My own breathing was too loud, every breath a great wind, a falling tree. I was conscious of my exhalations and how loud they were when I ran and when I sat in the grass waiting and watching. I held my breath to kill the sound but when I opened my mouth again my breathing was louder. It filled my ears and the air around me and I was certain it would be the end of me. When my breath calmed and I could hear other sounds, I soon heard a voice, a Dinka voice, singing a Dinka song.
I ran to the singing.
It was an old man singing, the voice small and coarse. I did not slow down when I came to him and emerged from the forest like an animal, almost knocking him over.
He shrieked. I shrieked. He saw that I was a boy and he held his heart.
— Oh, how you scared me!
The man was panting now. I apologized.
— The crashing of the grass sounded like a hyena. Oh child!
— I'm so sorry, father, I said.
— I am an old man. I can't handle these things.
— I am sorry, I repeated.-So sorry.
— If an animal came through that bush he need only breathe on me and I would be sent to the next world. Oh, my son!
I told him where I had been and what I had seen. The man told me he would bring me home to keep me safe until daylight, when we would decide upon a sensible course of action.
We walked and as we walked I expected to be offered food and water. I needed both, had had neither since the morning, but had been taught never to beg. Now I waited, expecting that because it was night and I was a boy alone, the old man would offer me a meal. But the man only sang quietly and walked slowly along the path. Finally he spoke.
— It has been some time since the lion-people have come here. I was very young when I saw this last. They were on horses? I nodded.
— Yes. These are Arabs who have fallen to the level of the animal. They are like the lion, with its appetite for raw meat. These are not humans. These lion-creatures love war and blood. They enslave people, which is against the laws of God. They have been transformed into animals.
The man walked in silence for some time.
— I think God is sending us a message through these lion-men. This is obvious. We're being punished by God. Now we need only find what it is that God is angry about. This is the puzzle.
I didn't know where the old man was leading me but after some time I saw a small fire in the distance. We reached the fire and were received kindly by the people there. They knew the old man, and asked me where I came from and what I had seen. I told them, and they told me that they had run, too. They gave me water and I watched their Dinka faces red in the fire and I thought that this night was the end of the world and that the morning would not come again. The red faces in the fire were spirits and I was dead, all were dead, the night was eternal. I was too tired to know or care. I fell asleep among them, their heat and murmurings.
I woke up in the purple light of dawn among four men, all elderly but one, and two women, one of them nursing a baby. The fire was cold and I felt alone.
— You're awake, said one of the old men.-Good. We need to move soon. I am Jok.
Jok was only bones and a threadbare blue gown. He sat with his knees by his ears, his hands resting limply on his knees. One of the women asked me where I was from. She spoke into the face of her suckling child. I told her I had come from Marial Bai.
— Marial Bai! You're far from there. Who is your father?
I told her my father was Deng Nyibek Arou. Now Jok was interested.
— This is your father, the businessman? he said. I said it was.
— And which son are you? he asked.
I gave my full name, Achak Nyibek Arou Deng. Third son of my father's first wife.
— I'm sorry, Achak Deng, he said.-Someone is dead from your family. A man. Jok and the two women each said they had heard something about the family of the businessman named Deng Nyibek Arou.
— Either your father or your uncle, a younger man with glasses said.-One is dead.
— I think it was your father, the nursing woman said, still not looking up from her baby.-It was the wealthy man.
— No, said the young man, — I'm almost sure it was the brother.
— You'll find out soon enough, the mother said.-When you go home. Oh don't cry. I'm sorry.
She reached out across the ash of last night's fire to touch me, but she was too far. I decided that I did not believe her, that she knew nothing about my father. I wiped my nose on the back of my hand and asked them if they knew the way back to Marial Bai.
— It's a half-day's walk that direction, Jok said.-But you can't go back there. The horsemen are still there. They're everywhere. Stay with us, or you can go with Dut Majok. He's going to get closer to see what's happening.
The young man with glasses, I learned, was named Dut Majok. I recognized him as the teacher from Marial Bai, the teacher of the older boys, husband to the woman I spoke to in the river. He was not much more than a boy himself.
When the day opened, I chose to walk with Dut Majok. We left after eating some nuts and okra. Dut was a man of no more than twenty or so, shorter than average and a bit round in the stomach. His face was small, his head very close to his shoulders. He picked leaves from the trees we passed, tearing them into small pieces and dropping them into the grass. He had a professorial air about him, and it extended beyond his glasses. He seemed more interested in everything-me, my family, the footprints we occasionally found along the way-than anyone I could recall.
— You were at the cattle camp? he asked.
— No.
— Too young I suppose. Where were you when they came?
— At home. In my house.
— Your father was a smart man. I liked him. Funny, shrewd. I'm very sorry about your loss. Have you heard about your mother? I shook my head.
— Well. The town was burned to the ground this time. Many women were burned inside their homes. The murahaleen do this now. This is new. The homes in your area, where the wealthier people lived, the big homes-the horsemen like to burn those. It was probably burned the last time, correct? Did she run?
— Yes, I said.
— Maybe she's okay. I bet she is. Is she fast? I said nothing.
— Well. Come with me, son. We'll see what we can see.
The sun rose as we walked and was high and small when Dut climbed into a tree and lifted me up. From there we could see the distant clearing of Marial Bai. All around was dust.
— Okay. They're still there, he said.-Those are their horses, some of the cattle they've stolen. Where you see dust, Achak, this is the murahaleen. We won't be going back into town for some time. We'll check again tomorrow. Come.
I followed Dut down the tree and back in the direction of the fire where we had slept. We walked for an hour before Dut stopped, looked quizzically in every direction, and then turned around completely. Throughout the afternoon, he stopped frequently and seemed to be making calculations in his head and with his hands. Each time, after his calculations, he would appear decisive and would be off again, confident with his new course, with me following. Then, after some time walking in the diminishing light, the process would begin again. He would stop, look to the sun, look all around him, make his hand calculations, and set off on a new path.
The sun had set by the time we reached the camp again.
— Where were you two? the suckling child's mother asked.