Ben Okri - The Famished Road

Dad paused.

‘Getmesomewater,’hesaidafterawhile.‘Thisstory ismakingmethirsty.’

Dad had been performing the story in the dark. I quickly fetched him some water. He drank. He breathed a sigh of pleasure. He continued.

‘The rest of the world waited for the return of the people they had sent. They waited for seven years. Then they sent another delegation. The same thing happened. Then they decided to kill the King of the Road.’

Dad paused again and lit another cigarette.

‘All the chiefs and princes and kings and queens in the world sent out messages to their peopleaskingthemtogatherallthepoisonthey couldfind.They gatheredallthe poisons and piled themup andtransportedthemtowherethegreatmeetingwasheld. While the different people travelled with the poison some of it spilled over and that is why some plants can kill and why there are places in the forest where nothing ever grows.

‘They gathered all the poisons from all the four corners of the earth and made a mighty dish with them. In the dish there were hundreds of fishes, roasted bush meat, yams, and cassava. The cooks made sure that the dish was tasty. The food was so much that it took more than one hundred people to carry all of it. They travelled for a long time till the King of the Road, who was by now sick with hunger, caught them. He asked what they had brought for him as sacrifice and complained bitterly about how the first two delegations were happy when they thought he was dead and about what he did to them. The leader of the delegation showed him the wonderful food they had brought him and said that they wished him long life. But the King of the Road was so angry with human beings for starving him that he ate half the number of people who went on that journey. Then he sat down and devoured the great dish.

‘He ate all of it and his eyes began to swell because it made him even hungrier than he was before. The more he ate, the hungrier he became. So he ate the rest of the delegation. Only one person escaped. And that person was our great-great-greatgrandfather. He knew the secret of making himself invisible. He was the one who cameback andtoldtheworldwhathadhappenedaftertheKingoftheRoadhadeaten up the entire delegation.

‘What happened was that, after his unsatisfactory meal, the King of the Road lay down to rest. And then suddenly his stomach started to hurt him and he became so terribly hungry that he ate everything in sight. He ate the trees, the bushes, the rocks, the sand, and he even tried to eat the earth. Then the strangest thing happened. He began to-eat himself. He ate his legs, and his hands, and his shoulders, and his back, and his neck, and he ate his head. He ate himself till only his stomach remained. That night a terrible rain fell and the rain melted the stomach of the King of the Road. Our great-great-great-grandfather said that it rained for seven days and when it stopped rainingthestomachhaddisappeared,but hecouldheartheKingoftheRoadgrowling from under the ground. What had happened was that the King of the Road had become part of all the roads in this world. He is still hungry, and he will always be hungry. That is why there are so many accidents in the world.

‘And to this day some people still put a small amount of food on the road before they travel, so that the King of the Road will eat their sacrifice and let them travel safely. But some of our wise people say that there are other reasons. Some say people make sacrifices to the road to remember that the monster is still there and that he can rise at any time and start to eat up human beings again. Others say that it is a form of prayer that his type should never come back again to terrify our lives. That is why a small boy like you must be very careful how you wander about in this world.’

When he finished the story Dad stayed silent for a long time. I didn’t move. Then suddenly he got up and went to bed. I couldn’t sleep. I kept seeingvivid colours, kept seeing intimations of the King of the Road, lying in state, eternally hungry, beneath the streets and beaten tracks and highways of the world. I stayed tossing, my mind very active and awake, till I noticed for the first time the silence of the room, the absence of the rats. Dad must have noticed the same thing for he said:

‘Go and throw out some dead rats for the road to eat.’

I was scared, but I swept out under the cupboard and found two more corpses of rats. I brushed them into a dust pan, hurried out, and threw them into the mouth of the darkness. As I hurried back in I fancied that I saw the King of the Road eating the dead rats and enjoyingthem. When I got back in Dad was already snoring.

I was floatingin thedark, on awind perfumed with incense. I was staringinto the simpleeyes of theboy-kingwho had thesmileof agod. I heard thewind tappingon our door. It tapped a code which I understood. I lit a candle. It was the photographer. He was dressed in a brilliant blue agbada. He wasn’t crouching. He seemed to have lost his fear. He was not as buoyant as the last time I saw him, but he looked healthier. He came in and took off his agbada top and I saw he had a silver-plated cross round his neck. He sat on the mat, cross-legged.

‘I am leaving tomorrow morning,’ he said.

‘Whereareyou goingto go?’

‘I am going to travel all the roads of the world.’

‘And do what?’

‘Takephotographs of theinterestingthings I see.’

‘Be careful of the King.’

‘The King will die.’

‘The King never dies.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Dad said so.’‘I am not afraid of the King.’‘TheKingis worsethan thugs, you know. Heis always hungry.’‘What King?’ ‘TheKingof theRoad.’ Helooked puzzled.‘Okay,’ he said finally, ‘I will be careful.’ There was a moment’s silence.‘Where have you been?’‘Hiding.’‘Where?’‘In my camera.’‘How?’‘Travelling on the back of the silver light.’‘Doingwhat?’‘Visitingother continents. Flyinground theuniverse. Seeingwhat men and women do. Takingphotographs.’ ‘What will happen to your glass thing?’ ‘I will leave it.’ ‘So you won’t display your pictures any more?’ ‘Not here in this street. But I will display them to the whole world.’ ‘How?’ ‘By magic.’ ‘How?’ ‘You ask too many questions.’ I fell silent. ‘Your poison killed all the rats,’ I said. ‘I told you it was good.’ ‘Will you give me some?’ ‘Why?’

‘In case the rats come back to wage war on us.’

He thought about it.

‘I will leave some for your mother.’

We were silent again. Then he asked if there was any food. I soaked some garri for him, which he ate with dried fish. Then I noticed a bowl of fried plantain and stew which Mum had put aside and I gave it to him. After he had eaten he opened the case of his camera and brought out a bundle of fine-smelling pictures. He looked through themand gavethemto me. Therewerepictures ofafishingfestival,ofpeopleonthe Day of Masquerades. The Egunguns were bizarre, fantastic, and big; some were very ugly; others were beautiful like those maidens of the sea who wear an eternal smile of riddles; in some of the pictures the men had whips and were lashing at one another. There were images of a great riot. Students and wild men and angry women were throwingstones at vans. Therewereothers of market women running, of whitepeople sitting on an expanse of luxurious beaches, under big umbrellas, with black men serving them drinks; pictures of a child on a crying mother’s back; of a house burning; of a funeral; of a party, with people dancing, women’s skirts lifted, baring lovely thighs. And then I came upon the strangest photograph of them all, which the photographer said he had got from another planet. It was of a man hanging by his neckfromatree.Icouldn’t seetheropethathehungfrom.Awhitebirdwassettling on his head and was in a blurred attitude of landing when the photograph was taken. Theman’sfacewasstrange,almost familiar.Hiseyeswereburstingopen,theywere wide open, as if he had seen too much; his mouth was twisted, his legs were crossed and crooked.