The First Wife

by Paulina Chiziane

Thank you, dear God, for ensuring my plan went well. They all came in as treacherous as snakes. As softly as the music of the soul. As elegant as true ladies. They claimed their own space with smiles. They waged war with perfume and flowers. They were the rain watering the soil so that new life should spring from it. Together, these women defeated prejudice, advanced with confidence, and exposed the charade.

  Tony’s face revealed surprise, shame, tears, and rage. We stripped him of his sheep’s clothing in front of his executioners and riddled his skinned body with a salvo of bullets. He took a deep breath and staggered to his feet. He attempted to make a speech.

  “I hope you understand … we are African … our culture … you know … women …”

  The guests whispered to one another, the case merited it. His old uncle was thunderstruck. He was silent for a few minutes and then objected:

  “We are Bantu in body and soul. Passionate men. In questions of virility, even whites respect us. But, son, don’t you think this is a bit of an exaggeration?”

  I offered Tony my hand of stone. I was the first lady, his support in all awkward moments.

  “I didn’t want this great family to remain invisible on this day. On this, of all days, I wanted you all to bear witness to how this man’s heart is as fertile as loam. Tony is a man who loves life, and for this reason he multiplies. He is no coward, but has drawn his sword to affirm himself through five women and sixteen children.”

  When I’d finished my speech, the priest uncle crossed himself, sighed, said a prayer, gave his blessing, and fled that den of sin. Tony, his nephew, was a Christian who’d been led astray, a lost sheep. Tony helped himself to a double whiskey on the rocks. The godfather minister gave a diplomatic speech. He spoke about culture, acculturation, enculturation, miscegenation, idiosyncrasy, cosmogony, concomitance, the black renaissance, and a whole list of other long words no one understood. He took his wife’s hand, bade his farewells, and left. Tony helped himself to another whiskey. His professional acquaintances, police officers, and ministers all congratulated him and wished him well, had another little drink, and then dragged their wives off home, telling him they had other commitments, so as not to expose their womenfolk to any further iniquity, so shielding them from being inspired by such vengeful examples, given that they too were guilty of the same thing. Tony had another whiskey on the rocks. All that remained were the neighbors, the scandalmongers, and my sister-in-law to control the explosion if it occurred. They gossiped. They whispered among themselves and giggled teasingly. They ate, drank, and danced. They were intent on being present at the final act, and seeing the curtain come down on the stage. Tony knocked back another whiskey on the rocks.

  I invited Tony for a private conversation with all his ladies. He came, mumbling something incomprehensible, and sat down next to us fearfully. I never thought a man could be such a coward when faced with his wives. I embarked on another speech.

  “Dearest Tony, happy birthday. Today, we, your wives, decided to organize this surprise for you. As proof of the love we have for you, we decided to come together so that you could feel our hearts pulsating. We decided to bring your five wives together as one. We are aware of what you suffer by loving us: one day here, another day there. So we decided to honor you with our presence all together and of one voice on your big day.”

  I was all for going on with my speech, but he interrupted me and said:

  “I’ll be back in a minute. I’ve got to give the minister some documents he left behind.”

  He opened the door, got in his car, and left. We waited for hours on end, but he never came back. He’d fled.

  “Girls! Rest assured once and for all. Now we’ve taken this step, there’s no turning back. We’ve destroyed the mantle of invisibility, so let’s celebrate. We’ve forced Tony to acknowledge publicly what he did in secret. Girls, why are you so scared? Have you ever attended Tony’s birthday party before? Have your children ever sat on their uncles’ and aunts’ laps, surrounded by love, like full members of the family? Don’t be scared of Tony. The king’s gone, but it doesn’t mean it’s all over. Let’s eat our fill and drink to our heart’s content.”

  We had great fun. Lu and Saly told stories and we howled with laughter. Ju and Mauá listened and smiled. The children played, screamed, and ran all over the house. The party went on into the early hours of the morning.

  I retired to my room. I went over to the mirror to look at my face and the mirror gave me an accusing look in return: You drunkard, you brazen woman, you killjoy! I tried to get to sleep, but couldn’t. I went back and had a stiff drink to try to forget. I’m a bit of a strange one. The more I drink, the more lucid I become, the more I remember. I closed my eyes and saw a multitude of startled faces, booing poor Tony in his despair, his tail between his legs like some stray dog.

  I reviewed the day. Bringing these women here was an act of inspiration, of courage, an instant triumph in the game of love. Tony mistreated me and I paid him back in kind, using the same tactics as he had used. Will the world understand or condemn me? Who has won this war? Who was the loser? Maybe we all won. Maybe we both lost. What future have I opened up today with my madness? I don’t even know, I’m certainly crazy, and crazy is what people call me. I now begin to realize that I’ve gone too far. Where’s my poor husband at such a late hour? At Mauá’s house? I have a fit of remorse and start crying inconsolably. This isn’t what I wanted for myself or for my home. This isn’t what I wanted for my husband.

  Why did Tony run away from us? Can a husband be such a coward in front of his wives? We five decided to come together as one, as we explained to him. Men like to conquer. Then they can’t keep it up. Eventually, they arrange subterfuges, intrigues, in order to escape. This love of mine is a turbulent affair. A love doomed to fail from the start. If a man’s time in life is shared between work, rest, socializing, a good polygamist is a love machine, who doesn’t work, doesn’t socialize, but just produces love by the ton, to be distributed as appropriate among his wives, mistresses, and concubines.

  My rivals have all gained paradise. They certainly have. From being marginalized, they have begun to gravitate within the family circle. From being ignored and invisible, they have become recognized and visible. From now on, they can greet the uncles and grandparents of their children, without fear. As for me, what have I gained from this comedy?

  15

  My mother-in-law gave me an urgent summons at six in the morning. I rushed to meet her. I thought she must be ill. What she had wasn’t a physical illness, but a deep bout of depression. Her eyes were red from lack of sleep and from crying, maybe she’d been dreaming of her dead husband. Hardly had she seen me than she started screaming. She said I was a murderer, that I’d tried to kill her son, that I was evil, stupid, irresponsible, and didn’t appreciate the quality of the man I had. She went on and on. I was astonished. My old mother-in-law is strict, but kind. She always did talk for the sake of talking, and I’d switch off and stop listening. A daughter-in-law, as far as her mother-in-law is concerned, is an eternal child, who must know how to listen, to suffer in silence, always having to accept being addressed in vicious terms, inherited from a tradition where differences in rank were marked. I asked her what the problem was and she told me. Tony had spent the night there. He’d arrived sad, crestfallen, as if carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. And he was crying like a child. He asked for something to eat, and his mother served him what little she had. It was an insipid plate of food. He was burning with fever and raving: I’ve been poisoned, Mother, I’ve been poisoned.

  I felt faint and my throat was dry. I told her my version of the facts. I told her about my war of love and jealousy, a war without victors that saw Tony fall at the first hurdle. A war of treachery that can end in death. I explained that I’d turned my rivals into allies, had poisoned my javelins in the battle of love. I spoke of the vanquished man who fled his wives and children to hide away at his mother’s home. Of the man who abandoned
mouthwatering delicacies to eat his sick mother’s insipid food.

  “It’s true there was a moment of shame. Collective shame. Shame is poisonous. It crushes,” I explained to my mother-in-law.

  The old woman listened to me attentively and collapsed in tears. I’d been violent, I realized. I’d told her everything, without any concern for her feelings. I’d given her a bizarre image of her son, whom she had thought a saint. She fell silent, withdrawn. An icy, agonizing silence. The lady must have been deeply hurt. Like me, she must have felt betrayed, for she was also against polygamy and its damaging effect on the Christian family. Then, suddenly, I detected a light in her old face.

  “Is it true you brought all the women together for everyone to see?”

  “Yes.”

  “Thank God! That wasn’t only your wish, Rami, but it was mine, too. The ancestors guided you to organize a great family reunion on an important day. You’re a great woman.”

  “Do you think so?” I replied, astonished.

  The old woman’s voice lost its hard edge, and its rhythm increased gradually, sweet and melodious. Her shoulders straightened. I was witnessing life being reborn, triumph over death. The extended family is a living, mobile collection of assets. It’s a form of social security and a guarantee of food in times of need.

  “Praise be to God! I didn’t know I had such a large family. That’s good. Of these seventeen grandchildren, some will give me joy and others sadness. Some will give me my last glass of water, others my funeral shroud. It’s good to have a large family, Rami.”

  “But all these children are illegitimate, isn’t that so?”

  “Illegitimate for you, who are bound by laws and commandments. Illegitimate because they’re the children of your rivals. For me, they are merely grandchildren, the continuation of my lineage.”

  She was rapturous, I had brought her comfort in her sadness. She now condemned her son. She said he was mischievous, bad mannered, selfish, that he’d turned her whole night upside down inventing nonexistent monsters. All this because he’d been scared to live a clean, honest, worthy, transparent life, without having to hide away. She said a man’s greatness is proved by the number of children he has. That polygamy is in man’s nature: although we may condemn it, it’s not a crime, and doesn’t do anyone any harm. That a man worthy of respect must have at least three women. That her own husband had never been polygamous, because he was a poor workingman, but Tony had a profession and was rich, which was why he had to have someone on whom to spend his wealth. Now she wanted to know all about her four daughters-in-law. I told her how marvelous they were. I invented stories to sweeten her and she was delighted.

  “Ah! Rami, why did you never tell me this? Why did you people go around postponing my happiness? I’ve got this huge garden, and the children can come and run and play here. I’ve got these trees loaded with fruit that goes rotten and falls because there’s no one to eat it, and here I am with so many grandchildren! Where do they live? When will they come and visit me?”

  She was in a hurry to hug all these hidden grandchildren.

  “That doesn’t depend on me.”

  “Please have a word with Tony. Tell him I need to see him urgently, and that we need to bring these children over here.” Now that her solitude was coming to an end, the old woman began to think of human warmth. She was delighted at the prospect of a house full of children to enliven her sad world. In this war, my mother-in-law and my rivals came out winners, while I, Rami, lost the battle.

  Sweet little Mauá was inseparable from our Tony. But he wasn’t happy according to our personal detectives. He looked like a ghost. Did anyone know what he was thinking? No one. He lived in silence, he’d go upstairs, come down, eat, go out. Had anyone asked him anything? No, no one. We didn’t have the courage. We were at a complete loss from fear, and so was he. He had become nervous, trying, shouting at those under his command. And he’d lost weight. He smoked a lot and drank more than he should. Tony was in need of therapy. Therapy of the type polygamous love could provide and not hospital appointments. But why is a polygamist happy when his women are at war with each other, and unhappy when they get along together?

  16

  One day, I told my rivals: Come, come and demand food when you don’t have enough, come and wake Tony up if by any chance he’s here, when your children are ill, or when they are at school and the teacher wants to see whoever is responsible for their education. Come and queue up to see him, he’s usually here at lunchtime. You are his wives and your children are my children’s brothers and sisters.

  A procession of mothers and children began to arrive. Tony couldn’t take it anymore, and ran away. Rami, you see to this riffraff. I did what I could for them, until eventually I said: Things are like this because you don’t work. Every day you have to beg for a few crumbs. If each of us had a source of income, a job, we’d be free of this problem. It’s humiliating for a grown woman to have to ask for money for salt and coal. Saly said she had a business but it went bust because she used all her money to pay for medicine when her son was ill. Lu said she’d like to have a fashion boutique, which had always been her dream. Ju said she liked children. She said that the day she looked for a job it would be to work with children. Mauá said she didn’t have a talent for anything. She’d been brought up to be a wife and to care for people. She couldn’t imagine herself working and didn’t want to become involved in such a plan.

  “We’ve got to work,” Lu said, “we’ve still got a bit of bread because Tony is still alive. What happens when he dies? From a period of mourning up until the time we manage to find new partners, that’s a lot of hunger to put up with. We must think of the future.”

  “What are we going to do?” said Mauá. “I don’t even have any qualifications or skills to do anything at all.”

  “Ah! Mauá!” said Saly. “All those people selling things on the street corner are women just like us. If someone were to lend me a bit of money, I’d set up my own business.”

  “I would too,” said Lu. “I’d sell clothes, even if it was secondhand. I’ve always dreamed of having a clothes shop.”

  I grabbed some money I’d put aside and lent it to Saly. She bought whole sacks of cereal and sold them by the cupful in markets out in the suburbs. Two months later, she paid me back with interest and gave me a present. Some cloth for a capulana, a silk scarf, and a red rose bought on the corner. Lu said: I’m inspired. If Saly has managed to make a go of her business, I can as well. Rami, can you lend me some money? I passed Saly’s returns across to her. And she began to sell secondhand clothes. And she began to put on weight, her tone of voice became gentler, and her smile broadened as the money began to flow. Three weeks later, she returned the money to me with more interest, a little hug, and a bunch of roses. Ju and Mauá protested.

  “Rami, why don’t you give us the same treatment?” Mauá asked. We’re poor women too, like Lu and Saly. You helped them. Why don’t you help us as well?”

  I transferred Lu’s money to Mauá and gave Ju a bit of money Tony had once entrusted to me to look after. Mauá set up as a hairdresser, straightening hair, which is something she knows all about. She began on the veranda of her house. She managed to build up a clientele. Work increased and she took on two assistants. The veranda got too small and she moved her salon into the garage of her house. Now Mauá has a whole host of customers.

  Ju goes to the warehouses, where she buys crates of drink and sells it retail. She makes a lot in the way of profit. In this country, people drink like fish. She’s begun to smile more and gained more self-confidence. Tony has reacted badly to our initiatives, but we don’t listen to him and get on with our lives.

  I decided to accompany Lu in her clothes-selling enterprise. We sold them in the market on the corner of the street where there are plenty of customers. The market is full of women, all of them talking at the tops of their voices, touting for customers. When business slackens, the women sit in a circle, eat their day’s meal,
and talk about love. A love transformed into hatred, anger, despair, trauma. I was raped by my stepfather when I was eight, said one. That was better than what happened to me. I was raped by my real father when I was ten. I got an infection and lost my womb. I haven’t got any children. I can’t have any. I got married, said another. I was happy and had three children. One day, my husband left the country in search of work and never came back. I had to put up with a lot of beating, said another. He’d lock me in the room with my children and sleep with other women in the next room. I was raped by five men during the civil war, said another. This handsome son I’m carrying on my back, I don’t know who the father is. Every time I look at this poor little creature, I remember that horrible moment when I thought I was going to die. My mother died in my arms, said another. She was brutally beaten by my father and died on her way to the hospital. From that time on, I couldn’t face men. Nor do I want to bring children into the world for them to suffer life’s torments. My husband drinks, said another, he drinks so much that he can’t even work anymore. At the end of the day, all we have in our house is violence. He wants my money so that he can go and drink, but I won’t give him any. One of them said she’d been married for twelve years and was happy. She’d never had any problems and sells in the market to help her husband, who doesn’t earn much. Another said her husband was a good man. She’d betrayed him. She’d been caught red-handed with another man.

  I told them my husband is a professional man and they were all astonished. The wife of a man with a profession doesn’t sell old clothes on the street corner, they argued. But we’re five wives, I explained. The salary of a professional isn’t enough for seventeen children. I’ve got my diploma for secondary school, I could get a job, but salaries are low, and selling at the market pays better. I explained to them all that this business of liking women isn’t limited to age, race, or social class. I told them Lu is my rival and no one believed me. You call her sister and she does too. You look alike, we thought you really were sisters. We’re sisters in love, the same man’s wives, I retorted.