Mission

by Philip Spires

  For what reasons, Munyasya?

  Again Nzoka was in view. Munyasya’s eyes were lifted up as if by a hand. There are many, Nzoka. First, he brands me as a collaborator who not only aided the oppressors, but also who believed all they told me and so I became one of them. In his eyes, I am infected with a vile disease that must be avoided at all costs. He says that since the people of Kenya have fought and died to rid themselves of the British, then the people of Migwani should also rid themselves of me and should treat me as if I were a traitor.

  But it is not this that causes you so much pain.

  You are right again, Nzoka. His second argument concerns responsibilities, responsibilities in the community, and responsibilities to others. A man without responsibilities should not be trusted, he says, and, in his eyes, I have none.

  Why not? Nzoka began to speak like a man who had just achieved some lifetime’s goal, more slowly and with obvious contentedness, savouring every moment of his closeness to victory.

  Mbuvu believes that my life has been a betrayal of all the values, which it should have respected, and thus I should not be entrusted with either the peoples’ respect or the power now to arbitrate on important decisions.

  And what values are these, Munyasya?

  I never married so I have no children. I have no surviving relatives and that worries Mbuvu deeply. If my decisions in life have led directly to the death of my family and the end of my name, would not my advice for the community as a whole result in the same fate for the people of Migwani? He looks upon me as a potential, perhaps real, curse upon the community, intent upon exterminating its life, as I have done my own. He doesn’t realise that I am not worried by loneliness. I am a Christian. I am baptised. When I die, God will be my judge, not my descendants.

  So that is what you believe, my child? If what you have just said about your God being your only judge, then why am I here with you now? Tell me that?

  I don’t know. I must be dreaming...

  What? Nzoka’s body stiffens with rage. His smile dissolves into anger as he strides across the room to confront Munyasya. Without another word he raises his arm and strikes Munyasya a sharp blow. Munyasya feels himself fall. The blow hurts, stings, like the slaps on the leg he had so often received as a child from his stepfather. I am no dream, Munyasya. He almost spits the words. Munyasya looks up to see Nzoka bending over him. Now let me explain, more clearly than Mbuvu ever could, exactly what your responsibilities are. I am not speaking of these responsibilities to the community that seem to occupy your thoughts so much; I am speaking of your duties - yes, duties - to me and your fellow ancestors. I have grown very impatient with you over the years. At first I was even a little proud of you. When I died you were merely a boy, but I followed your life, no less than lived it with you, sometimes helping, sometimes hindering. That was my duty to you. To watch over you; to do as much as I possibly could to ensure that your life followed the right path for both of us, but always giving you the right to choose. If you consider your life a success, then I must at least share the credit, but if, like Mbuvu, you consider your life to be a failure and yourself to be a traitor to something greater than yourself, then also I must share the blame. When a branch bends, the whole tree moves. Unfortunately for you, Munyasya, I believe Mbuvu is right.

  Think, for a moment, what I taught you; what every caring father teaches a son. I told you that when I passed away, I would not forget you; that I would live on with you, inside you and with all my relatives and friends; to watch over them; to do my best to protect them from themselves and from others until they themselves were released from life and its ties.

  Then we would all be reunited and would prepare ourselves for the next stage. I would then leave you again to begin the final journey toward complete rest, complete fulfilment, and complete happiness. Now a man who knows where he is going does not ask the way, but you have been lost, Munyasya, and so you needed me to help you on your way. That is where you and I stood last night, with you dead on the earth and me in control. And then our mutual friend arrived. And so I was trapped. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. You and I are now joined in your continued life. You know that I cannot start that journey while ever I live in you. Over the years I am willing to accept that I have gradually lost whatever influence I possessed over you. It seemed that you rejected me, but would not let go of your memory. For years I have waited for you to return and in vain. Time and time again, you have come near to death and I have prepared myself to step forward to claim my prize, made ready for the journey I must begin when my duties to you have been completed. But every time you have faced death, Munyasya, you have cheated it, as you have done again today. I have grown very impatient with you. I cannot begin my journey while you remember me in life. It is my duty to care for your life, but by caring, I prolong my own death, a state that, itself, should be no more than another transition. Munyasya, let me go! I should have started my path long ago. Let me go! I should have left behind this God-forsaken place for a greener land, which only seems to move further away and grow more barren as I watch. All this is your doing, Munyasya. For years you have been the only person to keep my memory, my name alive and I have grown to hate you for it, especially because you have rejected it. What makes it worse is that you are alone. You have no wife and no children. There is no one to share my burden. You live, but your life has ended. You are now useless to anyone, condemned forever. Your death will be mourned by no one. You have no future. Unlike me, you will die with your body’s death. There is no living soul within which your memory can grow and mature. Your weak and infant memory will be thus cast out from the protection of mourning, straight into its journey. If the path were straight and even, an infant might survive, but there are many pitfalls and many dangers, so surely you would perish for ever and would thus be doomed never to reach your paradise. So what have you to lose? Why do you cling so fearfully to a life that can now give you nothing? Why do you bind me so tightly to the present and so stand between me and my own destiny? Why do you not think of me? Consider your duty to me and please release my soul! It is you and only you who hinder my progress. Why, you could kill yourself! That would release me and because your state is so lamentable anyway you, yourself, would be no worse off than you are already. Think of your duty, Munyasya. Kill yourself to release me. If you refuse, I can bring great pain upon you. You would live only to regret your decision, if you made the wrong one …

  I could never kill myself. No one ever mourns a suicide.

  You have no one to mourn you anyway, so why do you worry?

  Munyasya had listened intently. It was as if his own conscience had sprung to life to confront him, to punish his years of disobedience. Inwardly, he knew the truths to be unquestionable, but publicly he dare not admit it. The lie had been lived for so long that even he had begun to believe it, but now a larger truth had caught up with him. It was inescapable. No matter how convincing, no matter how convenient another’s truths might be, these revelations were undoubtedly inevitable. They were tried and tested, made indisputable by Nzoka’s presence. His guilt was complete, acknowledged with downcast eyes, like those of a child who knows he has done wrong. He had learned all these things before. And he had turned his back on them.

  All these truths of life and death had been passed on to him by this same Nzoka during the days of his childhood. The logic was clear then and it was clear now. Death was not an end but a beginning. It brought to a close that period of testing which all souls must suffer. They must pay the price for their expulsion from the paradise at the beginning of time. The evil ones must be punished, but first they must be identified and their guilt proven. Life is but the first judge. Life is the soul’s only chance to prove its worth, to confirm its worthiness to return to paradise, to identify its willingness to uphold all things good and shun the bad. The responsibilities are clear: to survive the perils of childhood; to marry and procreate; to die and to be mo
urned.

  But that is just the first step. In death the journey begins. While life’s present recedes into one’s own past, a soul must retrace the passing of all time to be reunited with its own beginnings in paradise. For a while, death and life stay together and it remains the duty of ancestors to protect the lives of their family. But then, with that accomplished, a person’s life task is completed and there remains only a shared journey to retrace time, itself. The journey is long, the path tortuous and full of pitfalls. But those who are left behind eventually follow and offer help. No one, dead or alive can ever make such a journey without help. But then when it is made, time is no more. There the sun shines every day, the rains never fail and the harvest is always good. There is no illness, no hunger, no vice, everlasting labour and complete rest. But there are duties on the way and the first and most important is to ensure that you are mourned. While you are remembered you are tied to the present, given time to grow in a new infancy, time to recover the strength that the tribulations of death have sapped. Just as youths undergo seclusion before and after circumcision, which is just another of the necessary changes in the cycle, the dead must live on the memory of present for a while to receive the help and support of their descendants. Without them, without their remembrance, the still youthful soul is doomed. It is too weak, too naive to survive the tortuous path along which it must travel.

  But this waiting serves a dual purpose. It is also the duty of the dead to watch over those who survive them, to ensure their worthiness to enter paradise. They must be advised, influenced, cosseted through the difficulties they face. Then, if a direct descendant is shown through life to be unworthy, and to bear part of this, humanity’s ultimate guilt, the responsibility is shared. The whole family shares the guilt and all who have not yet found release from the present must suffer. If the offence is shown to be minor, then the handicaps imposed are correspondingly small. The journey will be longer and harder, but it will surely succeed. If, on the other hand, the family is responsible for a major crime, those still mourned by the guilty one suffer his fate. They are locked in the present, destined to wander this land forever, unable to achieve their eternal goal.

  But when a name ceases to be spoken by the living, once mourning is over, a freed soul can begin its own journey. It cannot start until it is strengthened by the memory of the living, but thus strengthened, that nurture must be withdrawn, and then, just as a child emerges from a parent’s care, the soul can make its own way.

  Munyasya had known all this, but had tried to ignore it. Now its obvious truth flooded back to him, reinforced by Nzoka’s prompting. In the bar, Mbuvu had spoken of these things and had listed all the reasons why he, Munyasya, had failed the test of life and therefore bore the guilt. There was no judgment in death, only in life. There was no great council, where one’s life was arraigned for assessment, no such simplistic arbitration between good and evil. Every man born was both good and evil in life and therefore the same in death. Life’s test merely proved the ability to control evil, for it can never be defeated, never be eradicated. Paradise is thus equally open to both the pure and impure in life, if they accept the responsibilities it imposes. If they are unwilling, then they are lost and rejected forever.

  In an instant, Munyasya remembered and knew it to be true. He was afraid, and repentant, but powerless. I cannot help you, Nzoka. If I kill myself, you will share the guilt that this very action will bring upon me. That is inescapable. As you say, I am clearly doomed, but you could still survive. You are my stepfather, not part of my immediate family. It is they who are really suffering.

  I know, Munyasya. I am here on their behalf. They are fast weakening. They have already waited for you for far too long. Without my help they will be lost. They cannot survive alone. It is you who holds their destiny in your hand, just as you also hold mine. Ending your own life now will release all of us. They are already weak. Any more delay will damn them forever to the present.

  For what seemed like hours, they confronted one another in silence. Munyasya frantically thought through his predicament, balancing influences against truths, possibilities against desires. Every fact fit the scheme, and it meant that he was trapped. But there might just be one flaw, one inconsistency that troubled him and rendered Nzoka almost powerless in his eyes.

  You should not be here.

  Nzoka’s confidence drained in an instant. His stern expression dissolved to betray confusion and apprehension. He tried to protect himself. That is not your worry. What I do in my position is my business. It is you who holds the key to all this, not I. I came here to confront you, to advise you. If you reject my advice you are doomed.

  You have said that I am doomed anyway.

  Munyasya awaited a reaction. None came. For the first time since they were reunited in the market place, Nzoka looked away, vulnerable. He was suddenly defensive and ponderous, conscious of the need to protect his weakness. He retreated towards the bed in which Munyasya’s body lay. He stopped and stared and then lifted the limp arm into whose vein the drip-feed passed. On release, it fell like a dry branch, inanimate and useless. You are dead, Nzoka observed in a whisper, half-turning towards the eyes which watched him.

  I think not, Nzoka, replied Munyasya slowly. What you are seeing is the effect of the drugs I have been given. They take away all feeling so I have no pain. But neither can I be conscious while they work.

  There was another long silence before Munyasya spoke again. You should not be here, Nzoka. If I remember your teaching well, the mourned should follow and influence the living, but they should never intervene directly. They must never be reunited until they can meet on equal terms as spirits. Only then is it my duty to help you prepare for your journey and see you on your way. You have committed a great wrong, Nzoka. You have been caught in your own trap.

  Munyasya, I will tell you again, you are dead. When I came to you last night, you were breathing your last breath. Your life was over, so I came as duty demands, in the way it has always demanded. This, he said gesturing vaguely towards the drip feed, is mere trickery, a vile spell cast by enemies, enemies who must therefore be your friends, just as Mbuvu said.

  You are making excuses now, Nzoka. You always were an impatient man and it seems you are no different now. You have appeared to me too soon and now this - this spell, as you call it, which prolongs my life, has trapped you. You cannot escape now, can you? Wherever I go, you must follow. You have misused your power, wasted it and now lost it. Now it is I who must carry your spirit. You are mine! My suicide would release you again, but while I live, you are not only tied to the present, but also you are tied to me!

  Nzoka began to seethe with rage. The mistake was not mine. I came when you summoned me and you then saw fit to cheat me, to trap me like some hyena. Well now you have me. Mistakes can only be seen after they are made. Now you control me, but beware. It could be that I will control you until we die together.

  It was Munyasya’s turn to laugh at the irony. You came to re-educate me, but it is not I who has overlooked the truth.

  Nzoka was now deep in troubled thought. Listen, my child, before you begin to enjoy your power. Think back to last night. Remember what happened and interpret it. It can surely be seen only in one way. I set my trap for a leopard. Did I catch a hyena? Were Mbuvu’s words true? Are you that traitor?

  Almost involuntarily, Munyasya did as he was asked. Nzoka’s power over him was still total.

  You were drunk. You were angry because your drinking friend Mbuvu had spoken the pure truth about you and you had tried to reject it. You fell, hit your head hard against a stone and died.

  Munyasya offered a silent question.

  Well you were about to die. I came to you to settle what needed to be understood between us. You have stood in my way for years and you could have held me forever because of the disrespectful and irresponsible way you have lived. Whatever happened you were doomed - and still are
- to inhabit the present forever. All I wanted from you was an assurance that your misguided ways did not come about as a result of my influence as your stepfather, that my part in your life is beyond reproach, that this hopeless position in which you find yourself is a result of only your own actions, of your wanton rejection of my sound advice and blind acceptance of others’ trickery. Eyes that once could see can go blind. You have been used, Munyasya, used to further interests which have been and still are alien to our people. You have been tempted away from the true path by the promise of rewards you were never destined to receive. Thus you have been a traitor to yourself, and I bear no responsibility.

  And so you are safe?

  Yes.

  Munyasya laughed cynically. His words began to shine with a new confidence. And now your plan has backfired on you. Oh, Nzoka, what a mistake you have made; what a dreadful mistake... now you are utterly tied to me and I to you. And I am still alive. Munyasya was laughing hard through the words. If I kill myself, then so do you. You would play a part in my suicide and would be branded with the same iron as myself. And now because of this trickery, we will live on together, to share the same broken old body and the same fate! Our paths are now inextricably joined. My life is now yours! May God preserve us!

  Whose God, Munyasya? Our God or your Christian God? Your decision is vital to both of us.

  Is there more than one God? Munyasya looked up to stare quizzically at the other, now deadly serious. Nzoka’s pathetic look of resignation, the sheer hopelessness of worry, made him laugh so deeply that it hurt, though he was not sure where.

  I should cut a switch and beat you, you insolent child! How dare you treat me like this?