The Ear, the Eye and the Arm (19 page)

The boys sat on rocks. They chewed tender new stems of foxtail, almost as placidly as the animals below.
Mopani
flies hovered around their eyes. They brushed them away. The shadows under the trees shrank as the sun moved toward noon.

What must it be like to sit here month after month? thought Tendai. You listened to the monotonous chewing of cattle, the tepid rustle of water as it fingered its way through the reeds. You brushed away thousands of
mopani
flies through the years. No wonder you brooded a lot about the personalities of your cattle.

A cow bawled from the middle of the stream. "That's Clay Belly," said Banga. "She always wants the grass on the other side, and she always gets stuck in the mud." Tendai welcomed the diversion. He followed Banga into the water. "Stay on the rocks. The bottom is sticky around here."

Tendai got behind Clay Belly and pushed her rump, while Banga hauled on her horns. Clay Belly complained but eventually worked herself loose. She lolloped up the bank, spraying mud and water on all sides. Everyone laughed.

Then it was back to the rocks, to chewing on grass stems, listening to the
sluck
of water and brushing away
mopani
flies. Tendai had a lot of sympathy for Clay Belly. She at least had the imagination to try for something beyond her reach.

The sun crawled to noon and past.

"Let's play a game," suggested Hodza. Tendai brightened. The boys went to a flat hollow in a stone. The hollow formed a tiny arena. Each boy produced a fat peanut that had been marked with charcoal to show the owner. Two boys would set their peanuts twirling like little tops in the arena. The object was to knock your opponent's piece out of the hollow. Tendai didn't do well at the game. Time after time, his peanut was sent flying, to the delight of the others. After a while, the game became as deadly as sitting on the rocks. No one, except Tendai, noticed.

Finally, when he was ready to scream with impatience, a girl showed up with lunch. The boys fell upon roasted mealies and boiled pumpkins. They drank a sweetish slightly alcoholic liquid called
maheu
made of
sadza
and water left to ferment from the night before. Tendai, as usual, had a separate bowl and a calabash full of
maheu.

The food disappeared very quickly, and still the boys were hungry. To quiet their stomach pangs, they set about coaxing termites from nests. They poked grass stems down holes. The soldier termites fastened onto these and were pulled up and eaten.

Banga produced a leather sling. They all collected smooth pebbles from the stream and took turns slinging them at targets. Tendai did very well at this.

On the plants growing out of the water, a colony of weaverbirds had built their nests. These were cleverly constructed baskets attached to the tips of reeds. They swayed in the breeze as the bright yellow birds zipped in and out with food for their young. Banga suddenly hurled a rock and struck a weaverbird just as it perched on its nest. The bird dropped straight into the stream.

Everyone cheered as Banga waded out to claim his prize. He proudly displayed the little heap of bloodstained yellow feathers. Tendai thought about the baby birds waiting inside the nest for food that would never come. I'm a fool, he thought. This is a traditional village. These people can't go to a restaurant for lunch. They have to hunt. But he couldn't help feeling sorry.

The boys killed several
quelea
birds, which was all right. They flocked by the hundreds in the reeds and were a serious pest. Banga built a fire and roasted the tiny creatures on a spit.

"Here comes the Kamba clan," said Hodza, just as they finished picking the bones.

"They don't graze this meadow until tomorrow," Banga said, but he didn't seem surprised. Along the ridge at the top of the meadow came a gang of strange boys and another herd of cattle. The boys halted, but the animals kept on coming.

"Shouldn't we stop them?" Tendai said.

"Not yet." Banga's eyes shone with excitement. The others of Garikayi's clan were suddenly wide awake.

"Won't the cattle get mixed up?"

Banga looked at Tendai as though he were crazy. "How could they? You don't get your brother mixed up when he's playing with other children." But to Tendai, all the animals looked the same, except for Clay Belly, who was covered with mud.

The Kambas began constructing something on a small hill. Tendai couldn't see what until they stepped back to reveal two mounds of dirt the size of small anthills. Things were getting stranger by the minute. "You be our bull," said Banga, pushing Tendai to the front.

"He's a visitor," objected Hodza.

"Grandfather says he's going to be one of us, so he has to prove himself." Banga yelled a perfectly filthy insult at the Kambas, and they answered back in the same way. A big mean-looking boy shouldered his way to the front of the rival gang. He had a horribly scarred face. He made hand signals Tendai didn't understand.

"Ooo," said the Garikayi clan. "You aren't going to let him get away with
that?"

Tendai didn't know what to do. He didn't understand the situation.
 
"What's wrong with his face?" he whispered to Hodza.

"He fell into a cook fire when he was a baby," Hodza answered. Tendai was horrified. In the city, such an injury could have been corrected.

"What's his name?"

"Why are you asking all these questions? He's the Kamba's bull. That's all you need to know. However, we call him Head Buster."

Great, thought Tendai. He watched with a sinking heart as the mean-looking boy swaggered up and down in front of the mounds of dirt. Boys on both sides hurled insults. Suddenly, Head Buster spun around and kicked one of the mounds to smithereens.

"Get him! Get him now!" yelled Banga.

"I don't understand," Tendai said.

"You idiot! He just insulted your
mother!
Those mounds are your mother's breasts. He just
kicked
one of them!"

Then Tendai understood. It was a ritual fight, one gang against another, him against Head Buster. He hated fighting unless it had a purpose. The ritual of building his mother's breasts and insulting them simply had no meaning. He would have fought to the death to protect Mother if she were really there, but this was a stupid game.

Banga and Hodza and the others yelled themselves hoarse, trying to goad him into battle. No one needed to push Head Buster. He looked as if he wrestled hyenas for sport. "This isn't fair," Tendai murmured.

"Fair? Fair? You're our bull, you coward! Go get him!" shouted Banga.

Finally, reluctantly, Tendai sprang into action. He ran up the hill, circling around to get the advantage of the slope between him and his opponent. The other boys scattered. Head Buster swayed back and forth with his arms out like the pincers of a scorpion. Tendai let him get close. Head Buster lunged, head down, and Tendai stepped aside and threw him down the slope.

The crowd went wild. Head Buster roared and charged up the hill again. Tendai threw him back. Every time the bigger boy tried to butt him, Tendai used his momentum to throw him off balance. Finally, he rolled the big boy all the way down the hill to bang against a rock. Blood poured from Head Buster's face. He howled with rage and pain.

And that seemed to be it. The fight was automatically stopped. The Kambas helped their bull stagger off along the ridge. They rounded up their cattle and drove them away. The Garikayi clan danced around Tendai.
        

"I thought you were afraid," said Banga. "That was a good trick, brother. You really caught him off guard."

"You're the best bull we ever had!" cried the others.

Tendai laughed along with everyone else, but inside he felt dishonest. The fight hadn't been fair, and not for reasons the Garikayi clan could imagine. All those years of practicing with the martial arts instructor had paid off. Tendai might not like jujitsu, but he knew a lot more about it than Head Buster.

And for an instant, when the ugly, scarred boy lay at the bottom of the hill, Tendai had been right down there with him. He knew what it was to be overcome with terror. He felt the dull, oxlike panic as blood dripped down his face. Then the instant was gone as he was surrounded by the ecstatic Garikayi clan.

The martial arts instructor said that was what made me a bad warrior, Tendai thought as he was carried in triumph around the meadow. I didn't do too badly, though. It felt good when Banga called me "brother."

At the end of the day, the boys herded the cattle and goats into a
kraal
surrounded by thornbushes. Tendai understood that the fight was to be kept secret. The elders forbade such goings-on — while at the same time expecting them. It was one of those confusing village rules.

If Tendai had run away from the fight, everyone from the smallest child to Garikayi would have been ashamed of him. The old man wasn't supposed to know, but from the smile he gave Tendai at the
dare
it was clear he had been informed about the victory.

Tendai was completely happy that night as he took his place in the
dare.
Everyone included him in the conversation. This time there were no riddles but much lighthearted banter about bulls. It was only when Rita entered with his dinner that Tendai became uneasy.

She looked so tired! Her face was pinched as though she hadn't been eating enough. She even had little
burns
on her upper chest. What on earth was going on? Rita stumbled with weariness as she left the
dare.

Tendai knew then he would have to confront Garikayi about leaving Resthaven. Rita was suffering, and he didn't even know what was happening to Kuda. He took a few deep breaths to get his courage up —

— and an ancient woman he had not seen before hobbled into the men's meeting place. She whispered something to Garikayi. Immediately, the atmosphere of the
dare
changed. The boys were sent out while their elders stayed to confer.

Tendai branched off from the others to hunt for Rita. He found her cleaning pots with sand and ashes. "Want me to help you?" he whispered.

She moved aside, and he took over the work. A cry sounded in the distance. "Something's happening," he said.

"Poor Chipo. She's having her baby," said Rita.

Tendai worked silently. Childbirth was something he didn't like to discuss.

"It's too early. She was supposed to travel to her own family at the other end of the valley. Women do that with their first child. Now she can't. Myanda sent people scurrying in all directions to find midwives."

"More than one?"

"Garikayi insists on at least three." Another cry sounded in the night.

Tendai shivered. "How
are you?
You have burns on your chest."

"Oh, that," Rita said dully. "I ran afoul of one of the rules in this charming place. I ate one of the mealies meant for your lunch."

"I wouldn't have minded."

"Even the She Elephant didn't care if I ate something extra. She always gave us enough." Rita was crying silently, hopelessly. "Myanda said I was stealing. I don't steal. I was hungry. I didn't know I had to ask."

"I'll save you my food," promised Tendai. Why hadn't he thought of that before?

"The women heated peanuts on the coals. They held me down and put them on my chest."

Tendai was so shocked he couldn't speak. He found Rita's hand and held it tightly.

"I suppose it will scar. A doctor might be able to fix it. If we ever see a doctor again."

"Of course we will," Tendai said. "Oh, Rita, I'm so sorry. I'll make it up to you." They sat together, holding hands in the dark.

The moon rose over the wall of Resthaven, painting the quiet
msasa
trees with silver and trailing a bright shimmer on the stream at the valley's heart.

Twenty

"Dinner with the Matsikas. We've come up in the world," said Eye, admiring his new
dashiki
in the mirror over the sink.

"Hurry up," Ear complained. "You've been standing there for fifteen minutes." The dirty dishes had, for once, been washed and put away. The mirror had been polished, but nothing could be done about the crack. When Eye looked in it, half his face appeared to be lower than the other half.