Hirut turns, uncertain of why she is trembling.
Then when Ettore walks into the station with his shoulders slightly raised from the memory of a camera he was wise not to bring with him, Hirut stands. For a moment, she has to feel her dress to make sure it is on, that she is not naked before him, shaking in loathing and humiliation as Fucelli orders, Again, soldato, take another picture.
Hirut straightens. She lifts her chin and stares at Ettore as he pauses and looks at her, recognition and shame rippling through light and shadow to shrink the space between them. And when he takes a step in her direction, nervous and bewildered, Hirut salutes.
He pauses, nearly stumbles, and between them the valley expands and gunpowder rises in the breeze to choke them both, but he keeps moving forward as if he has been expecting this, as if he has prepared himself for this moment, has been getting ready for it since the last time they faced each other on the battlefield. Ettore walks toward her as if the path to forgiveness lay between them, as if years erase scars and photographs and history, as if that hand stretching out to grasp Hirut’s can raise the dead and return all he has stolen.
He expects pity, this much she can see through the haze of old battles and the unearthly silence. He expects the years not to have hardened her fury. He expects to walk toward her as if he has never worn a uniform, as if he did not mold himself to fit its contours. Here is the truth he wants to ignore: that what is forged into memory tucks itself into bone and muscle. It will always be there and it will follow us to the grave.
Ettore has to look around to make sure that Seifu is not there when Hirut stands up and salutes. What he feels is a steady pressure at his back, a knife’s blade poking between his shoulder blades. Because when she gets to her feet and raises herself tall and gives him that Ethiopian salute, he thinks he sees her face transformed by hatred and revulsion before it shifts into something else he cannot describe, a recognition of something just over his shoulder. If he had brought his camera with him, he could have captured it to study later. He sees the box next to her feet, the same one filled with his letters and old photographs, the same one that must surely contain that last letter from his father that he hopes—knows—she must have taken in the ambush, along with that terrible picture of her.
He has brought with him another photograph to give Hirut, something to exchange for the box, and the letter, and everything he has taken from her. It is a photograph he took of her in a quiet moment between her and Aster. They are unaware of his presence just beyond the prison, oblivious to everything but their own urgent conversation. Hirut is drenched in bright sunlight, the rays scalloping radiant beams around her head. She is angling toward the other woman, hands clasped around that barbed-wire fence, tipping against it without concern for comfort, impervious to the sharp metal digging into her palms: a soldier determined to continue despite pain. He had stared at Hirut then, really looked at her without the filter of a lens. You and I, he had said to himself in that moment, are not so different after all. A steady tightness had wound itself around his chest until he lifted his camera to take the shot.
He had misunderstood himself until it was too late. He had mistaken the gentle certainty he felt with her as an inspired inclination toward the camera. He had confused his heart for his eye. He had become his father’s son, the son of a man who was a ghost, caught between what could be expressed and what needed to be kept silent, slowly disappearing.
Hirut, he says, speaking her name to himself in the train station. He stretches out his hand, her photograph in his shirt pocket, sweat collecting at the back of his neck. Hirut, he repeats. It is a name and a call for forgiveness, a sound falling at his feet to clear a path for him to walk.
Ettore sees Hirut still standing at attention, her mouth a firm and hard line on a beautiful face. He trembles, unable to stop his knees from buckling. He knows that she sees his outstretched hand and still, Hirut refuses to shift out of her salute. Refuses to be anything other than the soldier she has always been, even when a prisoner. The boundaries of bodies are the least of all things: the words from so long ago come back to him.
Hirut, he says again, certain that this is how he will become undone. This is how a name exposes a breach in the earth. Hirut, he repeats, and lets himself slide forward. He takes out the photograph and extends it to her. Look, he says. Look. Please.
Look, he says to her. I’m sorry, he adds, as if that is an apology, as if those are words strong enough to pull the ripped seams of her together and hold her intact.
Hirut shakes her head, still straight-backed in her salute, and takes a step away from him. Stay there, she says, don’t get any closer.
She is not looking at him, though. She is staring at the improbable figure who has come through the heavy doors into the station. It looks like Minim, but he is at home, her neighbor, far away. So she is certain it is the emperor. Haile Selassie, also called Jan Hoy, also called Ras Teferi Mekonnen, also called the sun unto his people. It is him. Hirut freezes in that salute. There is no logic that can balance this vision.
Outside, the voices of protesters meld with the prayers of the devout and all that sways between cruelty and devotion lays itself bare before her: manifest in an aging king dressed as a peasant, and a former enemy soldier repeating her name.
Minim, she says, letting her confusion wash over her and take control. Minim. Then she corrects herself, because she knows who it is. Jan Hoy, Emperor Haile Selassie, Your Majesty, how have you come here?
A crack in the world has been revealed and the emperor stands at its center, hearing this woman point to him in shock and call him a word like it is a name. Minim: Nothing.
Minim, she says again, as if it is an oath and a plea, as if this utterance will absolve his people of their past and future deeds. Those same people who have been raising their fists and shouting outside as if they want to hammer a dent into the heavens.
He turns to look for Amonasro, to ask him: Is this the child you were trying to save? But Amonasro is no longer there. He looks for Simonides, but the Greek poet has also disappeared. The only one who remains is Zenebwork, who is vibrating in this other woman’s rage, melting into it, finding comfort in its sharp contours.
Haile Selassie turns to look at this woman again. She is stuck in her stiff salute, pivoting between him and an Italian that the emperor is just noticing.
Are you waiting for your father? he asks her, because he is not sure of anything. He is uncertain, even, of who he really is, dressed in the clothes of a peasant while a woman who is starting to look vaguely familiar tells him he is nothing, then addresses him by his many names. He has forgotten her, he decides. He has left her out of one of the many rooms in his head and she is floundering, desperate for recognition, for a way to step out of the world of the dead and into the living who carry names.
Do we remember you? he continues. We must, he adds. We are sure of it. Give us your name so we can bring you forth.
She tilts her head: My name is Hirut, daughter of Fasil and Getey, proud wife of the great Aklilu, grateful mother of two strong daughters, closest friend and neighbor to the powerful Aster. Then she points to the shocked Italian bowing nervously to him. He is an invader, she says. Tell him to leave, if you are really the emperor.
The Italian flinches and stares at him, then lowers his eyes.
And who are you to tell us this, Haile Selassie says to Hirut.
I am a soldier, Hirut replies. I was the brave guard of the Shadow King.
Haile Selassie nods slowly. And others are trying to replace us again, did you know that?
Hirut, Ettore says. I don’t understand what’s happening but please, take this picture and give me what’s mine.
The emperor turns from the stunned foreigner speaking in perfect Amharic and grips his own empty hand.
Hirut drops her head and folds her arms across her chest. Go away, she says to Ettore. Leave my country now. Take this, she adds, shoving the box toward him with her foot. Get out of he
re. Vatene, she whispers. You’re not welcome in this place.
She speaks those words through a growing chasm that has swallowed that thing her heart cannot contain. Standing before him, Hirut recognizes him as something both startling and familiar. A new truth and an age-old deception.
Hirut, he says, I’m sorry. I did things I shouldn’t have, he adds. I followed orders, and I did much more. My father’s letter, is it in the box? Do you have it?
Ettore swallows and wipes his eyes and she sees a fleeting glimpse of the young man he once was. The young man she both hated and pitied and understood and something else unnameable.
I have nothing left but what’s in there, he adds, pointing to the box. Nothing else has any meaning to me except what’s in this room, right now, but I must leave. Let me take something with me, please. And he says her name with the familiarity that has always existed between them, marred by years and war, but still intact: Hirut.
Hirut feels the emperor’s eyes on her. He is shaking his head, looking from the box to Ettore, from Ettore to her, from her to his own tattered clothing and his hand grasping air.
The dead will shelter the living, Haile Selassie says quietly. They will find us once we have named them one by one. Isn’t that so, my daughter? And he nods to his empty hand.
Hirut feels something rise to the surface, an emotion that has always been there, waiting. She lets it roll over her and press into her chest then blossom in her head. And in the broad band of light creeping through the windows of the train station, Hirut takes out the letter and extends it to Ettore as she begins to speak:
Getey, Fasil, Aster, Nardos, Zenebwork, Siti, Tesfaye, Dawit, Beniam, Tariku, Girum, Amha, Bekafa, Bisrat, Desta, Befekadu, Saleh, Ililta, Meaza, Lakew, Ahmed, Eskinder, Biruk, Genet, Gabriel, Matteos, Leul, Hoda, Birtukan, Mulumabet, Estifanos, Hewan, Lukas, Habte, Mimi, Kiros, Mohamed, Wongel, Atnaf, Jembere, Imru, Senait, Yosef, Mahlet, Alem, Girma, Gelila, Birtukan, Freiwot, Tiruneh, Marta, Harya, Hayalnesh, Mengiste, Zinash, Petros, Anketse, Sergut, Mikael, Mogus, Teodros, Checole, Kidane, Lidia, Fifi and Ferres, and the cook, the cook, the cook, and as she says their names, she feels them gather around her and urge her on: Tell them, Hirut, we were the Shadow King. We were those who stepped into a country left dark by an invading plague and gave new hope to Ethiopia’s people.
Hirut turns from Ettore, now folded into his grief while clutching his father’s letter. She lifts her head to the sounds of gunfire and shouting. Then she steps toward the emperor as the calls for his demise spiral up like windblown clouds.
I’ll walk you home, she says. I’ll protect you from those outside, Your Majesty. I’ll be your guard. She takes his hand and grips it tight. She watches as he extends his other hand beside him, grasping air and time.
And as the door closes behind them, Hirut stands tall and repeats the names of those who came before her, of those who fell as she rose to her feet in choking fumes and continued to run, and she lets memory lie across her shoulders like a cape while she salutes the Shadow Kings, every single one, and raises her Wujigra, a brave and fearsome soldier once more. Then Hirut and the emperor walk to the palace together.
Photo
Look at the two of them: those women pressed against the barbed-wire fence while one clutches it in her hands as if it were knotted silk. Look at the flicker of light that will soon consume the enemy camp and announce a man who will race down the hill, his legs sturdy and sure, his arms swinging with fury while he cries his son’s name. What is seen cannot explain what exists: Hirut and Aster pressed against the barbed-wire fence while Hirut clutches it in her hands and the other woman says to her: They’re coming to get us tonight, they will kill every guard and set us free and you must be ready, the cook has let me know. And when Hirut turns her head so that rays scallop around her like a brilliant flame, what can the eye see but just a young woman seeking comfort in the warmth of an afternoon sun? What does the eye know of her only request: Let me kill the photographer myself. What can the camera see of her later mercy and that lifelong rage she will finally release in the surrender of a father’s letter to his son? What can Ettore know, after all, of the distances crossed and promises kept, of those unworded emotions that she has left unbound by futile vocabulary? What can he know except what he sees while staring at that young woman grasping knotted silk as if she were born to be draped in it: a beauty incomprehensible and ferocious, strong enough to break through bone and settle into a heart and split it forever.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
The first stories I heard of the war between fascist Italy and Ethiopia came from my grandfather. His tales focused on the heroic but poorly equipped Ethiopian fighters who struggled against a modern European army. Growing up, I imagined these men, stoic and regal like my grandfather, facing tanks and sophisticated artillery with outdated guns, and winning. It wasn’t until much later that I discovered the story of my great-grandmother, Getey.
She was just a girl, married but too young to live with an adult husband. When Emperor Haile Selassie ordered families to send their eldest son to the army, she volunteered to go as the eldest child; her brothers were not old enough. Her father disagreed and when he gave his gun to her new husband to represent the family, she sued to get the weapon. She won the case, and in front of the judges, she took her father’s rifle and began to sing the boastful songs of Ethiopian soldiers as they recounted their many strengths and courage. She enlisted, and went to war.
My great-grandmother represents one of the many gaps in European and African history. The Shadow King tells the story of those Ethiopian women who fought alongside men, who even today have remained no more than errant lines in faded documents. What I have come to understand is this: The story of war has always been a masculine story, but this was not true for Ethiopia and it has never been that way in any form of struggle. Women have been there, we are here now.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book is a work of fiction. Historical events and timelines have been altered or compressed for the purposes of the narrative. The many years spent writing this novel have led me to stories that I had not known existed, and that I did not know were mine. I have many to thank for each step of the way. This list will not do them justice, but it is my humble attempt.
My first introduction to this history came from stories told by my parents and relatives, by all those Ethiopians who refused to let this story die, and in the retelling kept the dead alive. The earliest pages were written at a residency at The Santa Maddalena Foundation at the invitation of Beatrice Monti della Corte. Thank you, Beatrice, for sharing your memories. The Fulbright Scholar Program and the entire Fulbright staff in Rome opened doors and provided life-changing opportunities while answering my most tedious questions. My research advisor in Italy, Sandro Triulzi, and his wife, Paola Splendore, led me to new discoveries, introduced me to those who could answer more questions, and invited me over for meals rich with stories and laughter. The Emily Harvey Foundation was a gift in the early days of this book. Shaul Bassi and Università Ca’Foscari in Venice made that beautiful city feel like home and gave me the time and space to research and write. The Puycelsi Writers Retreat gave me blessed isolation and breathtaking views from which to begin edits. Tarekegn Gebreyesus, Debrework Zewdie, Ruth Iyob, Gabriel Tzeggai, Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Shiferaw Bekele, the late Abiye Ford, and many others provided invaluable advice and resources. Two incredible women, Deb Willis and Ellyn Toscano, supported and listened and pushed me toward new ways of seeing images and talking about them, and never let me forget the true joy of research. My fantastic colleagues in the Queens College MFA Program in Creative Writing & Literary Translation provided immeasurable support and understanding during this entire process and alleviated so much stress.
To those who never said, Aren’t you done yet? Thank you. To those who did, it’s okay.
To my readers who dropped everything when I rushed in with a draft, and kindly offered invaluable feedback—Laila Lalami, Maud Newton, Sabina Murray—I
owe you. Special thanks to those who have given me encouragement and no-bullshit advice over the long years of this book, and opened their homes and shared many meals: Mylitta Chaplain, Sarida Scott Montgomery, Tedros Mengiste, Anketse Debebe, Jennifer Gilmore, Elif Batuman, Mona Eltahawy, Emmanual Iduma, Chiké Frankie Edozien, Robert Rutledge, Cheryl Moskowitz, Diana Matar, Molly Roden Winter, Alessandra di Maio, Harya Tarekegn, Hayalnesh Tarekegn, Genet Lakew, Hiwote Kenfe, Awam Ampka, Gunja Sengupta, Jeff Marowits, Yasmine El-Rashid, Alberto Manguel, Craig Stephenson, Gregory Pardlo, Jeff Pearce. To Juan and Nelly Navarro, for your generosity and kindness over the years. To my love, Marco, who was all of this and so much more, who believed in me through endless drafts and long nights and stayed up just to talk: we did it.
My deepest gratitude to my editor, Jill Bialosky, who waited patiently and read carefully and edited brilliantly. And to my agent, Lynn Nesbit, who was there and believed and pushed when sometimes I faltered.
To those women and girls of Ethiopia who would not let themselves be completely erased by history, who stood up when I was looking for them and made themselves known. I see you. I will always see you.
ALSO BY MAAZA MENGISTE
Beneath the Lion’s Gaze
The Shadow King is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2019 by Maaza Mengiste
All rights reserved
First Edition
For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to
Permissions, W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 500 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10110
The Shadow King Page 38