Nuruddin Farah - Knots

Nodding, the waiter departs. Then just as she takes her first spoonful, an unheralded carnival of voices, as erratic as they are mercurial, unsettle her. A horde of young men are frenziedly carrying items of furniture, lifting and heaving them in the clumsy way untrained bearers pick up and hoist heavy, many-legged movables. She recognizes one or two of the young men, and she begins to worry that they may hurt their backs on top of disfiguring or breaking the odd table, chair, or sofa, which will no doubt set Kiin back a bit. She watches them with a mix of anxiety and amusement as they haltingly struggle to bring a table that by her reckoning seats ten through a door that is too narrow for it. What is more, these youths’ maladroitness — raising the table above their heads with the likelihood of breaking one of its legs instead of tilting it to the side or bringing it out a leg at time — fills her with such unease she wonders if they will be good enough to participate in her play. In fact, she finds that her fearful worries have been realized: The table’s two front legs are wobbly, and the young men are drenched with sweat and panting. They go past the well to their left, then stumble, ungainly, up a stone stairway to her right, in the direction of the outhouse with the thatched roof and the windows that open outward at awkward angles.

Following them with her eyes, her gaze finally falls on the outhouse, which has an added-on aspect to it, an afterthought resulting from a need not only for more space but for something like a hall. She understands that that is where the hotel holds parties overflowing with revelers. In her mind, Cambara thinks of a future when peace is supreme and when Kiin’s preteen children may employ it as a bachelor pad. How curious that she realizes, only after watching the youths putting themselves out, hoisting and hauling, that the outhouse has an upstairs hall and a downstairs eat-in, the latter boasting a dozen or so tables and chairs dressed in colorful cloths and arranged as though for a formal function. Cambara has high aspirations that she will enjoy herself at the women-only party to which Kiin has invited her and will try to muster one or two of the women to help her with her plans, thank Farxia for what she has done and maybe at last meet the shopkeeper Odeywaa’s wife.

She looks up startled, with doubts starting to gnaw at her insides. Then again, she is consumed by an overwhelming uncertainty the moment she considers the furious tempo at which the new developments have unfolded, with Kiin becoming the plinth upon which the pillars of Cambara’s causes rest, and Zaak and Wardi virtually out of her sight and out of her mind. She persists, against reason, to rely wholly on Kiin, even though she feels that she must cultivate the friendship of other people to whom she can turn; otherwise, Kiin will be the only one on whom she will depend, however well appointed she has been or will be. Sadly, whenever she has had a good reason to celebrate a moment of triumph, Cambara is given to suffering an attack of anxiety, fearing the consequences of future failures instead of gathering the robe of success around her. Basta, enough!

SilkHair. What are her intentions toward him in the event that she commits herself more and more to his welfare? Will the time ever come when she may adopt him legally? This is one of her concerns. The idea of taking SilkHair in, even though it is not necessarily in the cards, does have its appeal, as it will give her more purchase when she decides to return to Toronto. She imagines saying, in response to her friends, who may ask why she is back so soon after leaving, “But you know, Mogadiscio is no place in which to raise an intelligent, ambitious child, as there are no schools, in fact nothing to recommend it.” Of course, there is no way of knowing how things will pan out, or whether SilkHair will prove to be a willing partner in her project, bearing in mind that he is the kind of boy who has clear ideas about what he wants to do with his life — for a boy of his age and background. More important, is she a good enough mother for a boy of his social circumstances. Is her hardiness comparable to Seamus’s, whom Kiin says has adopted the entire country and survived it?

She puckers her lips into wrinkled annoyance, disturbed at the recurrent thought that by inviting others into her life, she will bring into it complications without which she can do very well. Why does she keep doing that? Is it because she is perennially lonely, needing the company of others in the very same way some people have pets or married couples who are having difficulties invite third or fourth parties, because they cannot face each other alone? Why — even before she is certain of a favorable outcome about SilkHair — is she thinking about Bile? Maybe she believes that, in his own way, Bile not only will have supplemented and in the end completed her new self, but will have enriched it too. Like it or not, the question that comes to her mind now is whether or not she is exchanging Wardi, the estranged husband whom she has shed off, for Bile, and whether admitting SilkHair into the parameters of her newly reconstructed self will have given it a firmer format.

Her face brightens with a smile at the thought of not only meeting this Seamus but also placing the sketches of her plans before him and requesting that he carve the masks and, if feasible, build the stage and set too. Happy at the prospect of achieving her aim, Cambara takes a slow sip from her bottle of mineral water.

She takes a mouthful of the mango. She thinks, What a beauty, what a mango! Then she muses what shape this new self will take if allowed to develop to its full potential. To make things work, she will have to find out what kind of homeschooling Kiin has organized for her daughters and find out what chances there are for SilkHair. The question is how best to organize the life of a young boy in these difficult times and in such a way that it is manageable. Will she survive journeying into yet another new “thing” whenever the old “thing,” to which she gave her concentrated attention for many days, many weeks, many months, or many years, no longer fills her heart with excitement and emotion?

Suddenly, she hears a female voice that is at once familiar and full of animated vigor, giving instructions and shouting at several people at the same time. The part of Kiin’s voice that is familiar is imbued with an irresistible charm; the unfamiliar strain of it is raised, hastily spoken, stressed to the point of sounding plagued — the voice of a woman who is harried, hassled, and perfunctory too. Eventually, she catches sight of Kiin as she comes into view, riding the waves of her elegant stride. Deeply moved, excitement catches at Cambara’s throat, and she manages only to wave and wave. Eventually, Kiin acknowledges her beckoning motions and indicates, with a gesture of her hand, that she will be with her shortly.

Kiin joins her, even though it is clear that she is fretting, maybe because she has not much time to chat, what with the number of things that she must attend to before the evening party. The two friends hug, touching cheeks, kissing, each asking how the other is, and then answering, in unison, “Fine, very fine,” and finding this humorous and giggling.

When they have stood apart for a few seconds, Kiin says, “Have you heard from him? He’s promised that he will call you.”

It does not do Cambara’s heart any good to hear a generic allusion to a “he” and to remember that she has forgotten the mobile phone in the room — not knowing what manner of tidings this “he” will bring and whether they are good or bad. Who is supposed to have called her? Bless the fellow — Bile? Curse the fellow — Zaak? God forbid — Gudcur?

“From whom am I supposed to have heard?”