The Power of One (2 page)

Nanny sent a message to Inkosi-Inkosikazi to the effect that we urgently needed to see him on the matter of the child's night water. The message was put on the drums, and in two days we heard that the great medicine man would call in a fortnight or so on his way to visit Modjadji, the great rain queen.

The whites of Nanny's eyes would grow big and her cheeks would puff out as she talked about the greatness of Inkosi-Inkosikazi. “He will dry your bed with one throw of the shinbones of the great white ox,” she promised.

“Will he also grow skin over my acorn?” I demanded to know. She clutched me to her breast, and her answer was lost in the heaving of her belly as she chortled all over me.

The problem of the night water was much discussed by the field women, who pondered deeply that a matter so slight could bring the great one to visit. “Surely, a grass sleeping mat will dry in the morning sun? This is not a matter of proper concern for the greatest medicine man in Africa.”

It was all right for them, of course. They didn't have to go back to the Judge and Mevrou.

Almost two weeks to the day after we sent him the message, Inkosi-Inkosikazi arrived in his big black Buick. The car was a symbol of his enormous power and wealth, even to the Boers, who despised him as the devil incarnate, yet feared him with the superstition of all ignorant God-fearing men. None were prepared to pit the catechism of the Dutch Reformed Church against this aged black goblin.

All that day the field women brought gifts of food. By late afternoon a small mountain of kaffir corn and mealies, gem squash, native spinach, and watermelons had grown under the big old avocado tree next to the slaughterhouse. Bundles of dried tobacco leaf were stacked up beside it and, separated by two large grass
indaba
or meeting mats, lay six scrawny kaffir chickens. These were mostly tough old roosters, four-hour boilers, their legs tied and their wings clipped. They lay on their sides with their thin, featherless necks and bald heads caked with dust. Only an occasional “Skwack!” and the sudden opening of a bright, beady eye showed that they were still alive, if not exactly kicking.

One especially scrawny old cock with mottled grey feathers looked to me very much like my granpa, except for his eyes. My granpa's eyes were pale blue and somewhat watery, eyes intended for gazing over soft English landscapes, whereas the old cock's were sharp as a bead of red light.

My granpa came down the steps and walked toward the big black Buick. He stopped to kick one of the roosters, for he hated kaffir chickens almost as much as he hated Shangaans. His pride and joy was his one hundred black Orpington hens and six giant roosters. The presence of kaffir chickens in the farmyard, even though trussed and clipped, was like having half a dozen dirty old men present at a ballet class.

He greatly admired Inkosi-Inkosikazi, who had once cured him of his gallstones. “I took his foul green
mootie,
and by golly, the stones blasted out of me like a hail of buckshot! Never a trace of a gallstone since. If you ask me, the old monkey is the best damned doctor in the low veld.”

We waited for Inkosi-Inkosikazi to alight from the Buick. The old medicine man, like Nanny, was a Zulu. It was said that he was the last son of the great Dingaan, the Zulu king who fought both the Boers and the British to a standstill. Two generations after the Boers had finally defeated his
impis
at the Battle of Blood River, they remained in awe of him.

Twelve years after that battle, Dingaan, fleeing from the combined forces of his half brother Mpande and the Boers, had sought refuge among the Nyawo people on the summit of the great Lebombo Mountains. On the night he was treacherously assassinated by Nyawo tribesmen he had been presented with a young virgin, and the seed of the second greatest of all the warrior kings was planted in her fourteen-year-old womb.

“Where I chose blood, this last of my sons will choose wisdom. You will call him Inkosi-Inkosikazi. He will be a man for all Africa,” Dingaan had told the frightened Nyawo maiden.

This made the small, wizened black man who was being helped from the rear of the Buick one hundred years old.

Inkosi-Inkosikazi was dressed in a mismatched suit, the jacket brown and shiny with age, the trousers blue pinstripe. He wore a white shirt meant to go with a detachable starched collar, and the collarless shirt was secured at the neck with a large gold and ivory collar stud. A mangy-looking leopard-skin cloak fell from his shoulders. As was the custom, he wore no shoes, and the soles of his feet were splayed and cracked at the edges. In his right hand he carried a beautifully beaded fly switch, the symbol of an important chief;

I had never seen such an old man. His peppercorn hair was whiter than raw cotton, small tufts of snowy beard sprang from his chin, and only three yellowed teeth remained in his mouth. He looked at us and his eyes burned sharp and clear, like the eyes of the old rooster.

Several of the women started keening and were quickly rebuked by the old man. “Stupid
infasi!
Death does not ride with me in my big motor. Did you not hear the roar of its great belly?”

Silence fell as my granpa approached. He briefly welcomed Inkosi-Inkosikazi and granted him permission to stay overnight on the farm. The old man nodded, showing none of the customary obsequiousness expected from a kaffir, and my granpa seemed to demand none. He simply shook the old man's bony claw and returned to his chair on the
stoep.

Nanny, who had rubbed earth on her forehead like all the other women, finally spoke. “Lord, the women have brought food and we have beer freshly fermented.”

Inkosi-Inkosikazi ignored her, which I thought was pretty brave of him, and ordered one of the women to untie the cockerels. Two women ran over, and soon the chickens were untied. They continued to lie there, unsure of their freedom, until the old man raised his fly switch and waved it over them. With a sudden squawking and flapping of stunted wings, all but one rose and dashed helter-skelter, their long legs rising high off the ground as they ran toward open territory. The old cock who looked like Granpa rose slowly, stretched his neck, flapped the bits of wing he had left, his head darting left and right, slightly cocked as though he was listening; then, calm as you like, he walked over to the heap of corn and started pecking away.

“Catch the feathered devils,” Inkosi-Inkosikazi suddenly commanded. “Catch an old man's dinner tonight.”

With squeals of delight the women rounded up the chickens again. The ice had been broken as five of the women, each holding a chicken upside down by the legs, waited for the old man's instructions. Inkosi-Inkosikazi squatted down and with his finger traced a circle about two feet in diameter in the dust. He hopped around like an ancient chimpanzee, completing five similar-sized circles, muttering to himself as he did so.

The incantations over, he signaled for one of the women to bring over a cockerel. Grabbing the old bird by its long scrawny neck and both legs, he retraced the first circle on the ground, this time using the bird's beak as a marker. Then he laid the cockerel inside the circle, where it lay unmoving, its eyes closed; a leg protruding from under each wing. He proceeded to do the same thing to the other five chickens until each lay in its own circle in front of the crowd. As each chicken was laid to rest there would be a gasp of amazement from the women. It was pretty low-grade magic, but it served well enough to get things under way.

Inkosi-Inkosikazi moved over, squatted cross-legged in the center of the
indaba
mats, and beckoned that I should join him. It was the first time he'd acknowledged my presence, and I clung fearfully to Nanny's skirts. She pushed me gently toward him and in a loud whisper said, “You must go, it is a great honor. Only a chief can sit with a chief on the meeting mat.”

The old man had the strong, distinctly sweet smell of African sweat, mixed with tobacco and very old man. After all I had been through in the smell department, it wasn't too bad, and I too sat cross-legged beside him with my eyes glued to the ground in front of me.

Inkosi-Inkosikazi leaned slightly toward me and spoke in Zulu. “Tomorrow I will show you the trick of the chickens. It's not really magic, you know. These stupid Shangaans think it's magic, but they don't deserve to know any better.”

“Thank you, sir,” I said softly. I was pleased at the notion of sharing a secret. Even if it was only a trick, it was a damned clever one that might confound the Judge and the jury if I could get my hands on a stray chicken at school. My confidence in his ability to change my status as a
pisskop
was growing by the minute.

Inkosi-Inkosikazi indicated to Nanny that she should begin the matter of the night water. Two women were quickly delegated to start the cooking fire and the rest of the field women settled down around the
indaba
mats, taking care not to touch even the tiniest part of the edge.

African stories are long, with every detail cherished, scooped up for telling a thousand times over. It was a great moment for Nanny as she stood alone in the rapidly fading twilight and told her story. She spoke in Shangaan so that all could share wideeyed and groan and nod and sigh in the appropriate places.

The hugeness of Mevrou with her moustache they found amazing, the injustice of the Judge and jury they took in their stride, for they all knew how the white man passes sentences that have no relationship to what has been done. The pissing upon me by the Judge and jury had them rocking and moaning and holding their hands to their ears. Such an indignity was surely beyond even the white man?

In the sudden way of Africa it was dark now. A piece of green wood crackled sharply in the fire, sending up a shower of sparks. The leaping flames lit Nanny's face. There was no doubt that they would remember this teller of a great story of misery and woe. Tears flowed copiously as Nanny told of how death finally arrived in a shower of icy piss that jetted from the loins of the great, moustached angel of perdition.

I must admit, I was hugely impressed, but when Nanny got to the part where my snake had no hat, which, in my opinion, was the most important bit of the lot, they cupped their hands over their mouths and, between the tears, they started to giggle.

Nanny concluded by saying that the business of my night water was an evil spell brought upon me by the angel of death with the moustache like a man and waterfall loins so that she could return each morning to feed her great beating
sjambok
on my frail child's flesh. Only a great medicine man such as Inkosi-Inkosikazi could defeat this evil spell.

The light from the fire showed the deeply shocked faces of the women as Nanny finally sat down, heaving with great sobs. They knew that such a tale had never been told before and that it might live forever, warped into a Shangaan legend.

I can tell you one thing, I was mighty impressed that any person, most of all me, could go through such a harrowing experience.

Inkosi-Inkosikazi rose, scratched his bum, and yawned. With the handle of his fly switch he prodded my weeping nanny. “Get me some kaffir beer, woman,” he demanded.

Dee and Dum, the twin kitchen maids, served me my dinner, as Nanny was required to attend to the drinking and other needs of the scrawny old wizard. Both little girls were wide-eyed with the excitement of it all and told me I was the bravest person they had ever known.

By bedtime Nanny was at my side as usual, arriving with a large sweet potato, its tummy open with a spoon sticking out of the middle, tiny wisps of steam curling upwards and condensing on the handle. There is something about a sweet potato that cheers you up when you are low and celebrates with you when you are happy. Sweet potatoes baked in their jackets have a very large comfort factor built into them.

Nanny's excitement was still with her. She grabbed me and crushed me to her enormous bosom and laughed and told me how I had thrust greatness upon her with the coming of the old monkey who was, after all, the greatest medicine man in all Africa; how the telling of the tale of the night water showed that a Zulu woman could be a teller of tales superior in every way to even the best told by the most eloquent Shangaan.

I pointed out that she had entirely missed the matter of my school record for canings. A large tear rolled down her cheek. “In the matter of white man's punishment, the black people already understand that the body can be broken by a
sjambok
but never the spirit. We are the earth, that is why we are the color of earth. In the end it is the earth who will win, every African knows this.”

Whatever all that was supposed to mean, it didn't answer my question. Nanny finally left me, but first she lit the paraffin lamp and turned it down low, but not so low that I wouldn't recognize the bogeyman should he try to sneak into my room.

“Tonight Inkosi-Inkosikazi will visit you in your dreams to find the way of your night water,” she said, tucking me in.

The morning after the night Inkosi-Inkosikazi went walkabout in my dreams, he summoned me to sit alone with him again on the meeting mat. From an old leather bag he produced the twelve magic shinbones from the great white ox. Then, squatting on his haunches as he prepared to throw the bones, he commenced a deep, rumbling incantation that sounded like distant thunder.