Gods and Soldiers

by Rob Spillman

  “I am fine, thank you, Auntie. Do you have any rat poison? We are suffering with too many rats.” I was used to talking for my father.

  She scanned her eyes over shelves upon shelves of blue soap, cartons of matchboxes, petroleum jelly, instant coffee, hot sauce, plastic cups, plates and jugs, and on and on. It would have taken a whole day to list all the things packed together on the shelves.

  “I had it here somewhere, hmmm . . . but why don’t you get a cat?”

  “Do you want money or not?”

  I cringed. Taata should have had a drink first before coming here. She turned and gave him a stern look. She was not scared of him. If I had a store like hers, I wouldn’t have been either.

  “Ah yes, I put it far up there to keep it from the wrong hands.” She glanced back at my father, then got a stool, moved to a dark corner stuffed with tins and boxes and swollen blue plastic bags, climbed up, pulling her bulky frame up with effort, and got a jar from a row of colorful squashed packages. She clambered down, dusted it off with a rag, and peered at the label.

  “Be careful with this, eh? This poison is strong, eh, it’s not a joke.”

  “Who’s laughing? We can read the instructions just as well as you. How much?”

  “I was talking to Namuli. My dear, give it to your mother to use, okay? Don’t touch it. Five thousand only.”

  I took the jar wrapped in a thin black plastic bag as my father searched his pockets. For some reason Maama gave him money. She was like me; we did what he wanted, eventually.

  As we turned away, Auntie said, “Kale, Namuli, greet your mother, okay? Such a nice woman.” She shook her head at my father, but he was already gone. I rushed to follow, pulling my skirt down over my knees.

  Back home, my father got busy. We moved to our side of the compound, and using a stick, he mixed the thick poison paste with a little water on the cracked half of an old plate.

  “Go get some of yesterday’s supper.”

  My mother was not in the kitchen, thank God. I found some groundnut sauce and posho, which was now as hard as a brick. Taata broke it up into powdery pieces, and mixed it with the pink sauce and grayish poison. Wasn’t I relieved; I had thought I had to kill the cat with my bare hands. This was going to be easy.

  “Okay, don’t touch it, you hear?”

  I nodded, and he went indoors and began rummaging around in his old bags again. He came out of the house brandishing a decrepit looking bow and arrows. The bow’s string was frayed and sagging, the bow worn smooth with age. The arrows were as long as my arm, with rusty metal pointed tips. Me, use those?

  “Isn’t the poison enough?” I tried.

  “E-eh, Namuli, that’s not killing, that’s cheating. We’re using it just to make it easier for you. Maybe later, a gun, why not?” His eyes glinted, and he chuckled as if the demon had entered him too.

  All I had to do was tell my mother so that I could get out of this. It was getting to be too much.

  “Ah-ha, you want to run back to the skirts, I can tell. Go then.” Of course I couldn’t. I knelt in the dust next to him as he fidgeted with the small skin sack he had brought out the other day. His fingers trembled as he struggled to undo the strings tied around the top of the sack. I knew what he needed, and went off to get him his bottle. He took a swig, head leaning back, then sputtered and coughed. It didn’t help right away; I still had to help him open the bag, pulling at the tight knots first with my fingers then with my teeth. “There you go,” he muttered. “Use whatever you can.” Again, he scraped the bottom of the sack and came out with whitish dust. “Now I remember,” he said. “A rooster’s crown, dried and crushed,” and sprinkled it on the mash we had prepared for the cat. He continued, “This is not easy, not simple, but necessary, you understand? Can you be—you must be dedicated, slow, methodical, mechanical. Don’t think too much. Act.” I would. I would.

  My mother knew how to choose the worst times to appear. “Taata, are you—what are you two playing at now?”

  “Cat and kid.” My father giggled, and took a sip of his drink.

  “What?”

  “Why ask when you won’t understand?” He was busy tightening the bowstring.

  “He—we are going to, um, practice hunting,” I said.

  “Katonda wange, Chalisi, when will you grow up?”

  “Ee-h, you hear her. You think killing is a child’s game? I am trying to show her what is real: death after life.”

  Her eyes turned a boiling red. “Rubbish. If you want to play, play with fire. What about that heap of rubbish you were supposed to burn? That’s why dirty cats are here all the time—”

  “And I am trying to get rid of them. Fire? You want fire, yes, okay, we’ll burn it. Don’t worry. Just go. Go see Lidiya.”

  I hid a small grin behind my hand as Maama chewed her teeth and turned away. She knew by now that you could not reason with Taata. She stalked off, her big hips saying back off as they rolled away like a cement-mixing machine. Her backside could say come hug, or I’m sick of you, or I could be your pillow. My father smiled, his lips curling over his scattered moustache.

  We moved to the garden, not too far from the huge mango tree. Taata stood poised, one leg in front of the other, steady. He took aim, one eye almost closed, and in a blink, the arrow whizzed through the air and got stuck in the trunk. It sounded like a big fat bee racing past.

  “Now you.”

  He stood beside me, slightly bent, and held the bow in my hands, his fingers over my own. He stretched the string taut with me, aimed for me. My beating heart was soothed by his warm hands. “Steady, steady, pull, now . . . let go!”

  Out of my hands it flew, fast and sure, but then curved away and hit the ground beside the tree. “Not bad. Try again, pull harder, use more force.”

  I did so again and again, wiping the sweat off my palms onto my dress, wiping my forehead with my hands. This was my favorite tree. I struck it on the fifth attempt, screamed and jumped high. Taata laughed. “See!?” The direct hit, aiming for something and getting it, my mind controlling my eyes, hands, the air, the bow and the arrow, that was power. A quick shot of pleasure swarmed through my arms and legs, I found myself trembling. I had to do it again.

  I picked up the scattered arrows and handed them to my father. We could not stop grinning. As I squatted beside him and watched, excited, he dipped the arrow tips into a thick mix of rat poison and a few drops of water, adding some muttered words into the mix. I swear I heard some Latin from the priest at church. The other words I didn’t know, but yes, we needed God to help us with the demon.

  To be frank, the exhilaration of could-I-hit-or-not was sharper now than the evil that had gleamed out of the cat, despite a dream I had the night before. The cat had come up to me, eyes glowing like hell, and rubbed its dirty gray damp fur against my legs, its fish smell trying to suffocate me. I pulled and pulled at it, but it clung to my legs tighter, whining, not snarling, as if it needed me, like a baby starved of milk, while I struggled against it. The crying thing would not let go, its body stretching long like thick slippery elastic. As it wailed, I begun moaning with it until finally, thankfully, my whimpers woke me up. Relief gushed through and out of me like sweat. I sat up in bed and vowed not to sleep again that night, but of course I did.

  But now, now the dream was mere shadow, as the bow and arrows became a potent extension of my arms. More than fear, I wanted to see if I could aim accurately again, and hit and hit and hit.

  The cat had kept away while we were practicing, but now all was quiet. It slunk back to the rubbish heap, which was still nice and high and colorful with fresh refuse, the cracked plate of food and poison balanced on the top where I placed it. A few flies that landed on it failed to fly off. My father had told me not to eat again to help me focus. “Sit in the sun and wait,” he said, and I did, closer to the heap, its smell stinging my nostrils. My father sat a little way off under the shade of the mango tree, sipping as usual, watching and waiting with me. My mother was no
t even a thought in my mind.

  As the sun struck my forehead, and my father drank more spirit, he began his mutterings again. “Sacrifice. For my father’s father’s gods, a chicken was enough. A goat, maybe, a cow even. But what better sacrifice than a man? The Son of God, who is God also. What my father could have done, but many many times over. For the past, the present and the future, even for those not yet born. Yes, that is the essential thing: sacrifice.”

  Taata’s monotone became an incessant hum in my ears as the sun bore down. I watched the cat sniff at the plate then gobble up the food quickly. It licked its lips and face with that agile pink darting tongue, then sniffed around for more. I kept my eyes on it as it moved down the heap, heading towards me. It stopped abruptly and started coughing, its little white head jerking up and down. I had to act before it got away. A part of me coughed with it, a strange echo of the wails in my dream. Another part of me was also the cat, rising up slowly, body taut with resolve, all arms and shoulder and muscle and aim and stretching; all with the cat’s sure grace. Tight, tight, I pulled and stretched the bowstring, hungry for the cat’s narrow body, hungry not to miss.

  With all my will I let the poisoned arrow go, and its swift zing was joined in the very same second by a devilish screech, and I felt it, I did, the sharp metal point plunging through soft fur and skin, the second of resistance, then the impossibility of it. My mind shot back to when my mother had passed a needle through fire then stabbed my ear lobes, one after the other, while I, all fright, felt my flesh from the inside, deeply. Now, as sweat fell into my eyes, I saw red bursting bright like a flower out of the grayish-white. A bubbling flower that I had made.

  The cat scrambled and slipped, desperately trying to crawl away, but I scrambled too, quickly, my mind sharp and clear. I aimed and shot again, and again felt that sweet sharp invasion of hard cold metal meeting, tearing and entering soft hot skin and flesh. I grabbed yet another poisoned arrow, but from somewhere far away, heard my father shouting, “Stop!” I staggered back, and like the writhing cat, could not escape. I was its body; the poison gained life as it took it, seeking veins and sneaking through, racing quickly throughout the dirty little hot body. Now the flesh itself became thirsty for it, begged for it, like how after my fast, I had drunk water so frantically I almost choked, and felt it flush cold down my throat and spread, tingling, even to the tips of my fingers and toes.

  The cat had to stop writhing, and it did, slumping down dead. Still, blood moved out and over it, covering the once white fur with blotches of crimson. Its red eyes remained open. I had chased out its sleek and tawny grace and was left with a limp nothing. I would have to throw it on the rubbish heap, and I wanted to throw myself there too.

  Instead, I turned away and ran to my father who, with his arms raised, filled the air with shouts of praise. He stopped long enough to give me a small precious sip of his almost empty bottle, for the very first time, then he went on hollering to the sun. What could I do but try to shout like him, even adding a dance on trembling legs, until I could dance and shout for real. I waved the bow and arrows over my head and screamed, “I did it! I did it!” My father was full of loud hallelujahs, so I danced for him, and he laughed. But he had not seen the cat’s red eyes. Though they had stopped glowing, they were not defeated.

  I swiveled round and round, my skirt flying, then threw the bow and arrows down as if in victory, not disgust. I can end a life, I Namuli. The dancing finally, finally took hold, and I jumped and screamed higher.

  My mother, hearing all the commotion, rushed out of the house. “Have you gone mad?” She shrieked like the dying cat, like me, only louder.

  “I killed a cat! I killed—”

  She came right up, and with all the weight of her wonderful body, shook me by the shoulders until my cheeks wobbled and I shut up. When she let go, I fell down still. Finally, like the cat, I let go. Something warm oozed out of me, streamed down my leg. Blood? Pee. Warm, tangy pee. What had I done? Then came the tears, and I let them.

  Mother continued to scream, her cries filling the air like a swarm of crickets as she tried to put the up-side-down world straight again, tried to make us sane, but it was too late. My father tugged at me. “Come on, you’re too old for this now.” But I couldn’t stop. “You won,” he pleaded, and I turned away from him. The soil making me dirty seemed right. He shrugged, let his arms fall to his sides, turned and strode off, mumbling and grumbling, he couldn’t stay and listen to women crying and cursing. This time, I wanted him to go, go get his own drink.

  My mother got quiet, now that Taata was no longer there to scream at. “Typical! The fool causes trouble, then runs away.”

  She turned to me. “Namuli?” Although I now felt stupid, lying there wet and dirty on the ground, I didn’t want what she would do: pull me up gently, wipe my face with her wrapper, dust my dress, try and fold me back into her. Couldn’t she see I now had claws like a cat?

  “Leave me alone. Just leave me, okay?” I got myself up and moved away. I would wash myself, and go sit on my stool by our wall for a while. I wanted to sit alone.

  NURUDDIN FARAH

  • Somalia •

  from KNOTS

  CAMBARA TEARS DOWN the stairway, as though on a warpath, and strides over to the toolshed in the backyard, which has been converted to the qaat-chewers’ retreat. There, the driver and several youths are busy munching away, their cheeks bulging with the stuff, slurping very sweet tea and sipping Coca-Cola. From where she is eavesdropping on their conversation, barely a few meters from the door to the shed, she can hear them chatting lazily about cutthroat civil war politics and also debating about which warlord controls which of the most lucrative thoroughfares in the city and how much money he collects daily from his tax-levying ventures. Speculating, they move on to another related topic, mentioning the name of an upstart clansman of the same warlord, formerly a deputy to him, most likely to unseat said warlord with a view to laying his hands on the thriving business.

  Having heard enough about warlords and their presumptive, empty jabbering, she decides it is time she barged in without announcing either her presence or motive. First, she takes her position in the doorway, blocking it—arms akimbo, her feet spread wide apart—and fuming at their conjectural politics and their slovenly behavior. Some of the men look appalled; others appear amused; yet others shake their heads in surprise, as they all unfailingly turn their heads in her direction and then toward each other. To a man, they stop whatever they have been doing, maybe because they were unprepared for her entry.

  They are baffled, because it is unclear to them under whose authority she is acting, and because they have no idea where Zaak is on this or what part he is playing. One of them whispers to his mate that she is like a headmistress at a convent school who is disciplining her charges. His mate, in riposte, compares her to a parent waking his truant teenagers from a late lie-in, shaking them awake. When a couple of the others resume talking in their normal voices and some go back to their chewing or tea sipping, Cambara embarks on a more startling undertaking: She confiscates their qaat. The whisperer now says, “How incredibly fearless!” His mate remarks that it is not enough for her to barge in on them as if she owned the place; she must show us she is the boss. Another wonders where it will all end.

  As if to prove the whisperer’s mate right, she gathers the bundles of qaat that they have not so far consumed from in front of them—they are too gobsmacked to challenge her—and she dumps the sheaves in a waste bin crawling with noxious vermin. Turning and seeing the shock on their faces, she does not ease off. She shouts, “This is a sight worse than I’ve ever imagined. How can you stand living so close to the fetid odor coming from the waste bin, which none of you has bothered to empty for a very long time?” And before the driver or any of the youths has recovered from her relentless barrage, she tells them, “It is time to be up.”

  No one speaks. They are all eyes, fixed on her. After a brief pause, however, the driver gathers his thin
gs and joins her; several others do likewise. One might wonder why the driver or the youths act out of character and remain biddably unassertive when it is very common among the class of men to which the armed vigilantes and the driver belong to take recourse to the use of guns at the slightest provocation. Cambara puts their compliant mood down to the fact that her behavior has taken them by surprise and that many of the armed militiamen hardly know how to respond to the instructions of women.

  She orders the driver to supervise the two youths who earlier had bullied SilkHair, whom she tells to wash the inside and outside of the truck, vacuum, and make sure they rid it of the execrable odor. When the driver retorts that he does not have a Hoover or any of the other sanitizers about which she is speaking, she suggests that they use a house disinfectant. Still, when each of them, except for the driver, picks up his gun—for they seem naked without one, now that they are upright, their hands uselessly hanging down—and they argue that they do not know where they can find any deodorizers, Cambara eyes them unkindly. Then she takes one of them by the hand, dragging him into the kitchen; she provides him with an assortment of these cleaning items from a stack of household goods, mostly for cleaning, which presumably Zaak bought and locked away in one of the cupboards. She returns with the youth bearing the stuff and breathing unevenly. She gets them down to work, on occasion swearing at them under her breath. On top of being amused, she watches them for a few minutes with keen interest. Good heavens, how clumsy they appear now that they are missing their weapons, which over the years have become extensions of themselves; they appear wretched without them. With their bodily movements uncoordinated, they are as ungainly as left-handers employing their right hands to lift something off the ground. For their part, the guns have an abandoned look about them, to all intents and purposes, just pieces of metal worked into pieces of wood and no more menacing than a child’s toy.