He held her breast and she let him squeeze it. ‘You can stay in this palace with me – as my guest.’
‘No, Your Highness. You see, Uncle Namme he tol’ me to return back before de night come.’
‘I’ll send a messenger to tell him you’re well and happy.’ He stroked her cheek. ‘Jagwa, wha’s your reply?’ His eyes burnt into her cheeks.
She sighed. ‘Ah tol’ you before, Chief Ofubara. I tol’ you dat I got somethin’ to beg you. You already done one. You release Nancy. But dis one is somethin’ I want to beg you for myself.’ She felt his hands slacken. ‘When am leavin’ dis Krinameh, I want me an’ you to go togedder to Bagana. I take God beg you dis. We will go togedder to Bagana, and you will shake hand with Uncle Namme. Das all I beg you.’
Chief Ofubara sat straight up on the settee. ‘I got my pride, Madam. Why they themselves can’t come to me? They know the way!’
‘But you tol’ me jus’ now dat you love me?’
‘Yes.’
‘An’ you promise to give me wardrobe. An’ I know dat if you ready to give me money, it will be somethin’ … But I don’ ask you for all dat. I jus’ ask you to come with me to Bagana an’ shake hand with Uncle Namme. Den you two kin talk. Lissen, Chief Ofubara. Your country people, dem suffer because of dis foolish proud you showin’. You proud. David Namme proud. Uncle Namme proud. Well, I got no proud, so I beg you for my sake.’ She saw that he was listening and went on: ‘Just now you talk with me. You say you wan’ unity. Well, I goin’ to give you de chance to get dat unity! …’
She got down and began to unbutton her skirt herself. His eyes widened. She was wearing silk undergarments frilled with the finest lace. She knew how clean her body was and how beautifully groomed. When he talked now, his voice was trembling. He was hooked.
‘So that’s all you want from me? Just that.’
‘Oh, God bless you! … I know you’re better dan dem all. Dem only talking word. But you doin’ de deed! …’
‘I like your shape, Jagua … I wan’ to marry you.’
‘Am a business woman; I can’t marry no one, Chief.’
One part of her felt intensely sorry for the Chief. He was still under the Jagwa dazzle and she knew she could have got anything out of him. She asked for some more O.H.M.S. which he quickly provided and they sat drinking. She strutted about the room in her high heels and jutted out her hips. His eyes were getting redder and redder with every passing moment. He slapped her bottom and pulled her to his knees, kneading her breasts.
He took her to bed and she gave him herself with an abandon calculated to shock and delight him. The feigned noises, practised over the years, the carefully punctuated sighs and cries of pain, the sudden flexing of thighs and neck … All these she performed with a precision which surprised herself. It was a long time since she had played her true role.
Chief Ofubara went mad. ‘I mus’ marry you.’ He rose and walked to another room. She heard him rummaging in a cupboard. When he came back he was holding a green canvas bag. ‘We got no use for this here …’ He threw a wad of notes on the bed. It was marked one hundred pounds. ‘You say you’re from Ogabu. The bride price there is about one hundred and twenty pounds.’ He dipped his hand into the bag and threw on the bed another bundle. It was marked fifty pounds.
Jagua sat quite still. She felt rotten, loose and awful. She knew she could never really abandon her past life and settle down with someone like Chief Ofubara in a village like Krinameh. But the money would come in useful. She reached out her hand and clasped the two bundles.
‘Come lay down, Chief. You never satisfy me. I hungry for your love.’ She guessed that none of his wives would dare talk to him as an equal. He came and lay beside her. She took off his clothes for him and kissed him.
‘Hol’ me tight. I goin’ to teach you ’bout de worl’. I goin’ to show you how young man use’ to loss his head when ’e sleep Jagwa woman.’
He was mumbling incoherently and sucking at her lips like a child of six months. She stroked his hair tenderly and laughed the submissive laughter of the practised whore, brassy, with an eye to the gold coins in the trousers pocket.
Jagua Nana remained in the palace at Krinameh for ten days. And every day a canoeman from Bagana came searching for her in the palace at Krinameh, but she always sent him back to tell Uncle Namme that she was well and would soon return.
The wounded lion had been caged. Jagua felt the proud glow heroes must feel on their return, victorious, from the hunting ground, carrying the vanquished animal on their shoulders. When the people of Bagana saw the Royal Canoe of Krinameh with Chief Ofubara gloriously seated in it, they stared. They crowded the beach. The canoe landed and stalwart arms lifted Jagua and Chief Ofubara and planted them on Bagana soil. Chief Ofubara took a handful of the soil and tasted it and Jagua heard him mumbling like a man at prayer.
Jagua showed him Uncle Namme standing in the group further away from the water’s edge. He was flanked by his councillors. Mama Nancy and Nancy stood on the fringes of the group. Nancy was wearing a maroon T-shirt with a white bow above her left breast.
Jagua whispered to Chief Ofubara. ‘Go meet Uncle Namme now. Remember how you promise me? I take God beg you: don’ show any proud. Go meet Uncle Namme. Salute am like you brodder an’ let everythin’ finish today!’
Chief Ofubara tottered and hesitated, but Jagua gave him no respite. She prodded him in the back. One step at a time he advanced on Uncle Namme and his Councillors, holding out his hand. Jagua saw the muscles tighten in Uncle Namme’s jaw. He must be struggling with himself. Instead of taking the proferred arm, Uncle Namme opened out his arms and the two men embraced. The tears came in a flood to Jagua’s eyes as she watched the scene.
Many times in later years Jagua saw this happy moment in her dreams. It was evening and the sun was peeping for the last time over the tops of the mangrove trees. The bars of gold etched out the red and yellow robes of the two royal men who had been in strife for over thirty years, but had now come together. Fussing around them was an amateur photographer, focusing his lens on the great Bagana picture that was later to hang on every wall in Krinameh and Bagana. While the men embraced drums of Bagana sang out the joyful news. Men ran after goats, and capturing them slashed off their heads. Fowls were taken and their blood spilt on the family altars. The news went round and round that a great thing had happened, that a woman from another land had brought with her the good luck they had prayed for all the time. Jagua beamed with joy. She knew that her victory in bringing the two feuding villages together was far greater than Nancy’s mastery of the Bagana dance. She did not deceive herself into thinking that the problem had been solved. Wounds inflicted many years ago, she knew, still festered. But she was glad. The first step had been taken; and there was goodwill on both sides.
She could hardly see clearly for tears as she joined the procession to the palace, mumbling the joyful song with the crowd.
‘When David Namme returns from Port Harcourt,’ said Uncle Namme, ‘we shall rejoice – properly. Oh, this is a great thing.’ He turned and looked admiringly at Jagua. ‘So this is what kept you, eh? You did well! You should be made a queen of Bagana for this!’
‘I already ask her,’ Chief Ofubara said.
‘And she refused, of course!’ laughed Uncle Namme. ‘She promised Freddie Namme, but I don’t know about that young man. He wants Jagua, he wants Nancy! He must make up his mind … I don’t understand these modern people … But Jagua is a sincere lady.’ He winked at Chief Ofubara. ‘If you’re serious, perhaps she will change her mind. Personally, I believe Jagua will suit you fine, eh?’ He was in a happy mood, Jagua could see that and she smiled and sang even louder.
The mention of Freddie shot through her a stab of remorse and pain. She knew she must not wait any longer in Bagana. She must be on her way back, through Ogabu and Onitsha. Her mission in Bagana was accomplished. She had known Freddie’s people and become known to them. No matter what her enemies thought and said, she felt she ha
d contributed something to the happiness of Bagana.
That night, in the middle of the drumming, with the hurricane lanterns etching out the muscular outlines of the dancers, Jagua went and touched Chief Ofubara. He lifted his face and his eyes danced with admiration. For his benefit she had shampooed and curled her hair and from her earrings down to her dancing shoes, the colour was violet. The hurricane lamps caressed the skin above her breasts, her bare shoulders and arms. She had accentuated her eyes with discreet applications of antimony. The total effect pleased her: that of the well-groomed and happy woman, mature and independent.
‘Tomorrow, I mus’ be goin’ back …’
He jumped in his seat. ‘Nonsense! You not going anywhere! Not while I live. Don’t you like it here? You must follow me back to Krinameh. I’ve already paid your bride price!’
‘You can have de money back.’ Her fingers sought the catch of her handbag. Chief Ofubara restrained her.
‘Wait!’
‘Is all you thinkin’ about! You think you kin buy me with money? Am a free woman. An’ I already sleep wit’ you ten night an’ give you experience of Lagos woman dat you never dream! …’
‘I’m sorry, Jagua! … I’m only jokin’ … Now, Jagua, what are you going to do about your fiery temper?’ He held her arm tightly. The drumming and the laughter, the shouting and the cheering insulated them in a private world.
‘You kin have your money back, Chief Ofubara. But you mus’ promise me about Bagana.’
‘That’s settled, Jagua. David Namme’s going to be Yaniba of Bagana. We’re going to draft a letter to the Government and recognize him … already the people of Bagana promise they’ll give me some trading agencies and financial help with education and medical work.’
Jagua sat on the edge of his chair. ‘You see now! I already tol’ you. Is pride dat killin’ you two family. If to say you still prouding, where you will get all dis?’
‘I have you to thank, Jagua.’ He tapped her arm. ‘Come with me, Jagua, and let’s talk seriously.’
‘You done gone crase about me?’ She giggled, showing all her teeth. That night, Jagua was looking as beautiful as she had ever been in her life.
She walked beside him. The moonlight had a yellowness that gilded everything it touched. He was talking earnestly as they approached the beach-side but she manœuvred him to the bathing-place where she had forced Nancy into the lagoon and pursued her into the Krinameh rocks. The coconut palms spread their dark fronds into the face of the moon. She looked beyond the haze and saw Krinameh. She remembered the silk-lined bedroom, the O.H.M.S. evenings, and the days when the Councillors came in and Chief Ofubara introduced her to them as ‘my special visitor from Lagos’. How the men laughed and told Chief Ofubara not to deceive them, to speak up like a man if he had married a Lagos queen, so they could come and drink his O.H.M.S. She would gladly go there and live with him. He seemed to see things in her own way. He listened to her advice; he appreciated her. He would solve the problem of her life. But was there sufficient urge?
He broke into her thoughts. ‘That’s Krinameh over there; and you can join me and be very happy there …’
She knew he had the money to lavish on her. If he could casually fling away one hundred and fifty pounds he also had some gallantry. She leaned against him.
‘I confuse. I don’ think I fit to say anything till ah reach Lagos. After!’
‘Then you’ll come back to Krinameh?’ He gripped her hands. ‘You’re not deceiving me – you’re speaking the truth?’
‘Ah goin’ to come back.’ She walked away from him with a wiggle of her hips, striking a pose. ‘I think you wan’ me – not so?’
He came towards her, hands outstretched. Jagua walked into his arms and he lifted her joyfully.
‘You’ll come back to me – promise.’
‘I already tol’ you. Or you don’ trust me?’
He set her down. In silence they walked towards the palace. A chorus of female voices came floating towards them on the thin veils of the night. Jagua remembered that she must go to bed early, so as to leave early tomorrow morning. She would not be able to keep the all-night vigil of the joyful Baganans.
At the entrance to the palace gate, Jagua saw a woman who seemed to be waiting to speak to them. It was Mama Nancy. She must have watched their going and now was making sure of seeing their coming.
‘De harlot woman!’ she said aloud. ‘De shameless harlot woman! She sleepin’ with de Papa, an’ she lyin’ to de Pickin’, and she don’ care nothin’. De harlot woman! You goin’ to die wretched! Vulture will chop you eye!’
‘Ma Nancy, you talkin’ to me?’ Jagua flared, leaping towards her enemy. Chief Ofubara restrained her.
‘Try to act like a queen! Ignore her!’
Jagua struggled, but the Chief’s grip was unshakeable. She could do nothing but yield. Mama Nancy’s curse followed her, rising louder and louder but the drumming suppressed the vitriol in her words, neutralizing their sharpness.
15
By now Bagana had become a chain of rusty-red pan roofs on a horizon dominated by a church steeple and set deep beyond the flat waters of the creek. Jagua’s canoe swung into one of the wide arms of the Niger Delta, heading towards Port Harcourt. It was her way home to Ogabu and Lagos. It was goodbye to Bagana, goodbye to Chief Ofubara, Uncle Namme, Mama Nancy, Nancy Oll, Krinameh, the war drummers. The swarthy face of Chief Ofubara had become even darker as he told her: ‘Remember your promise, Jagua. I already paid the bride-price.’ His voice had been dead earnest.
Jagua held her breast as if that would ease the pain. Now that the canoe was taking her away from Bagana and Krinameh, she began to think of the fishing people with a touch of nostalgia. She would come back to Krinameh, to the spot where the youths had dived in and captured the naked Nancy Oll. This one desire – to come back – kept expressing itself. She could not suppress the montage of jutting rocks, and salt-creeks, and Chief Ofubara’s moustachios and O.H.M.S. decanters and the intertwined legs on the bed, the finger-tips on unshaven jaws and her whispers of ‘I goin’ to teach you about Lagos woman, to make you loss your min’ …’ Now it was she, strangely enough, who was on the verge of losing her head over the Chief.
Suddenly she was seeing Chief Ofubara as the outcast of Krinameh, as a man who was infatuated with her, as a man of her own age and attitudes. She could see that he had never really experienced the sensation of African woman as equal. Jagua treated him as she would treat a brother or a precocious lover in modern Lagos. Her glance stripped him of his title, and he became a man lusting after her; her temper made him her slave, willing to obey her maddest whims merely to restore the smile on her lips.
When the canoe turned the creeks she stood up, nearly upsetting it. The other passengers protested, but Jagua was waving at a Bagana vanishing in the rising heat. ‘Goodbye, Chief! … Expect me! … I mus’ surely come an’ see you again!’
In Ogabu she kept the mammy wagon waiting in the forest lane and ran to her father’s house. The barking of the old watchman’s dog welcomed her. He came out of the hut and brought the dog to heel.
‘Daughter. You back? You stop there long time.’ The sun caught the angles of his shoulders and elbows, the criss-cross wrinkles on his bare skin. His eyes were dancing with delight.
‘Only three week I stay. Where’s Papa an’ Mama?’
‘You’re to be feared!’ He clicked his hands at her, in a gesture of reproach. ‘You won’t even bring down your load, you begin’ ask about Papa an’ Mama! Your Papa still on tour.’
‘I go an’ see dem for Onitsha!’
She ran quickly back to the lorry and jumped in beside the driver. The old man called after her. ‘If you don’t see them, you find Brother Fonso in the market.’ He waved at her. ‘Go well!’ By this time, his children had appeared and were waving and yelling. Before the people of Ogabu gathered to make a fuss, Jagua’s lorry was well on the way to Onitsha.
She found Fonso in Onitsha Marke
t sitting among bicycle parts, poring over an account book. It was just as the old man had said. He did not appear to her different in the least. If anything he appeared a little paler, like one whom the world has treated none too gently.
‘Ai, Sister!’ He looked up and shut the book. ‘You come to our Onitsha? Is it in a good way?’
‘I jus’ from home; I returnin’ to Lagos by de ferry, so I say let me come an’ see how you gettin’ on.’
Fonso folded his book and talked to his helper, a young man in khaki. He talked earnestly while Jagua waited.
‘Le’s go,’ he said. ‘De ferry can cross you today, but you mus’ stop and eat pepper with me. Is a long time I seen you.’
Jagua followed him into his little house by the waterside. Onitsha, the market town, she thought as they passed along the streets with the noise of bicycles, the blaring of gramophone records, the tooting of horns, all slamming at her eardrums. Onitsha was busy in a fiendish way, minting the money. By the riverside she saw the yams and the cassava, the newly-killed fish and the long canoes, vying for the merest space in which to squeeze and make a stand against the customers. The riverboats and launches were drenching the market with soot. Jagua felt caught up in the unbelievable atmosphere of trickery, opportunism, intuition, daring and amazing decisions. People who lived here, she was sure, did not care what happened elsewhere; they were hard-headed and complete strangers to laziness.
Brother Fonso pointed them out to her triumphantly. She sensed a sharp reproach in his manner, though as yet he had said nothing direct. He talked about their father, how ill he was and how neglected. ‘One day, you’ll just hear he’s dead.’ Was Jagua doing anything in Lagos, and when Jagua said she was trading in cloth, Fonso laughed. ‘Let us hear somethin’ else, Jagua. You deceivin’ no one. My dear sister, is time you stop your loose life. Is a shameful thin’ to me, your brother. I got a beautiful sister like you. God made you with dignity; an’ when I think of your kind of life …’ He was not looking at her face, and he walked so quickly that she found difficulty in keeping up with him. ‘So what I say to you is this. My sister, come home and stay in the family. You don’ wan’ to marry. Awright. Nobody forcin’ you. Den keep yourself with respect.’
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