A Grain of Wheat (10 page)

The two freedom fighters looked at Warui. They had been in the forest for more than seven years. But nobody challenged Warui’s claim.

‘What is a prayer?’ General R. suddenly asked, as if continuing the
previous conversation. ‘It did not help Kihika. Kihika believed in prayer. He even read the Bible every day, and took it with him wherever he went. What I never understand is this: Why is it that God would not whisper a word – just one word – to warn him not to walk into a trap?’

‘A trap?’ Gikonyo asked quickly. ‘Do you want to tell us that Kihika was betrayed?’

‘The radio said he was captured in a battle in which many of his men were killed,’ Wambui said.

General R. took his time to satisfy this awakened interest. He stared at the ground in absorption.

‘On that day he was going to meet somebody. He often went out alone to spy or to finish off a dangerous character like DO Robson. Yet he always told me about his plans. On this day, he told me nothing. He seemed very excited, you might say almost happy. But he grew angry whenever anybody interrupted him. Again, he never forgot to take his Bible. But on this day he left it behind. Perhaps he never meant to be long.’

General R. fumbled in his pockets and took out a small Bible which he passed on to Gikonyo. Warui and Wambui craned forward, excited by this, like little children. Gikonyo shuffled through the small Bible lingering on verses underlined in black and red. His fingers were slightly shaking. He stopped at Psalm 72, where two verses were underlined in red.

‘What are these red lines?’ Wambui asked, with awed curiosity.

‘Read a few lines,’ Warui said.

Gikonyo read:

Again this was followed by a profound silence. Then General R. continued.

‘Actually Kihika was never the same person after the day he shot DO Robson. And that’s why we have come here tonight.’ All this
time, General R. had stared in one spot. And he spoke quietly, choosing words as if he was directing questions at his own heart. Now he suddenly raised his eyes to Mugo. And every other person’s eyes were turned to Mugo.

‘I believe you were the man who sheltered Kihika on that night. That is why you were later arrested and sent to detention, is that not so? What we want to know is this. Did Kihika mention to you that he would be meeting somebody from the village – in a week’s time?’

Mugo’s throat was choked; if he spoke, he would cry. He shook his head and stared straight ahead.

‘He did not mention Karanja?’

Again Mugo shook his head.

‘That’s all we wanted to know. We thought you might be able to help us.’ General R. fell back into his former silence.

‘Now, now, who would have thought—’ Warui started and then stopped. Wambui seemed fascinated more with the Bible than with General R.’s news.

‘A Bible! You might have thought his father a priest …’ she moaned. ‘Our son should have been a priest …’

‘He was a priest … a high priest of this our freedom.’ Warui said. Gikonyo laughed, uneasily. He was joined by Wambui and Lt Koina. Mugo and General R. did not laugh. Again the tension was broken. Gikonyo coughed and cleared his throat.

‘General, you almost made us forget why we came here,’ he announced, now the voice of a businessman who had no time for rituals. ‘But I am glad you came for this also concerns you. It is like this. The Movement and leaders of the village have thought it a good idea to honour the dead. On Independence Day we shall remember those from our village and ridges near, who lost their lives in the fight for freedom. We cannot let Kihika’s name die. He will live in our memory, and history will carry his name to our children in years to come.’ He paused and looked straight at Mugo and his next words addressed to Mugo were full of plain admiration. ‘I don’t want to go into details – but we all know the part you played in the movement. Your name and that of Kihika will ever be linked together. As the General here has said, you gave Kihika shelter without fear of danger
to your own life. You did for Thabai out here and in detention what Kihika did in the forest. We have therefore thought that on this important day, you should lead in the sacrifice and ceremonies to honour those who died that we might live. The elders will guide you in the details of the ritual. For you the main thing will be the speech. We are arranging a large meeting at Rung’ei Market around where Kihika’s body hung from a tree. You will make the main speech of the day.’

Mugo stared at a pole opposite; he tried to grasp the sense of what Gikonyo had said. He had always found it difficult to make decisions. Recoiling as if by instinct from setting in motion a course of action whose consequences he could not determine before the start, he allowed himself to drift into things or be pushed into them by an uncanny demon; he rode on the wave of circumstance and lay against the crest, fearing but fascinated by fate. Something of that devilish fascination now seemed to light his eyes. His body was deathly still.

‘What do you say?’ Wambui asked slightly impatient with Mugo’s intense look. But Warui was fascinated by people’s eyes and he always said this of Mugo: He has a future, a great future. Shouldn’t I know? You can see it in his eyes. He now said:

‘You need not talk the whole day. I have seen many people ruin good speeches because they would talk till their mouths were drained of all saliva. A word to touch the hearts – that is all. Like the one you spoke that day.’

‘I do not understand,’ Mugo at last said.

‘We of Thabai want to honour our heroes. What’s difficult in that?’ Warui asked.

‘I know how you feel,’ Gikonyo said, ‘You want to be left alone. Remember this, however: it is not easy for any man in a community to be left alone, especially a man in your position. No, you don’t have to make up your mind now. But we would like to know the answer soon, December 12 is only four nights away.’

Saying this, Gikonyo rose to leave. The others also stood up. Gikonyo hesitated a moment as if an undelivered thought lingered in his mind.

‘Another thing! You know the government, now that it is controlled by the Movement, will allow chiefs to be elected by the people. The branch here wants you to stand for this area when the time comes.’

They went out.

A smile slowly spread from the edges of Mugo’s mouth. It could have indicated joy, mocking or bitterness. The visitors had left the door ajar. He shut the door and sat on the bed. Gradually the meaning of what Gikonyo had said began to light the blank abyss of incomprehension. What do they want? What do they really want? he asked himself, holding his head in his hands to steel himself.

Outside Mugo’s hut the forest fighters parted from Gikonyo, Wambui and Warui. The two shared a hut at the other end of the village. The hut had been bought for them by some ardent members of the local branch of the Party who then believed the Party was the reincarnation of the Movement.

‘Do you think he will help us?’ Koina suddenly asked.

‘Who?’

‘That man!’

‘Oh, Mugo. I don’t know. Kihika rarely mentioned him. In fact, I don’t know if he knew him well.’

They walked the rest of the way without more words. Koina fumbled for matches to light the oil-lamp. He was small-boned, light-skinned, and had large veins that protruded on his face and hands. General R. sat on the bed, absorbed in thought. Koina stood and stared at the yellow flame.

‘All the same, we must find out the traitor,’ General R. said, as if continuing their earlier conversation. His voice was low and carried grim determination.

Koina did not answer at once. He remembered the day Kihika went out, never to return. Kihika commanded more than three hundred men, split into groups of fifty or even twenty-five men. The groups lived apart, in different caves, around Kinenie Forest, and only came together when going for a big venture like the capture of Mahee. Koina was always struck by Kihika’s absolute disregard for personal danger. The way he had finished DO Robson was already a legend in
the camps around Longonot, Ngong and even in Nyandarwa. Koina felt worshipful admiration for Kihika. At such times he would swear: ‘I will never leave him. I swear to God above I’ll never abandon Kihika. I was without faith. He has given it to me.’ Yes, Kihika had given him, a mere cook, new self, by making him aware of black power. Koina had felt this the day they took Mahee. As they waited for Kihika to return, he keenly felt the imminence of that black power. Later they sent out scouts, who reported that a big operation was on. Word went round. General R. ordered his men to prepare for a quick retreat into Longonot, their other big hide-out. They learnt that Kihika had been arrested. Njeri had wept. And even he, too, a man, could not hide his tears.

‘Do you think that he was going to meet a woman?’ Koina now asked.

‘No, I don’t think so. Karanja is really our man if what you tell me about him is true.’

‘Everybody in Githima tells me the same story. If you touch him from behind, he shakes uncontrollably. He never walks in the dark alone. He never opens his door to anybody after seven o’clock in the evening. All these are signs of a guilty man, but—’

‘God! If the louse had anything to do with Kihika’s crucifixion!’ General R. said, jumping to his feet. He paced up and down the room. ‘We all took the oath together. We took the oath together.’

Koina sat on the bed, surprised by the passion and vehemence in the General’s voice. Koina had always feared him and even felt small in the other’s presence. Both had been in the Second World War; the General had fought in Burma. But he, Koina, never rose beyond the rank of a cook. After the war, the General worked as a tailor. Koina moved from job to job. His last job was with Dr Lynd, an ugly white spinster, whom Koina hated at first sight. He and the General really knew one another in the forest. In the battles, General R. emerged without betraying emotion. When Kihika was arrested General R. had remained calm, had shown no surprise or any sign of loss. With years Koina, who had wept at the time, forgot Kihika’s death and did not feel any urgency for revenge. Now it was the General who trembled with passion. Koina looked around the bare hut, avoiding the pacing
figure. A sufuria, two plates, empty bottles and a water-tin lay on the floor, rather disconsolately. He cleared his throat:

‘Perhaps it is no use. Perhaps we ought to forget the whole thing.’

General R. abruptly stopped pacing. He looked at Koina, weighing him up and down. Koina fidgeted on his seat, feeling the antagonism in the other’s stare.

‘Forget?’ General R. asked in a deceptively calm voice. ‘No, my friend. We must find our traitor, else you and I took the oath for nothing. Traitors and collaborators must not escape revolutionary justice. Tomorrow you must go back to Githima and see Mwaura about the new plan.’

The other three delegates walked some distance from Mugo’s hut before anyone spoke.

‘He is a strange man,’ Wambui commented.

‘Who?’ Warui asked.

‘Mugo.’

‘It is the suffering,’ Gikonyo said. ‘Do you know what it was to live in detention? It was easier, perhaps, with those of us not labelled hard-core. But Mugo was. So he was beaten, and yet would not confess the oath.

‘It was not like prison,’ Gikonyo went on, surprised at his own sudden burst of feelings. ‘In prison you know your crime. You know your terms. So many years, one, ten, thirty – after that you get out.’

As suddenly Gikonyo checked himself. He could not clearly see Wambui or Warui in the dark. It seemed to him that he had only spoken to empty air.

‘Sleep well,’ Gikonyo called outside the house he had recently built.

Warui and Wambui went away without answering. The empty silence harrowed Gikonyo. He did not want to enter the building. Light from the sitting-room showed through the curtains and glass windows. Mumbi, then, must still be waiting for him. Why can’t she go to bed? He walked away from the light, without knowing where he was going. He resented his recent outburst in the presence of Wambui and Warui. Why could he not control his emotions in Mugo’s hut? A man should never moan. And for Gikonyo, hard work had been a drug against pestering memories.

He had built a house, one of the best and most modern in the village; he had wealth, albeit small, and a political position in the land: all this a long way from the days of the poor carpenter. Yet these things had ceased to have taste. He ate, not because he enjoyed the food, but a man had to live.

The village was now far behind. Darkness had thickened. It struck him, like a new experience, that he was alone. He listened. He seemed to hear, in the distance, steps on a pavement. The steps approached him. He walked faster and faster, away from the steps. But the faster he walked, the louder the steps became. He panted. He was hot all over, despite the cold air. Then he started running, madly. His heart beat harder. The steps on the pavement, so near now, rhythmed with his pounding heart. He had to talk to someone. He must hear another human voice. Mugo. But what were mere human voices? Had he not lived with them for six years? In various detention camps? Perhaps he wanted a voice of man who would understand. Mugo. Abruptly he stopped running. The steps on the pavement receded into a distance. They would come again, he knew they would come to plague him. I must talk to Mugo. The words Mugo had spoken at a meeting two years before had touched Gikonyo. Lord, Mugo would know.

But by the time he reached Mugo’s hut, the heat of his resolution had cooled. He stood outside the door, wondering if he should knock or not: what, really, had he come to tell Mugo? He felt foolish standing there, alone. Maybe he had better come tomorrow. Maybe another time he would know how best to tear his heart before another person.

At home, he found Mumbi had not yet gone to bed. She brought him food. This reminded him that he had hardly eaten anything the whole day. She sat opposite him and watched him. He tasted a little food and then pushed the rest away. He had lost his appetite.