A Girl Named Disaster

by Nancy Farmer

  After the goods were delivered, the tractor slowly ground its way back with a load of people returning to the outside world. That was why sugar, like salt, was so rare and why, much as she wanted to, Nhamo didn’t dare take a spoonful for herself. Aunt Chipo watched the supply too closely. Nhamo contented herself with licking a few grains from her fingers. By this time Takawira was perched on the bench outside his hut.

  She poured him tea.

  “I want milk,” complained the old man, but unfortunately none of the cows was producing at the moment. He wrapped his old gnarled fingers around the enamelware cup.

  Masvita emerged from Ambuya’s hut with Grandmother close behind. They wore broad smiles, and Masvita hurried off to the stream. Grandmother came to the fire to drink her tea. She didn’t offer any explanation, so of course Nhamo couldn’t ask her anything.

  She pounced on her cousin when she found her packing a basket in the girls’ hut. “All right, what’s happening?” Nhamo said.

  Masvita grinned. “I’m going to stay with Vatete.” Vatete was Uncle Kufa’s sister in the next village, five miles away.

  “Whatever for?”

  “I’m a mhandara now,” Masvita said proudly.

  So that was it: Masvita’s first blood had shown, and she was going to stay with her father’s sister to be instructed in the secrets of womanhood. No wonder she was smiling!

  Nhamo felt her mutimwi hidden under her dress-cloth. Everyone, boys and girls, wore a secret cord to protect his or her fertility. Masvita’s mutimwi would be broken with great ceremony because now she had proven her readiness to bear children.

  It was hard to dislike Masvita—she was so goodnatured—but Nhamo felt a little serpent tongue of envy wriggle inside because her cousin had crossed the river into womanhood first.

  “How long will you be gone?” she asked.

  “Until the full moon. That way we can have a party all night,” Masvita replied.

  Flicker, flicker went the little serpent tongue. Of course there would be a party with dancing and good food.

  “Nhamo! Hurry up and give the little ones their breakfast,” said Grandmother as she entered the hut.

  Feeding the toddlers was Masvita’s job. Ordinarily, Nhamo would have enjoyed the chore, but her pleasure was spoiled by her cousin’s triumph. She spooned the porridge with such bad grace the little ones complained and cried for Masvita. She told them to be quiet if they didn’t want a smack, and they watched her with round, accusing eyes.

  Even the babies liked her cousin better! It wasn’t fair!

  At midmorning, Grandmother placed the broken mutimwi and a stamping pole from one of the mortars across the doorway of Uncle Kufa and Aunt Chipo’s hut. Gravely, the parents stepped over these, to show that they accompanied their daughter on her journey to womanhood. The old mutimwi was burned, and Masvita, who was hidden in Grandmother’s hut, was presented with a new one. She wasn’t allowed to see her parents until after her visit to Vatete was over.

  As soon as Masvita left, Nhamo stalked off to the deserted village. Let Aunt Chipo beat her! She didn’t care. She bent over the rock pool and studied her body. She didn’t look like a mhandara yet. Her chest was as flat as the top of a drum.

  “At least I won’t have to get married soon,” she told Mother when she had laid out the utensils and picture. “Masvita will probably go to someone with two wives already. They’ll beat her when he isn’t looking.”

  She listened to Mother’s reply.

  “Oh, I don’t really want Masvita to suffer. Or not much,” Nhamo added honestly. “But sometimes I wish Masvita would do something bad. It would feel so good to have a reason to dislike her!” She cut slices of sponge cake and served them with ice cream. She had never seen ice, let alone ice cream.

  Then she laid out a plate of fried chicken. She and Mother were going to celebrate today. They finished up with lemonade sweet enough to make their jaws ache.

  “When I become a mhandara,” she announced, “I’ll get a new dress-cloth and a necklace of blue beads. I’ll have pink plastic shoes like that pair Aunt Shuvai got from the trading post. When I come back from Vatete’s house, I’ll have a party, too.”

  A sudden thought struck her. Masvita’s vatete was, of course, Uncle Kufa’s sister. Who was hers?

  Father must have a sister. Where was she? Not in any village Nhamo knew about.

  A child belonged to its father’s family. No matter that Nhamo had spent her entire life with Mother’s relatives. When the time came for her to marry, Father would arrange the bride-price.

  “Grandmother will send a message to him,” Nhamo assured Mother. “Ambuya says he is at Mtoroshanga. She must know how to call him.”

  By now Nhamo’s stomach was grumbling. It was all very well to eat pretend cake and chicken, but her real stomach felt like the two sides were stuck together. She repacked her treasures, slid down the rock, and built a fire in the dry streambed. Nhamo dug around the deserted gardens until she had found several sweet potatoes to roast.

  Then, driven more by thirst than by any desire to return home, she gathered a bundle of wood—to mollify Aunt Chipo—and trudged back to the stream.

  She entered the village nervously. She had been gone for hours. The water pots had been neglected, the pumpkins unwatered, the mealies unstamped. Aunt Chipo would be furious! Nhamo dropped the firewood outside the cooking hut and braced herself.

  But Grandmother came out instead. Aunt Chipo was squatting inside, her mouth set in a sour line. She didn’t say anything. Ambuya beckoned for Nhamo to follow her. In amazement, Nhamo saw Ruva and the other girls hauling water from the stream.

  “It won’t hurt them to bend their backs for once,” Grandmother remarked. “I need my granddaughter’s company today.”

  “Masvita is your granddaughter, too,” Nhamo couldn’t resist saying.

  “Yes, but she’s off getting her skin oiled and her mouth sweetened with honey. Anyhow, Little Pumpkin, sometimes I find Miss Masvita just a little dull.”

  Nhamo was astounded by this. It was the first time anyone had hinted Masvita might be anything less than perfect.

  Grandmother took Nhamo into her hut and gave her—wonder of wonders!—lemonade with sugar. Exactly what she had pretend-given Mother.

  “Your mother grew slowly,” said Ambuya, startling Nhamo out of her reverie. “I worried a great deal at the time, but people are like plants. Some shoot up like weeds, and some are slow like fruit trees. In the end, the fruit trees are worth more.”

  That sounded all right to Nhamo: Masvita was a weed.

  “Runako, your mother, was worth waiting for. Did you know she could read?”

  Nhamo shook her head. Things were getting more surprising by the minute.

  “Your grandfather and I used to live at Nyanga in Zimbabwe. It’s cold there. Ice forms on the water in winter.”

  Nhamo tried to imagine it.

  “Grandfather cut trees for a white farmer. Oh, such strange trees! They were tall, with leaves like needles. Every one was exactly alike, and they grew in rows like vegetables. Every week, the farmer’s wife gave us a sack of mealie meal, sugar, cooking oil, and meat. She also gave me cloth once a year and, when your mother and Chipo were old enough, school uniforms. Shuvai was still a baby.”

  “What’s a un-i-form?” said Nhamo, stumbling over the unfamiliar word.

  “A dress. All the girls at school wore exactly the same thing. It looked very smart to see them lined up with their faces scrubbed and their hair combed.” Grandmother sighed. She didn’t speak for a while, and Nhamo knew she was remembering. Ambuya wept when she thought of Mother, so Nhamo had always been afraid to ask questions. She was excited to learn that Mother had gone to school. Perhaps she ate ice cream, too.

  “Runako was so clever! The headmaster said she could go to university someday. Chipo, on the other hand, forgot everything as quickly as possible. How different things might have been…”

  Grandmother trailed off again. N
hamo sipped her lemonade slowly, to make it last. Outside, crows cawed and someone shouted at them. They must be trying to raid the garden.

  “One day Grandfather was killed by a car as he was walking along a road. The farmer gave me his pay for that month—ten dollars—and turned us out of the house. His wife gave me two old dresses and a photograph of herself—I tore the picture up the minute I was out of sight! We had no house, no money, no work. This village was the only place we could survive. Runako cried when I took her books back to the school.”

  Ambuya fell silent. Quite soon, she began to snore. Nhamo gently helped her lie down and stretched out on the mat herself to think.

  Masvita returned the day of the full moon. Her head was shaved and she wore a new dress-cloth. It was yellow with dark-blue fish and a red border. Aunt Chipo killed a chicken in honor of Vatete, who had returned with her, and several other relatives arrived from the other village with baskets of food.

  Technically, the party was merely a family gathering on a full-moon night, but everyone knew it was really to celebrate Masvita’s new status. She would be a fine woman, everyone said. She was modest and obedient. She never put herself forward, but kept her position respectfully equal with other people, and she did not say irritatingly clever things. The praises became more extravagant as the beer flowed.

  Nhamo padded from group to group with snacks. Old Takawira sang in a reedy voice as his son played an mbira, a hand piano. Someone else was beating a drum. Nhamo’s feet danced along to the music. Uncle Kufa sent her to fetch more bananas from the grove at the edge of the village.

  She could see the party from the shadows of the banana trees. If she made a circle with her hands, the whole village fit inside. Here and there were small, lively fires. People danced and chattered, and she smelled popcorn and beer. It suddenly seemed that she held everyone in her hands, like a picture in a magazine. She could almost roll them up and hide them in a pot.

  Cough-cough.

  From the dark forest behind her came a noise.

  Cough-cough.

  Nhamo didn’t have to think. She burst out of the banana trees and ran faster than she dreamed possible. She fled back to the campfires and fell on her knees in front of her astonished relatives.

  “Nhamo,” cried several people, springing to their feet.

  “Did you hurt yourself?”

  “What’s the matter?”

  Nhamo lay on the ground, moaning with terror. “Leopard,” she finally managed to gasp.

  Everyone grabbed branches from the fire and ran off to protect the animal pens. For a while, all was confusion. Men shouted; women dragged babies into huts. Then, gradually, the commotion died down.

  “All that exercise has given me a powerful thirst,” said a man, tossing his burning branch into the fire.

  “Me, too,” agreed his friend, settling next to a pot of beer.

  “I didn’t see any leopard tracks,” Uncle Kufa said in a dangerous voice.

  “It—was in the forest behind the banana trees.” Nhamo was huddled against Grandmother’s knees.

  “If you ask me, she made it up,” said Aunt Chipo. “She’s always trying to grab attention.”

  “Look how she’s trembling. She isn’t making that up.” Ambuya patted Nhamo’s shoulder.

  “It’s so dark in the banana grove. I’ve often been frightened there,” Masvita added kindly. Uncle Kufa scowled, but he didn’t say anything more.

  Quite soon, everyone was singing and dancing again. Grandmother kept Nhamo by her side and refused to let her run any more errands. After a while, the conversation reverted to roora, the bride-prices that had been paid for various relatives. This was a very popular topic of conversation. Fathers counted on the wealth they would get for their daughters. How else could they be rewarded for raising otherwise useless girls? How else could they afford to buy wives for their sons and insure that they would eventually become ancestors?

  Sometimes it took many years to pay the roora; sometimes—there were several sly looks—it took no time at all. Nhamo understood that a woman’s value was determined by the size of her bride-price.

  Vatete told them all about someone who had earned a whole herd of cattle for her family. Years and years the son-in-law slaved to pay for his wife.

  “Ah,” everyone sighed with envy.

  On the other hand, Vatete said, even a barren goat was too much for some women, not mentioning names of course.

  “We won’t have that problem with Masvita,” said Aunt Shuvai.

  No indeed, everyone agreed.

  “Or with Ruva,” added Vatete. “She’s so plump and pretty.”

  Ruva ducked her head with embarrassment.

  What about me? Nhamo wanted to ask. I’m older than Ruva. What about me?

  She waited for Grandmother to introduce the subject, but Ambuya merely signaled for Aunt Shuvai to massage her feet. Not long afterward she sent Nhamo and the other girls to bed.

  5

  Wake up,” said Masvita, shaking Nhamo. Nhamo sat up and rubbed her face to clear it of sleep. It was still dark, although the crowing of a rooster told her dawn was not far away.

  “What’s the matter? Did the leopard come back?”

  “No. Vatete is sick. They’re sending for the nganga.”

  Nhamo got up at once. Nhamo’s village had no nganga, and sick people had to travel five miles to be treated. Vatete must be extremely ill to ask the doctor to come from her village.

  “She was tired by the walk yesterday,” Masvita said as they hurried through the dark. “We had to rest every mile or so. I thought she was better last night, but she began to vomit after the party.”

  By now they were at Aunt Chipo’s hut. Vatete was curled up on a mat inside, and Aunt Shuvai was wiping her face with a wet cloth. Nhamo saw at once that Vatete was extremely ill.

  “Thank goodness! Nhamo, cut some thatching grass. We need it for bedding.” Aunt Shuvai dipped the cloth in water and bathed the sick woman’s arms and chest. “She’s very hot. I don’t think this is food poisoning.”

  Nhamo took a sickle and hurried off. The first streaks of light were turning the clouds pink. She could see well enough, but she moved cautiously after leaving the village. No one else had seen any trace of the leopard, but Nhamo had no doubts about its existence.

  Presently, she came to a stand of dry grass and sliced off as much as she could carry. When she returned, Aunt Shuvai and Masvita packed a layer under the sick woman. Aunt Chipo attempted to give her water, but Vatete only moaned and pushed her away. The sick woman was curled up in a ball as though her stomach hurt. Her face was gray and her eyes were squeezed shut.

  “Don’t just stand there, Nhamo,” Aunt Chipo snapped. “Fix breakfast and feed the babies. Don’t think you’re going to sneak off to the bushes today, my girl!”

  Nhamo spun around and left. She felt stung that Aunt Chipo thought she would run away during an emergency. It hadn’t escaped her notice either that she had been the one awakened to cut grass.

  At least it shows they believed me about the leopard, thought Nhamo with a bleak smile. She blew last night’s coals into a flame and hauled a large pot to the fireplace.

  All day she ran from one chore to another. Inside Aunt Chipo’s hut, Masvita fanned Vatete, and Nhamo’s aunts watched with expressions of great worry. Uncle Kufa sent another messenger to urge the nganga to hurry.

  But at midday Aunt Chipo and Masvita suddenly broke into wild cries. Aunt Shuvai rushed out of the hut, pulling her hair. “She’s dead! She’s dead!” she wailed. She fell on her knees. Nhamo caught her emotion and began to wail, too. Other women rushed to add their cries.

  Poor, poor Vatete, Nhamo thought as she rocked back and forth with her arms tightly wrapped around her chest. Only last night she was joking about roora. She was so happy!

  People hurried off to carry the message to the other village. A woman poured ashes into a mortar and pounded them as she called the names of Vatete’s relatives who lived to
o far away to attend the funeral. “Cousin Kuda,” she cried, “Greataunt Misodzi. Uncle Tendai. Please do not be frightened. Your relative has died here. We know you would come if you could.” The ashes blew away on the wind, carrying the message.

  But when evening came, grim news arrived. People were dying in the other village. Even the nganga lay in his hut, unable to rise. None of the relatives would be able to come.

  “What is this illness?” Nhamo whispered to Masvita.

  “Ambuya says it’s cholera,” Masvita whispered back.

  Nhamo’s eyes opened very wide.

  “She says we must boil our water. We must wash our hands carefully and go far from the village when we have to—”

  Nhamo nodded. They would have to provide old Takawira with a pot.

  “But Father”—Masvita meant Uncle Kufa—“says it’s witchcraft.”

  Nhamo sucked in her breath. That meant a witch-finding ceremony. She had never seen one, but she had heard about them. The most horrible thing was that a person could be a witch and not even know. He or she—it was usually she—could ride hyenas at night and spread sickness, and in the morning she wouldn’t remember anything about it.

  “There’s not much we can do until after the funeral. Vatete’s sisters are supposed to prepare the body, but for all we know they’re dead, too.” Masvita began to cry again, and Nhamo waited patiently for her to be finished. She didn’t feel like crying. She knew this showed lack of proper feeling, but she had barely known Vatete.

  Aunt Chipo washed the dead woman’s body. She broke Vatete’s mutimwi and laid it aside to give to whichever female relatives might survive. This cut Vatete’s last tie with life. No longer would she tend her garden or prepare food for her family. She would not sit by the fire, nor would she clap respectfully when her husband returned from hunting. Now she belonged to the spirits and would dwell in the land of her ancestors forever.

  Aunt Chipo dressed the dead woman again and wrapped her in a cloth to await the funeral.

  A brooding sense of disaster hung over the village that night. The men ate silently in the dare. The women sat drawn and worried inside their huts. This death was not natural. Trouble would surely come of it.