Ama

by Manu Herbstein

  Thompson had invited Jensen to a farewell party at Cape Coast. Jensen had seen young Rose, Madam-Thompson-to-be, who already, in spite of her tender years, showed undoubted indications of the great beauty which she was to become, and who had, moreover, acquired from her mother precocious skills of coquetry.

  At Sekondi, Thompson had looked after the girl with tender care, taught her to speak English and even taken the trouble to teach her to read a little and sign her name, Rose Thompson. He had had little else to occupy his idle time since there were no other Europeans in the vicinity to share his port and brandy. He had spoiled Rose by showering her with gifts of cloth and jewellery from his stock-in-trade, in the belief that this would encourage her to return his own undeniable, doting affection.

  Jensen, having been instructed to marry, considered all the possible candidates. His light fell on Rose. After paying a professional call on his proposed mother-in-law and paying generously for her service, he discovered little difficulty in persuading Taguba to accept a further dowry in return for her daughter’s hand. The two of them established an immediate understanding, each recognising in the other a kindred spirit.

  Taguba then visited Mr. Thompson in Sekondi, allaying his suspicions by telling him how much she missed her daughter. In the course of the visit she contrived to have Rose kidnapped by accomplices and put aboard a canoe and sent to Elmina, there to be delivered into the now impatient clutches of Jensen.

  Taguba, feigning mourning, returned to Cape Coast. Thompson, believing that his Rose had been panyarred and sold into slavery, immediately went mad and took to his bed.. Soon after he was found there, murdered. Since Rose was now betrothed to Jensen, some suspicion fell on him. However, what little evidence there was, was entirely circumstantial, and in view of the separate and distinct territorial responsibilities of the judicial authorities at Cape Coast and Elmina, not to speak of the likely diplomatic complications should charges be laid, the suspicions remained just that. After some time the rumours subsided and Thompson was forgotten.

  Rose, having acquired from Thompson sufficient rudimentary knowledge of the catechism to qualify for baptism, Van Schalkwyk joined her to the Church. The banns were put up and the date for the wedding was announced. It would be the first wedding to be held in the Dutch chapel since that of Jacobus Capitein and his white wife.

  * * *

  Since it was he who had pressed Jensen into marriage, De Bruyn agreed to bear the cost of the wedding reception and offered to lend Rose the wedding dress of his late wife Elizabeth; moreover, he persuaded Augusta and Ama to make the necessary alterations, which they agreed to do in spite of their shared misgivings about Jensen.

  Rose was brought to the Governor's rooms. The seams of the dress were ripped open and pinned to fit the slender form of the young girl.

  Ama was fascinated by Rose’s light complexion, her long brown hair, straight nose and blue eyes. But the girl was cheeky and Augusta had to reprimand her.

  “Did they not teach you to respect your elders in Cape Coast, child? Or was it that white man, what was his name, in Sekondi, who taught you bad manners?”

  Rose started to cry. She was still a child. Thompson had pandered to her every whim. He had treated her like a spoiled only daughter rather than his future wife. She had not loved him. Indeed, apart from her mother (and that with reservations), Rose loved no one but herself. But she had quickly come to realise that, unlike Thompson, Jensen would stand no nonsense from her. Now she began to miss her former mentor. When she heard of his murder, she wept bitterly. Then she finished crying and forgot about him. Her only regret was that she had had to leave behind all the presents he had given her; and that Jensen clearly had no intention of taking the risks contingent upon an attempt to recover them.

  **********

  The wedding was set for a Saturday afternoon.

  Taguba's maternal uncle and family head, known as Kwesi Broni, agreed to give the bride away. Taguba and Kwesi Broni and a large party of friends and relations arrived at Elmina at dawn, just as the castle gate was opened. Jensen had set aside two rooms for them, one for the men and one for the more numerous women and children.

  Old Kwesi Broni had persuaded the Chief Merchant at Cape Coast castle to let him have, on hire, a fashionable European suit, complete with buckled shoes, breeches, waistcoat, ornately embroidered jacket and powdered shoulder length wig, to which he proposed to add his favourite deerskin hat. He took his bath and his breakfast, attended by his granddaughter, the bride. Then he changed into this attire. After admiring his reflection in a looking glass he set out to inspect the castle courtyard and the town. He was followed by a chattering entourage of his extended family, who sang and danced from time to time, as the spirit moved them.

  There was a long-standing rivalry between Edina and Cape Coast (or Oguaa, to give it its proper Fanti name) a rivalry which mirrored that of their respective Dutch and English patrons. In spite of this their townsfolk were united by many ties of marriage and clan. Uncle Kwesi Broni took the opportunity to pay his respects to his near and distant in-laws in Edina. Custom required that libation be poured at each port of call. Old Man, in consequence, became somewhat unsteady on his feet. As the time of the wedding ceremony approached, he had to be helped back to the castle and up the steep stairs to the church, where he sat down and promptly fell asleep.

  In another room set aside for the purpose, Taguba and her sisters spent the morning dressing their daughter, doing her hair and adorning her with such paraphernalia and accoutrements as beads and bangles, necklaces and charms.

  Jensen had invited all the officers above a certain rank to attend the wedding. He had no close friends, but all his drinking companions would be present. After the business with Thompson, he had decided not to send any invitations to Cape Coast castle.

  However, Van Schalkwyk had thought this a good opportunity to reciprocate the hospitality which Philip Quaque had shown him. The Chaplain of Cape Coast castle had been borne over to Elmina in a hammock the previous day, accompanied by his personal slave. He would stay for a week.

  Ama, never having attended a church service before, was excited at the prospect. It was not the religious aspect which intrigued her. She enjoyed the tales she read in the Bible, but she regarded them as no different from the rich fables she found in other books, nor indeed from the folklore of her childhood and the Asante Anansesem. Her intelligence rejected Van Schalkwyk's claim that the European god was the only one there was. She had grown up aware of the pervasive spiritual presence of her ancestors, mediated by the elders in the three shrines of the Owners of the Earth: the Earth Shrine, the River Shrine and the Fertility Shrine of the women. Unlike the ancestors, the gods were remote and impersonal.

  In Yendi and Kafaba she had heard of a powerful god called Allah and of other gods who had their own shrines, priests and devotees. The Asante paid homage to their own ancestors, but also worshipped a supreme god, Kwame Onyankopon and an earth goddess, Asase Yaa, through a pantheon of minor regional deities who lived in rivers, rocks and mighty forest trees. And the people of Edina, as Augusta had told her, had seventy seven gods of whom the greatest was Tweneboa, spirit of the Benya river.

  It seemed natural and proper to her that different peoples should each have their own gods. That applied, of course, to the Europeans as well. It would be strange if the whites were to worship Fanti gods. By the same token, she could not see why, far from home as she was, she should abandon the ancestors of the Bekpokpam for the god the whites called God or for the ancestor they called Jesus.

  The chapel was a simple rectangular room, furnished with plain wooden benches. Two shuttered windows looked down into the inner courtyard of the female slaves and four more, two on each side, flanked the door which led out on to a landing with steps down to the roof of the North Bastion below and a view of the bay beyond.

  The benches were already quite full when Ama arrived with De Bruyn. The Governor led her to the front of the room. They sho
ok hands with Van Schalkwyk, who introduced them to his guest, the Rev. Philip Quaque, whom neither of them had met before. De Bruyn went off to look for the groom and Van Schalkwyk to attempt to explain to Kwesi Broni, now awake, but only somewhat sobered, what would be expected of him.

  Ama was left with the Cape Coast Chaplain. They sat in awkward silence for a few moments.

  Then Ama said, in Fanti, “You are welcome to Elmina, sir.”

  “Speak to me in English, child,” the Reverend replied. “I neither speak nor understand that heathenish tongue.”

  “Reverend Van Schalkwyk,” he continued. (She smiled at the peculiar accent with which he spoke the Dutch name.) “Reverend Van Schalkwyk tells me that you speak a passable English and that you have also acquired some skill in reading and writing. So speak to me in English, if you please.”

  “Please, sir,” Ama replied in English, “I said that you are welcome to Elmina.”

  “I know what you said, child,” he replied testily. “What is your name? Van Schalkwyk told me but I have forgotten.”

  “Please, sir, I am called Ama.”

  “Not your pagan name, girl,” said Quaque. “Do you not have a Christian name?”

  “The whites call me Pamela,” she replied.

  “Pamela?” he said. “That does not sound like a Christian name to me. I do not recall a saint of that name. Saint Pamela? No. My name is Philip, you see. I am named after Saint Philip who was one of the twelve Apostles of Our Lord. My late wife, my first wife, was called Catherine, after the holy Saint Catherine of Sienna. But Pamela has the virtue at least of being an English name. To have an English name is an honour and to have acquired a command of the language is a blessing, especially for a pagan. Now let me test you. Can you recite the Lord’s Prayer?”

  Ama looked nervously over her shoulder. The chapel was filling up. The ladies from Cape Coast sat chattering amongst themselves at the back. The Dutch officers, in their dress uniforms, had taken their seats nearer the front. Three of them sat immediately behind Ama.

  She was shy. Why does the man do this to me? she wondered. But she had no choice. The world was ruled by men.

  “Our Father,” she began, in a low voice, almost a whisper.

  “Louder,” said Quaque. “You need not be ashamed of prayer.”

  She began again, a little louder.

  “Excellent,” he said, when she had finished. “I am most impressed. Reverend Van Schalkwyk is clearly a gifted teacher. He tells me that you read the Bible too. Which is your favourite book?”

  De Bruyn had reminded her that it was Quaque who had sold him the children’s books which had introduced her to English. Thinking to flatter the austere black minister, she flashed a smile.

  “Goody Two-Shoes, sir.”

  “Goody Two-Shoes! What kind of book is that?”

  He laughed an outraged, humourless, laugh.

  “A story book, sir,” she replied. “Mijn Heer, I mean the Director-General, told me that it was you who sent it, with many others, to help me to learn to read.”

  “Ah, yes, I remember now. It must be one of the chapbooks that Catherine brought out with her. Catherine was my first wife, you know. She was an English woman, a white. But she died within a year of coming to Cape Coast. This is not a good climate for whites.”

  For a few moments he was lost in thought.

  “Goody Two-Shoes, did you say?” he asked, coming back to the present. “Well, I suppose if it was one of Catherine’s there could be no great harm in it. But that is not what I meant by my question. For me there is only one book, the Good Book, the Holy Bible which contains the revealed Word of God. I see no purpose in delving into other books, except of course, the Book of Common Prayer. I advise you too to confine your reading to the Bible. I ask you again, which is your favourite book?”

  Ama was saved from the necessity of a reply by the reappearance of Van Schalkwyk. Quaque, too, was not wholly displeased at the interruption of his conversation with Ama. He felt it his duty to raise with her the issue of her baptism and salvation from the sinful condition in which she was living with De Bruyn; but he was uncertain how to tackle the diplomatic problems which might arise. Now, with a clear conscience, he could set the issue aside for a more opportune time.

  Soon the ceremony began. The congregation sang the opening hymn. Bombardier Trenks, who was the company map-maker, attempted an accompaniment on his old fiddle. His musical gifts, regrettably, did not match his cartographic skills. However the singing of the Dutch men made up in volume for what it lacked in grace, so Trenks’ scraping was drowned out and little was lost. De Bruyn led Jensen in and, leaving him standing in front of the simple table which served as an altar, took his seat next to Ama. Jensen was resplendent in the white uniform with gold braiding and epaulettes in which Ama had first seen him. She remembered Esi and sighed. The pig-god, they had called Jensen. She squeezed De Bruyn’s hand and looked at his profile. He did not react. She wondered where Esi was now.

  Van Schalkwyk welcomed the visitors and announced the order of the service. Then, at a signal, Trenks led them into Handel’s Joy to the World and Kwesi Broni entered, his suit a little the worse for the morning’s wear, his deerskin hat perched jauntily on his wig and Rose clasping the extended crook of his arm. Rose looked beautiful in the late Elizabeth’s reconstructed white satin wedding gown. Jensen, turning his head, saw the approach of the veiled apparition and for a moment swallowed his bile at having been forced into this ceremony. The Cape Coast women applauded and, forgetting where they were, broke into a rhythmic chant of praise, drowning out what remained of the hymn.

  It was only when the bride and groom had been asked to sit and Kwesi Broni, too, had been shown to the seat reserved for him in the front row, that Van Schalkwyk managed, with some difficulty, to re-establish a semblance of order. Stung by the interruption, he chose to deviate from his prepared sermon, quoting, in both Dutch and English, John Knox’s description of women as weak, frail, impatient, feeble and foolish; unconstant, variable, cruel, and lacking the spirit of counsel. However the censure was lost upon its target. The Dutch men, pleased that on this occasion at least, they were not the object of their predikant's invective, and without womenfolk of their own to intimidate them, murmured their agreement. Van Schalkwyk was flattered that they had heard him. All too often he suspected that he was preaching to deaf ears.

  Ama wondered what Van Schalkwyk could be talking about. His sermon went on and on. She tried to recognise a Dutch word, any Dutch word, but soon gave up. It was muggy in the chapel and she began to feel drowsy. A fly buzzed at her ear and she lashed out at it. De Bruyn gave her a stern look. Her attention wandered and she dozed.

  At last the preacher signalled the approaching end by summarising what he had said. De Bruyn screwed up his eyes in a conscious effort to focus his attention. If he remembered nothing else, the summary at least would allow him to make a respectable attempt at polite conversation on the sermon. He could not reveal to poor Hennie that he sometimes found it impossible to follow the thread of his tedious homilies.

  When Reverend Quaque, in response to Van Schalkwyk’s invitation, rose to read the lesson in English, there was another uproar. It was not that the Cape Coast women had much regard for the black minister; on the contrary they usually regarded him at best with suspicion and at worst with contempt; but he was, after all, a Cape Coast man; and he had not only mastered the white man’s language and become ruler of the white man’s church in his own home town, but he was now making his mark in the very den of their Edina rivals. They might understand nothing of what he said; after all he insisted on speaking only the broni language: yet they shared his triumph. And so they cheered and clapped, ignoring his withering glare.

  The service proceeded slowly to its interminable conclusion and in due course gold rings were exchanged and Jensen lifted Rose's veil and kissed her, evoking ululations from the bored visitors.

  Van Schalkwyk now brought the service to a close. As
a challenge to the outrageous paganism of the visitors he led his countrymen in Luther’s A Mighty Fortress Is Our God! which his compatriots, catching his crusading mood, sang with great gusto. The groom signed an improvised register and the bride followed with Rose Thompson, which was all she could write.

  CHAPTER 22

  A passing ship brought news that the Dutch factor at Axim was seriously ill.

  “I’d have to go even if it weren’t for this crisis,” De Bruyn told Ama. “It’s two years since my last inspection.”

  “How will you go?”

  “Bezuidenhout will take me in the brig.”

  “When?”

  “As soon as possible. On the high tide tomorrow morning if the wind is right.”

  “Well I shall just have to manage without you.”

  “I'll come back just as quickly as I can. You will miss me, won’t you?”

  “Of course,” Ama replied, kissing him on the cheek.

  “I'll tell you what. We’ll ask Hennie to brush up your catechism while I'm away. As soon as I get back we can have you baptised. Then we can start thinking about a date for our wedding.”

  * * *

  The brig Admiraal de Ruyter was moored in the Benya lagoon.

  Ama went on board with De Bruyn. There was only one cabin in the little ship and since De Bruyn would be using it Commodore Bezuidenhout would have to sleep on deck with the Europeans and company slaves who made up the small crew.

  Though Ama had never been on a ship before, she had often examined the tall masts and the rigging through Mijn Heer’s spyglass. Now she ran her hands over a hemp rope and revived the shine on a brass bollard with the corner of her cloth.