Ama

by Manu Herbstein

  “In the castle dungeons, no doubt,” replied Augusta.

  “Maame, is it not wicked to treat human beings like that? I mean to chain them as if they were animals and then sell them to the Europeans? Are they not our own people, our own brothers and sisters?”

  “Young woman, that is dangerous talk. I hope you do not talk such words to Mijn Heer.”

  “Maame, I am sorry if I have offended you, but when I looked at their faces, it was my own face I saw. It was as if I were looking into a mirror. Since then my sleep has been disturbed. I have had bad dreams.”

  “Ama, you must stop this talk at once. Let me tell you something. Three hundred slaves arrived. One hundred of those belonged to the King, whom you will see presently. Of the balance, sixty were mine and another twenty were for my husband. I made a special journey to the market at Simbew to buy them from the Asante. All three hundred have been delivered to the castle, but we, the suppliers, have yet to be paid. Mijn Heer says he must sell them before he settles his accounts with us. That is how we have always done business together. If you had ever been in trade, you would know the importance of giving credit to good customers. I do not distrust him. However, the sooner he sells them and settles his accounts, the better for all of us here.

  “Mijn Heer is trying to persuade this English captain, Williams, to fill his ship with slaves from Elmina. If he is successful, we will be paid at once. That is why I have invited the two of them to visit our town and why, as you will see, we are showing Williams such special hospitality. The King himself will welcome Williams. He does not do that for every white captain who drops anchor at Elmina, believe me. But of course Nana has an even larger stake in this transaction than I have. It is important for us to make Williams feel good so that he will agree to buy many slaves.

  “Have you understood what I have been telling you? Now, I do not want you to spoil everything by making speeches about your sympathy for the slaves. Do you think we are not also sorry for them? I don’t need you to tell me that they are human beings, even if I would not go so far as to call them my brothers and sisters. But every one of them has done something to deserve his fate. Some have been defeated in war, others have fallen into debt, or been forfeited as pawns and so on. Some have even been sold into slavery by their own parents. That is life. In Edina we depend on this trade for our livelihood. Where do you think I get the gold dust to buy these clothes, these ornaments? I will tell you. My profit from trade in cloth and other merchandise is nothing to me by comparison with what I make from trading in slaves.

  “I hope I have made myself clear. I am sorry to have to speak to you so harshly, but I must warn you to speak no more of a matter concerning which you are ignorant and which, moreover, is none of your business.”

  She turned her angry face away. Ama’s mind was in a turmoil. She felt humiliated, wrung out like a damp piece of cloth. She bowed her head. There was nothing she could do but apologise. She was near to tears. She bit her lip.

  She said, “Maame, I beg you. I am sorry. I will not talk of this again.”

  Augusta looked at her and saw her distress.

  “I did not mean that you should never talk to me about the slave trade. If it troubles you, you may talk. But only at a proper time and at a proper place. Now wipe the tears from your eyes and smile at me.”

  * * *

  Two male slaves, heads shaven, bare to the waist, each armed with a spear, stood guard at the gate of the palace. They greeted Augusta respectfully as the party approached.

  “Now, Ama,” said Augusta, “forget that you are a slave. As far as we are concerned, you are the Director’s wife.”

  They passed through a covered porch into a single storied courtyard and then through a short passage into an enclosed quadrangle. Here the King held court with his elders each day except Tuesday, which was the day set aside for Tweneboa, the spirit of the Benya.

  Opposite the entrance, on the far side of the courtyard, the elders, wing chiefs and family heads sat on stools under an awning. They were dressed in colourful calico prints, folded and wrapped calf-length around the waist. Each wore a necklace of beads and most a cap of deerskin or a European hat.

  The King was at the centre, the only one seated on a chair, He alone wore his cloth over his shoulder. It was rich plain red velvet A heavy gold necklace, several gold bracelets on each arm and rings of the same material on every finger evidenced his status. His sandals, too, were encrusted with gold. An enormous red and green umbrella, embroidered with gold thread, gave him shade.

  “Àgòo!” called Augusta, announcing their presence and asking permission to enter.

  “Amêê,” came the acknowledgement from her husband, who was the Omankyeame, the official spokesman of the King.

  Augusta led the visitors in single file to perform the customary greetings. Facing their hosts palm to palm from the right, the visitors shook hands with each of the elders in turn.

  “Your Majesty,” said De Bruyn in Dutch, “I hope you are well.”

  “Thank you,” replied the King in the same language.

  Chairs had been arranged under another awning on the opposite side of the courtyard. When the visitors were seated, slaves brought them palm wine.

  Then the elders rose and threw their cloths over their left shoulders. The Omankyeame, his staff of office in his hand, led the King, followed by his umbrella bearer and the others to shake hands with the visitors. The slave attendants turned the elders’ stools, and the King’s chair, on their sides as they rose, setting them right only when their owners returned.

  When they had again taken their seats and adjusted their cloths, the Omankyeame stood up and spoke in Fanti. He welcomed the visitors on behalf of the King and asked the purpose of their visit. Augusta translated this into Dutch for De Bruyn and De Bruyn translated into English for Williams. Then Augusta stood up and spoke, also in Fanti.

  “Nana and respected nobles,” she said, “we bring you no ill tidings.”

  There was a murmur of acknowledgement.

  “His Excellency the Director-General of the Dutch company, Mijn Heer De Bruyn,” she continued, “is well known to you. He asks me to greet the King on his behalf and wish him well.”

  She paused for her husband, the Omankyeame, to speak.

  “Nana,” he said, turning to the King, “the woman says that the visitors do not bring any bad news. She says that the Director greets you.”

  “This young woman is his wife,” Augusta continued. “Her name is Ama Donko and her Dutch name is Pamela.”

  Another murmur.

  “She speaks the Asante and Fanti languages. She can read and write in English as well as any white man.”

  The elders had heard about Ama, but this was the first time they had seen her.

  “She can read and write in English as well as any white man,” each repeated to his neighbour, nodding sagely.

  Ama bowed her head in modesty. She had not expected this.

  “Nana,” the Omankyeame told the King, “she says the young woman is the wife of the Director. She says that this young woman can read and write in the language of the English.”

  “This gentleman is called David Williams,” continued Augusta. “He is an Englishman and is the Captain of the ship which is lying offshore at present. We know that the Dutch and the English are rivals, but, in spite of this, the Captain is an old friend of the Director-General. He has come to our country to buy slaves. His holds are empty and he can accommodate as many as four hundred in his ship. Since he speaks only English, he has asked me to greet you, Nana, and to bring you the friendly greetings of the English King.”

  The Omankyeame told the King what his wife had said.

  “Omankyeame,” said Augusta, “the Director has brought Nana one anker of the best French brandy and a parcel of Brazilian tobacco and begs you to accept these gifts as a token of his esteem and that of Captain Williams.”

  “The King thanks the Director and the Captain and is pleased to acc
ept his gift,” said the Omankyeame.

  Augusta signalled to Vroom and Kobina to deliver the gifts.

  While she was telling De Bruyn what she had said to the King, more or less; and De Bruyn was translating for Williams, the Omankyeame again led the King and the elders to shake their hands to express his thanks.

  When they had resumed their seats, the Omankyeame held out a pewter mug. A slave extracted the bung from the keg and filled the vessel with brandy. Adjusting his cloth with one hand, the Omankyeame poured a little of the drink onto the ground before him.

  “Gods of the silent world,” he intoned, “we are here. Tweneboa, spirit of Benya, greatest of the seventy seven gods of our nation, we greet you. Let gold flow. Let the sea and the lagoon be abundant with fish and the forest with game. We beseech you. Let the heavens give us rain and the soil give us food. Let there be peace and prosperity for all.

  “Nana Kwa Amankwaa, founder of our nation, and all the great kings who have ruled us since and have gone before us: the King and elders of Edina greet you. We beg you to share this drink with us.”

  He poured some more of the liquor from the mug. The brandy soaked into the dry ground.

  “We are gathered here today, the King and elders of the people of Edina, to welcome the white visitors, the chief of the castle and the captain of the ship who has come from over the sea to buy slaves. We have sold so many slaves to the Dutchman that his dungeons are full. Yet he says he cannot pay us until he, in turn, has sold the slaves to the white visitor. The captain has an empty ship. We beg you to use your powers to persuade the captain to fill his ship from the Dutchman’s dungeons.”

  Another decantation.

  “I have spoken what the King has commanded,” he said and emptied the mug.

  The vessel was refilled and passed from elder to elder. Each took a draft. Four glasses of the brandy were sent across for the visitors. Mijn Heer and Williams threw back their heads and poured down the drink. Ama took a sip. It burnt her throat and brought tears to her eyes.

  The King was consulting the Omankyeame. Several elders gathered around them.

  The Omankyeame stepped forward and spoke again.

  “Woman,” he said to Augusta, “Nana has instructed me to tell the white men that they are welcome and that their visit does him honour.”

  He paused for her to interpret.

  “You have told us that the Captain has come to our country to buy slaves.”

  Again he paused.

  “You should tell him that it is we who have supplied many of the slaves which the Director will sell to the Captain. The King assures him that these slaves are of the highest quality, healthy, strong and, above all, submissive to the will of their masters. The King says that he will be happy if the Captain will fill his holds with slaves from Elmina and so shorten his stay in these parts which are so unhealthy for white men.”

  Augusta was not sure that Williams would react favourably to this pressure.

  “This is what the King's linguist says,” she warned De Bruyn in Dutch, “but you might not want to translate all of it for the visitor.”

  “What does he say?” asked Williams, who was beginning to be bored by the tedious ceremonial, from which he was excluded.

  “The King asks you to convey his highest regards to the King of England,” De Bruyn replied, agreeing with Augusta’s assessment, “and to assure him of the King's ability to supply to him as many slaves of the highest quality as His Majesty might require.”

  Williams laughed.

  “Tell him that I undertake to pass on his message the very next time I meet King George.”

  “He has heard what you have said,” said Augusta, “and he will think on it.”

  They sat for a few minutes. The brandy had begun to take effect on some of the elders and a heated discussion broke out. The King listened impassively.

  Augusta rose again. “Àgòo,” she called for attention. “My lords, the white men have asked me to thank you for your hospitality. They would like to stay longer. However they have pressing business to attend to. Therefore they request your permission for them to take their leave.”

  “The road is there: permission is granted,” said the Omankyeame.

  The visitors rose and after a final round of handshaking left the palace.

  “Well, how did you find our King?” Augusta asked Ama as they emerged into the bustle of the market square.

  Ama was about to make an unfavourable comparison with the pomp and pageantry of the Asantehene's court, but she thought better of it.

  “He is a handsome man,” she dissembled.

  She no longer felt that she could be completely frank with Augusta. She was a slave, after all, and Augusta a slave trader; and the business of that morning’s meeting had been the trade in slaves.

  “Well, how did you find our King?” De Bruyn asked Williams.

  They were again walking ahead of the women.

  “He looks a great scoundrel to me,” Williams replied, “but that is only an impression. You have a longer experience with the blacks than I have: how do you find him?”

  “You are a good judge of character, Captain,” said De Bruyn. “His Majesty thinks it no crime to cheat us, if he can get away with it. In this he is no different from his subjects: they will boast amongst themselves of their skill and ingenuity in deceiving any Dutchman. The only one of them that I can trust is Augusta and even she, who was once my wife, is not above taking advantage of me if she sees an opportunity.”

  CHAPTER 21

  Sven Jensen, the Chief Merchant, ranked second after De Bruyn, above the Treasurer and the Commodore. Hendrik Van Schalkwyk stood fifth in precedence.

  Jensen was an efficient administrator. As a trader he drove a hard bargain. De Bruyn was content to devolve upon him responsibility for most of the commercial activities of the Company. He had an ear for languages: of all the Europeans at Elmina, he was the only one who had picked up sufficient Fanti to trade without using a mulatto interpreter.

  A handsome, at first sight charming man, the Dane was an inveterate, indiscriminate and shameless womaniser. He thought nothing of flouting the strict Company rules of conduct.

  He was fond of telling the story of a visit he had paid to a house in the town where he was well-known. An old woman was sweeping the courtyard, her face lined with wrinkles, her flat, empty dugs hanging down before her bent body. Without waiting for an invitation, Jensen had taken a seat and started to employ his charm on the hag. She, however, was not to be taken in by his sweet words.

  “First you fuck my daughter,” she had said. “Then you fuck her very own pikin, my granddaughter, who never know a man before. Now, today, my daughter is not in the house and my granddaughter neither. You talk, talk like you also want to fuck an old grandmother woman like me, too.”

  “Get out, you shameless wretch, get out,” she had screamed, driving him away with her broom.

  Jensen was not above arranging a short term conjunction between a castle employee and a female slave. He rendered no service free of charge, but the nature of the payment was negotiable, in cash or kind, or merely in the form of an obligation set to mature at some future, unspecified date.

  As poor Esi had discovered, he was not above paying a private visit to the female dungeons himself.

  One of Van Schalkwyk's duties was to send to the Classis in Amsterdam a confidential annual appraisal of the spiritual progress of the Elmina community. There was seldom anything good to report. A reasonable attendance at church could only be ensured by fining absentees. There was a great deal of heavy drinking, and much bad language, both of which would have caused the elders of the Classis particular offence, had they known. Given the least lapse of security, the men would take a female slave, with or without her consent. Van Schalkwyk feared that if the Classis became aware of the extent of the moral depravity at Elmina, they would blame him for dereliction of duty, rather than the sinners for their sins. His report was largely constructed of wish
ful thinking. He was aware, however, that the gentlemen of the Classis were no strangers to human weakness; on the contrary, they thrived on it. So he found it expedient to lend his fiction credibility by spicing it with a few salacious titbits.

  Van Schalkwyk had little to lose by disclosing at least part of the gossip about Jensen. He was aware of De Bruyn's dislike for the fellow and he was not averse to doing his friend a secret favour by cutting the Chief Merchant down to size. Jensen was, moreover, not a Dutchman and it was thus unlikely that he would have friends at court who might speak up on his behalf.

  Van Schalkwyk sent off his report to the Classis; the Classis wrote to the Council in Amsterdam and in due course De Bruyn received a letter asking him to investigate the allegations made against Jensen. He called the Chief Merchant in and told him the contents of the letter.

  Jensen immediately suspected Van Schalkwyk. He made no attempt to deny the charges. Instead he poured out a long stream of furious invective directed at the Chaplain.

  De Bruyn let him boil, quietly enjoying his deputy’s loss of composure.

  “My advice to you,” De Bruyn told him, when he had finished, “is to get married. Quickly. Without delay. I mean properly married, in church. I will issue the necessary instructions to the chaplain. I shall then be able to report the event to Amsterdam and to advise the authorities there of my expectation that the behaviour complained of will cease forthwith.”

  Jensen reluctantly accepted the Governor's advice and applied his mind to the selection of the wench who would be honoured with the title of Madam Jensen.

  Some years before, a well-known Cape Coast harlot, by name of Taguba, had borne a mulatto child, a girl, whom she had named Rose. The child's paternity was unknown but, judging from her appearance was evidently European. When the girl was about eleven years old, she was seen by a factor at Cape Coast castle, who went by name of John Thompson. Taking a fancy to the girl, Thompson had paid a dowry to Taguba in return for a promise that the girl would be his when she reached a proper age for matrimony.

  Jensen had visited Cape Coast on business and Thompson, meeting him for the first time and falling victim to his charm and flattery, had made the grievous error of boasting to his new friend of the beauty of his future wife. Shortly afterwards, Thompson had been promoted and sent to Sekondi as Chief Merchant there. Since he did not trust Taguba, he had persuaded her, in return for a further payment, to let him take the girl with him, solemnly promising that he would not consummate the marriage until after the girl’s menarche. This, perhaps, was his undoing.