Munyasya had dealt with those letters before. Only a few weeks into his unpaid part-time post as personal assistant to the chief, he had perfunctorily knocked on the office door at the usual time and entered to find all unexpectedly quiet. He had completed his morning command duties, checked the correct deployment of his men to their various stations in the town and then continued, as had become his habit, to offer an hour’s assistance to Mulonzya Mwendwa. Later he would learn that the chief had closed the office for the day and sent the staff home having, that morning, received an unexpected letter advising him that, at his convenience, he could visit a hospital in Nairobi where he would be fitted with prostheses to replace his missing hands. Excited beyond reason by the prospect of regaining some of his lost abilities, he could not be persuaded to wait and so he had travelled immediately to the appointment. He would, of course, at first sight be disappointed by the hollow strap-on wooden cups on offer, designed to hide his scars from others’ eyes rather than help him regain the ability to grasp, but, as time passed, he would invent ingenious and often creative ways of using these two cumbersome crude tubes, with their slotted hemispherical ends, to accomplish the most delicate of tasks. He would learn, for instance, how to slot a spoon or knife into the hole at the end to feed himself. The same hole, he later found, would admit a pen, allowing him to learn afresh how to write letters in his once delicate hand, but which now, even with the most carefully expert control of his bulbous block of a hand were at best legible. Eventually, he would thus learn to be satisfied with these tools, but his initial shock of disappointment that day was enormous, greater than the original excitement he had felt at the prospect he imagined.
Perhaps that excitement of anticipation was why, that day, he had been uncharacteristically careless. Ever meticulous in his habits, both at work and in his personal life, Mulonzya Mwendwa never left a task half finished. But that day, lying on the always-unmarked blotter pad on his desk was a blue manila folder that Munyasya had grown to recognise. It was newer than most others and bore his full name in the top right hand corner, Major Edward Munyasya, preceded by the three crucial capitals, FAO. For Munyasya, these letters were tantamount to an order. Now he knew the file was usually stored away, that he never saw its contents, that Mulonzya Mwendwa would sit with it open before him, where only he could read its contents. On any particular day, there would never be more than two papers to deal with and the task would never be arduous. The chief would scrutinise his papers and then dictate a suitable letter in response that Munyasya would write, place in an envelope and then take to the post office. Two letters a day and then a fifty-yard walk to the town’s miniscule huddle of shops. This surely was not real work, so he never once resented his duties on behalf of the man it was his job to protect.
So it was with an air of practice, familiarity and duty that Munyasya took hold of the folder that was marked for his attention, despite the fact that he had never before touched it. Inside was a single sheet. A scan of the short text revealed a format and content he recognised as matching several letters he had written on the chief’s behalf in recent weeks. So apparently predictable was the action required that he decided he was only helping by dealing with the task. Keeping the wheels of his work turning without troubling his superior was how he justified it to himself. The letter in the folder summarised receipts of produce, bought wholesale from local farmers, thus relating to Mulonzya Mwendwa’s licensed concessionary trading business. Carefully, double-checking against his own memory, since the previous letters he had written in response to similar reports were all locked in the cabinet, he drafted the seemingly perfunctory confirmatory note that had to be sent to the District Commissioner’s office in Kitui. Thus he recreated the short letter he had written several times already and amended the memory to include the latest figures from the report in the file. He would never have dreamt, of course, that the numbers in the note to the District Commissioner, whose office collated such figures for official statistics and taxation, should be significantly different from and lower than the ones reported by the warehouseman. Even if he had access to the locked-away files marked ‘Personal’, he would not have noticed the discrepancies, since the warehouse reports were never filed here, only the confirmatory letters to Kitui. So he wrote the letter, reported the quantities, addressed the envelope and posted it, aglow with the knowledge that Mulonzya Mwendwa would thank him for completing the task. The following day, when Mulonzya Mwendwa returned from Nairobi, disappointedly sporting a pair of stained-black, heavy willow clubs on the ends of his arms instead of the new hands he had expected, Munyasya respectfully allowed him an hour to himself before entering the office to report the task done. Thus, one of the first things Mulonzya Mwendwa learned to do with his new club hands was to strike someone hard across the face. The blow struck before he had even started the torrent of abuse – all in Kikamba, without a word of English to stain the message – that followed. Major Edward Munyasya was left in no doubt that never again should he do something without the expressed and accurate direction of Mulonzya Mwendwa. From that moment, he would do as he was told, nothing more, nothing less. It was only to be a few weeks later when this modus operandi began to benefit the chief and his son, James, who claimed that he had thought up the plan all by himself.
The colonial authorities had never taken to the idea of pastoralism. It was a problem in both the north and south of the country. The border with Tanganyika, however, presented no real problem. True, it crossed the ancestral homelands of the Masai and some families did drive their herds to and fro, from one country to the other to find grazing. But the land here was quite good. There was usually enough grass and no one travelled very far, so the requirements of this border could be easily enforced in the future. The north, however, posed an altogether different problem. Arid, semi-desert scrub offered few grazing opportunities, and the general lack of rain accompanied by the unpredictability of what did fall meant that Somalis, in particular, would often drive their herds hundreds of miles to sustain life. Not caring too much about which country they were in today, they would set off to find tomorrow’s subsistence, the continued well being of their cattle fundamental to their existence. Borders, and the governments that were defined by them, therefore could not accommodate pastoralists on the move.
James Mulonzya had discussed these issues in Nairobi, a town known for good grazing but few cows, and had reported the conclusions to his father. Opportunity, it seems, is often the product of entirely random and independent factors coexisting in time and space. Opportunity grasped, however, is a sign of genius, and so, later, when the product of the campaign was revealed, most people assumed that it had come from the father’s brain and not that of his dull son. A government policy to encourage the settlement of the pastoralists, a respected and trusted administrator’s standing, a nascent political presence promising future achievement and, crucially, a devoutly obedient group of armed soldiers, comprising mainly poor recruits eager to earn a little on the side, were the ingredients. History would record the ‘Shifter’ problem as having taken place over decades, on many fronts and taking many forms. Often described as a ‘tribal’ conflict over land, grazing rights and ownership, it would record many skirmishes and minor battles resulting in loss of life and occasional stealing of women as trophies. History would make no special record or reference, therefore, to the activities of a particular armed group in the north of Mwingi District. Always at night and always with what some described as ‘professional’ precision and competence, they attacked nomadic groups who entered an area that could be recognised and delineated only by those who had designated its limits. The surprising and unique characteristic of these often brutal attacks was the victors’ habit of removing the left ears from the dead. This was both noticed and recorded, but, in the overall run of things, these occurrences were a relatively small proportion of the large number of incidents, which spread in different manifestations right across northern Kenya. And so it was als
o unrecorded by history, but certainly not unnoticed either by officialdom or people in general in that area, that Mulonzya Mwendwa and his son, James, established in their joint names, within a newly erected fence where the like had never been seen before, one of the largest cattle ranches in the soon to be independent country on land their faithful detachment of King’s African Rifles had vacated on their behalf.
***
All right, Munyasya, you can sit down now.
Thank God for that! I was beginning to think I would have to carry on walking all the way to paradise.
Munyasya, just sit down and be quiet. Have a drink and leave me in peace for a while. I have to think.
Have a drink? A drink of what?
There’s a bottle in your coat pocket. Now be quiet. Go to sleep if you want. Let your stepfather think in peace for a while. I’ll keep watch.
Look, Nzoka, what is all this about? Keep watch for what? I am tired of being your donkey. Carry me here. Carry me there. Go here. Go there. Carry me this way and that. Lie here. Walk there. Sit here. Sleep. Wake up. Drink. All I hear from you are orders. You are worse than a sergeant major on a parade ground. I wouldn’t mind if I had a choice. I try to say no to you, but my body doesn’t even listen; it just does whatever you say. And for what? Every idea you have ever had has been nonsense. You seem to come up with a different one every day and none of them ever seem to work. Munyasya, lie down in front of this bus. There might be more stupid things a man could do with his time, but I have certainly never come across them. But off I go, limbs obeying every command you even suggest, let alone deliver. You say it will kill me and then make both of us free. Especially yourself, no doubt. I remain nothing less than sceptical at what it can possibly accomplish from my point of view. My goodness I feel uncomfortably sober. Where did you say that bottle was?
In the inside pocket of your coat. Can’t you feel the weight of it?
Where was I? Oh, yes. When this bus runs over me, people will somehow be immediately enlightened so that they will see this white man’s invention, and everything else associated with it, including the white man, himself, as equally evil. You will have destroyed me and will have atoned for your mistakes in the past at the same time. Rather convenient from your point of view, if you ask me. And then what happens? They come into the road, pick me up and move me - or the driver goes backwards and then drives on his way as if I was never there in the first place. I am either scraped from the road like squashed lizard or ignored like some cow shit that got in the way of a tyre. And if it did succeed, if the bus did drive over me, what would it prove? People would look at me and say that it’s only a stupid fly that gets killed by a falling turd.
But that proves my point, Munyasya. Don’t you see?
Nzoka, for years what I have seen is only what you have seen. You are my eyes. And you say this proves your point? Only if your point is nonsense!
Look, Munyasya, people know these things are evil and dangerous. If they were not, then they would ignore you - drive their animals over you - even they themselves know it is evil, but it controls them. It forces them to protect it, to keep its evil hidden. So they move you, or just avoid you.
Then you were wrong in what you thought...
No, Munyasya, not wrong, but not quite right either. A bird does not thatch a nest from a single blade of grass. It has taken time to collect all the facts.
I am growing sick of your excuses, Nzoka. You have dragged me around with you for years now and I am sick of it. Why don’t you accept your fate, my fate! And just let me die? You keep trying to convince me that you are trying to bring this pathetic sham called a life to an end, but for years it has been you who has kept it alive. I have certainly done nothing to help! It is clear, Nzoka, that you are dealing with some power which is both stronger and wiser than yourself. If that is the case, then could I offer the judgment, if you would be so good as to pay attention to me for just this once, that you will not be able to beat it, no matter what it is.
Wisdom is something that grows, Munyasya, and I am certainly much wiser now...
Wisdom may grow, Nzoka, that I would not choose to deny, but not all of us start from the same point, do we? In your case, you are still the same failure in death that you always were in life. Why should you have changed, for God’s sake? And you are still trapped. There is no way out now. You may be wiser, Nzoka, but you are certainly no nearer your goal.
Ah, but there you are quite wrong, my son. I have made mistakes, it is true, but unlike you, Munyasya, I have learned from those mistakes. And I now have a plan that must succeed.
Oh no, not another of those schemes which...
Wait, Munyasya, and hear what I have to say. This one is perfect - and very simple. We will not fail this time. Once the traveller knows the way he no longer needs to ask for directions. I have a plan and this time we will not fail.
I see. The plan and its perfection are both yours alone, but any failure will be ours? I suppose that is one step better than it being my responsibility alone, but as usual I am going to get the blame when it all goes wrong. I suppose you’re going to tell me that the bus is going to come along the road and I am going to lie down in front of it. There wouldn’t perhaps be an easier way of making the same point by any chance?
No, of course not. I am not having you deal with any more buses. I have already told you that I have concluded that the tactic is simply no good.
So if no bus, what? Pray?
A small bus. A car.
And that makes a difference?
Yes.
You are more senile than I, Nzoka. Why push me all the way to this place just to try the same trick again? We could have found a car in Migwani. There was no need to come all the way to this place. Even Father Michael has a car.
Exactly. But my plan is better than even you think.
To have more than nothing is not necessarily to have something... Ah, Nzoka, I am truly an old man now, not the child that was your brother’s son. Don’t beat me. You can’t teach an old dog like that!
It’s about time I did treat you like a child, if you ask me, you old rascal. I have tried and tried to make you see, but you are always too lazy even to make the smallest effort to think or see for yourself!
Lazy? You call me lazy, you… you layabout? What choice have I in the matter? You command and I follow. It can hardly be my fault if my body is too weak to respond. How can I be expected to do everything you ask? You seem to think that I am still seven years old and that I can jump fences and run to catch a bus...
All right, Munyasya. That’s enough for now. Listen first and then make your complaints later. I now command you to listen to me. What I have to say is neither new to you nor difficult to understand. Listen, and my argument will convince you as it has convinced me.
Can I have a drink first?
All right. You can have your body for now, but listen and listen carefully. Now you know as well as I do that this world in which we live is a punishment. It is a desert to which we have been banished to prove ourselves worthy of paradise. We know that is true because our people have lived their lives according to this for generations. I know it is true because I have seen what happens after this world is left behind. Unlike you, Munyasya, I have seen the argument from both sides.
What if it has three sides? Or even more?
Arguments only have two sides, Munyasya. Yes is one side and no the other. There can be no room in peoples’ lives for anything harder to comprehend. That is why there is no language that has an alternative to saying ‘yes’ or saying ‘no’.
Hmmm... maybe...
No, believe me, Munyasya, I have seen the argument from both sides. Life is but a trial, designed to allow us, each and every one of us, to prove that we are worthy of achieving the paradise that is just beyond our temporal life.
Nzoka, it is a long time since my grandfather taught me
such things by the evening fireside. I can remember hardly anything of what he said. Anyway the stories weren’t true. The Bible explains how the world was created. It’s all written there - and it is a different story from the one my grandfather told me.
Munyasya, how many times do I need to tell you that I am not interested in the white man’s myths? There are no white men in paradise. There never were any and there never will be, because they are evil and always have been and always will be. What you have to remember from your childhood is the truth. It seems that you still need me to remind you of what that is.
If I remember correctly - if you remember it correctly, that is, because I’m sure that these thoughts are yours - the story - the truth - is that paradise and the world in which we live are the same thing. They are the same size. The land is the same and even the people are the same.
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