Mission
Page 54
Are you sure, Nzoka?
Completely. My plan cannot fail now. Everything has worked perfectly. And having a great chief here to witness the event and then to interpret it is surely proof that God wanted this to happen. We could not have been luckier, Munyasya, for now we are assured that our message will flow from the mouth of a great advocate. I think, now, my son, it is time I was on my way. How I have waited for this moment.
Impatient as ever, Nzoka. You should not leave me until we have met as equals.
But you have already taken your last breath.
That may be true, but my ribs cannot push it out...
My son. I have waited for you too long already. It’s time I went. Until we meet again in paradise...
Don’t shake my hand! It’s broken and it hurts like hell. Ah! Ah! You had to beat me one last time! To hurt me again as you did when I was a child! Nzoka! Wait! Are you still listening to your great chief? Come back and listen! Come back! Ha, ha ha...
What is it now my boy? I was already on my way and you have breathed again. If you delay me for nothing, I will take a stick to you! What is so funny?
Listen to your friend Mulonzya! Listen to what he is saying! Ha, ha, ha...
What’s he saying? Munyasya, tell me what he is saying. I can’t hear! You’ve got another breath in your body. Will you never die? Tell me what’s he saying?
Oh no, my friend. It was your idea. You had better learn to live with the results.
But you are not Munyasya Nzoka! What fool told him that was your name? He is called Munyasya. I am Nzoka. We are two people, different people. And I am now free of this half of a man who calls himself Munyasya. He is the one you want and his name is Munyasya Maluki. I am Nzoka. I have nothing to do with him any more. Munyasya, say something while you still have a breath in your body! Say something, man! Tell him he has spoken your name wrongly!
Listen, Nzoka. This is just what you always wanted to hear. Munyasya Nzoka they call me. I am you. I have become you and you have become me. Over these years when you have lived again inside this body, you have taken the power of life into yourself and made it your own. You have acted in this world and become a part of it. And now they will remember your deeds, not mine, for they never were mine, and they will remember your name alongside mine, for we are joined in their memory. Your plan did work in one way, but...
Munyasya, what are you saying? It has worked. People have seen this priest exposed for what he is.
But he is not the hyena you stalked, Nzoka. You left a trap for a hyena and caught a gazelle. It is the hyena who is speaking now and he has condemned both of us, both you and I, to eternal death by demanding that we will live forever in the memory of this place. There, he said it again. Munyasya Nzoka, your name will live forever here. It is your great chief who is the hyena. It is he, Mulonzya, who is destroying the values you came back to rediscover. Hear what he has said of Munyasya Nzoka, you and I. We are to be honoured forever by a monument for what we have shown today.
But this is not what I wanted, Munyasya!
Ha, ha. Nzoka, but wait a moment. Listen again to what your great chief, for whom you show such respect, has said. He has also said that the people of this place will remember what has happened forever. And again, they will place a plaque here by the road to mourn the tragic death of Munyasya Nzoka so that everyone will remember our name and the circumstances of this death forever. His jaws have closed on us, Nzoka. You chose the wrong target. We are now companions in this place, where people will forever speak the names of the dead. And so we will be tied to this place, imprisoned here for all time.
Munyasya, one last breath! Say something to the man. He is wrong! Tell him he is wrong!
Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha...
About The Author
Philip Spires was born in 1952 in Wakefield and spent his first ten years in Sharlston, then a mining village, followed by another eight in Crofton, a mile nearer Wakefield. He went to London University, where he obtained a BSc from Imperial College in Chemical Engineering and a PGCE from King’s. After two years as a VSO in Kenya, he taught in London for 16 years and devoted much of his spare time to assisting an NGO concerned with development and human rights. In 1992, after completing an MA, he worked in Brunei technical education. From 1999 he worked in Zayed University in the United Arab Emirates. Since 2003 he has lived in Spain and has completed a PhD in education’s role in Philippine development. He has published two novels, Mission and A Fool’s Knot, both set in Kenya and has collaborated with Martin Offiah in his 50 Of The Best.
www.philipspires.co.uk
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