Wizard of the Crow

by Ngũgĩ Wa Thiong'o

  If only he could get in touch with his friend Machokali! Why had the minister not called him from America? When they last met at the Mars Cafe, the minister had said that he would be calling from time to time to get reports about the activities of his political enemies. Was this not an activity that Machokali ought to know of and even talk to the Ruler about with a view toward stopping Sikiokuu and Kaniürü from taking over other people’s jobs? He feared that the pair’s success in sidelining the boss of Marching to Heaven might embolden them into setting their sights on higher jobs … No, he did not want to think about the possibility of a Sikiokuu coup d’etat; he might go crazy.

  Tajirika decided that as long as his friend Machokali and the Ruler were in the USA he would not appear before the commission as summoned, and with that bold resolution he felt at peace. He redirected the chauffeur to take him not back to the office but to his Golden Heights residence.

  They came for him at midnight, men in plainclothes. They threw him into the back of a Land Rover like a log of wood, ignoring the entreaties of Vinjinia. They said not a word, did not identify themselves. They drove into the night, leaving Vinjinia standing at the door in darkness and silence.

  11

  Vinjinia lay awake, not knowing what to do or even think about the whole thing. Were Tajirika’s abductors police or common thugs pretending to be plainclothes police? What had Tajirika done to deserve this? She had not been pleased with her husband since her own return from police custody. Coldness had settled between them. They hardly talked, and when they did Tajirika simply wanted Vinjinia to go over the questions she had been asked while under interrogation, and only those relating to him and his businesses.

  How Vinjinia had felt when the police arrested her, what she thought while in their custody, how she dealt with the ordeal: these were clearly not priorities for Tajirika. What most pained her was her suspicion that deep down Tajirika believed her to be guilty of secretly associating with the women who had brought shame on the Ruler and Marching to Heaven. Unlike her husband, however, she was not indifferent to her spouse’s newfound woes.

  She began her inquiry at the Santamaria police station because the boss, Wonderful Tumbo, was a family friend. She did not know that when Tumbo saw her coming from afar he left through the back door. The men Vinjinia found in the office acted as if they did not believe her story: who would be so crazy as to arrest Tajirika, owner of Eldares Modern Construction and Real Estate, friend of the Minister for Foreign Affairs and chairman of Marching to Heaven? Wait a few days, they advised, her husband would almost certainly turn up. She moved from station to station, receiving virtually the same answer to her entreaties. At one, they were so callous as to advise her to look for her husband in the city morgue. She had no success there, either.

  At first Vinjinia went about her search quietly, trying to avoid unnecessary publicity, but soon she turned to the newspapers. One editor told her that the disappearance of an adult was not news he could use. Another pitied her and explained to her why.

  Political disappearances had become commonplace as the powers that be proclaimed ignorance and innocence even though relatives and friends swore that they had seen their loved ones hauled off in police cars. Besides, he added with a smile, Aburlrian men were notorious for having multiple homes, some official, others on the side.

  Next she tried Tajirika’s friends, but none wanted to have anything to do with the case. At first they would listen to her sympathetically, but as soon as it dawned on them that the government might be involved they would become alarmed, some going so far as to ask her not to call again.

  She was advised to get a lawyer to file a habeas corpus, but no one would take her case, citing one excuse or another. “You are wasting your money for nothing,” one lawyer was honest enough to tell her. “In Aburlria we are governed by personal whims.” With the Ruler in America, who was making new laws under which people were being abducted at night? she wondered.

  She turned to the church and to her Christian friends for help and moral support but they offered only their prayers; some made it clear by their body language that Vinjinia was not welcome in their homes and at their social gatherings.

  One day she stopped her Mercedes-Benz by the roadside, got out, and sat on some raised ground and began to weep: everything—the government, her friends, and her fellow Christians—seemed to have conspired against her. She started questioning the truths she had taken for granted, like the fairness of government and solidarity of the religious. To whom would she now turn for an answer to her troubles?

  In the midst of tears and numerous questions, Vinjinia suddenly thought of the Wizard of the Crow.

  12

  Early one day Vinjinia set out and, as on the first visit, parked her Mercedes-Benz in the street and walked to the old shrine, where she got directions to the new complex of wood and stone walls and iron roofs, far tidier than many of the state-owned clinics and hospitals she had recently visited. She was led by an assistant into an inner chamber, where, after being left alone for what seemed an eternity, she suddenly heard the sound of a latticed window opening to reveal a face.

  “I’m here to see the Wizard of the Crow,” Vinjinia said.

  “Your wish has been granted,” a voice said, and Vinjinia was surprised to hear that it was that of a woman.

  “When I was last here, he spoke in a male voice.”

  “I wear many faces. I talk in many voices. What brings you to me today?”

  Vinjinia hesitated. Then suddenly the floodgates of woes within opened and she told of her tribulations as she searched for her lost husband. By the time she came to the end of her story she was feeling much better, as if by merely listening the Wizard of the Crow had lifted the load she had been carrying all by herself.

  “Might he not be in hands similar to those in which you found yourself not so long ago?” Nyawlra asked, having suddenly recalled her disbelief when news of Vinjinia’s capture reached her secretly in the forest.

  Vinjinia almost fell off her seat: How did the wizard know that I, too, had been plunged into a similar darkness?

  “The Wizard of the Crow knows what he knows,” the voice said, answering her unspoken thought, which surprised and impressed her even more.

  “They have refused to confirm his arrest,” Vinjinia said. “Actually, they have denied it.”

  “So even if I use my mirror to find him, they will not admit to holding him?”

  “Yes, but it would ease my heart to know.”

  “Or burden it even more.”

  “Not knowing is worse.”

  “But you yourself saw them take him away?”

  “Yes.”

  “So what you want to know is not whether they have got him. What you want is for them to say that they have got him.”

  “You have read my heart completely,” Vinjinia said.

  What would Vinjinia do were she to uncover my identity? Nyawlra wondered. Would Vinjinia rush to report her to the very forces that had made her life miserable? While incarcerated, had Vinjinia said anything about Nyawlra to her captors? Was Vinjinia worn down not just by Tajirika’s abduction but also by questions she was asking herself and for which she had no ready answers? She saw herself in Vinjinia: after her car accident, she, too, had started by asking herself questions she had not asked herself before the trauma. Nyawlra felt very strong sympathy for the woman, and her own political stance against the regime in power only strengthened the bond. No matter how she despised the likes of Tajirika, she acknowledged that he had rights, too, like any other Aburlrian. But how could she help Vinjinia? She wished that Kamltl were around so they could put their heads together to find a way to make the government publicly declare that they were holding Tajirika. But Kamltl had not yet returned from KTambugi.

  Her mind drifted to the contrast between Vinjinia’s public devotion to her husband and her own father’s public denial of her, and Nyawlra felt a creeping sadness. Kaniürü had ruptured her ties to her fathe
r. Her recollection of Kaniürü s words in the media revived and intensified the pain and bitterness she still felt. Kaniürü thinks he can build success on the ruins of other people’s lives. Contemplating the man’s arrogance and mean spirit, Nyawlra found herself forming an idea.

  “Listen carefully,” she told Vinjinia. “Friday is the Day of the Way at the shrine. I want you to come back dressed like any ordinary working person, and on foot like most clients. Bring some traditional women’s clothing with you: twelve leather skirts with front aprons and twelve red-ochered tops.”

  13

  By evening the following Friday, Vinjinia was back at the shrine, seated among the other seekers of the Way, waiting her turn patiently.

  “Here is the bundle,” she told the Wizard of the Crow.

  “Are you ready to know the fate of your husband?”

  “Yes.”

  “Even if it means your coming face-to-face with those who took him away?”

  “If only I could, I would let them know that I will not be silenced.”

  “Everything you need is at Kaniürü’s place.”

  “What! The deputy to my husband? A kidnapper?”

  “Yes, the same one.”

  “Who empowered him?”

  “Surely you know that he is now the chairman of the Commission of Inquiry into the Queuing Mania. And remember that Kaniürü, like your husband, does not act alone. There are more powerful others behind his actions.”

  “How can I free my husband?”

  “I didn’t say anything about freeing him. But if you do as I say, you will at least be able to compel them to say what they have done with him.”

  “What must I do?”

  “My mirror tells me that a date has been set for Sikiokuu to open formally Kaniürü’s offices in Santamaria. Go home; find out the day and the hour of the ceremony. On that day, dress as you normally would for a similar occasion and be there as the ceremony begins. Show no undue interest in anything around. Tell them that all you want is to see Sikiokuu to find out where he is hiding your husband. Be firm and refuse to leave the premises until he has shown you where he buried your husband’s body. If your demand is met, leave at once and, again, show no interest in whatever else is happening around.”

  “Is that all?”

  “That is all.”

  “You mean I don’t have to carry magic potions in my dress?”

  “The most potent is the magic within you.”

  14

  From the moment that Kaniürü was notified of the day Sikiokuu would stage the opening ceremony, he had looked high and low for women dancers to grace the occasion, but in vain. He was personally despised, and no one wished to be associated with him openly. How was he going to impress Sikiokuu and the media without women dancers? Then one evening a couple of days before the ceremony, luck knocked at his door.

  He was looking through the window idly, in total despair, when there appeared outside his offices a woman dressed in a long leather skirt, a front apron, and a red-ochered top with two bunches of beads hanging from her earlobes. He rushed to open the door himself.

  It was a little dark in the corridor, but on hearing what she had to say, that she was bringing a message from a group of dancers, Kaniürü was so elated that he started jumping up and down like a little child before swearing before the woman that if indeed she could get him a group of women dancers to perform for Sikiokuu he would personally ensure that the group got two new buses with which to start their own transport business.

  He was so excited at his new luck that he did not ask many questions about the woman and her group, for he did not want to frighten his good fortune away.

  So Kaniürü himself called the newspapers and radio and TV stations to tell them of the occasion. On the morning of the scheduled event he called again as a reminder, adding that something dramatic would be happening.

  Most satisfying was the sure knowledge that, at last, his picture, he and Sikiokuu mobbed by adoring dancers, would finally appear in the press.

  15

  The dancers were among the first to arrive. In traditional garbs, they all looked much the same. But though difficult to distinguish one from the other, as a group they were impressive to an onlooker. Kaniürü delayed meeting them formally before the arrival of the media. But the women did not seem to mind as they settled in the yard preparing themselves for their act. The guests were mostly those who wanted to buy favor in anticipation of the abundant windfall for Marching to Heaven.

  For his part, Sikiokuu had brought his own state photographers, but it was not until press reporters and cameramen arrived that Kaniürü and Sikiokuu stepped out into the yard and took their places, ready to be showered with praises by the dancers, now arranging themselves into a formation. As they were about to start, Vinjinia arrived.

  She was startled to see the dancers in the traditional ensembles that she had taken to the Wizard of the Crow. They had cost her quite a sum, but now she was inwardly glad to see how striking the clothes had turned out to be. Mindful of the instructions at the shrine, she tried not to show any interest in them, and she made a beeline toward the front row where other guests sat. I want to speak to Minister Sikiokuu, she said loudly.

  All eyes, including the dancers’, now turned to the woman.

  Sikiokuu leaned toward Kaniürü and asked him who the woman was. A crazy woman, Kaniürü replied, but because he did not want any commotion before the press, Kaniürü tried to diffuse the situation by asking the woman loudly and in a friendly voice, Mother, what do you want? Vinjinia, just as loudly, said that she simply wanted to know where the government had buried the body of her husband, Tajirika. Sikiokuu did not react one way or another; he stared straight ahead as if he had not the slightest clue as to what Vinjinia was talking about. Kaniürü gestured to some policemen to take the woman away. Vinjinia screamed in protest. By now the press photographers were snapping away. Sikiokuu saw that the situation might get out of hand and ordered the police officers to stop manhandling the woman. Kaniürü was fuming with anger, for this was not exactly the kind of drama he had promised the press, but he did not know what to do. Vinjinia was shouting and demanding to know if her husband was alive, and if not the authorities should take her to his grave. In desperation Kaniürü turned to the dancers and instructed them to start their performance.

  One of the women, as if in response to Kaniürü’s appeal, raised her voice in song while the others responded with undulating hip and hand movements punctuated by rhythmic grunts.

  When I came here to sing praises to the visitor

  I did not know that it was to a house at war

  I do not sing in houses at war

  My song might become cacophony

  And my voice gets lost in my throat

  For though you see me dancing

  I have a husband and a child to look after

  I would not want the child to lose a father

  For a home is father, mother, and child

  On hearing their song, Sikiokuu realized that unless he did something drastic, the situation would worsen, might become as shameful as what had happened at Eldares, and how would the Ruler react if the news was to reach him in America? He stood up and asked the women to stop singing for he had something to say to the media.

  He had come here, he said, to formally open these two important offices and also make a statement. He had planned to say what he had to say at the end of the ceremony, but mindful of press deadlines he thought it better to do so now, not wanting to risk the possibility of some reporters having to leave early. Uppermost in his mind were two issues:

  The first concerned Nyawlra, the outlaw. The government was aware that she was hiding among the people, and he wanted to remind them that everyone was duty bound to report her to the nearest police station. Whoever harbored the fugitive would be as guilty of treason as the criminal. He wanted to emphasize, however, that if Nyawlra herself surrendered to the authorities as her own father had asked h
er to do, she would not be harmed in any way. She would be tried fairly under the laws of the land. He then announced a reward of fifty thousand Burls for anybody providing information leading to the arrest and successful criminal prosecution of the said Nyawlra for crimes against the State.

  The second issue concerned Titus Tajirika. He said that Tajirika, Nyawlra’s employer, was in the hands of the security forces, helping them in their search for the roots of the recent queuing mania in Eldares. He, the minister, had not known that the woman before them was Tajirika’s wife. He pledged to transport Vinjinia and her children to Tajirika so that they could see for themselves that he was very much alive and well. The government appreciated the information about Nyawlra and the queuing mania that Tajirika was providing, but the minister could not go into details “for security reasons.”

  Sikiokuu ended his statement by asking Mrs. Vinjinia Tajirika to join the other guests of honor at the podium waiting to be entertained by the women dancers. He sat down and gestured to the official police photographer and instructed him on what to do.

  The statement caught everybody by surprise. Vinjinia did not know what to do; this development had not been scripted at the shrine. Should she express indifference as the Wizard of the Crow had counseled? Should she ignore the invitation and walk away? But how could she refuse a ministerial invitation? They might even take it as rudeness and delay the promised visit to her husband. She found herself sitting at the podium next to the big ears of Silver Sikiokuu.

  The women dancers now raised their voices in song, calling for peace and unity among the people of the land.

  Sikiokuu, you were given big ears so that you could hear things from afar

  And you, Kaniürü, a big nose so that you could smell out things from afar

  Listen, then, to what we the people of this land say