No Longer at Ease

by Chinua Achebe

  “What’s the matter?”

  “Nothing. I’m just depressed, that’s all.”

  It had been dark in the car. He put an arm round her and pulled her towards him.

  “Not here, please.”

  Obi was hurt, especially as he knew his driver had heard.

  “I’m sorry, dear,” said Clara, putting her hand in his. “I will explain later.”

  “When?” Obi was alarmed by her tone.

  “Today. After you have eaten.”

  “What do you mean? Aren’t you eating?”

  She said she did not feel like eating. Obi said in that case he too wouldn’t eat. So they decided to eat. But when the food came they merely looked at it, even Obi, who had set out with a roaring appetite.

  There was a film show which Clara suggested they should see. Obi said no, he wanted to find out what was on her mind. They went for a walk in the direction of the swimming pool.

  Until Obi met Clara on board the cargo boat Sasa he had thought of love as another grossly overrated European invention. It was not that he was indifferent to women. On the contrary, he had been quite intimate with a few in England—a Nigerian, a West Indian, English girls, and so on. But these intimacies which Obi regarded as love were neither deep nor sincere. There was always a part of him, the thinking part, which seemed to stand outside it all watching the passionate embrace with cynical disdain. The result was that one half of Obi might kiss a girl and murmur: “I love you,” but the other half would say: “Don’t be silly.” And it was always this second half that triumphed in the end when the glamor had evaporated with the heat, leaving a ridiculous anticlimax.

  With Clara it was different. It had been from the very first. There was never a superior half at Obi’s elbow wearing a patronizing smile.

  “I can’t marry you,” she said suddenly as Obi tried to kiss her under the tall frangipani tree at the edge of the swimming pool, and exploded into tears.

  “I don’t understand you, Clara.” And he really didn’t. Was this woman’s game to bind him more firmly? But Clara was not like that; she had no coyness in her. Not much, anyway. That was one of the things Obi liked best about her. She had seemed so sure of herself that, unlike other women, she did not consider how quickly or cheaply she was captured.

  “Why can’t you marry me?” He succeeded in sounding unruffled. For answer she threw herself at him and began to weep violently on his shoulder.

  “What’s the matter, Clara? Tell me.” He was no longer unruffled. There was a hint of tears in his voice.

  “I am an osu,” she wept. Silence. She stopped weeping and quietly disengaged herself from him. Still he said nothing.

  “So you see we cannot get married,” she said, quite firmly, almost gaily—a terrible kind of gaiety. Only the tears showed she had wept.

  “Nonsense!” said Obi. He shouted it almost, as if by shouting it now he could wipe away those seconds of silence, when everything had seemed to stop, waiting in vain for him to speak.

  Joseph was asleep when he got back. It was past midnight. The door was shut but not locked, and he walked in quietly. But the slight whining of the door was enough to wake Joseph. Without waiting to undress, Obi told him the story.

  “The very thing I was thinking to ask you. I was thinking how such a good and beautiful girl could remain unmarried until now.” Obi was undressing absentmindedly. “Anyhow, you are lucky to know at the beginning. No harm is done yet. The eye is not harmed by sleep,” Joseph said somewhat pointlessly. He noticed that Obi was not paying any attention.

  “I am going to marry her,” Obi said.

  “What!” Joseph sat up in bed.

  “I am going to marry her.”

  “Look at me,” said Joseph, getting up and tying his coverlet as a loincloth. He now spoke in English. “You know book, but this is no matter for book. Do you know what an osu is? But how can you know?” In that short question he said in effect that Obi’s mission-house upbringing and European education had made him a stranger in his country—the most painful thing one could say to Obi.

  “I know more about it than yourself,” he said, “and I’m going to marry the girl. I wasn’t actually seeking your approval.”

  Joseph thought the best thing was to drop the matter for the present. He went back to bed and was soon snoring.

  Obi felt better and more confident in his decision now that there was an opponent, the first of hundreds to come, no doubt. Perhaps it was not a decision really; for him there could be only one choice. It was scandalous that in the middle of the twentieth century a man could be barred from marrying a girl simply because her great-great-great-great-grandfather had been dedicated to serve a god, thereby setting himself apart and turning his descendants into a forbidden caste to the end of Time. Quite unbelievable. And here was an educated man telling Obi he did not understand. “Not even my mother can stop me,” he said as he lay down beside Joseph.

  At half-past two on the following day he called for Clara and told her they were going to Kingsway to buy an engagement ring.

  “When?” was all she could ask.

  “Now, now.”

  “But I haven’t said I …”

  “Oh, don’t waste my time. I have other things to do. I haven’t got my steward yet, and I haven’t bought my pots and pans.”

  “Yes, of course, it is tomorrow you are moving into your flat. I’m almost forgetting.”

  They went in the car and made for the jeweler’s shop in Kingsway and bought a twenty-pound ring. Obi’s heavy wad of sixty pounds was now very much reduced. Thirty something pounds. Nearly forty.

  “What about a Bible?” Clara asked.

  “What Bible?”

  “To go with the ring. Don’t you know that?”

  Obi didn’t know that. They went over to the C.M.S. Bookshop and paid for a handsome little Bible with a zip.

  “Everything has a zip these days,” said Obi, looking instinctively at his trouser front to make sure he had not forgotten to do the zip up, as had happened on one or two occasions.

  They spent the whole afternoon shopping. At first Obi was as interested as Clara in the different utensils she was buying for him. But after an hour in which only one little saucepan had been bagged he lost any semblance of interest in the proceedings and simply trudged behind Clara like an obedient dog. She would reject an aluminum pot in one shop, and walk the whole length of Broad Street to another to buy the very same thing at the very same price.

  “What is the difference between this one and the one we saw at U.T.C.?”

  “Men are blind,” she said.

  When Obi got back to Joseph’s room it was nearly eleven o’clock. Joseph was still up. In fact he had been waiting all the afternoon to complete the discussion they had suspended last night.

  “How is Clara?” he asked. He succeeded in making it sound casual and unrehearsed. Obi was not prepared to plunge headlong into it. He wanted to begin at the fringes as he used to do many years ago when he was confronted with a morning bath in the cold harmattan season. Of all the parts of his body, his back liked cold water the least. He would stand before the bucket of water thinking how best to tackle it. His mother would call: “Obi, haven’t you finished? You will be late for school and they will flog you.” He would then stir the water with one finger. After that he would wash his feet, then his legs up to the knees, then the arm up to the elbow, then the rest of his arms and legs, the face and head, the belly, and finally, accompanied by a leap into the air, his back. He wanted to adopt the same method now.

  “She is fine,” he said. “Your Nigerian police are very cheeky, you know.”

  “They are useless,” said Joseph, not wanting to discuss the police.

  “I asked the driver to take us to the Victoria Beach Road. When we got there it was so cold that Clara refused to leave her seat. So we stayed at the back of the car, talking.”

  “Where was the driver?” asked Joseph.

  “He walked a little distance
away to gaze at the light-house. Anyway, we were not there ten minutes before a police car drew up beside us and one of them flashed his torch. He said: ‘Good evening, sir.’ I said: ‘Good evening.’ Then he said: ‘Is she your wife?’ I remained very cool and said: ‘No.’ Then he said: ‘Where you pick am?’ I couldn’t stand that, so I blew up. Clara told me in Ibo to call the driver and go away. The policeman immediately changed. He was Ibo, you see. He said he didn’t know we were Ibos. He said many people these days were fond of taking other men’s wives to the beach. Just think of that. ‘Where you pick am?’ ”

  “What did you do after that?”

  “We came away. We couldn’t possibly stay after that. By the way, we are now engaged. I gave her a ring this afternoon.”

  “Very good,” said Joseph bitterly. He thought for a while and then asked: “Are you going to marry the English way or are you going to ask your people to approach her people according to custom?”

  “I don’t know yet. It depends on what my father says.”

  “Did you tell him about it during your visit?”

  “No, because I hadn’t decided then.”

  “He will not agree to it,” said Joseph. “Tell anyone that I said so.”

  “I can handle them,” said Obi, “especially my mother.”

  “Look at me, Obi.” Joseph invariably asked people to look at him. “What you are going to do concerns not only yourself but your whole family and future generations. If one finger brings oil it soils the others. In future, when we are all civilized, anybody may marry anybody. But that time has not come. We of this generation are only pioneers.”

  “What is a pioneer? Someone who shows the way. That is what I am doing. Anyway, it is too late to change now.”

  “It is not,” said Joseph. “What is an engagement ring? Our fathers did not marry with rings. It is not too late to change. Remember you are the one and only Umuofia son to be educated overseas. We do not want to be like the unfortunate child who grows his first tooth and grows a decayed one. What sort of encouragement will your action give to the poor men and women who collected the money?”

  Obi was getting a little angry. “It was only a loan, remember. I shall pay it all back to the last anini.”

  Obi knew better than anyone else that his family would violently oppose the idea of marrying an osu. Who wouldn’t? But for him it was either Clara or nobody. Family ties were all very well as long as they did not interfere with Clara. “If I could convince my mother,” he thought, “all would be well.”

  There was a special bond between Obi and his mother. Of all her eight children Obi was nearest her heart. Her neighbors used to call her “Janet’s mother” until Obi was born, and then she immediately became “Obi’s mother.” Neighbors have an unfailing instinct in such matters. As a child Obi took this special relationship very much for granted. But when he was about ten something happened which gave it concrete form in his young mind. He had a rusty razorblade with which he sharpened his pencil or sometimes cut up a grasshopper. One day he forgot this implement in his pocket and it cut his mother’s hand very badly when she was washing his clothes on a stone in the stream. She returned with the clothes unwashed and her hand dripping with blood. For some reason or other, whenever Obi thought affectionately of his mother, his mind went back to that shedding of her blood. It bound him very firmly to her.

  When he said to himself: “If I could convince my mother,” he was almost certain that he could.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The Umuofia Progressive Union, Lagos branch, held its meetings on the first Saturday of every month. Obi did not attend the November meeting because he was visiting Umuofia at the time. His friend Joseph made his excuses.

  The next meeting took place on 1 December 1956. Obi remembered that date because it was important in his life. Joseph had telephoned him in the office to remind him that the meeting began at 4.30 P.M. “You will not forget to call for me?” he asked.

  “Of course not,” said Obi. “Expect me at four.”

  “Good! See you later.” Joseph always put on an impressive manner when speaking on the telephone. He never spoke Ibo or pidgin English at such moments. When he hung up he told his colleagues: “That na my brother. Just return from overseas. B.A. (Honors) Classics.” He always preferred the fiction of Classics to the truth of English. It sounded more impressive.

  “What department he de work?”

  “Secretary to the Scholarship Board.”

  “ ‘E go make plenty money there. Every student who wan’ go England go de see am for house.”

  “ ‘E no be like dat,” said Joseph. “Him na gentleman. No fit take bribe.”

  “Na so,” said the other in unbelief.

  At four fifteen Obi arrived at Joseph’s in his new Morris Oxford. That was one reason why Joseph had looked forward to this particular meeting. He was going to share in the glory of the car. It was going to be a great occasion for the Umuofia Progressive Union when one of their sons arrived at their meeting in a pleasure car. Joseph as a very close friend of Obi would reflect some of the glory. He was impeccably turned out for the occasion: gray flannel trousers, white nylon shirt, spotted dark tie, and black shoes. Although he did not say it, he was disappointed at Obi’s casual appearance. It was true he wanted to share in the glory of the car, but he did not care to be called the outsider who wept louder than the bereaved. It was not beyond Umuofia men to make such embarrassing comments.

  The reaction of the meeting was better than even Joseph expected. Although Obi had arrived at his place at four fifteen Joseph had delayed their departure until five when he knew the meeting would be full. The fine for lateness was one penny, but what was that beside the glory of stepping out of a pleasure car in the full gaze of Umuofia? As it turned out, nobody thought of the fine. They clapped and cheered and danced when they saw the car pull up.

  “Umuofia kwenu!” shouted one old man.

  “Ya!” replied everyone in unison.

  “Umuofia kwenu!”

  “Ya!”

  “Kwenu!”

  “Ya!”

  “Ife awolu Ogoli azua n’afia,” he said.

  Obi was given a seat beside the President and had to answer innumerable questions about his job and about his car before the meeting settled down again to business.

  Joshua Udo, a messenger in the Post Office, had been sacked for sleeping while on duty. According to him, he had not been sleeping but thinking. But the Chief Clerk had been looking for a way to deal with him since he had not completed the payment of ten pounds’ bribe which he had promised when he was employed. Joshua was now asking his countrymen to “borrow” him ten pounds to look for another job.

  The meeting had practically agreed to this when it was disturbed by Obi’s arrival. The President was just giving Joshua a piece of his mind on the subject of sleeping in the office, as a preliminary to lending him public funds.

  “You did not leave Umuofia four hundred miles away to come and sleep in Lagos,” he told him. “There are enough beds in Umuofia. If you don’t want to work, you should return there. You messengers are all like that. I have one in my office who is always getting permission to go to the latrine. Anyway, I move that we approve a loan of ten pounds to Mr. Joshua Udo for the … er … er the explicit purpose of seeking reengagement.” The last sentence was said in English because of its legal nature. The loan was approved. Then by way of light relief someone took up the President on his statement that it was work that brought them four hundred miles to Lagos.

  “It is money, not work,” said the man. “We left plenty of work at home.… Anyone who likes work can return home, take up his matchet and go into that bad bush between Umuofia and Mbaino. It will keep him occupied to his last days.” The meeting agreed that it was money, not work, that brought them to Lagos.

  “Let joking pass,” said the old man who had earlier on greeted Umuofia in warlike salute. “Joshua is now without a job. We have given him ten pounds. But ten pounds do
es not talk. If you stand a hundred pounds here where I stand now, it will not talk. That is why we say that he who has people is richer than he who has money. Everyone of us here should look out for openings in his department and put in a word for Joshua.” This was greeted with approval.

  “Thanks to the Man Above,” he continued, “we now have one of our sons in the senior service. We are not going to ask him to bring his salary to share among us. It is in little things like this that he can help us. It is our fault if we do not approach him. Shall we kill a snake and carry it in our hand when we have a bag for putting long things in?” He took his seat.

  “Your words are very good,” said the President. “We have the same thought in our minds. But we must give the young man time to look round first and know what is what.”

  The meeting supported the President by their murmurs. “Give the young man time.” “Let him settle down.” Obi felt very uneasy. But he knew they meant well. Perhaps it would not be too difficult to manage them.

  The next item on the agenda was a motion of censure on the President and executive for mishandling Obi’s reception. Obi was amazed. He had thought that his reception went very well. But not so the three young men who sponsored the motion. Nor, as it turned out, a dozen or so other young people. Their complaint was that they were not given any of the two dozen bottles of beer which had been bought. The top people and elders had monopolized it, leaving the young people with two kegs of sour palm-wine. As everyone knew, Lagos palm-wine was really no palm-wine at all but water—an infinite dilution.

  This accusation caused a lively exchange of hard words for the better part of an hour. The President called the young men “ungrateful ingrates whose stock-in-trade was character-assassination.” One of the young people suggested that it was immoral to use public funds to buy beer for one’s private thirst. The words were hard, but Obi felt somehow that they lacked bitterness; especially since they were English words taken straight from today’s newspaper. When it was all over the President announced that their honored son Obi Okonkwo had a few words to say to them. This announcement was received with great joy.