A Girl Named Disaster Read online

  “Good! You’re an observant girl. I’m sure you noticed how Crocodile Guts maneuvered his boat.”

  Nhamo had, in fact, often watched the fisherman. Boating was one of the many things she had studied without having any clear reason to do so. He had a pole with a flat paddle that he used first on one side, then the other, to move himself along.

  “When it gets dark, you pull the boat into the water and let yourself float downstream. After a while you’ll come to the Musengezi. Then you must use the paddle to force yourself against the flow. You have to go upstream, not down. When you need to rest, go toward shore and tie up to a tree. Crocodile Guts always kept a coil of rope in his boat. Be sure it’s still there. It’s perfect! You’ll be safe from animals all the way.”

  Nhamo was stunned by the idea. It was so unbelievably daring! Could she really float—or row—all the way to freedom? “How will I know when I’ve gone far enough?”

  “When you come to electric lights,” said Ambuya. “You’ve never seen them, but they’re bright—bright as a hundred fires! You must be very careful crossing the border, though. Don’t get out of the boat. The ground is full of land mines.” Grandmother explained about land mines, and Nhamo felt queasy.

  All at once, they heard Aunt Chipo’s voice outside. Ambuya lay flat and closed her eyes. The woman brought in food and maheu. There was a special dish of treats for Nhamo. “Since it’s your last day,” Aunt Chipo explained. She lifted Grandmother’s hand, which was perfectly limp, and laid it back down with a sigh.

  When they were alone again, Nhamo shared her treats with Ambuya. “I had to lie to her,” the old woman explained. “If Kufa knew I could give you advice, he might guess where you went after you escaped. I’m hoping he’ll think you went back to the trading post.” The two of them ate and talked more as if they were two girls rather than a revered elder and a child. It was like the afternoon they had listened to the guitar at the trading post.

  But finally, Grandmother told her to close the door for privacy. “Move that chest at the end of my bed,” she ordered. When Nhamo had done so, Grandmother told her to dig a hole in the floor. A few inches down was a small pot. It was full of gold nuggets.

  “I collected those from the stream. I used to trade them with Joao, but I’ll never do that again.”

  “Don’t say that,” begged Nhamo.

  “I’m only telling the truth. When I go to my ancestors, Chipo will hunt around until she finds it. She can dig up a pot of earthworms for all I care! I want you to have it.”

  Nhamo poured the nuggets into her hand. They were colder and heavier than she’d expected.

  “Put them into a cloth bag and tie them around your neck,” instructed Ambuya. “Don’t try to sell them without advice—ask the nuns for help.”

  “At Nyanga?” said Nhamo, remembering the place her mother had gone to school.

  “You won’t be able to walk that far, but there are nuns all over Zimbabwe. Just find the nearest ones and tell them you’re Catholic. They can send a letter to your father.”

  Her father! Nhamo had forgotten about him. Suddenly, Grandmother’s daring plan took on reality. Nhamo had a family in Zimbabwe. She had a name: Nhamo Jongwe, member of the Jongwe clan, which might include friendly aunts and uncles and even grandparents.

  “He’s as trustworthy as a rat in a grain bin, but he’s all you’ve got,” said Ambuya, spoiling Nhamo’s enthusiasm. Still, Grandmother didn’t really know Father that well. He might have a very nice family.

  “Go for a walk now, Little Pumpkin. Take food from the storehouse. Get matches, a calabash, and whatever else you can manage without getting caught.”

  “That’s stealing,” protested Nhamo.

  “That’s survival. I, your elder, command you to do it. Now go. I’m exhausted with talking and need to sleep.” Grandmother closed her eyes and this time really dozed off. Nhamo tore a square of the red cloth she was to use for the wedding ceremony and tied the gold pieces inside.

  My roora, she thought with a bitter smile. Then she set about following Ambuya’s directions.

  All went with amazing smoothness. Crocodile Guts’s boat was still jammed into the reeds, and the mooring rope was still attached. Nhamo removed a sack of already ground and dried mealie meal from the storehouse. She visited Aunt Chipo’s hut and took a box of matches and a bag of beans. Here and there she went, removing odds and ends. It was wicked to steal—she knew that—but worse to disobey an elder. And so she entered into the adventure with a clear conscience. No one bothered her or even stopped to talk. She was a ghost in her own village, already seen as the bride of the ngozi.

  Only Masvita gave her an uncomfortable moment. “I’ll miss you,” her cousin said tearfully as Nhamo bent over Aunt Shuvai’s baby. “I want you to know…if it doesn’t work out…if he’s cruel…come back. I couldn’t bear to see you suffer. I’ll argue with Father until he lets you stay. You’ll have to return anyway to have your first child.”

  Nhamo knew that Masvita would never find the courage to argue with Uncle Kufa, but she appreciated the thought. She felt slightly guilty because she had just stolen a pot of the millet-and-honey cakes Aunt Chipo kept to fatten her daughter up.

  Nhamo stored everything in the boat. In the late afternoon, she went to the ruined village and fetched Mother. “You’ll never guess what I’m going to do,” she whispered to the clay pot. “I know it seems wrong, but Grandmother commanded me to do it.”

  As the shadows grew and the time for departure approached, however, Nhamo began to have second thoughts. It had been a wonderful plan when the sun was high. Ambuya had seemed full of confidence and even—if such a thing were possible with an elder—mischief.

  Now the spaces between the trees filled up with blue-gray shadows as Nhamo halted by Crocodile Guts’s boat. Quelea birds flew to safety in the reeds. The moment, when day had not quite become night, held the forest enthralled. A kudu stood, one foot poised, near the water; a monkey gazed at Nhamo from his perch in a mobola plum tree. Nhamo hesitated, holding the clay pot with Mother’s picture inside.

  Then the light shifted; the kudu snorted and backed away to find another path. The monkey fled. “Oh, Mother, I’m so frightened,” murmured Nhamo. She placed the pot in one end of the boat and packed grass around it for protection.

  12

  As usual you’ve arrived too late to help,” grumbled Aunt Chipo as Nhamo entered Grandmother’s hut. “Don’t think you’ll get away with such laziness with your new husband. He’s a man who knows what’s what.” She leaned against the wall with a bowl of sadza and relish. Masvita was carefully spooning food into Ambuya’s mouth.

  “She looks better, don’t you think?” said Masvita. “I almost think she understands what we say.”

  “Poor Mother! If it wasn’t for Nhamo, she wouldn’t have angered the muvuki. Well, what are you looking at, girl? I’m not going to wait on you.”

  Nhamo helped herself to the pot of relish and platter of sadza next to Grandmother’s pot shelf.

  “You be ready bright and early—no running off to the forest,” Aunt Chipo said.

  “Please come to the girls’ hut tonight,” begged Masvita. “I’ll ask Tazviona to watch Grandmother.”

  Nhamo almost choked on her sadza. “I’ll see you again, lots of times. I don’t know when I’ll see Ambuya.”

  “Then I’ll stay with you,” her cousin said warmly.

  “Oh, no! You won’t get any sleep,” snapped Aunt Chipo. “You have to do this one’s chores, now that she’s running off to a new home.” She made it sound as though Nhamo were marrying Goré’s brother out of spite.

  Masvita made a few gentle protests and dropped the argument. “Don’t worry. I’ll come and see you as often as possible after you’re married,” she whispered. Nhamo doubted this very much. Her cousin had a kind spirit, but she was no match for her mother.

  And it didn’t matter. Masvita wasn’t going to visit her in her real new home.

  Nhamo h
urried to perform the final chores of the day after Aunt Chipo and Masvita had left. She helped Ambuya sit up to relieve herself. She tidied the hut and made sure a water jar was close to the bed. She discovered that Grandmother could hold a cup and drink without any help at all.

  “You fooled everyone,” she said with admiration.

  “In a day or two I’ll magically recover.” The old woman smiled serenely.

  Nhamo glanced out the dark door. “Grandmother…if I run away, won’t the ngozi punish everyone?”

  Ambuya paused before she answered. “I’ve been thinking about that a long time. Many people died of cholera, not just our family. I believe Rosa was right: Goré Mtoko couldn’t be responsible for a whole epidemic.”

  “But the muvuki—”

  “Was wrong. I know that’s a surprise,” said Grandmother when Nhamo’s eyes widened. “You see, spirit mediums are ordinary men and women when they’re not being possessed. A few of them fake messages when they can’t manage a real one.”

  Nhamo was deeply shocked.

  “I’ve lived a long time, Little Pumpkin. I honor and revere ngangas; I believe they can tell us what our ancestors want, but a few—a very few—are dishonest. Now and then one is downright wicked.”

  “Like the muvuki.”

  “What kind of decent person would kill his own son? Really big problems, like drought or swarms of locusts or epidemics, are dealt with by the mhondoro, the spirit of the land. The muvuki’s spirit is only a flyspeck compared to it.”

  Grandmother’s words were disturbing. Nhamo had never heard anyone question the authority of an nganga—except the trader and his wife. They were Catholic, so their opinion didn’t count.

  An idea suddenly occurred to Nhamo. “Aunt Chipo! She was possessed by Goré’s spirit.”

  “Oh, yes. Chipo,” Grandmother said bitterly. “Listen, Little Pumpkin. What I’m about to say will be upsetting, but you need to understand. Your aunt has hated you from the moment you were born. She hated your mother, too. Runako was the one everyone said was pretty. She was the one who did well in school, and the very worst thing Runako did was have a beautiful child one month before Masvita was born. It took all the attention away from Chipo.”

  Beautiful. They thought I was beautiful, Nhamo said to herself.

  “She’s always wanted to get rid of you, and her chance came when we visited the muvuki.”

  “You mean she was lying?”

  “It’s been known to happen.”

  Nhamo’s world turned upside down. First Ambuya had accused the doctor of making things up, and now she said Aunt Chipo had pretended to be possessed. What could anyone believe when things like that happened?

  “You can’t wait any longer,” Grandmother said softly.

  “Now? I don’t want to go!”

  “You have to. If I could come along…” Ambuya sighed. “Well, I can’t, and that’s that. I know all about Zororo. Believe me, you wouldn’t last a year before he either beat you to death or one of his wives poisoned you. Your only hope of survival is to go. I gave Runako her chance long ago. Now I’m giving you yours. I only wish you were older.”

  “I’m frightened,” sobbed Nhamo, clinging to Grandmother.

  “I know.” Ambuya smoothed her hair, and Nhamo felt a tear drop onto her head. “The journey will be the hardest thing you’ll ever do, but it will be worth it. Just think of finding your father. I don’t expect the trip will take more than two days—we’re very close to the border. Remember to push yourself against the current when you reach the Musengezi. Close to the border the river divides in two, but it doesn’t matter which branch you take. They both go to Zimbabwe.”

  “What lies in the other direction?” Nhamo asked.

  “Lake Cabora Bassa. The Musengezi used to flow into the Zambezi River until the Portuguese dammed it up. Now the Zambezi’s become a huge lake. You can’t even see across it.” Nhamo nodded. She had heard many tales about Lake Cabora Bassa. Ambuya gently removed her granddaughter’s arms from her neck and pushed her toward the door.

  “You might get sick in the night,” Nhamo protested.

  “I’ll be fine. Remember, Little Pumpkin, your mother’s spirit is watching over you. She’ll warn you of any danger.”

  “I’ll never see you again!”

  “Sh. Sh. Someone might hear us. If I go to my ancestors before we meet again, my spirit will come to you in a dream. I promise it.”

  Nhamo felt sick with grief as she crept out. She removed the small oil lamp that lit the interior of the hut and put the wooden door in place to keep out predators. She heard Grandmother sigh as the old woman lay back down.

  All around stood the dark huts of the village. A quarter moon lay low in the west, not giving enough light to tempt anyone to stay up late. Nhamo took the lamp along to light the way. Far off, in the distance, a lion roared. He was not the dangerous one, the girl knew, but his mate who padded noiselessly through the trees.

  Every trickle of noise made Nhamo freeze and her body break out in sweat. Every rustle of leaves made her want to flee back to Ambuya’s arms. But it was a false safety. Besides, she had been ordered to go by her elder. “Please protect me, Mai,” she prayed as she tiptoed along.

  Eventually, she pushed aside the reeds and saw Crocodile Guts’s boat floating right where she had left it. She climbed in. Oho! It swayed like a tree branch. Nhamo had never been in a boat, and she didn’t like the sensation. She lay on her stomach with her arms over the stern, untying the rope. A puddle of water in the bottom soaked her dress-cloth.

  Once free, she took the oar, as she had seen Crocodile Guts do many times, and pushed herself away from shore. The boat moved! At first it edged by inches, but it drifted more swiftly as it reached the middle of the stream. Nhamo held tightly to the sides. The quarter moon was almost down.

  She could see the sky over the trees. Now and then she glimpsed a round boulder or a patch of sand. Of her village there was not a trace.

  In spite of her fear, Nhamo felt a little thrill of excitement. She was really doing it! She was sailing away from Zororo and his jealous wives. In two days she would arrive in Zimbabwe and ask the first people she met to find her some nuns. And then—oh, then!—they would send a letter to her father at Mtoroshanga.

  Thinking happily of the aunts and uncles she was soon to have, Nhamo watched the dark shore slide by as she floated on toward the Musengezi River.

  13

  Nhamo woke with a start. At first she was completely confused. The floor rocked and her dress-cloth was soaked. I’m on the boat, she realized after a moment. She sat up cautiously. A faint light marked the eastern horizon, and the shoreline seemed very far away.

  Fighting back a surge of panic, she scanned the water for clues as to where she might be. The current was moving much more swiftly than it had in the middle of the night. That was what had awakened her. “This must be the Musengezi,” she said aloud. Nhamo took the oar and began to paddle against the flow, first on one side, then the other, as she had seen Crocodile Guts do. But she didn’t make much headway. The river was very strong.

  The light increased, and pink wisps of cloud appeared in the sky. Nhamo felt chilled by her wet dress-cloth. Surely there was more water in the boat than she remembered? Meanwhile, it took all her strength to make any progress. Her arms ached; she clenched her teeth to keep them from chattering. Soon the villagers would discover her absence and search parties would go out. She would have to be either far away or hidden before anyone decided to visit the river.

  The red ball of the sun appeared to her left over the gray-green smudge of the shore. Red ripples dimpled the water, and the odor of cooking fires stirred on the sluggish morning breeze. Nhamo’s chest began to hurt. She badly needed rest, and so she turned toward land.

  It would have been safer to go to the farther bank—the villagers wouldn’t be able to find her—but she could barely see it. A heat haze lay over the water and hid all but the tallest rocks. Sometimes even they
disappeared. Nhamo doggedly plied the oar. The trees drew closer with painful slowness. Her dress-cloth untied and fell into the murky water sloshing around her feet, but she couldn’t take the time to retrieve it. If she paused, the current rocked the boat in a frightening way.

  Finally, with a last burst of energy, she drove the craft toward a stand of reeds and stood up to catch an arm of willow protruding from the water. The boat spun around. Nhamo fell back. “No, no, no, no,” she whimpered as the prow swung toward shore and crunched into a mass of acacias. Wicked-looking thorns passed within inches of her face. She stared up wildly at the branches crackling around the boat. Dust, ants, and twigs showered over her, but the trees also caught the craft and kept it from being swept away. After a few moments she felt secure enough to creep forward and tie the rope to an acacia. Then she lay still with her cheek pillowed on the soggy lump of her dress-cloth. Her body trembled with fatigue.

  So much for her first attempt to sail to Zimbabwe!

  Nhamo rested for a long time. The water smelled of rotten fish—an odor she had always associated with Crocodile Guts. Now it seemed to sink into her skin as thoroughly as it had permeated the fisherman. People always said you could smell Crocodile Guts before you saw him. Perhaps she, too, would advertise her presence in this way. Nhamo smiled bitterly. Would Zororo be as anxious to marry her if she smelled like a sun-ripened tiger fish?

  As the heat of the day rose, Nhamo’s stomach began to churn. Her fingers wrinkled from being immersed in water and, perversely, her mouth dried up with thirst. Still, she was unwilling to move. In the distance she heard voices. They grew and then faded as the searchers combed the forest. It didn’t seem likely that anyone would venture into the acacia thicket and, fortunately, the village had possessed only a single boat.

  Grandmother said that once many people had owned boats. At that time the Musengezi was a tame river. When the Portuguese dammed up the Zambezi, it pushed water back up the mouth of the Musengezi, widened it, and made it a dangerous place to sail. During the civil war, Portuguese soldiers came through the village and destroyed all the boats to keep them from being used by Frelimo. Only Crocodile Guts managed to hide his, and only he continued to fish until Frelimo took over the country.