‘If you have any grain of sense in your belly,’ said Obika, ‘you will know that you are not in the house of the white man but in Umuaro in the house of the Chief Priest of Ulu.’
‘Hold your tongue, Obika. You heard Akuebue say just now that strangers talk through the nose. Do you know whether they have Chief Priests in his land or the land of the white man?’
‘Tell that young man to take care how he talks to me. If he has not heard of me he should ask those who have.’
‘Go and eat shit.’
‘Shut your mouth!’ roared Ezeulu. ‘This man has come all the way from my mother’s land to my house and I forbid anyone to abuse him. Besides he is only a messenger. If we dislike his message our quarrel cannot be with him but with the man who sent him.’
‘Very true,’ said Akuebue.
‘There are no words left,’ said the escort.
‘You asked me a question,’ continued Ezeulu turning again to the messenger. ‘I shall now answer you. I am that Ezeulu you spoke of. Are you satisfied?’
‘Thank you. We are all men here but when we open our mouths we know the men from the boys. We have spoken many words already; some were words of profit, some were not; some were words of sanity and some words of drunkenness. It is now time to say why I have come, for a toad does not run in the daytime unless something is after it. I have not come all the way from Okperi to stretch my legs. Your own kinsman here has told you how Kaputin Winta-bor-tom has put me in charge of many of his affairs. He is the chief of all the white men in these parts. I have known him for more than ten years and I have yet to see another white man who does not tremble before him. When he sent me here he did not tell me he had a friend in Umuaro.’ He smiled in derision. ‘But if what you say is true we shall know tomorrow when I take you to see him.’
‘What are you talking about?’ asked Akuebue in alarm.
The Court Messenger continued to smile menacingly. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Your friend Wintabota’ (he mouthed the name in the ignorant fashion of his hearers) ‘has ordered you to appear before him tomorrow morning.’
‘Where?’ asked Edogo.
‘Where else but in his office in Okperi.’
‘The fellow is mad,’ said Obika.
‘No, my friend. If anyone is mad it’s you. Anyhow, Ezeulu must prepare at once. Fortunately the new road makes even a cripple hungry for a walk. We set out this morning at the first cock-crow and before we knew where we were we had got here.’
‘I said the fellow is mad. Who…’
‘He is not mad,’ said Ezeulu. ‘He is a messenger and he must give the message as it was given to him. Let him finish.’
‘I have finished,’ said the other. ‘But I ask whoever owns this young man to advise him for his own good.’
‘You are sure you have given all the message?’
‘Yes, the white man is not like black men. He does not waste his words.’
‘I salute you,’ said Ezeulu, ‘and I welcome you again:
Nno!
’
‘There is one small thing I forgot,’ said the Court Messenger. ‘There are many people waiting to see the white man and you may have to wait in Okperi for three or four days before your turn comes. But I know that a man like you would not want to spend many days outside his village. If you do me well I shall arrange for you to see him tomorrow. Everything is in my hands; if I say that the white man will see this person, he will see him. Your kinsman will tell you what I eat.’ He smiled and put his fez back on the head.
‘That is a small matter,’ said Ezeulu. ‘It will not cause a quarrel. I do not think that what you will put into that small belly of yours will be beyond me. If it is, my kinsmen are there to help.’ He paused and seemed to enjoy the messenger’s anger at the mention of his small size. ‘You must first return, however, and tell your white man that Ezeulu does not leave his hut. If he wants to see me he must come here. Nwodika’s son who showed you the way can also show him.’
‘Do you know what you are saying, my friend?’ asked the messenger in utter disbelief.
‘Are you a messenger or not?’ asked Ezeulu. ‘Go home and give my message to your master.’
‘Let us not quarrel about this,’ said Akuebue stepping in quickly to save the situation which his spirit told him was fraught with peril. ‘If the white man’s messenger gives us some time we shall whisper together.’
‘What are you whispering for?’ asked Ezeulu indignantly. ‘I have given my message.’
‘Just give us some time,’ said Akuebue to the messenger who complied and went outside. ‘You may go out with him,’ he told the escort.
Ezeulu took no part in the consultation that followed. When the Court Messenger and his companion returned to the hut it was Akuebue who told them that because of the respect he had for the white man Ezeulu had agreed to send his son, Edogo, to bring back whatever message there was for his father. ‘In Umuaro it is not our custom to refuse a call, although we may refuse to do what the caller asks. Ezeulu does not want to refuse the white man’s call and so he is sending his son.’
‘Is that your answer?’ asked the Court Messenger.
‘It is,’ replied Akuebue.
‘I will not take it.’
‘Then you can go into that bush there and eat shit,’ said Obika. ‘Do you see where my finger is pointing? That bush.’
‘Nobody will eat shit,’ said Akuebue, and turning to the messenger he added: ‘I have never heard of a messenger choosing the message he will carry. Go and tell the white man what Ezeulu says. Or are you the white man yourself?’
Ezeulu had turned a little away from the others and begun again to pick his teeth with the broomstick.
Chapter Thirteen
As soon as the messenger and his escort left Ezeulu’s hut to return to Okperi the Chief Priest sent word to the old man who beat the giant
ikolo
to summon the elders and
ndichie
to an urgent meeting at sunset. Soon after the
ikolo
began to speak to the six villages. Everywhere elders and men of title heard the signal and got ready for the meeting. Perhaps it was the threat of war. But no one spoke of war any more in these days of the white man. More likely the deity of Umuaro had revealed through divination a grievance that must be speedily removed, or else… But whatever it was – a call to prepare for battle or to perform a communal sacrifice – it was urgent. For the
ikolo
was not beaten out of season except in a great emergency – when as the saying was an animal more powerful than
nté
was caught by
nté
’s trap.
The meeting began as fowls went to roost and continued into the night. Had it been a day meeting children who had brought their father’s stools would have been playing on the outskirts of the market place, waiting for the end of the meeting to carry the stools home again. But no father took his child to a night meeting. Those who lived near the market place carried their stools themselves; the others carried goatskins rolled up under the arm.
Ezeulu and Akuebue were the first to arrive. But they had hardly sat down before other elders and men of title from all the villages of Umuaro began to come into the Nkwo. At first each man as he came in saluted all those who were there before him but as the crowd increased he only greeted those nearest to him, shaking hands with only three or four.
The meeting took place under the timeless ogbu tree on whose mesh of exposed roots generations of Umuaro elders had sat to take weighty decisions. Before long most of the people expected at the meeting had come and the stream of new arrivals became a mere trickle. Ezeulu held a quick consultation with those sitting nearest to him and they all agreed that the time had come to tell Umuaro why they had been called together. The Chief Priest rose to his feet, adjusted his toga and gave the salutation which was at the same time a call to Umuaro to speak with one voice.
‘Umuaro kwenu!’
‘Hem!!’
‘Kwenu!’
‘Hem!!’
‘Kwezuenu!’
‘Hem!!’
‘I thank you all for leaving your different tasks at home to answer my call. Sometimes a man may call and no one answers him. Such a man is like one dreaming a bad dream. I thank you that you have not let me call in vain like one struggling in a bad dream.’ Somewhere near him someone was talking into his talk. He looked round and saw that it was Nwaka of Umunneora. Ezeulu stopped talking for a while, and then addressed the man.
‘Ogbuefi Nwaka, I salute you,’ he said.
Nwaka cleared his throat and stopped whatever it was he had been saying to those near him. Ezeulu continued.
‘I was thanking you for what you have done. Our people say that if you thank a man for what he has done he will have strength to do more. But there is one great omission here for which I beg forgiveness. A man does not summon Umuaro and not set before them even a pot of palm wine. But I was taken by surprise and as you know the unexpected beats even the man of valour…’ Then he told them the story of the Court Messenger’s visit to him. ‘My kinsmen,’ he said in conclusion, ‘that was what I woke up this morning and found. Ogbuefi Akuebue was there and saw it with me. I thought about it for a long time and decided that Umuaro should join with me in seeing and hearing what I have seen and heard; for when a man sees a snake all by himself he may wonder whether it is an ordinary snake or the untouchable python. So I said to myself:
Tomorrow I shall summon Umuaro and tell them
. Then one mind said to me:
Do you know what may happen in the night or at dawn?
That is why, although I have no palm wine to place before you I still thought I should call you together. If we have life there will be time enough for palm wine. Unless the penis dies young it will surely eat bearded meat. When hunting day comes we shall hunt in the backyard of the grass-cutter. I salute you all.’
For a long time no one stood up to reply. Instead there was general talking (which sometimes sounded like murmuring) among the assembled rulers of Umuaro. Ezeulu sat down on his stool and fixed his eye on the ground. He did not even reply when Akuebue told him that he had spoken all the words that needed to be said. At last Nwaka of Umunneora stood up.
‘Umuaro kwenu!’
‘Hem!!’
‘Umuaro kwenu!’
‘Hem!!’
‘Kwekwanu ozo!’
‘Hem!!’
He put right his toga which had nearly come undone from his left shoulder.
‘We have all heard what Ezeulu said. They were good words and I want to thank him for calling us together and speaking them to us. Do I speak the mind of Umuaro?’
‘Speak on,’ replied the men.
‘When a father calls his children together he should not worry about placing palm wine before them. Rather it is they who should bring palm wine to him. Again I say thank you to the priest of Ulu. That he thought it necessary to call us and tell us these things shows the high regard in which he holds us, for which we give him our thanks.
‘But there is one thing which is not clear to me in this summons. Perhaps it is clear to others; if so someone should explain it to me. Ezeulu has told us that the white ruler has asked him to go to Okperi. Now it is not clear to me whether it is wrong for a man to ask his friend to visit him. When we have a feast do we not send for our friends in other clans to come and share it with us, and do they not also ask us to their own celebrations? The white man is Ezeulu’s friend and has sent for him. What is so strange about that? He did not send for me. He did not send for Udeozo; he did not send for the priest of Idemili; he did not send for the priest of Eru; he did not send for the priest of Udo nor did he ask the priest of Ogwugwu to come and see him. He has asked Ezeulu. Why? Because they are friends. Or does Ezeulu think that their friendship should stop short of entering each other’s houses? Does he want the white man to be his friend only by word of mouth? Did not our elders tell us that as soon as we shake hands with a leper he will want an embrace? It seems to me that Ezeulu has shaken hands with a man of white body.’ This brought low murmurs of applause and even some laughter. Like many potent things from which people shrink in fear leprosy is nearly always called by its more polite and appeasing name –
white body.
The applause and laughter was mingled with the salutation:
Owner of words
to Nwaka. He waited for the laughter to die down and said: ‘If laughter presses you you can laugh; as for me it does not press me.’ Ezeulu sat in the same way as he had sat when he ended his speech.
‘What I say is this,’ continued Nwaka, ‘a man who brings ant-ridden faggots into his hut should expect the visit of lizards. But if Ezeulu is now telling us that he is tired of the white man’s friendship our advice to him should be:
You tied the knot, you should also know how to undo it. You passed the shit that is smelling; you should carry it away
. Fortunately the evil charm brought in at the end of a pole is not too difficult to take outside again.
‘I have heard one or two voices murmuring that it is against custom for the priest of Ulu to travel far from his hut. I want to ask such people: Is this the first time Ezeulu would be going to Okperi? Who was the white man’s witness that year we fought for our land – and lost?’ He waited for the general murmuring to die down. ‘My words are finished. I salute you all.’
Others spoke. Although none spoke as harshly as Nwaka, only two came out clearly against his line of thinking. Perhaps there were others who did also, but they did not speak. Most of those who spoke said it would be foolhardy to ignore the call of the white man; had they forgotten what happened to clans which fell out with him? Nwokeke Nnabenyi tried to soften the harsh words even more. He said that six elders should be chosen to go with Ezeulu.
‘You may go with him if your feet are hungry for a walk,’ shouted Nwaka.
‘Ogbuefi Nwaka, please do not speak into my words. You stood up here and spoke to your fill and no one answered you back.’ He repeated his suggestion that six elders of Umuaro should go with their Chief Priest to Okperi.
Ezeulu stood up then. The big fire which had been lit some distance away shone in his face. There was complete silence when he spoke. His words did not carry the rage in his chest. As always his anger was not caused by open hostility such as Nwaka showed in his speech but by the sweet words of people like Nnabenyi. They looked to him like rats gnawing away at the sole of a sleeper’s foot, biting and then blowing air on the wound to soothe it, and lull the victim back to sleep.