He walks through the length of it. When he returns home, the sun is cooling and he can hear people talking to each other as more people return from the farm. He decides against a shower, opting for bed instead. There is a stone in his heart, and the weight of it sinks deep and makes his legs weary.
Few people have a treasure. He must have read this somewhere, and he will tell it to anyone he loves, or his children, for that matter, if he gets to have any. Few people, very few, have a treasure, and if they do, they must cling to it and not let themselves be ambushed and have it taken from them.
Even though he feels this strongly, he is no longer certain whether the words are true or useful. And where is Paul when Ajie is in need of certainty?
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
He wakes up twice at night and falls back into a recurring dream.
He is nine years old again and Paul is sitting beside him on the mud floor in Nkaa’s front room. It is the night of ntitroegberi, and Nkaa is to narrate — as he does once every year — the story of how their ancestors came to Ali-Ogba. On such nights, the room is usually packed with people, but today’s flow is scanty, some children half asleep, cross-legged on a mat. Kitchen stools with uneven legs are stacked on each other by the corner. There is a chill in the air, but the space is firelit; it crackles and leaps, shadows grow long on the mud walls.
Nkaa sweeps into the room in full regalia. Black velvet feni with yellow furry imprints of lion heads spewing fire. The wrapper tied around his waist is grazing the floor, stiff with embroidery, strewn with sequins and stones, and his red cap is adorned with a singular eagle feather. He approaches the armchair that has been set for him by the fire; he is magnificent and terrible, a towering old tree. He assumes his throne and makes a gesture designed to prompt silence, but this is not necessary.
Paul is sitting on Ajie’s left side, and to Ajie’s right is a boy who is reeking of palm kernel oil. Ajie hates the smell of palm kernel oil. The light from the flames makes the lion heads on Nkaa’s tunic look bloodred.
Nkaa begins: Hundreds of years ago, in the royal courts of the ancient Bini kingdom, Prince Ogualor is raging against his brothers, and there is no way to pacify him — the cause of his anger various and unclear. He goes in search of them in the palaces. Nkaa suffers genuine alarm, his hand flies up and slams against his chest as he recounts the tale, for Ogualor’s temper was legendary. It is a night of anger and blood, of treachery, betrayal, and separation. He growls like a wounded leopard, picks up his machete, and goes in hunt of his brothers. Prince Ogualor ransacks the land; he splits in half any man he meets on his way. Wherever he goes, a wilderness follows in his wake. His brother Aklaka hears of the hunt and flees Bini. He takes his sons, Ogba and Ekpeye. In order not to be discovered, they travel in disguise and without their retinue down the River Niger. They fake their lives as ordinary people, mere travelers, a people displaced by famine or war. They search for a place beyond the reach of Prince Ogualor; for a spell, they settle among people they meet on the way. They lie down for a season in Agbor, but news reaches them that Ogualor has not relented in his search, so they pack up and move down the Niger River.
Decades go by, and Aklaka grows gray and frail. Before he passes away, the gods show him a vision of the land his children will settle on. It is the center of the earth. Igmi is to the right, Oru to the left. It is between the great forests and the endless sea. The land is fertile and the water rich with fish.
They travel on till they dip their feet in the Sombreiro. The river is quick and aloof. They pass through the land of the Engenni. They marry wives from their neighbors. Is Aboh not their brother? What about all those who reside near the water? Is Awura not to them as a sister? Is Oguta not just here beside us? They set down on the plains between the great rivers Orashi and Sombreiro, gently sloping and well drained. They make their first home in Ahiahu.
Nkaa breaks into singing; his voice is smoky, and he taps his fingers on his wrapper, inspiring a response from his audience.
Paul nudges Ajie awake. He elbows him gently three times, and the bedspring creaks as Ajie rolls over on his side. The morning sun catches his eyes.
—
Everything is going well. The sound system has been set up successfully, four canopies pitched around in the quadrangle, and people are seated already, waiting for the pastor to begin the funeral service with a prayer. Ma is sitting on a bench beside the casket, her hand resting on the lid’s silver handle, as if she needs to steady it from falling off.
There is a crowd, but Ajie doesn’t notice anyone in particular. Deaths always draw a crowd, funerals draw larger crowds, and funerals for people who passed away in dramatic circumstances draw the largest crowds.
People push their way toward him. They talk, offer condolences, touch him on his shoulders — strangers, family, friends, all in beautiful dark clothes. His eyes cut through the array of them, their essence yielded up to him, but he doesn’t drink them in. He feels like he is all eyes. He has never seen as clearly as he does today. His old friend Gospel is testing the microphone, and Bibi hurries past with a tray of refreshments. That’s just Bibi being her capable self, making sure everyone is catered to. A lump rises in Ajie’s throat; his rib cage is about to heave. Dotun walks over to ask if he and Gospel need any help, and Ajie says no, he has this one, but Dotun still stands by as Ajie switches the mic on and off and taps it and adjusts a button on the feedback speaker.
A girl Ajie does not care to remember is wailing by the pavement; she is sitting on the floor with her legs stretched out, bawling. Her cry becomes a song, and people gather around to console her. Older people in Ogibah, it seems, still stay away from the funeral of a very young person. Dying young is always considered an indecent act that should be met with proportionate rudeness so it doesn’t repeat itself. Application Master came to see Ma that morning and stayed with her for a while. He has gone home, saying he would return later. The girl weeping by the pavement has broken into a mourning dance, swaying and waving an invisible handkerchief this way and that way like someone paddling a canoe. This inspires sobs from other mourners, all of them showing up at a funeral and weeping louder than the bereaved. Bibi walks by the mourners, and one of them holds her by the waist, and Bibi pauses and touches her slightly on the back. Were they childhood friends? Ajie decides he does not know any of them. If he tells Bibi what he is thinking, she will say he has spent too much time abroad and has grown impatient with Ogibah ways.
He is very thirsty. Like he hasn’t had a drop to drink in the past thirteen years. All he needs right now is a cold bottle of Guinness or half a glass of stinging whiskey. He is desperate for a cigarette, but he knows there is no quenching that. The dead will not be consoled; neither will those who live in the skin of their dead.
Some people have traveled from very far; many have come on the shortest notice, as soon as they heard. They tell Ajie all these things and look him in the face and hold his hand. Ma couldn’t reach Mr. Ifenwa, since he moved back to his home village, Nnobi.
The pastor is standing by the lectern now and, after a short prayer, reads a verse from Job 19 and a couple of verses from I Corinthians 15. They all rise to sing from a hymnbook. Ma picked the hymn herself. She deliberated over three final choices and then selected a favorite from her school days, “Be Still My Soul.” Ajie mouths the words of the hymn as the assembly sings along. He looks at Ma, standing beside the casket, the funeral program fluttering a little in her hand.