The Heart of Redness: A Novel
Page 21
There was silence for some time, while the men pondered this heavy matter. They puffed rhythmically on their long pipes, blowing out rings of smoke that hung like halos over their heads.
“Perhaps followers of the religion of the white man like Mjuza and Ned have a point,” Nxito said finally. “It is better to forget about happiness. Look what its pursuit has done to my people. They thought it would finally be achieved when the new people came.”
“The followers of the god of the white man are lost, Old One,” appealed Twin-Twin. “I know that many of our people are beginning to resort to this white god. It is because prophets who purport to speak for our god have let us down. But if we commune with the ancestors, and do all that is right by slaughtering for them, they will give us happiness. Of course they will never come back as the amaThamba, the Believers, have been deceiving the people. Only we shall go to join them when Qamata so decides.”
Mjuza and Ned decided it was futile to try to convert these people. They were set in their ways. It did not matter, though. They remained friends still. Unbelievers, whether they were Christians or heathens, could be relied upon as allies of The Man Who Named Ten Rivers. Or so Mjuza and Ned thought.
“Anyway,” said Mjuza, “it is clear that we shall not see the question of happiness with the same eye. Let us talk about what you called us here for.”
“We summoned you here because messages from the Gxarha River are becoming more frantic,” Nxito explained. “Hardly a day passes without a messenger coming to say that Nongqawuse and Nombanda are demanding my return to my chiefdom. What should I do? What do Gawler and Dalton, the representatives of The Man Who Named Ten Rivers, want me to do in this case?”
“I wonder why Nongqawuse is so keen that you return to Qolorha, when it is her Believers who drove you away in the first place,” said Ned.
No one seemed to have an answer. Could it be that the prophetesses feared the wrath of the ancestors should the aged Nxito die in exile, far away from the graves of his fathers?
“Perhaps they are afraid that when Nxito’s ancestors arise from the dead they will not be happy to see that their son has been exiled,” said Mjuza sarcastically.
“What does the elder think?” asked Ned. “Perhaps things will depend on what Chief Nxito himself wants to do. We’ll take your message to the magistrate. I am sure he will want to know what your own view is.”
“I am sure the old man is longing for his home,” added Mjuza.
“I think that if the old man returns on the orders of these young girls then he’ll be giving them more power,” said Twin-Twin. “People will believe in them even more.”
While Twin-Twin was grappling with the grave issues of happiness and the demands of girl-prophets, Twin and Qukezwa were sitting on top of a hill watching for the approach of Russian ships. They no longer sat on the banks of the river or on the beach, but now preferred the hill since it gave them a good vantage position. From here they would wait until the new people came riding on the waves, or until the long-promised Russian fleet sailed to the shores of Qolorha to destroy The Man Who Named Ten Rivers and his white settlers.
Heitsi was digging out roots a short distance away. The days of glorious feasting were over. The euphoria that soaked the land after the defeat of HMS Geyser had long since bubbled itself out, and people were faced with the stark reality of starvation. Twin and Qukezwa were now dependent on wild roots. Even these were hard to find, since starving hordes of Believers had long invaded the veld and the hills to dig them out. Old people, children, the weak, and the infirm were fainting from hunger. At least one person, the son of a believing diviner, was known to have died from the famine.
Yet Twin and Qukezwa’s belief was not weakening. They refused to cultivate their fields. Like everyone else, they were hungry. To ease the pain of hunger they tightened leather belts around their stomachs. On days when they could not find any roots, they survived on the bark of mimosa trees. They even had to eat shellfish, which was not regarded as food at all by the amaXhosa. Yet the hope that the prophecies would ultimately be fulfilled burned even brighter in their hearts.
They replenished their belief by going down to Mhlakaza’s hut at the Gxarha River. Often they found Believers there whose belief was gradually fading, pestering the prophets and demanding that they be saved from a looming death.
“Go and adorn yourselves!” Nongqawuse told them. “There is no time for weeping! There is time only to celebrate the coming of the new people!”
Once more the people were invigorated. They dressed up in their red ochre costumes and beaded ornaments. Tottering old women were resplendent in new isikhakha skirts and in brass jewelry, hoping that with the rising of the dead they would have their youth restored to them. Twin and Qukezwa were torn between the austere teachings of Nonkosi, which demanded that Believers should eschew all forms of beautification, and Nongqawuse’s instructions. On some days they followed Nonkosi and on others Nongqawuse.
But hunger was no respecter of beauty. It attacked even the best dressed of people. The Believers appealed to the believing chiefs to be rescued from its pangs. The chiefs in turn appealed to King Sarhili. After all, he had taken the responsibility of the cattle-killing upon himself. Even Chief Maqoma, the general who had brilliantly led the amaXhosa forces against the British in the War of Mlanjeni, was sending persistent messages to Sarhili. Maqoma was a leading Believer, and had now taken over from his brother as the chief of the amaNgqika clan. He had led his clan into a frenzy of cattle-killing, and into famine. King Sarhili in turn appealed to Mhlakaza and his teenage prophetesses. He tried to force them to come up with a new date for the fulfillment of the prophecies.
“There is nothing I can do,” said Mhlakaza. “Nongqawuse and Nombanda have spoken. They say that the dead will not arise as long as Chief Nxito remains in exile. The chief must first return to his chiefdom near the Gxarha. Only then will the new day be known.”
Twin-Twin was adamant that old Nxito should not go back to his native place on the instructions of the girls. He was angry because, in spite of the protection that had been guaranteed by the British magistrate and his crony, Dalton, Believers had entered his homestead and had stolen grain from his silos and milk from his two cows. There was also talk that they were looking for his cattle, which were hidden in cattle-posts in the Amathole Mountains under the care of his many sons. Twin-Twin suspected the hand of his twin brother in all this. But he couldn’t have been more wrong. Twin was interested only in the rising of the dead. He had no wish to steal anyone’s food. He was fulfilled in his hunger. All he wanted to do was to sit in a dazed state with his Qukezwa and Heitsi, and await the Russian ships and the coming of the forebears riding on the waves.
Twin-Twin was now rekindling his old lust for the prophetesses, particularly for Nongqawuse. He was spreading the news throughout Qolorha that copulation was the only medicine that would drive out the wild prophecies from her head. But of course this remained only talk. He would never dare get near Mhlakaza’s homestead to seduce or rape the prophetess, even with his phalanx of bodyguards.
Pressure was mounting on Chief Nxito, and finally in November 1856 he yielded and rode back to Qolorha in the company of Twin-Twin and a number of his unbelieving followers. His son, Pama, handed back the chieftainship to him without any argument. After all, it was the wish of the prophetesses that the old man should rule.
The first thing he did, on the very first day of his arrival, was to go to Mhlakaza’s homestead. He wanted to talk with Nongqawuse personally. But she seemed disorientated and confused, in the manner of all great prophets. It was left to Mhlakaza and Nombanda to speak for her.
“Nongqawuse says that the new people—” began Mhlakaza.
“The new people?” asked Nxito.
“The ancestors who will rise from the dead,” explained Nombanda.
“Nongqawuse says that the new people no longer wish to speak through a commoner like myself,” Mhlakaza continued. “They want to
speak through you, Chief Nxito. That is why the prophetesses insisted that you come back to your chiefdom. The new people have chosen you, a senior chief of kwaXhosa, to be their spokesman.”
“How is that possible?” asked Nxito.
“Nongqawuse says the new people—”
“Nongqawuse says? But she did not say anything,” shouted Twin-Twin. “We didn’t hear her say anything. She just sits there staring at nothing and you keep on lying that Nongqawuse says, Nongqawuse says. . .”
Nxito’s entourage mumbled its agreement, while the Believers expressed their indignation at such blasphemy. Some said it was a pity that Twin was no longer interested in the affairs of the state. He no longer attended imbhizos but sat all day long on the hill. If he were here he would have taught his stubborn brother a thing or two about respecting those who had been chosen by the ancestors to be their messengers.
“Nongqawuse says soon the new people will present themselves to Chief Nxito,” continued Mhlakaza, ignoring Twin-Twin’s comment. “And when that happens he must call an imbhizo of all commoners and chiefs of kwaXhosa. The multitudes must gather to await the return of the ancestors.”
Chief Nxito and his entourage laughed all the way back to his Great Place. What did Mhlakaza take them for? Did he think they were fools?
But the Believers read the return of the old chief and his meeting with the prophets in their own way. Soon word spread that Chief Nxito had been converted from his unbelief. This gave more hope to the Believers that the prophecies would soon be fulfilled. Some even said that the rising of the dead would take place at the next full moon. Once more euphoria swept the land. And the rivers thundered their laughter.
The weather is swollen, and the rivers continue to thunder their laughter. The elders of the Unbelievers have fallen on the ground in a trance. Izitibiri sounds that have leaked through the cracks of the Qolorha-by-Sea Secondary School hall are filtering through the heavy air and seem to lull the elders into a deeper trance.
Eventually, Bhonco, son of Ximiya, is the first to open his eyes. Perhaps it is NoPetticoat’s voice flavoring the izitibiri that hauls him from the pain of the ancestors’ world to the world of joyous school concerts. Hazy figures of little men take shape before him. He looks around. The fellow elders are still in a trance. But to his shock they are all surrounded by a group of abaThwa, the small people who were called Bushmen by the colonists of old.
“Wake your friends up,” says the leader of the abaThwa, mixing isiXhosa with his own language which is composed of clicks. “Wake them up!”
“Hey, what is the matter?” Bhonco asks.
“We demand the return of our dance!” says the leader.
“Woe unto the amaGcaleka who have given birth to me!” cries Bhonco.
He tries very hard to wake up the other elders. Slowly they return. Their bodies are drenched with the sadness of the past. They are emerging from the trance ready to face the world and to battle with the Believers. They are taken aback when they hear that the abaThwa are demanding the return of their dance. This is a setback that none of them is prepared for. How will they survive without the dance?
They ask the abaThwa to sit under another tree while they confer.
“Didn’t these people give us this dance? How can they demand it back?” asks one elder.
“It is now our dance,” asserts another. “They gave it to us.”
“But now they want it back,” says Bhonco. “I do not think there is anything else that we can do.”
“We shall not give them the dance. What can they do?”
“Yes, what can they do? Will they beat us up?”
The elders would be laughing at this ridiculous notion if the elders were other people. Who can imagine little men like the abaThwa beating up giants like Bhonco? But Unbelievers are not prone to laughter. Or if they laugh at all, it must be in secret. No one must ever know about it. That is why the elders once reprimanded Bhonco when they thought he was becoming too loose with his expression of joy.
“Of course they will not beat us up,” says Bhonco. “But we do not want to upset people who have such a powerful dance . . . a dance that can send one to the world of the ancestors and back again. We do not know what other powerful medicine they have that they can use against us should we anger them. We must tread lightly when we deal with these people. If they say they want their dance back, we must give it to them.”
“But how are we going to survive without the dance? How are we going to induce sadness in our lives without visiting the sad times of our forefathers?”
“And how do we visit the sad times of our forefathers without the dance?”
“We must negotiate. We must beg them to lend us the dance again,” says Bhonco.
“These selfish abaTbwa!” shouts another elder. “I shall not be surprised if they have been put up to this by the Believers. That Zim! He is related to these people, is he not? He must have put them up to this!”
“It is possible that the Believers have had some influence on the abaThwa,” says Bhonco. “But Zim is not related to the abaThwa. He is related to the Khoikhoi. They are different people, although if you don’t know their language you may think it sounds the same. They look different too.”
“You cannot teach us about the abaThwa and the Khoikhoi,” says the first elder dismissively. “We have lived with them since the days of our forefathers, although we did not call the Khoikhoi by that name. We called them amaLawu or amaQheya.”
Bhonco sighs appreciatively at the elder’s use of these derogatory isiXhosa names for the Khoikhoi and people of mixed race. It is the next best thing to laughter.
After a long debate, during which the abaThwa become impatient under their tree, the elders of the Unbelievers agree that the abaThwa must be given their dance back.
“We must be nice to them so that we can borrow it again when we need it,” says an elder.
“We are like a sparrow that is wearing the feathers of an eagle,” says Bhonco. “We must invent our own dance. At first it will not have the power of the dance of the abaThwa. But it will gain strength the more we perform it. Perhaps one day it will take us to the world of the ancestors just as efficiently as the dance of the abaThwa.”
Bhonco is fuming as he makes his way to the concert. Today he will have a showdown of all showdowns with that Believer, Zim. If he wants to fight dirty by sending the abaThwa to take back one of the valued rituals of the Unbelievers, he too, the son of Ximiya, has a few tricks up the sleeves of his wrinkled suit.
After paying his admission fee, Bhonco saunters into the school hall. The hall is full, but a young member of the audience stands up and gives Bhonco his seat. The elder throws his eyes around the hall. They fall on Zim, who is sitting in a self-satisfied manner next to Camagu. The eyes of the elders meet. Bhonco sneers. Zim smiles. Camagu is engrossed in the sounds of the school choir.
Across the aisle John Dalton sits next to Xoliswa Ximiya. He is not with Camagu because things have been a bit icy between them since Camagu’s indiscretion of criticizing his efforts to develop his village. Things are a bit icy between Camagu and Xoliswa Ximiya too. Not only because of their divergent views on civilization and barbarism. The little matter of Qukezwa finally reached Xoliswa Ximiya’s ears, and she did not hesitate to confront Camagu about it.
It was during one of his visits to her home. Even before he could take a seat, she asked, “Is it true what I hear about you and that child?”
“Child? What child?”
“Don’t play dumb with me. I am talking about Qukezwa.”
“That child, as you call her, is not dismissive of beautiful things. Where you see darkness, witchcraft, heathens, and barbarians, she sees song and dance and laughter and beauty.”
“So it is true! You are a dirty old man! I have lost all respect for you!”
“What is true? And why am I a dirty old man all of a sudden?”
“You made her pregnant. Everyone in the village says so.”
“Woman? She is no woman. She was my student here only yesterday. And of course she made herself pregnant, did she?”
“The grandmothers confirmed after a thorough examination that she is still a virgin. I never had anything to do with her.”
“You believe in that mumbo jumbo? You are a disgrace to all educated people!”
People talked of Xoliswa Ximiya’s fury spreading like a veld fire. It was affecting everybody: her colleagues, her parents, and her students. She was right to be angry, too, they said. This Camagu was proving to be a scoundrel. He must be the one who messed up Zim’s daughter, even though the grandmothers have certified her a virgin. Otherwise how did the seed get into her? Who planted it? In what manner?
People’s thirst for knowledge must be quenched.
The history teacher is the chairman of the concert. He rings the bell and the choir stops singing. He stands up, obviously enjoying the power that he wields.
“Silence please, the chair is speaking!” he shouts. “Here we have Miss Vathiswa from the Blue Flamingo Hotel. She is buying with her twenty cents that the school choir must take a rest for the duration of three songs, and must be replaced by the choir from the Blue Flamingo Hotel!”
People applaud as the school choir walks from the stage. The Blue Flamingo choir takes the stage, and NoPetticoat’s voice rings in a new izitibiri song. Vathiswa herself joins the choir and dances around clownishly. But even before they have gone halfway through the song the bell rings again. The choir stops.
“For twenty-five cents this young man here . . . he is a student at Qolorha-by-Sea Secondary School. . . he says that he will not allow anyone to treat his school choir like that,” says the chairman. “The Blue Flamingo choir should go home to sleep, and the school choir should come back to the stage.”
The school choir has sung only one song before Vathiswa buys it off the stage again. The buying battle between Vathiswa and a group of students, now also joined by some parents, continues until the price is five rand. Vathiswa throws in the towel, and the choir from the secondary school dominates the stage. It sings three songs in a row, which reverberate around the walls of the hall, overwhelming everyone with joy. The very joy that is reflected on the faces of the students as they sing and dance.