by Mia Couto
I don’t understand, the emperor retorted. I asked you whether you were Angolan. What has the flag got to do with my question?
Here, we all venerate the same sovereign: the king of Portugal.
The emperor raised his eyes skyward, diffusing the anger caused by the prisoner’s insolence.
That flag is a piece of cloth, which I have hoisted and brought down whenever I want, he growled.
I also take off my uniform when I want, argued the Angolan.
The king didn’t like what he heard. With a twig, he cleaned the long nail of his little finger, a habit of his when he was irritated. He muttered between his teeth:
Someone go with this man.
This was his way of announcing a sentence. The emperor uttered these words and the wretched man’s fate was a foregone conclusion. He wouldn’t even reach the outer limits of the village. The victim would be speared to death, his body lying where it fell, unburied and forgotten. But God was on his side. For Godido, who was leading the executioners, allowed him to escape. He untied him and told the others: Let’s leave him be, he’ll be eaten by wild animals.
On that occasion, he had gotten away. But the mangolê knew that he was serving another, longer, more deadly sentence. When the war ends, the Portuguese will go back home. But we Angolans will remain prisoners here forever.
While Ondjala recounted his troubles, my father was busy gathering pieces of bark and wood. To these improvised keys, he added some nsala gourds. Out of almost nothing, he fashioned a marimba. With the crucifix, he tapped the wooden keys and a ragged melody caused us to stop talking.
I like him, said the soldier. He’s a musician, he doesn’t live in this world.
Katini abruptly stopped playing his music and bade us hurry so that we could continue our journey. And we returned to the dugout. My old father’s face had a peculiar expression and he didn’t speak until he dug an oar in against the current, causing the boat to stop in midstream. With the tip of his oar he prodded the soldier’s shoulder and asked:
Who fired the shot?
What?
Who killed my son?
I don’t know, we all fired at the dugout.
All?
Then my father suddenly got to his feet, causing the boat to rock perilously. Seen from below like this, he gained the loftiness of a giant. He raised the oar high above his head and brought it down fiercely on the Angolan’s head, arms, and whole body. Then he pushed the soldier’s body overboard, holding his head underwater for a time. When the Angolan offered no more resistance, my father brought out his metal crucifix and did what is done to fish: he plunged it, like a hook, into the man’s neck. The soldier’s arms and legs spread out like wings on the surface of the water and our boat was surrounded by a bloodstained slick. Katini stood motionless, watching the body drifting weightlessly.
Father, let’s go! I wailed.
I grabbed the blood-covered oar. In my haste to get away, I was unable to get the boat back on course. Whichever way I turned, I saw João Ondjala’s body floating as if seeking its own shadow on the riverbed. With unusual decisiveness, Katini Nsambe ordered:
We are going back to the church!
But Father! What about Mwanatu?
There is no grave. My son was thrown into the water, that’s what they did to him. The river is the only tomb he has.
Standing at the prow, as stiff as an ancient statue, he raised his cross and a thousand flashes glittered in his hand.
With this crucifix, I’m going to kill the others.
What others, Father?
He didn’t answer. He merely added:
When we get to the church, we’ll say the soldier fell into the river and was eaten by crocodiles.
With a nobility he had never shown before, my father confronted the surrounding landscape like a corsair who had taken possession of the river he was navigating. He held the crucifix up against the sky again and declared:
Some see a cross, but I see a dagger. This is the blade God has placed in my hands. Vengeance is the justice of the weak. Well, my daughter, I am the weakest of the weak. There will be no greater vengeance than mine.
* * *
The sparse meager lights of Sana Benene were twinkling when we moored the boat to the landing stage. In times of war, the fires remain lit day and night. This is done so that the warriors, wherever they may be, always remain in the light. I was preparing to climb the slope when my father grabbed my arm.
Wait, I need to talk to you.
I sat down in the boat again. I looked at Katini’s bloodstained hands still clutching the fateful crucifix.
I’ve changed my plans, he declared. I’m going to give you to the Nkosi, you’re going to be the king’s wife. You’re going to be Ngungunyane’s principal spouse.
Don’t do that, Father, for the love of God!
Life has deceived me, the Portuguese have betrayed me. Now it’s my turn to betray them. You’re going to be his wife.
His words were a double-edged knife. In one go, he was tearing me away from my love for Germano, and delivering me up to the creature I most detested. I wept as if I were speaking, as if each tear were a word, each sob a sentence:
I shall do as my mother did: I’ll kill myself.
My intention was to appeal to his sense of compassion. The opposite occurred. Overcome by an uncontainable fury, my father ground his teeth together and upbraided me:
Never compare yourself again to your mother! Your mother was full of life. That was why the tree received her in its embrace. You cannot kill yourself. And do you know why? Because there’s no life in you at all.
Whereupon he fell on me as if he wanted to hurt me. But then he stopped himself. When I opened my eyes again, I received the blurred image of my father bent over me, his arms shaking my shoulders:
Stop crying. You’ll summon evil spirits.
Don’t do this to me, Father. Are you going to betray those of our people who were murdered by Ngungunyane?
I’m fighting for those who still have to live. The others …
There’s no difference, Father. There are no others …
Hatred was growing in me and I couldn’t contain my weeping. I slapped the oar against the water as if I were beating myself. Smacking the river was a way of hurting old Katini Nsambe.
Think of one thing, my daughter …
I’m not your daughter!
That doesn’t matter much. I’m your father.
Apart from anything else, I made a promise. I promised on my mother’s grave that I would kill that cursed Ngungunyane.
You haven’t understood, Imani. That is my intention: You marry him first. Then you kill him. Who, other than a queen, can hold a king’s life in her hand?
What Katini Nsambe was saying at that moment was too much for me to comprehend.
Let me go, Father. I need to say goodbye to Germano.
You’ve already said goodbye.
I want to be with him. It’ll be our last time together.
That sergeant of yours left for Chicomo this morning. Go and get your things ready. Tomorrow we’ll go to Mandhlakazi.
27
SERGEANT GERMANO DE MELO’S NINTH LETTER
It’s not enough for us to walk unshod. Our feet need to tread the ground until they lose their skin. Until the soil’s blood circulates in our veins.
—THE WORDS OF BIBLIANA
Somewhere between Sana Benene and Chicomo, October 28, 1895
Dear Lieutenant Ayres de Ornelas,
I am dead, sir. I have been deprived of my past, and my dreams have been torn away. In the early morning, Captain Santiago Mata forcibly pulled me from my quarters at Sana Benene. He uttered only two words: Come on! While I hurriedly put on my clothes, the captain asked me: Why do you think I came to this bloody place? He raised his arms as if the whole world were obliged to hear him: I was told to come and get you. And he did not need to add that I was to be taken by force to the garrison at Chicomo.
This is a
sad way, sir, of reminding me that I am, more than anything else, a soldier and a Portuguese. Farewell Swiss hospital, farewell Imani, farewell to my dreams of a life in Mozambique. I am writing these lines with the same despair as those who are buried alive and hopelessly beat on their coffin lid. This is the source of my lassitude. Never again will I have romance, friends, or neighbors.
You cannot imagine, sir—or maybe you can imagine it better than anyone—the circumstances in which I am scribbling these lines to you: seated in a cart, the world swaying all around me. I take this opportunity to tell you of the adventures I have been through ever since I began this journey by oxcart early this morning. I am traveling in the company of Santiago Mata and his seven soldiers who are plodding along as an escort. Apart from myself, the cart is loaded only with weapons, some boxes of biscuits, and two pots of water. I am seated in the devil’s position, with my back to a path that opens up endlessly in front of us. We are bound for the garrison at Chicomo, where I am due to receive medical treatment.
Swayed by the movement of the cart, I cannot help feeling that I am once again rehearsing for my own funeral cortege. First it was in the belly of a boat. Now in a dusty oxcart. On the day of my real funeral, I shall be dressed in this uniform that I always hated and that now covers my soul more than my body. Take note of this request, sir: Bury me as if my skin had been transformed into the foul-smelling uniform. It was in this predestined funeral shroud that I set out on this journey. Or, sadder still, this is what I am: A piece of cloth that I have been wrapped in, whether in life or death. First a uniform, and then a shroud. I am a soldier, I do not belong to myself. At my funeral, other soldiers, ignorant of the fact that they too have lost their souls, will fire a salute of blank shots. They will be unaware that their shots will be killing the very sky.
Throughout the journey, I have been the butt of Santiago’s insults. Far from troubling me, they distract me from other, greater pains. And besides, my mother used to say: He who utters a lot of insults can’t be a bad man. Judging by the way he reels off his derisive comments, Santiago must be an excellent person. Thanks to you, he confronted me, thanks to you, my little faggot, I never got to take part in the Battle of Coolela. All because I had to come and fetch you, because our little prince here couldn’t walk through the bush on his own. Tell me something, my little sergeant: With those little arms of yours, how do you manage to wipe your ass? Was it that lovely little black girl who washed your nether parts? Wouldn’t you like one of these black soldiers to wipe your little butt? You can be sure, they’re very good at it. They’ll make such a thorough job of it, you’ll never shit again in your life.
At first the soldiers contained their laughter. Then gradually they stopped listening. The captain merely began to talk to himself in his endless rosary of insults:
With your hands in the state they’re in, there’ll be no more tossing off for you. I can just imagine how you’ve found your fun spanking the monkey out in the bush. Anyway, no more fun and games with those five little dwarves of yours. Now you’re going to have to screw those wily kaffir women. I hope you’ve made a start with that cute little black girl who was with you in the church. Or shall I check her out for you, you crafty little piece of scum?
Eventually, he fell silent. Despair caused him to hunch his shoulders as he walked on in silence. In his swarthy face, however, his eyes continued to gleam, as they scanned the countryside. The man guiding us through the bush must have been terribly lonely.
When darkness fell, he ordered us to stop and pitch camp far from any path. While he was spreading out the canvas that would serve as our bed, the man addressed me in a civil tone for the first time to tell me that I was in luck, for Dr. Rodrigues Braga was passing through Chicomo.
The following day, after a cumbersome climb up slopes covered with thorny shrubs, we encountered a kaffir, whom we asked for food and water for our oxen. He led us in silence to his hut and there offered us some roasted corncobs, which we devoured. Then he warned us that some Vátua soldiers had assembled not far from there. They had arrived in groups and were concentrated by a small lake, where they were getting ready for a ceremony to bless their fighters.
A group of these warriors had visited him early that morning. The oldest of them went to his corral and chose a bull ox. He infuriated the animal by hitting it on the nose with a rod. At this, some younger ones jumped on its back and brought it to the ground. While they were holding it down by the horns, the leader of the group slit its throat with an ax.
Look, you can see the blood here. The farmer pointed at a black stain covered with flies.
In little more than a few minutes, the warriors had cut up the carcass and carried chunks of flesh away on their backs. The kaffir pointed to a valley down which they had disappeared.
Follow me, the man invited us. They’re not far off. If we’re careful, they won’t notice our presence.
Are there many of them?
About fifty.
What battalion, what impi are they from? Don’t tell me they’re the Ziynhone Muchopes, the White Birds?
No, these are older. They looked to me more like the Mapepe, the Wily Ones.
We’ll ambush them! Santiago ordered.
You’re crazy, Captain, I said.
In any other situation, my insolence would have been harshly punished. But at that moment Santiago merely glared at me before handing me a rifle.
We’re going to make a soldier of you, my old son of a bitch. With the fingers you’ve got left, or with your old cock, you’re going to fire this gun.
Another weapon was given to the poor farmer, who stood there stock-still, such was his astonishment, unable to bear the gun’s weight.
And you too, nigger, if you don’t kill them, we’ll kill you.
We advanced in complete silence as far as a clearing in the forest. The kaffir was right: There were some fifty men arranged in a circle around a witch doctor, called a nganga around here, and a military commander. Smoke rose from a huge pot where they had cooked the meat of the ox. Hidden behind a clump of bushes, we peered at this extraordinary ritual. Each down on one knee, the soldiers were chanting and beating out a vigorous rhythm on the ground with their shields and spears. Then at a certain point the commander got to his feet and held up a human finger. A cold shiver went through me. The appendage could have been one of my missing digits. Noticing my alarm, our kaffir companion explained that this was some old trophy torn from a VaChopi military leader. Such were the rules followed in this magic ritual.
When he had finished exhibiting the desiccated finger, the commander scraped it with the blade of a large knife, allowing the dust to fall onto the ox meat. This condiment was called war medicine, the potion that would make any qualms of conscience disappear. By eating meat seasoned like this, the soldiers lost their heart. For conscience dwells in the breast. This is what the farmer whispered to us.
Santiago was far from paying attention to those words. He was studying the surroundings in order to plan a surprise attack. Using only gestures, he ordered us to spread out in order to create the illusion that there were many of us. At his order, we launched the attack. Taken by surprise, the Vátuas fled in disorder, leaving behind their spears and the few firearms they had. Three of them fell by the great pot, dying next to the potion that was supposed to render them immune to the bullets of the enemy.
The Vátuas seemed to have vanished into the forest when, all of a sudden, our position was sprayed with a salvo of bullets. One of our soldiers, a black private, fell next to a boulder. I even saw his fingers buried in the sand as if he were trying to resist some dark force dragging him away. As he lay dying, he turned to look at me and his eyes were as dark as bottomless wells. I recognized him. He was one who had not spoken a word during the entire journey, because the only European language he spoke was English. And this, for Santiago, was an unacceptable slight.
Next to me, Santiago was horrified. The ambush had gone into reverse and the hunters had beco
me the prey. In a frenzy, the captain assembled his soldiers and, with yells and kicks, urged them to advance against the enemy. He kept calling them cowards until he saw them eventually advance, open-chested, against the invisible Vátuas. The captain and I remained in the rear guard. Suddenly, I saw him bend double as if he had been shot in the stomach. He was waving at me to come to his aid when I noticed that the stain on his trousers was not blood. It was urine.
Then the shooting stopped abruptly on all sides, and a complete silence ensued. Santiago Mata ordered us to return to the hut where we had left our effects. Once there, the first thing the captain did was to pour a whole pot of water over his body. The soldiers were puzzled by this wastefulness.
Fearing that the kaffirs would prepare some ingenious counterattack in revenge, we grabbed all that was indispensable for us, tied the oxen up in the middle of the bush, and cut some branches so as to hide the cart. It was crucial that we set out as light and as speedily as possible on a forced march to Chicomo. Realizing what our intentions were, the farmer declared almost in tears:
The only thing left for me now is to go with you.
Santiago ordered him to tether his oxen and bring his things. It wasn’t a question of returning a favor. His presence as a guide would be vital:
My things? he asked, with a sad smile.
And off we went, handing the luckless, barefoot farmer the task of guiding us through the inscrutable landscape. Under instructions from Santiago, we passed an abandoned military outpost where they had arranged to meet the Angolan soldier who had guided Imani and Katini down the River Inharrime. But the post was empty, without any sign of anyone at all having passed through the place. Santiago didn’t seem surprised at his absence:
Black son of a bitch! There’s no point in trusting these people …
At that point, the farmer told us what he had heard from a traveler he had met that morning. This traveler had told him that the body of a black man had been washed up on the riverbank, half eaten by crocodiles. And this black man was wearing the uniform of a Portuguese soldier. Santiago Mata’s reaction was immediate and forceful: