Wizard of the Crow (17 page)

Kaniürü was melting inside at the prospect of working with so famous a minister when the first obstacle to happiness presented itself. After describing in general what he wanted from an artist, Machokali instructed one of his trusted aides to show Kaniürü the drawing. “Look at it only once,” he had said. “The rest I leave to your imagination.” Kaniürü did not then know the significance of the drawing that would serve as inspiration for his art, but when he found himself working under lock and key, being body searched every time he left the room, he figured it was something important. And when he learned that it was somehow connected with the Ruler’s birthday celebration, he gave the aide a note begging the minister to acknowledge his contribution to the national effort. The aide was reassuring; not only would his name be mentioned but he might even be introduced to the Ruler himself, or at least be asked to come forward so the people could see him. These words made Kaniürü thank the minister’s aide profusely, calling him “my friend,” while ignoring all the hints about greasing the palm of the messenger. The aide was compelled to wonder, What kind of person is this who does not seem to know that the carrier of a message must eat? Peeved by the meanness of art teachers, the aide later told the minister that the teacher had said that his name should not be mentioned anywhere, so selfless was he. Unaware of this treachery, Kaniürü for several days considered
how best to grandstand in public. He would sit far back so that when his name was called he would have to walk through the throng all the way to the platform. And even if asked simply to stand up, he would be looked at by a thousand heads turning toward him. But instead of being the object of everybody’s grateful attention, he attracted only angry gestures from those who sat near him, and a warning about keeping the peace from a cop who added injury to insult by threatening to blow off his nose with a gun. How could he ever forgive Machokali for treating him like dirt?

Even as the bitterness of the moment came back to him, he controlled himself so as not to show weakness before the woman he was trying to woo back.

He was a little relieved to learn that Nyawlra had not been present at the ceremony, and, as truth is in the eyes of the interpreter, he tried to make her see things through his eyes.

“Believe me, I painted that madness at Machokali’s insistence. He gave me, or rather his aides gave me a copy of the architectural design and they wanted an artistic rendition of Marching to Heaven. To be very frank, I thought that the whole project was stupid and that’s why I insisted on the minister’s not mentioning my name.”

“I admire your modesty,” Nyawlra said. “Humility is certainly more becoming than humiliation.”

“Spare me your mockery. Let me tell you something. There are still many pillars of the Buler’s Party that are as solid as a rock. For instance, Minister Silver Sikiokuu. He, too, can see through this nonsense, and that’s why he came up with the brilliant idea of a personal spaceship modeled on some of those we see on these walls. What has been done is doable. Imagine the Buler ruling space. Sikiokuu is a political genius, a genuine visionary.”

“This is getting interesting. Who owns you, Minister Sikiokuu or His Boyal Mightiness? Whose youthwinger are you after all?”

“I’m not ashamed to say that I belong to the Buler’s Party. Total loyalty. One hundred percent. Were it not for his wise leadership, where would we all be? Imagine the disaster if the likes of Machokali led this country! To be one of the youthwings of the Buler is not a partisan act; it is a patriotic duty. Even university professors and PhDs are enlisting. Girls like you are now needed. The Girl-Youth.”

“I am a woman, a divorcee.”

“I just wanted to make sure that you knew that in the Ruler’s Youth there is no discrimination based on gender or age. Some of our most vocal members are women. A few professors are more than fifty years old. Sikiokuu himself is head of the youthwing movement; he is a genuine man of the people. He aims to make his youth happy. He wants women like you to join …”

“Go back to your Sikiokuu with his rabbit ears and tell him that Nyawlra does not bow to political bosses.”

“What is the difference? You now work for Tajirika, a loyal follower of Machokali.”

“Yes, but I am not employed as a political activist. I am an ordinary employee with an everyday job.”

“What is so ordinary about the ever-present queue outside your offices these days?”

“Didn’t you tell me just now that you happened to be passing by? So you have been here the whole day? And by the way, when are you going to London to get a bigger nose?” Nyawlra asked, and laughed as she tried to imagine how his nose would look if even larger. “Machokali has had his eyes enlarged, Sikiokuu his ears, and Big Ben Mambo his mouth, or rather his tongue. Who better than you to sniff out enemies of His Royal Mightiness?”

“Nyawlra, listen to me: You are right. I do pass by here from time to time. But not because of Tajirika. Neither Tajirika nor his business brought me here today. It is the prompting of my heart—please don’t go. Stay and hear me out; you don’t even know what I am about to say. I want you. I find it difficult, almost impossible, to stay away from you. But I won’t intrude on your privacy, even if I knew where you lived. But I am free to be out and about in public. Yesterday I was walking by this road and I saw you with another man, engaged in a deep conversation.”

“Am I not allowed to speak to whomever I wish?”

“But that is my point. The man you were talking to is no ordinary man.”

“How terribly interesting.”

“Please hear me out and judge for yourself. Both of you were sitting not very far from where I found you replacing the signboard. After you parted company, I had an urge to follow you just to say hello, but there was something about the man that made me want to
stay and observe him further. He sat there for a long time as if waiting for somebody or as if he had nowhere else to go. Eventually he did walk down this street, and I followed him. At Santamaria or somewhere there he stopped and stood against a wall as if he had lost his way. He was soon on the road again until he reached the Ruler’s Square near Paradise. And do you know what he did? He walked into a public toilet …”

Nyawlra could not help laughing aloud. His tone was dead serious. What was so strange about people going to public toilets? But she recalled how horribly filthy they were and was almost ready to concede his concern.

“Laugh all you want, but I assure you that this is no laughing matter. I saw him with my own eyes go into the toilet; I stood guard at the entrance, and only a beggar dressed in rags came out. He didn’t. I am not holding anything back; I am telling you the whole truth. After a long while, I thought to relieve myself and went in to see what was happening. There was nobody there, not a soul. The man had vanished into thin air.”

“An alien. Back to Mars,” she said, trying to make light of the whole thing.

“This is no joke. Do you know the man well?”

“No,” she said, yawning as if she was bored with Kaniürü. “Or, I should say, if the person you are talking about and the one I have in mind are the same, I can tell you truthfully that I don’t know much about him beyond the fact that he wandered into our office looking for work.”

She would have failed a lie detector test, because even as she said that her anxiety was mounting. How was Kamltl? Had something happened to him? Was Kaniürü holding back something?

“Whether you want to hear it or not, I care about you and would not want you to come to an evil end because of bad company. I am not superstitious, but that man is no human. He might be a djinn or an ogre.”

“An ogre, and not in the government?” Nyawlra asked with forced laughter. “I can defend myself.”

She grabbed her handbag and stood up to go. She thought of Kamltl, wondering where and how he had spent his day. In addition to his travails, now he had to put up with an ex-husband on his trail.
She felt weary, but at the thought of harm coming to Kamltl something flashed across her heart, and she did not know whether to be sad or happy.

“Look,” she told Kaniürü. “Even if you come across someone plotting to kill me, keep it to yourself. I want nothing from you. Don’t pretend that you are acting on my behalf.”

He watched her walk to the counter to pay for the tea and cake. She left without once looking back. He sat there gloomy at not having been taken seriously, yet he was so sure of what he had seen. Could his eyes have deceived him?

“No. The man is human, yet more than human,” he murmured to himself, still puzzled by the mystery he had witnessed outside the gates of Paradise.

Constable Arigaigai Gathere had used the same words when he told the story of what had happened to him the day the Wizard of the Crow had ordered him to leave the haunted house. Strange. First he talks to me with the soft voice of a woman. Then out of the same mouth comes a bellowing masculine sound ordering me to go away and wash my feet, which had defiled the playground of his magic powers. That man? I swear, true!
Haki ya Mungu,
that man, he is human yet more than human. For A.C. the words conveyed not malice but awe, respect, and admiration, for he told his listeners, “All that I am, all that I have now, I owe to the craft of the Wizard of the Crow.

“How could I not obey his first words of command to me? Without any hesitation, I ran all the way to my place, where I washed my feet and hands over and over again, and within the hour I was back in Santalucia. Now I was careful not to touch the door or stand too close to it. The door opened all by itself as if to invite me in, and I entered the sacred grounds of his living space. Then I heard another command: stand in front of the small window. The window looked
like that of a confessional in a Catholic church, except it had no lattice and one could clearly see his face and eyes. But what eyes? They were more like balls of fire.

“Your heart is a little weary’ the voice said.

“Yes! Yes!’ I said quickly.

“ Weighed down by many burdens?’

“Yes! Yes!’

“ A particular burden that brings you to the Wizard of the Crow?’

“His voice was round, soft, and soothing, so different from before that I could not tell whether he was making a statement or asking a question.

“You have spoken my thoughts exactly’ I told him. You see, I have been in the police force for many years, and no matter how hard I work I have never been promoted. Wizard of the Crow, I am sure I have enemies who are hindering me through magic’

“Is your heart telling you that?’

“Yes!’

“ Why? What makes you so sure it’s the truth?’

“Because the heart never lies. You see, I am a workaholic. When I am on traffic duty, for instance, I hand out more tickets than any other cop. I am particularly hard on
matatus.
I ask myself, Why is it that I have not been promoted? And I always hear the same whisper: There is a person whose shadow crosses yours.’

“ The person whose shadow crosses yours, do you know him?’

“Oh, no. Such people work in the dark. He could be anybody, my neighbor or one of my workmates. Or, for that matter, any of the
matatu
drivers to whom I have issued tickets.’

“ What do you want from me?’

“My heart was beating loudly. I had not realized how bitter I had been toward my enemy, whoever he is. But that aside, he will now know that I am none other than Constable Arigaigai Gathere. Never again will he harm my career or anybody else’s as he has all these years. Look for him everywhere. Ferret him out. Bemove him from the face of the earth,’ I said with gleeful expectation.

“ To kill a man—you know that is a hard thing to do?’

“Not for us, the Buler’s police officers,’ I told him. Any life that threatens the Buler’s power is nothing to us, nothing at all.’

“He paused.

“ You know, it may be easy for the Ruler’s police officers to kill the body, but not the spirit.’ His voice was still enriched with softness to soothe even the most turbulent of souls.

“You have spoken the truth,’ I told the Wizard of the Crow, because if I knew who my enemy was it would be easy for me to blow him to pieces, but as I don’t know who he is, he torments me whether I am awake or asleep. So I ask myself: How is it that somebody can always be on my mind and in my heart and yet I cannot say who he is? Now you have made me understand. It is because he comes in the form of an evil spirit. Yes, it is not easy to kill spirits. Believe me, Wizard of the Crow, I have been to every witch doctor in and around these towns and villages, and to each I have given the same riddle.
I have enemies I don’t have
—
who are they?
And none has been able to ease my torment within so that I can sleep soundly’

“ What makes you believe that I am capable of what others have failed to do?’

“I know your power,’ I told him bluntly. Last night, when I set eyes on the bundle of magic hanging from the roof, I felt my legs rooted to the ground. I said to myself, Here is the wizard for me. You have already proven me right in thinking so. You are the only one to solve the riddle of the enemies I know I have and don’t have. For the first time, I know who my enemies are. They masquerade as evil spirits. Not that I needed proof. You who can make birds lose the power of their wings, yes, you who can bring down even crows and hawks from the sky, how can a mere mortal resist your power, as a spirit or not? Wizard of the Crow, your very name is proof of the powers you possess.’

“Do you have a mirror?’ he asked me.

“‘No.’

“ You don’t carry a mirror?’

“‘No.’

“How do you look at yourself?’

“I am clean in my ways. I never look in the mirror too often.’

“ How do you know if you hardly ever look at yourself?’

“I just know.’

“ You told me that sometimes you are on traffic duty?’

“Yes.’

“ Have you ever stopped a driver in a vehicle with no mirrors?’

“ No mirrors? How can he drive without mirrors? A driver of a vehicle without mirrors is a menace to his own life and that of others. Even a broken mirror poses danger.’