He just came, a jolly young of about twenty-two or twenty-three. He had just gone through the education system of the colonial government successfully. Now was the time to pursue higher education – A diploma in a field that would benefit his community. He settled for Animal Health.
Like most young men of his days, he was lean, of ill health, and dusty all the way to the hair and perhaps his spine was just as dusty. He had obviously fundraised for his first pair of shoes, something that the government couldn’t provide, and perhaps the new shirt, and the pair of pressed khaki shorts.
On the way to college, something snapped. Bad luck must have visited upon him as he put it for quite an unusual occurrence happened. Just near the gates of Echton College of Agriculture, a swarm of live bees greeted him in the name of the dark lord. Perhaps. It was an unusual for the only qualifier from this backward part of the country to be stung by bees on the very first day of college life.
Questions pricked his sharp mind, and gnawed at his conscience. Proceed or not proceed was the most dominant. Not proceed seemed to be the most likely answer.
Amid the swarm, he ran to a nearby stream for the water to drown the unforgiving insects, perhaps sent to destroy him. The water did scare them away from his turf skin, but two or three had gotten a taste of his temple, parts that held his brain in place. A sharp brain as per ‘African’ standards, the District officer had commented in his acceptance letter.
What followed the double or triple bee stings on his temple was indescribable. A string of body reactions followed that made his already ugly face swell to hitherto unknown proportions. He must have looked real hideous as he expressed his fears to the multiple fiancés betrothed upon him. They were ready to behold the only college qualifier from the whole division.
Oh, how his face now swollen. Yet it wasn’t the first time this had happened. It wasn’t the first time he had been stung by bees. But it was the first time such swelling had been recorded. Recollections followed. Recollections that had been registered between reception of his admission letter, and this day, the day he was to report for registration at Echton.
An old man with a sorcerer’s face and dirty tattered clothing had paid a courtesy visit on his aging parents to congratulate them on their newly accomplished feat their new found prominence. Stories were told of legendary feats that could measure to the latest, but most could only approximate his. None could adequately stand in the way. Traditional parties were held. And beer flowed freely like the Nile towards Africa’s deserted north.
Maidens danced themselves dead, competing for his undivided attention. Each day, every time, he nodded his approval and recognised their smiles. And they felt nice, and they moved closer, he had noticed them, and the celebrations dragged on and on. Goats were slaughtered and masses held at a nearby Catholic church – just six miles away. Six miles only!
People trekked the distance, each holding the conviction that it wouldn’t be long before a graduate brought along a long vehicle that could accommodate all of them, perhaps a train to carry away the whole community. They even suggested at a council of elders meeting of their new found resolve to allow the construction of a railway line they had duly protested against not long before. They wanted this to be fitting preparation for their son’s graduation in three years time.
This resolution was unanimously agreed and word send to the white district officer that every man woman and child feared in the village feared. Provide the work force and part of the finances, came the answer. Nothing could stand in their struggle towards the now much needed civilisation. But there was only one man who could contribute the finances. Only one man in three years time: the boy visiting college.
The registration didn’t take long. Girls were indeed scarce and those present were from another caste – white. Black girls had long dropped out of school to begin families, dowry being the in thing. Few had entered school; fewer had proceeded past the notorious common entrance examination taken after four years of primary education. The fewest, the cream had proceeded thereafter. He furtively glanced at the other students. They were mainly white; some were Indian and a few of Arabic origin.
He appeared guilty of having been stung by bees on the part of his face that really mattered. The registrar doubted whether he had really qualified for this regional institution of higher learning on the strength of his appearance: such an ugly face, such a swollen black face that made several clerks inquire his links with cannibalism. They inquired from his parish priest to intrude upon his knowledge of English, the queen’s language, the tongue of the handsomely civilised, the rich and famous.
They later inquired whether he had a girlfriend back home to which he smiled and looked real bad that the lady behind the desk before him shrunk to nearly half her original size.
‘Yes, I do have madam.’ He answered and added:
‘Lots of them, and they love me more than they would the governor.’
‘Oh’, she laughed. ‘How do you manage carrying around this…?’
‘Head? Well it isn’t heavy like it seems. Just swollen, stung by bees. Surely one could be forgiven to think the amniotic fluid of all pregnant women has been transfused into it, quite abnormal?’ he asked with another grin that made the lady to nearly scream. But she covered her mouth to protect the ears of her neighbour from possible ear drum rupture.
‘Bees?’ she asked, frightened even more.
‘Yes madam.’
‘When was that?’
‘When? Not when. It was a couple of hours ago, on my way to this place. The only vehicle broke down and I had to walk for a couple miles. We are used to all that madam.’
‘I admire your courage, your confidence. Its very much unafrican, you seem not to care of what people will think of you.’
‘That shows the low opinion you have of Africans. I thought you are different. Anyway I care what people say, what they seem to think, but if I cry, I will look real bad, I mean I will look worse than when I grin or laugh and this entire registration practice might as well come to an end. I care for this process madam. You don’t understand what it means to me.’
‘Here is a mirror, just look at your face.’ The lady behind the registration desk offered, extending her slim hand in a manner to suggest some kind of leprosy in the air – she seemed far from convinced that this young man was all human. She snatched her hand away as the village hero ‘grabbed’ at the small mirror that would be thrown away after its latest reflection. Perhaps.
‘Well, don’t give it back to me please. It’s yours now, you will need it.’
She said smiling, though her latest pronunciation seemed to suggest the aforementioned. Or simply a feeling he couldn’t place. Was it pity, fear, mistrust? What was it that this fragile white felt? He suddenly laughed. He laughed at his face, attracting the attention of everyone. The supervisor reproached the white lady for being a little ‘overfriendly’.
‘Thanks madam, I must have really frightened you. You really are courageous. Or shall we say all whites are?’
‘Not really. It’s you people that fear everything white. You seem to suffer from a hard to describe inferiority complex. How many whites failed to gain entry into this place? You feel frightened for nothing. Don’t you?’
‘Not really. We have been made to feel that way for generations. Nobody seeks to understand the African soul. Nobody seems to want to understand our way of life. We are in fact forced to stop this or that. Right now I have a feeling that something grave is about to happen. Bees have always stung me while grazing my father’s herd. But today, look at my face. Is it natural? Is it a normal bee sting? It’s the black cat, the female black cat, plumb, and pregnant, that crossed my paths on my way to this place perhaps – I don’t really know. You people will never understand the laws of nature, our nature. Maybe …’
‘Maybe what? Understand who?’
‘Understand us. Understand the Blackman and his cultural practices. He didn’t just wake up one day and declare that he wanted to be a cannibal or that one of the twins his wife had brought forth must die for the other to survive. That he wanted to worship God in this or that manner. That he wanted to marry that number of wives. Do you understand that madam? Can you understand? If you do then you are truly different!’
‘How can I? I must admit my ignorance. I have always thought it was for lack of an education. Would you want to be polygamist too?’
‘I don’t know how to put it really. We had our kind of education. We still have. He had our way of life, our culture. I don’t know what can make you understand, but…’
‘Lets finish the process first, and then perhaps we can talk. I just …’ just what? The young lady didn’t finish. She instead let this incomplete statement gnaw at the young man’s conscience for hours and minutes. Students were still arriving from distant parts of the region. They would study in preparation for independence which was not far away.
‘Back to business, what’s your name?’ she asked.
‘Chiyumbali Ngolio’
‘What did you say?’ she asked seemingly alarmed.
‘My name’
‘But that’s not… I mean I expected some English name like Peter, James or john.’
‘But am not English. They forced on me the middle name you just mentioned.’
‘Peter?’
‘No’
‘James?’
‘Yes. That is what they forced on me at the parish in the name of baptism. I couldn’t get elementary education without it. Not even in the so called indigenous schools. My father wanted to create a permanent herd’s boy out of me, he jumped for joy at the possibility but our parish priest gave me the name you just said. I felt nothing new, I felt nothing strange after the baptism. I remain the same old Chiyumbali’
‘You distaste the name James?’
‘Not really. But I think it threatens my identity if I keep labelling my self with everything English. Write what is indicated here.’ He removed an identity card.
‘Chiyumbali James Ngolio’
‘Yes madam. In fact am going back home right after this’
‘What for, you may not get a matatu’
‘I will do it the way my forefathers used to.’
‘Did they also attend colleges of higher learning?’
‘They had their communal schools. Their own colleges and universities. They had a beautiful way of life that was envied by all visitors but then…’
‘What did they call Animal Health?’
‘Nothing you can pronounce. And even when I lie, you won’t be able to realise’
‘So you’ve been lying all along?’
‘I had no reason to. The world has suffered so much under the tyranny of liars.’
‘The world?’
‘Yes, I know of a certain world too. Why are you surprised?’
‘It sounds strange coming from…’
‘Those fat lips? You will be used to them the way you’ve gotten used to my face. You no longer shrink when I smile.’
‘I hadn’t realised that myself.’
‘You almost ran away, you almost screamed at my face.’
‘I am the wife of a district commissioner. Why should I scream?’
‘Oh, I bet that’s why I called you madam.’
‘You already knew?’
‘Not really. I thought you were his daughter or something. You look a little too young. Seventeen or eighteen.’
‘Am twenty. You doubt it?’
‘Perhaps, but lets say it doesn’t really matter. You are well fed. Daughters and wives of government officials are supposed to be.’
‘Is that all that can make one appear younger?’
‘Hunger and bullets are killing our people.’
‘Your people?’
‘I don’t know, but we are not used to that sort of individualisation of objects or existence itself.’
‘Not even a wife?’
‘It depends on what you take a wife to be. Is she an object?’
‘I don’t know Africa and its beliefs. It’s you to teach me. In the meantime, I am through with your registration. Welcome to Echton James.’
‘Thanks. I should be going. My face is throbbing. Those bees must have been sent by an evil being.’
‘Do you mean the devil?’
‘The devil is alien to us. We paint him in different colours.’
‘Why do you say alien?’
‘He was introduced to us from without, loved us, and stayed on the continent. He didn’t exist earlier.’
‘That’s strange. Why cant you wait for this process to end, I can drive you home or to a hospital for a check up. You won’t get a vehicle. And neither can you walk the whole distance.’
‘At twenty?’ he thought aloud, unaware of the lady’s presence perhaps. A twenty year old girl already owned a car and was willing to drive him home. How would the villagers react? How would they react if he went back the same day or even the following day with a white girl? To think of the disappointment that would be invited upon the faces of all the eager mothers that had asked him of possible matrimonial ties with their daughters. To think of his father’s disappointment, his mother’s… he smiled and involuntarily closed his eyes perhaps in imagination.
‘Have you agreed?’
He heard the beautiful voice once again. He heard the sweet white voice ask his ugly face. He hesitated. What was this girl up to? Were her proposals genuine? What had she noticed in him that made the latest necessary?
‘No’
‘Are you afraid of me?’
‘No, I would have run away or pissed in my pants’
‘Do I take it then, that you have agreed to ride with me?’
‘It’s difficult to say madam. Are you really white? You seem to have a black soul and spirit.’
‘Am a human being first and foremost. I didn’t choose to be born white in a black man’s land. Only that …’
‘You are beautiful and… and…’
He blushed and didn’t go on.
‘And what?’ she eagerly asked with a smile, almost springing to her feet. He nearly apologised for the tongue slippery but, faltering and placing his heavy hand upon his swollen face in shame tried to smile.
‘James, are you afraid of me?’ she now whispered and turning excused herself.
‘Let me register these two, and then we shall talk. Find some place and rest.’ He heard her whisper again. This was torture. She wanted him dead. He was sure about this. The white girl wanted him detained for being overfriendly or something. She wanted him sent away from his people. There were laws he still didn’t know. He didn’t want to break any of them, but that was more than forty years back. Forty eight years to be exact. He had gone back home and visited a magician who had easily confirmed his fears.
He didn’t have long to live and would die before completing his three year diploma course at the most prestigious college in the region. The whole village mourned with him searching for the sorcerer who had resorted to hunting the cleverest son in the village. The people were angry. How could they stand aside and watch as their hopes of a railway line complete with a train of their own dissipate into nothingness?
He had come back to college to differ his studies, waiting for death, and found the beautiful Margarita, she who had carried him back home in her car! She had tried to dissuade him from taking the magician’s point of view without much success.
‘You can’t understand Maggie. They are forces beyond your comprehension. I have watched them kill a hen by simply pointing a knife in its direction.’ He said amid tears, crying upon her shoulder. The fear of impending death made him almost insensitive to the warmth that now pervaded his body from her. Neither could he smell the perfume she had used.’
‘Darling please don’t let such obstacles muffle your goal. Independence is not far away, the whole district, the whole region is banking on you. You might be the next Minister of Agriculture and livestock development James. Am also banking on you James. I am!’ this revelation increased the pain in his breast.
‘Maggie, please understand. I haven’t long to live. Of what use shall I be to my people, to you, when am long dead? It wasn’t meant to be. I urge you to understand.’
‘I can’t! How can such an intelligent soul auction itself to the forces of evil? How can such a strong man turn into a weakling within days? I can’t understand!’ She screamed and broke into tears. ‘I can decide to do something real terrible’ she whispered.
‘I might die on my way home Maggie. Is that what you want? Please don’t bank on me in that way. You are beautiful, you are married, you already have a car of your own, and you have the power anyone would want. Don’t leave your husband, don’t hang onto this mass of poverty, and don’t stick around this bag of ignorance! Don’t stop to think of my ugly face. Go, run away now, I won’t blame you at all. I am waiting for death.’
‘Who won't die in the end? Aren’t you suggesting the very inferiority complex we talked about?’
‘My fate is sealed Maggie. I am dead. I have been sacrificed.’
‘By whom?’ she shouted, shaking his large frame in her slim hands.
‘You can't understand! I might just collapse any time. Of what benefit shall that be to you?’
‘Have you ever been in true love James? Have you been strongly in love?’
‘Yes, but I feel only death at the moment. Have you ever died before? I know you care for my future, well being, education, and all that but there is no future in death. When it comes, we don’t stop in its tracks and look back, it just…’
‘I love you James, don’t destroy my life!’
‘You bring pain to my heart. You bring tears to my eyes. You flood me with pain Maggie. I wish I could live and love you truly.’
‘You will live James. And we shall love each other for fifty years to come. I don’t want to go back to England. I want to marry the next Minister for Agriculture. You might be the next president if you play your cards well. There is no need to impose death upon yourself. You won't die! You can't squander such a chance. The magician is just jealous. Wishes his son were in your shoes.’
‘Are there magicians in England?’
‘No, but there are jealous people. I was born here and only schooled in England. I am fond of this land and you in particular. Please don’t leave me.’
‘We have only known each other for a week. You were frightened of me and now… I don’t really understand!’
‘Don’t you love me?’
‘Please…’
‘Tell me that you feel nothing for me, that you can't love a white woman! Don’t you care for me too? Don’t you care for my future, my feelings? Why do you want me dead?’
‘I didn’t say that!’
‘But you hate me, you hate me because…’
‘Stop it Maggie, I will never hate you. Why, you are almost a…’
‘Then you love me?’
‘But…’
‘You said I was beautiful.’
‘But that is true. I can't deny that. Many before me might have noticed that. I like you, I value you, I cherish you Maggie.’ This exchange pushed the issue of death to the back of his mind. He was alive. It brought back feeling to his heart.
‘What do I do James?’ the district commissioner’s wife asked after a lull in the conversation but there was no way they could end up together.
He now remembered the conversation. Forty-eight years down the line. His place and admission number had been preserved until now that death had not visited. He was seventy or seventy-one, an old man by all standards. The burden of guilt had weighed down heavily upon his shoulders for forty-eight years, but here he was, determined to earn his diploma in three years, in memory of Margarita.
Independence had come and gone. Presidents had risen and died to be succeeded. Maggie, a girl he had made love to and vowed to die for had long gone back to England, home of her parents.
He now held a college identity card with the same old admission number, ANHE/00I/58, and the same old name save for James which had long been dropped.
With a walking stick in one hand and a clip board in the other, he slowly negotiated the spiral staircase that led to his class, the centre of his newly found activity, balancing himself on twos as befitted a man of his age. On numerous occasions he sat at the back of the congested hall. Echton was now a full university but his diploma hadn’t grown to a Masters degree.
A grand daughter was somewhere in the front row, while a son was now a big man in government. Perhaps he was here to relive his past, to complete his education in memory of margarita, the white girl he had loved, a girl that had softened his heart by bringing love to his life, and his life to love.
He had walked on foot for years, inquired in hotels and restaurants, and perused daily newspapers to no avail. Was she still alive? Could she have recognised the old man behind the white hair and beard? Could she once again hold him in her slim arms and smile?
Dreams know no age. They came one after the other. What if she came back as one of the Professors? No, she was too old to teach. Had she died like she had threatened?
His mind was loaded and guilt yoked his shoulders so that he stooped under its weight. He had waited for death as warned by the magician who had long died. The would be sorcerer had been lynched on the outskirts of the village, yet the sentence, and the fear of its consequences was still in force.
He was back in class to fulfil Maggie’s expectations of him. He would be the third president. He hoped she was alive and that she would come back for his graduation, their graduation. Would she, could she?
Results of the first assignment came, and everybody gathered around him to see what the old grandpa of Animal Health had gotten. It seemed what he had been waiting for. He sneezed once, twice, and fell with a thud. Everyone thought it was funny. He was dead.