by Amos Tutuola
But as we looked at our back, we were looking at the large hands with fear, so when the hands gave us sign to come to him, now my wife and myself betraited ourselves, because when the hands told both of us to come to him, my wife pointed me to the hands and I myself pointed her to the hands too; after that, my wife forced me to go first and I pushed her to go first. As we were doing that, the hands told us again that both of us were wanted inside the tree, so when we thought that we had never seen a tree with hands and talking in our life, or since we have been travelling in the bushes, then we started to run away as before, but to our surprise, when the hands saw that we took to our heels again, they stretched out from the tree without end and then picked both of us off the ground as we were running away. After that they were drawing back to the inside of the tree, but when we nearly touched the tree, there we saw that a large door opened and the hands drew us through that door to the inside of the tree.
Now by that time and before we entered inside the white tree, we had ‘sold our death’ to somebody at the door for the sum of £70:18:6d and ‘lent our fear’ to somebody at the door as well on interest of £5:10:0d per month, so we did not care about death and we did not fear again. When we entered inside the white tree, there we found ourselves inside a big house which was in the centre of a big and beautiful town, then the hands directed us to an old woman, and after the hands disappeared. So we met the old woman sat on a chair in a big parlour which was decorated with costly things, then she told us to sit down before her and we did so. Then she asked us did we know her name; we said no; then she said that her name was called ‘FAITHFUL-MOTHER’ and she told us that she was only helping those who were in difficulties and enduring punishments but not killing anybody.
After that, she asked us did we know the name of the big hands who brought us to her; we said no. Then she told us that the big hands’ name was called ‘FAITHFUL-HANDS’, she said that the work of Faithful-hands was to watch out for those wo were passing or going about in their bush with difficulties etc. and bring them to her.
∨ The Palm-wine Drinkard ∧
19
The work of the faithful-mother in the white tree
After she had related her story, then she told one of her servants to give us food and drinks and at the same time the servant served us with the food and drinks, but after we had eaten and drank to our satisfaction, then the Faithful-Mother told us to follow her and we did so. She took us to the largest dancing hall which was in the centre of that house, and there we saw that over 300 people were dancing all together. The hall was decorated with about one million pounds (£) and there were many images and our own too were in the centre of the hall. But our own images that we saw there resembled us too much and were also white colour, but we were very surprised to meet our images there, perhaps somebody who was focusing us as a photographer at the first time before the hands drew us inside the white tree had made them, we could not say. So we asked from Faithful-Mother what she was doing with all of the images. She replied that, they were for remembrance and to know those she was helping from their difficulties and punishments. This beautiful hall was full of all kinds of food and drinks, over twenty stages were in that hall with uncountable orchestras, musicians, dancers and tappers. The orchestras were always busy. The children of seven to eight years etc. of age were always dancing, tapping on the stage with melodious songs and they were also singing with warm tones with non-stop dance till morning. There we saw that all the lights in this hall were in technicolours and they were changing colours at five minutes intervals. After that she took us to the dining hall and then to the kitchen in which we met about three hundred and forty cooks who were always busy as bees and all the rooms in this house were in a row. Then she took us to her hospital where we met again many patients on sick beds and she handed us to one of the patentees to treat our heads without hair which the people of the ‘Unreturnable-Heaven’s town’ had cleared with broken bottle by force.
We remained in that hospital for a week under treatment before our heads brought out full-grown hair, then we went back to the Faithful-Mother and she gave us a room.
∨ The Palm-wine Drinkard ∧
20
Our life with the faithful-mother in the white tree.
Now we were living with the Faithful-Mother and she was taking care of us with her faithfulness, but within a week that we were living with this mother, we had forgotten all our past torments and she told us to go to the hall at any time we liked. So early in the morning, we should go to the hall and begin to eat and drink, because we were not buying anything that we wanted, so that I began to lavish all the drinks as I had been a great palm-wine drinkard in my town before I left. And within one month my wife and I became good dancers. This was rather queer. One night, when we were short of drinks at about two o’clock in the midnight, then the Chief waiter reported to the Faithful-Mother that we were short of drinks and there was none in the store, then she gave the chief waiter a small bottle which was exactly the size of injection’s bottle and it contained only a little quantity of wine. After the chief waiter brought it to the hall we began to drink it, but for three days and nights, the whole of us could not drink the wine which the bottle contained to one-fifth. So after about three months that we were inside this white tree, we became the inhabitants of the house and we were feeding on anything that we liked free of charge. There was a special room in this house to play gamble and I joined the gang, but I was not perfect enough, so that all the money for which I sold our ‘death’ was taken away from me by the expert gamblers, but I had forgotten that one day, we should leave there and need money to spend. Of course the borrower of our ‘fear’ was paying us regularly every month. Now we disliked to continue our journey to the town that we were going to before we entered inside the white tree, as a matter of fact we did not like to leave there ever. But after we had completed the period of one year and two weeks with Faithful-Mother, one night she called my wife and me and told us that it was time for us to leave there and continue our journey as usual. When she said this we begged her not to let us leave there ever, then she replied that she had no right to delay anybody more than a year and some days, she said again that if that had been in her power, she would grant our request. After that, she told us to go and pack all our loads and be ready to leave there tomorrow morning. Then we went back to our room, and began to think that we were going to start our punishments again. We did not go to the hall that night and we did not sleep till the daybreak, so early in the morning we thought within ourselves to tell her to escort us to our destination. Then we went to her and told her we were ready to leave and we wanted her to lead us to our destination because of fearful creatures in the bush. But she told us that she could not do such request, because she must not go beyond their boundary. So she gave me a gun and ammunitions and a cutlass, then she gave my wife many costly clothes etc. as gifts and gave us plenty of roasted meat with drinks and cigarettes. After that she accompanied us, but what made us very surprised was that we saw the tree opened as a large door, and we simply found ourselves inside the bush unexpectedly, and the door closed at once and the tree seemed as an ordinary tree which could not open like that. But at the same time that we found ourselves at the foot of this white tree inside the bush, both of us (my wife and I) said suddenly “We are in the bush again.” Because it was just as if a person slept in his or her room, but when he woke up, he found himself or herself inside a big bush.
Then we took our ‘fear’ back from the borrower and he paid us the last interest on it. Then we found the one who had bought our ‘death’ and told him to bring it, but he told us that he could not return it again, because he bought it from us and had paid for it already, so we left our ‘ death’ for the buyer, so we took only our ‘fear’. So when the Faithful-Mother led us to the river which we could not cross before we saw the white tree and entered it, we stopped and looked at her. After a while, she picked up a small stick like a match stick on the ground a
nd she threw it on that river, but at the same moment, there we found a narrow bridge which crossed the river to the other edge. Then she told us to cross it to the other edge or the second side, but she stood in the same place, at the same time that we reached the end of the other edge, she stretched out her hand and touched the bridge, but it was only that stick we saw in her hand. After that she was singing and waving her hand to us and we were doing the same thing to her as well, then she disappeared at once. That was how we left the Faithful-Mother in the white tree who was faithful to every creature.
So we took our ‘fear’ back and started our journey as usual, but before an hour passed since we had left the Faithful-Mother, a heavy rain came and we were beaten by the rain for two hours before it stopped, as there was no shelter in this bush for rain or anything. My wife could not travel as quickly as we wished to, so we stopped and ate the roasted meat which the Faithful-Mother gave us, and we rested there for two hours, then we started to travel again. But as we were travelling along in this bush, we met a young lady who was coming towards us, but as we saw her, we bent to another way, but she bent to the place too, then we stopped for her to come and do anything that she wanted to do, because we had sold our ‘death’ and we could not die again, but we feared her because we did not sell our ‘fear’. When this lady approached us, we noticed that she was dressed in a long fancy gown, and there were many gold-beads around her neck and she wore high-heel shoes which resembled aluminium in colour, she was as tall as a stick of about ten feet long, she was of deep red complexion. After she had approached us, she stopped and asked where we were going to. We replied that we were going to ‘Dead’s town’, and she asked again from where were we coming. We replied that we were coming from the Faithful-Mother in the white tree. After we had told her that, then she told us to follow her, but when she said so, we feared her and my wife said – “This is not a human-being and she is not a spirit, but what is she?” Then we were following her as she told us. After we had travelled with her to a distance of about 6 miles in this bush, then we entered inside a ‘Red-Bush’ and the bush was in deep red together with all the trees, ground and all the living creatures therein. Immediately we entered this ‘Red-Bush’ my wife and myself turned deep-red as that bush, but at the same time that we entered the ‘Red-Bush’, these words came out from my wife’s mouth – “This is only fear for the heart but not dangerous to the heart.”
∨ The Palm-wine Drinkard ∧
21
We and the red-people in the red-town
After we had travelled about 12 miles away in the ‘ Red-Bush’ with the Red-lady, we entered a Red-town and there we saw that both people and their domestic animals were deep-red in colour. So we entered a house which was the largest in that area, but as we were feeling hungry before reaching there, we asked the lady to give us food and water. After a while she brought both for us, but to our surprise, both food and water were as red as red paint, but both tasted as ordinary food and water so we ate the food and drank the water also. After she had brought the food for us, she left us there and went away, but as we sat down there, these Red-people were coming and looking at us with astonishment. After a few minutes the lady came back and told us to follow her and we did so. Then she took us around the town and showed is everything, after that she took us to their king who was also red as blood. The king saluted us well and told us to sit down before him. Then he asked us where were we coming from? We replied that we were coming from the Faithful-Mother who was in charge of the white tree. When he heard so from us, he said that the Faithful-Mollher was his sister, then we told him how she helped us from our difficulties etc. After that he asked us what was the name of our town. We told him the name. Then he asked whether we were still alive or dead before coming there. We told him that we were still alive and we were not deads.
After that he told the Red-lady that brought us to him to put us in one of the rooms in his palace, but the room was very far from the other rooms and nobody was living near there. So we entered the room and began to think – What was his aim, the Red-king of the Red-people in the Red-town, was the question we asked ourselves, and we could not sleep till morning, because of this question.
When it was early in the morning, we went to the Red-king and sat down before him and waited for what he would say. But when it was about 8 o’clock, the Red-lady who brought us to the Red-king came and sat down behind us. After a while the Red-king started the story of the Red-town, Red-people, and the Red-Bush thus: – He said – “The whole of us in this Red-town were once human-beings; in the olden days when the eyes of all the human-beings were on our knees, when we were bending down from the sky because of its gravitiness and when we were walking backwards and not forwards as nowadays.” He said also ‘ One day, when I was still among the human-beings I set one trap in a bush which was very far away from any river, even a pond did not be near there, then I set one fish-net inside a river which was very far away from any bush, even a piece of land did not be near there. But when it was next morning, I went first to the river in which I set the fish-net for fish, but to my surprise, the net had caught a red-bird instead of a fish and the red-bird was still alive as it was in a river. Then I took out the net together with the red-bird and put it down on the bank of the river. Next I went to the bush in which I had set the trap for bush animals and again the trap had also caught a big red fish and it was still alive. After that, I took both the net and the trap with red-bird and red fish to my town. But when my parents saw the red fish that the trap caught instead of a bush animal and again that the fish-net had caught a red-bird instead of a fish, and both were still alive, they told me to return them to the place that I brought them from, and I took both of them and returned to put them in the place where I had caught them.
But when I was going along the way, I stopped mid-way under the shade of a tree and made a fire there, then I put these two red creatures inside the fire. My aim was to burn them into ashes and return to my town from there. But what surprised me most was that, when I was going to put these red creatures in the fire, they were talking like human-beings, saying that I must not put them in the fire, because red creatures were not to go near fire at all, but when I heard that from them, I was greatly terrified. Of course, I did not listen to them, I was only taking both of them from the net and trap to the fire, but as I Avas taking them out of the net and trap, they were still boasting that I could not put them in that fire at all. Although when I heard that from them, I was greatly annoyed and put them in that fire by force. As these red creatures were inside that fire, they were saying that I should take them out of the fire at, once, but I told them that that could not be done at all. After a little time, they burnt into halves, but they were still talking. Then I gathered more dried sticks and put them inside the fire, but when the fire rose up, I was suddenly covered by the smoke which came out from the fire, and I could hardly breathe. Before I could find my way out from the smoke I had turned red, and when I saw that I had become red, then I ran to my town and entered our house, but the smoke was following me as I was running to our house, and entered the house with me. When my parents saw that I had turned into red, they wanted to wash me, perhaps the red would be washed away, but as soon as the smoke entered with me the whole people became red also, then we went before the king who was on the throne to show him what had happened, but the smoke did not allow the king to say anything, before it scattered all over the town and all the people, domestic animals, town, river and bush became red at the same time.
But when everyone of us had failed to wash his or her red away, then on the 7th day after we had turned into the red the whole of us died with our domestic animals, and we left that town and settled down here, but we were still red as before we died and also our domestic animals, rivers, town and bush or anything we met here became red, so that since that time we were called Red-people and our town was called Red-town etc. But some days after we had settled down here, the red fish and the red-bird came a
nd lived inside a big hole which was very near this town. Since both red creatures came here they have been coming out from the hole every year for human sacrifice and we are sacrificing one of us to them yearly to save the rest of us. So we are very glad that both of you came to the Red-town just now because there remain only three days before these two creatures come out for their sacrifice of this year and I should be very glad too if one of you would volunteer his or her life for these two creatures.
After the Red-king had related the story for us and in his conclusion bad said that one of us should volunteer his or her life for the two creatures, willingly or not, I asked my wife what could we do now? Because I do not want to leave her or she to leave me here alone and none of these Red-people wanted to volunteer his or her life for these creatures and again the king wanted to hear from us as soon as possible.
But my wife said these words – “This would be a brief loss of woman, but a shorter separation of a man from lover.” But I did not understand the meaning of her words, because she was talking with parables or as a foreteller. After a little time I went to the Red-king and told him that I should volunteer my life for the two red creatures. And when the Red-king and Red-people heard that from me, they were exceedingly glad. The reason why I volunteered my life was that when I remembered that we had sold away our ‘ death’ to somebody, I knew these two creatures would be unable to kill me at all. I did not know that these Red-people would perform their native ceremony for me or anybody who volunteers his or her life to the two creatures before the very day that the two creatures would come out from their hole.