A. Barrett - Love Is Power, or Something Like That - Stories

Perpetua climbed the verandah and waited for Mr. Farasin. In her haste she had left behind her Bible. Mr. Farasin clutched his in one hand. The bucket, with water sloshing inside, was held in the other.

The boys’ quarters had four doors. The bathroom door had rotted off its hinges; it leaned against the wall. The kitchen door hung open to reveal a soot-blackened ceiling, a coal brazier, a large enamel basin of fermenting tapioca. The third door, which bore a Citadel sticker, was padlocked. The last door was closed. When Mr. Farasin stepped onto the verandah, Perpetua walked to the last door and pushed it open.

The room, though sparsely furnished, was cluttered. A metal bed faced the door, and a row of cartons lay in the thick dust collected under it. Beside the bed stood the old cooker that Perpetua had replaced nearly three years ago; its closed lid was covered with cosmetic bottles and tubes, skeins of glass bead jewelry, combs, hairpins, hairbrushes. In front of the cooker was a straight-backed chair, which was draped with clothes. A raffia bag stood against one wall of the room, and clothes spilled from its mouth. The floor was scattered with high-heel shoes, leather sandals, cloth slippers, candy-colored pom-poms. Perpetua stood in the doorway and stared at the disorder. She recognized many of the clothes and footwear, the heart-shaped jar of face lotion that she had thrown away because it lightened her skin, a chipped crock water jug that was a wedding present from someone she couldn’t remember, the wooden hairbrush that broke in half when she flung it at a cockroach. Tene’s room, to Perpetua’s astonished gaze, was a house of mirrors constructed out of her memories.

Tene lay on her back on the bed, her knees raised and her skirt gathered around her waist. A transistor radio, playing highlife music, sat on her belly. At Perpetua’s entry she turned a surprised face toward the door, and when Mr. Farasin appeared she sat up and arranged her skirt, then swung her legs off the bed. The radio crashed to the floor and fell silent.

“Auntie?” Tene said in an anxious voice. Her eyes watched Mr. Farasin.

“We have come to cleanse your room,” Perpetua said.

“Ehn?”

“You heard her,” Mr. Farasin said. “Your room has evil spirits.”

Gloom settled over Tene’s face. She sighed deeply, then rose from the bed and took a step toward the door, but Mr. Farasin turned and pulled it shut.

“You stay,” he said.

Tene glanced at Perpetua, who dropped her eyes; then she returned her gaze to Mr. Farasin, glared at him. “I be Roman Catholic.”

“God is God anywhere,” Mr. Farasin said.

He held her gaze. She remained silent. Then he stuck his Bible under his arm, raised the bucket, asked the women to kneel and close their eyes. Tene refused with a shake of her head, and sat at the bed’s edge to watch him. He nodded at Perpetua. After Perpetua knelt and bent her head, he began to pray and spray water. His voice rose; it beat the air. He placed his wet hand on Perpetua’s forehead, and she swayed, gasped for breath. He released her and strode toward Tene with his hand outstretched, but she moved her head away from his grasp. He bent down, set the bucket on the floor, then grabbed Tene’s shoulder with his left hand to restrain her, and when she raised her face in protest, he gripped her temples with his right. She struggled, and he held on, chanting prayers. His fingers squeezed until she groaned and beat his arm with her fists. He released her, and she sank to the floor, her legs kicking. Her foot caught the transistor radio. It slid across the floor, struck the wall, and burst into music.

“Amen!” Mr. Farasin shouted.

“Amen!” Perpetua cried, and opened her eyes.

Mr. Farasin removed the Bible from under his arm, touched it to his forehead, left shoulder, then right. He said, “You can get up now, madam. Your house is clean.”

As Tene struggled onto her knees, Perpetua rose to her feet. Mr. Farasin put his arm round her shoulder and led her toward the door. In the doorway, he turned around.

“You,” he said in a stern, booming voice, pointing his Bible at Tene, “if you want to remain in this house, you must change your church.”

Tene’s breath rasped in her throat. “Who you be to tell me—”

“Shut up, thief,” Perpetua said.

With a gift of eighty shillings, Mr. Farasin left. When the gate clanged shut behind him, Perpetua rang the bell for Tene. They had not begun cooking when the school bus honked at the gate. Tene led Daoju upstairs, changed her clothes, then piggybacked her to the dining table and sat with her as Daoju struggled through lunch. The meal finished, she took her to the garden to play for half an hour, and then carried her kicking and screaming to her bedroom for siesta. By the time Tene returned to the kitchen, pots were bubbling on the cooker, the air was thick with the aroma of roasted chicken and groundnut stew and coconut rice, and Perpetua was standing at the sink, skinning a pineapple.

Daoju rose from sleep at twenty-one minutes past three. At two minutes to four, Perpetua sent Tene to Aunty Deborah Store, which was just round the corner, to buy a crate of beer. While Tene discharged the errand, Perpetua set Daoju on her knee and read to her from the Bible, from chapter thirty of Exodus, which was as far as they had gone in two months of daily reading. The plan, undertaken on the advice of Mr. Farasin, was to read the entire Bible to her daughter before her third birthday. It was slow going; Daoju found the stories bewildering, dreary. Before long — as happened whenever her mother insisted on this ritual — she began to scratch her elbows, and pull her Calabar plaits, and swing her legs with impatience. When she interrupted to ask if she could go outside to play, Perpetua lost her temper.

“You’ve started again, you stubborn child! You’re lucky I don’t have time for you today! No more play — go into your room and stay there!”

Daoju climbed the stairs, sobbing.

At seventeen minutes past four, Tene returned. After stacking beer in the refrigerator, she asked Perpetua where Daoju was. A cluck of annoyance was the reply she got. She mumbled an excuse and slipped from the kitchen, but halted on the staircase when Perpetua called out, “Leave her alone. Go and bathe and change into something nice. Our visitors will be here by seven.”

When the grandfather clock struck five, Perpetua went upstairs to prepare herself. At ten minutes to six, she emerged from the bedroom. She wore a cream muslin gown, a string of pearls, and silver sandals. She walked past her daughter’s bedroom, down the stairs, and into the kitchen. She smiled when Tene, who was dozing on a stool, started awake and said, “Ah auntie, your cloth fine o!”

Under Perpetua’s direction, Tene set the table. The tablecloth was changed. Napkins were arranged. The silverware, porcelain plates, and crystal wineglasses were unboxed, cleaned, and laid out. The food, served into lidded dishes, was moved from the kitchen to the dining room sideboard. At fifteen minutes to seven, Perpetua gave Tene last instructions. She reminded her about the refrigerated jugs of drinking water and when to serve dessert, and showed her again how to remove the plates, how to refill the wineglasses, how to walk, to bend forward, to smile.

At two minutes past seven, Godspeed arrived with the guests.

Sam Briggs was a big-voiced, big-bellied man. His round cheeks oozed health and Old Spice aftershave, and he cultivated a regal air, with his arms held away from his body and his neck as stiff as a cockerel’s. He wore a white voile etibo over black gabardine trousers, his dove-gray bowler hat sat at an angle over one eye, and his pointed black leather shoes were polished to a dazzle. He wore gold around his neck and left ring finger, and silver signet rings on the four fingers of his right hand, which clutched the silver knob of his ebony walking stick. Sam Briggs led the group into the house. Perpetua was waiting in the foyer. On sighting her he threw his arms wide as if for an embrace, but when he drew near he brought his hands together with a soft clap. She curtsied and held out her hand.