Ben Okri - The Famished Road

‘I don’t know.’

‘Andyouhavebeensearchingevery cornerofmy room.’

‘No.’

‘What did you find?’

‘Nothing.’

‘What did you see?’

‘Nothing.’

She stared at me for a while. The women hadn’t moved. Their faces remained angled towards the door. Then one of them looked at me.

‘When did you come in?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘You better start going,’ Madame Koto said.

I stayed still. She went behind the counter. One of the women got up, went out, and came back in with three lanterns. She put them on different tables.

‘Whenarethey bringyourelectricity?’

‘Don’t ask me questions,’ Madame Koto said.

Shecameroundthecounter,went out,andIheardherhagglingwiththetapper.They reached an agreement. The tapper made a raucous joke. I heard him wheeling his bicycle away, leaving a rusted cranking sound in his wake. Madame Koto came into the bar with three kegs. Flies followed her. Wine spilt on the floor. The women didn’t move. When she dropped the kegs near me she planted her fists on her hips and roundly berated the women for their lassitude. They jumped up and made themselves busy, arranging benches, washing cups and plates. Madame Koto went out again. As soon as she was gone the women resumed their places and their motionless expectancy. Then the wind blew a man to the front door. He stood outside, visible behind the strips of curtain. He came in and looked round and two of the women rushed to him and led him to a seat. It was Dad. The women sat opposite him. I went over and he touched me on the head, and said nothing. His face was gaunt, his bristles were growing wild, and there was a vacant stare in his eyes. I knew something was goingto happen.

‘Let’s go home,’ I said.

‘Why? I’ve only just arrived. It’s been a devil’s day. Fetch me some palm-wine. Where is Madame Koto?’

‘Gone out.’

One of the women brought him palm-wine and waited for him to pay. He waved her off.

‘I don’t know you,’ she said. ‘So pay now if you don’t want any trouble.’

Dad stared at her as if he might hit her.

‘He’s my father,’ I said.

‘So what?’

Dad, very reluctantly, paid. I sat beside him.

‘Oneday,’hesaid,‘troubleisgoingtoblowup inthisarea.’

One of the women sucked her teeth. Another one spat.

‘Spit all you like,’ Dad said. ‘Your trouble still remains.’

The women left him. He hung his head and drank slowly. The women began to talk about the forthcoming rally. They built such a picture of this political rally that it sounded like a fantastic bazaar to be held at the end of the world. They talked of cows that were going to be slaughtered, goats that would be roasted on spits, great musicians that would perform, cars of all kinds that would be seen, and they invoked visions of money thrown out to the people from bags, of thousands of people converging from all over the world to be fed, to be shown the miracles of power, and the promises of a new future.

‘Rubbish!’ Dad said, sucking his teeth.

The women were at first silenced. Then, in a gravelly voice, one of them said:

‘It’s people like you who eat rubbish!’

Dad finished off his palm-wine in one long slurp and then he belched. He stared intently at one of the women and the woman glared back at him. The wind blew the curtain strips into a frenzy. We all looked at the door as if expecting an unusual personage to step in from the rain. Dad went on staring right through the woman, through the walls, and the vacant concentration in his eyes frightened me. The lamp nearest the door fluttered and went out. Then Dad gave a chilling laugh that began the faintest tremor of a fever in me. He went on laughing, with an unmoving face like a mask in the darkness, and his laughter seemed to affect the wind. Something shook the rooftop. I heard the curious wailing of cats from the forest. The wind roamed the bar like a disembodied spirit looking for somewhere to sit. When Dad stopped laughing the room seemed darker and the wind had stilled. We were all edgy in the longspaces of an undefined expectancy.

‘Let’s go home,’ I said, ashiver passingthrough me.

‘Shut up,’ Dad said, eyes still vacant.

One of the women stood up and sat down again. Another one got up and, rolling her buttocks, went and stood at the door. In the faint light I could see a scar at the back of her neck. She stood there for a long while, trembling. The rain started again, slowly drizzling. Dad poured himself more palm-wine. Another lamp went out. The eyes of the women were bright in the darkness. The wind started; I heard it howl as it gathered mass amongst the trees. A terrible spirit stirred in its movement. Gusts of air rattled the zinc roof, I heard the trees protesting, the wind blew on the croaking of frogs. The woman at the door turned and, shaking every inch of movable flesh on her body, came towards us and went round a table and sat heavily. She sighed.

‘No customers tonight,’ she said.

There was a moment’s silence. I looked at the door. The curtain strips parted, as if giving way to a great form, and a three-headed spirit came into the bar. Each of its heads was a different shape. One was red with blue eyes, the other was yellow with red eyes, and the third was blue with yellow eyes. The spirit had about ten eyes in all.

It came into the bar, stayed at the door, each head looking in different directions, smoke issuing from the yellow eyes. Then it moved slowly and awkwardly into the room.Iwatchedit infascination,feelingaterriblefeverrisingtomybrain.Thespirit came and stood in front of me. Then, from across the table it elongated all three heads towards me and stared at me with its ten eyes. The fever got to my brain and an awful noise like an incessant drill started at the top of my skull. The spirit stared at me for a long time. I could not move. The colours of its eyes began to hurt me, began to burn out my sight. Then a voice in my skull said:

‘Shut your eyes.’

I shut them and could still see. The heads of the spirit swayed and then were retracted. Then the spirit, walking through the table as if it didn’t exist, went and sat between the women. Two of its heads, in opposite directions, stared at the women’s faces. The one in the middle, the yellow head with red eyes, stayed fixed on me. One of the women coughed. Another one sneezed. A third stood up and sat down again. Dad burped.

‘Something stinks in here,’ said the woman who had just sneezed.

‘I feel sick,’ said another.

‘I want to vomit.’

‘I can’t move.’

‘And no customers.’

‘No customers, no money.’

‘No electricity.’

‘Stupid rain.’

‘Bad wind.’

‘And Madame Koto has vanished.’

‘Where has she gone?’

‘How would I know?’

They fell silent. The wind was still, as if the land had finally given birth. One of the womenbrought out somesnuffandsniffeditviolently.Andthen,foralongmoment, she gripped the table, her head swaying, her mouth poised and wide open. The spirit’s blueheadwasinfront ofher.Then,suddenly,shegavethemostdevastatingsneeze, which fairly rocked the spirit’s head. The head drew back, startled. The other heads widened their eyes and the one on the farthest side began to sway and toss about. Its eyes became very big. And then it burst forth with a mighty sneeze which practically threw me against the wall.

‘What is wrongwith you?’ Dad said.‘Nothing.’‘A woman sneezes and it blows you away? Are you not a man?’

Then I began sneezing. Dad hit me on the head. Another of the women took up the sneezing. Dad joined in. Soon we were all infected with uncontrollable sneezing. We sneezed for such alongtimeand with such intensity, that it seemed wewould loseour heads altogether. The woman who began it sprayed her mucus everywhere and sneezed out the last lamp. Dad dislodged snot into his cup of palm-wine and then knocked the cup over. We were all contorted in paroxysms, when the wind, roaming the bar, took our sneezing away, and in its place left five rowdy men who laughed at us. Wedidn’t realisewehad stopped sneezingtilloneof themsaid: