fear neither the lion nor the leopard nor the hyena. Wherever you walk, all My other creatures rush to move out of your path. Why do you no longer wish to be an elephant?”

  “Because as powerful as I am, there are others of my kind who are more powerful,” answered the elephant. “They keep the females to themselves, so that my seed will die within me, and they drive me away from the water holes and the succulent grasses.”

  “And what do you wish of me?” asked Ngai.

  “I am not sure,” said the elephant. “I would like to be like the giraffe, for there are so many treetops that no matter where he goes he finds sustenance. Or perhaps the warthog, for nowhere can he travel that there are no roots to be found. And the fish eagle takes one mate for life, and if he is not strong enough to defend her against others of his kind who would take her away from him, his vision is so keen that he can see them approaching from great distances and move her to safety. Change me in any way you wish,” he concluded. “I will trust to Your wisdom.”

  “So be it,” pronounced Ngai. “From this day forward, you shall have a trunk, so that the delicacies that grow atop the acacia trees will no longer be beyond your reach. And you shall have tusks, that you may dig in the ground for both roots and water no matter where you travel upon My world. And where the fish eagle has but a single superior sense, his vision, I shall give you two senses, those of smell and hearing, that will be greater than any other animal in My kingdom.”

  “How can I thank you?” asked the elephant joyously, as Ngai began the transformation.

  “You may not wish to,” answered Ngai.

  “Why not?” asked the elephant.

  “Because when all is said and done,” said Ngai, “you will still be an elephant.”

  Some days it is easy to be the mundumugu on our terraformed world of Kirinyaga. On such days, I bless the scarecrows in the fields, distribute charms and ointments to the ailing, tell stories to the children, offer my opinions to the Council of Elders, and teach my youthful assistant, Ndemi, the lore of the Kikuyu people—for
the mundumugu is more than a maker of charms and curses, more even than a voice of reason in the Council of Elders: he is the repository of all the traditions that make the Kikuyu what they are.

  Some days it is difficult to be the mundumugu. When I must decide disputes, one side will always be unhappy with me. Or when there is an illness that I cannot cure, and I know that soon I will be telling the sufferer's family to leave him out for the hyenas. Or when Ndemi, who will someday be the mundumugu, gives every indication that he will not be ready to assume my duties when my body, already old and wrinkled, reaches the point, not too long off, when it is no longer able to function.

  And, once in a long while, it is terrible to be the mundumugu, for I am presented with a problem against which all the accumulated wisdom of the Kikuyu seems like a reed in the wind.

  Such a day begins like any other. I awake from my slumber and walk out of my hut into my boma with my blanket wrapped around my shoulders, for though it will soon be warm the sun has not yet removed the chill from the air. I light a fire and sit next to it, waiting for Ndemi, who will almost certainly be late. Sometimes I marvel at the facility of his imagination, for never has he given me the same excuse twice.

  As I grow older, I have taken to chewing a qat leaf in the morning to start the blood flowing through my body. Ndemi disapproves, for he has been taught the uses of qat as a medicine and he knows that it is addictive. I will explain to him again that without it I would probably be in constant pain until the sun was overhead, that when you are as old as I am your muscles and joints do not always respond to your commands and can fill you with agony, and he will shrug and nod his head and forget again by the following morning.

  Eventually he will arrive, my young assistant, and after he explains why he was late today, he will take my gourds down to the river and fill them with water, and then gather firewood and bring it to my boma. Then we will embark upon our daily lesson, in which perhaps I will explain to him how to make an ointment out of the pods of the acacia tree, and he will sit and try not to squirm and will demonstrate such self-control that he may well listen to me for ten or twelve minutes before asking when I will teach him how to turn an enemy into an insect so that he may stamp on him.

  Finally I will take him into my hut, and teach him the rudiments of my computer, for after I am dead it will be Ndemi who will have to contact Maintenance and request the orbital adjustments that will affect the seasons, that will bring rain to the parched plains, that will make the days longer or shorter to give the illusion of seasonal changes.

  Then, if it is to be an ordinary day, T will fill my pouch with charms and will begin walking through the fields, warding off any thahu, or curse, that has been placed on them, and assuring that they will continue to yield the food we need to survive, and if the rains have come and the land is green, perhaps I will slaughter a goat to thank Ngai for His beneficence.

  If it is not to be an ordinary day, I usually know at the outset. Perhaps there will be hyena dung in my boma, a sure sign of a thahu, or the wind may come from the west, whereas all good winds blow from the east.

  But on the day in question, there was no wind at all, and no hyenas had been in my boma the night before. It began like any other day. Ndemi was late—this time, he claimed, because there was a black mamba on the path up my hill, and he had to wait until it finally slithered off into the tall grasses—and I had just finished teaching him the prayer for health and long life that he must recite at the birth of a new baby, when Koinnage, the paramount chief of the village, walked up to my boma.

  “fambo, Koinnage,” I greeted him, dropping my blanket to the ground, for the sun was now overhead and the air was finally warm.

  “Jarnbo, Koriba,” he replied, a worried frown on his face.

  I looked at him expectantly, for it is very rare for Koinnage to climb my hill and visit me in my boma.

  “It has happened again,” he announced grimly. “This is the third time since the long rains.”

  “What has happened?” I asked, confused.

  “Ngala is dead,” said Koinnage. “He walked out naked and unarmed among the hyenas, and they killed him.”

  “Naked and unarmed?” I repeated. “Are you certain?”

  “I am certain.”

  I squatted down near my dying fire, lost in thought Keino was the first young man we had lost. We had thought it was an accident, that he had stumbled and somehow fallen upon his own spear. Then came Njupo, who burned to death when his hut caught fire while he was inside it.

  Keino and Njupo lived with the young, unmarried men in a small colony by the edge of the forest, a few kilometers from the main village. Two such deaths might have been coincidence, but now there was a third, and it cast a new light on the first two. It was now obvious that, within the space of a few brief months, three young men had chosen to commit suicide rather than continue their lives on Kirinyaga.

  “What are we to do, Koriba?” asked Koinnage. “My own son lives at the edge of the forest. He could be the next one!”

  I took a round, polished stone from the pouch about my neck, stood up, and handed it to him.

  “Place this beneath your son's sleeping blanket,” I said. “It will protect him from this thahu that is affecting our young men.”

  “Thank you, Koriba,” he said gratefully. “But can you not provide charms for all the young men?”

  “No,” I replied, still greatly disturbed by what I had heard. “That stone is only for the son of a chief. And just as there are all kinds of charms, there are all kinds of curses. I must determine who has placed this thahu on our young men, and why. Then and only then can I create strong enough magic to combat it.” I paused. “Can Ndemi bring you some pornbe to drink?”

  He shook his head. “I must return to the village. The women are wailing the death chant, and there is much to be done. We must burn Ngala's hut and purify the ground upon which it rested, and we must post guards to make sure that the hyenas, having feasted so easily, do not come back in search of more human flesh.”

  He turned and took a few steps toward the village, then stopped.

  “Why is this happening, Koriba?” he asked, his eyes filled with puzzlement. “And is the thahu limited just to the young men, or do the rest of us bear it, too?”

  I had no answer for him, and after a moment he resumed walking down the path that led to the village.

  I sat down next to my fire and stared silently out over the fields and savannah until Ndemi finally sat down next to me.

  “What kind of thahu would make Ngala and Keino and Njupo all kill themselves, Koriba?” he asked, and I could tell from his tone that he was frightened.

  “I am not sure yet,” I replied. “Keino was very much in love with Mwala, and he was very unhappy when old Siboki was able to pay the bride-price for her before he himself could. If it were just Keino, I would say that he ended his life because he could not have her. But now two more have died, and I must find the reason for it.”

  “They all live in the village of young men by the edge of the forest,” said Ndemi. “Perhaps is cursed.”

  I shook my head. “They have not all killed themselves.”

  “You know,” said Ndemi, “when Nboka drowned in the river two rains ago, we all thought it was an accident. But he, too, lived in the village of young men. Perhaps he killed himself as well.”

  I had not thought of Nboka in a long time. I thought of him now, and realized that he could very well have committed suicide. Certainly it made sense, for Nboka was known to be a very strong swimmer.

  “I think perhaps you are right,” I replied reluctantly.

  Ndemi's chest puffed up with pride, for I do not often compliment him.

  “What kind of magic will you make, Koriba?” he asked. “If it requires the feathers of the crested crane or the maribou stork, I could get them for you. I have been practicing with my spear.”

  “I do not know what magic I shall make yet, Ndemi,” I told him. “But whatever it
is, it will require thought and not spears.”

  “That is too bad,” he said, shielding his eyes from the dust that a sudden warm breeze brought to us. “I thought I had finally found a use for it.”

  “For what?”

  “For my spear,” he said. “I no longer herd cattle on my father's shamba, now that I am helping you, so I no longer need it.” He shrugged. “I think I shall leave it at home from now on.”

  “No, you must always take it with you,” I said. “It is customary for all Kikuyu men to carry spears.”

  He looked inordinately proud of himself, for I had called him a man, when in truth he was just a kehee, an uncircumcised boy. But then he frowned again.

  “Why do we carry spears, Koriba?” he asked.

  “To protect us from our enemies.”

  “But the Maasai and Wakamba and other tribes, and even the Europeans, remain in Kenya,” he said. “What enemies have we here?”

  “The hyena and the jackal and the crocodile,” I answered, and added silently: And one other enemy, which must be identified before we lose any more of our young men, for without them there is no future, and ultimately no Kirinyaga.

  “It has been a long time since anyone needed a spear against a hyena,” continued Ndemi. “They have learned to fear us and avoid us.” He pointed to the domestic animals that were grazing in the nearby fields. “They do not even bother the goats and the cattle anymore.”

  “Did they not bother Ngala?” I asked.

  “He wanted to be eaten by hyenas,” said Ndemi. “That is different.”

  “Nonetheless, you must carry your spear at all times,” I said. “It is part of what makes you a Kikuyu.”

  “I have an idea!” he said, suddenly picking up his spear and studying it. “If I must carry a spear, perhaps I should have one with a metal tip, so that it will never warp or break.”

  I shook my head. “Then you would be a Zulu, who live far to the south of Kenya, for it is the Zulus who carry metal-tipped spears, which they call assagais!'

  Ndemi looked crestfallen. “I thought it was my own idea,” he said.