The Headhunter's Daughter (8 page)

“
Eyo, muambi
. She wants to carry me to her cooking pot. Is it not time for the evening meal?”

The captain laughed. “You have a delightful imagination, Cripple. “But you are like an old hen that no longer lays but has been kept around to sit on the eggs of the young hens that refuse to brood. Your meat will be far too tough to eat; even if it is tenderized with all the papaya leaves in the Kasai.”

“
Aiyee! Mona buphote buebe!
”

“What did she say?” the white
mamu
demanded. “I did not learn these words in my
Tshiluba
language school.”

“I cannot translate this for your ears,” the captain said, and laughed.

Cripple was not appeased by his good humor. “Will you make this strange child put me down?”

“No. It will be dark soon and then the hyenas will be out.”

“See what you have done?” Cripple said, directing her words to the white face just inches from her own. The Headhunter’s Daughter didn’t even bat an eyelash, which made Cripple all the angrier. “
Muambi
,” she cried, “this Mushilele does not bathe; never have I smelled such stink. Even you whites do not offend me as bad as this one.”

“Good,” the captain said. “Then you will stay awake, which will make it easier to transfer you into the truck when we reach it.”

“
Baba wetu, baba wetu
,” Cripple moaned. “Surely now this is the end of me.”

When they got back to the truck, they found a pack of jackals prancing around it. One brave individual had actually jumped in back and was trying in vain to loosen the securely bundled elephant meat. Other than that, everything was just as the rescue party had left it. This astounded Amanda. Such a state of affairs might not have been the case had one been able to transpose the scene to Cherry Road, back in Rock Hill, South Carolina. Of course back home the precious commodity would have been something quite different than elephant meat—like maybe a hi-fi stereo.

“Where are we all going to sit?” Amanda asked.

“You, and I, and Miss Bossy Pants will sit up front. The others can stand in back, behind the elephant meat.”

“Yes, but what about the girl?” Amanda said. “And please, Pierre, try to think charitable thoughts about Cripple. You, more than anyone, should know that she really is a diamond in the rough.”

“
Mais oui
, but diamonds stick to grease; that is how they are mined in Kasai Province. Every time I’m through dealing with Cripple I feel greasy.”

“Oh, stop the dramatics, Pierre. Anyway, this Mushilele girl cannot ride in the back.”

“Why not?”

“Because she’s white, silly.” Although they were thousands of miles apart, there were some things about South Carolina culture and Belgian Colonial culture that were identical; segregation of the races being one of them. Personally, Amanda saw nothing wrong with the races mixing upon occasion, but at Belle Vue where the whites were the minority, it did make sense to maintain one’s distance. One couldn’t, for instance, invite a black into one’s home socially, because then all the Africans would want to see what the inside of a white person’s house looked like.

“I see,” said Pierre. “So Cripple gets to sit up front in my truck, as does this white Mushilele girl. I suppose you get to do so as well—am I right?”

Amanda’s heart pounded. She had never assumed anything
but
that she would get to ride in the cab.

“Yes, of course.”

“Then where does that put
me
? I am, after all, the silly owner of this truck. And if I am to ride in back, which of you three ladies will drive?”

Ladies?
Was Pierre mocking the other two women, or did his Gallic sense of gallantry really extend to women of color? Amanda had heard that the Portuguese were more tolerant in that regard, but not the Belgians, half of whom were Flemish and were said to have brought with them to the Congo the more Germanic views on race.

“I am a perfectly good driver,” she said crisply. “I possess an International Driver’s Certificate—although it is back at the rest house.”

“
Alors
,” Pierre said, “then our problem is solved. I will ride in back with my soldiers and guard the elephant meat with my life.”

If looks could kill, Amanda shot him a look that could have killed a pair of pachyderms, had any live ones been handy. Unfortunately, it was too dark for the handsome young captain to read the passion in her expression.

“Are you being sarcastic?” she demanded.

“Quite possibly,” he said.

“Have the ladies get in,” she said, and without speaking to him again climbed up to the driver’s seat and retrieved the keys from their “hiding place” behind the sun visor.

“The girl will sit next to you,” Pierre said.

Amanda bristled at the directive. “If she wants to, then she may,” she said.

“No, Mademoiselle Brown. The white Mushilele
cannot
sit next to the door; there is too much danger that she might jump out. I have seen it before with natives who have never ridden in automobiles. They are terrified of the noise and the motion. It was the same way with our grandparents, no? And back then the autos did not even go so fast as we drive now on these terrible Congo roads.”

The trouble was that the girl did stink. The combination of wood smoke and body odor was bad enough, but with every bump, every sudden jostle, her unwashed, scarified, scab-covered flesh seemed to seek out Amanda and press up against her, and for far longer than was necessary. But remarkably, the girl did not let out a peep when the truck roared to life. And even when Amanda misjudged the location of a deep rut that the truck had to straddle, and the axle nearly broke, the strange white girl remained eerily silent.

Then, just a few kilometers outside Belle Vue, all hell broke loose—literally, to hear Cripple tell it. One minute they were driving along a fairly smooth stretch of hard packed clay, anxious to get home with their elephant meat and tales of the strange white
mamu
, and the next minute a demon was flapping about the cab.

Yes, Amanda had screamed. Who wouldn’t have? But the boldly patterned demon that thrashed about their faces was merely a bewildered nighthawk that had been blinded by the headlights. Cripple had been just as frightened; she’d practically wet herself and had shrieked like a banshee. However, the bizarre young woman sitting between them had remained as still and silent as a stone carving. That’s when Amanda knew for sure that repatriating the girl was simply not going to be possible.

Chapter Eight

S
he’s beautiful!” The American teenager strained to get a better look at the creature squatting next to the wood box in the kitchen; only her father’s arm prevented her from getting any closer.

“We need to leave her alone for the night,” Dorcas said. As the oldest white present, she represented the voice of wisdom.

There really was no point in waking up the OP at this hour of the night, was there? This was, after all, first and foremost, police business. Besides, Pierre knew from past experience that the OP could be as congenial as a cape buffalo if aroused from a deep sleep. No, there was nothing so important that it couldn’t wait until morning except for a heart attack and acute appendicitis, and the white Mushilele suffered from neither.

The question remained, however, of where to leave the girl for the night. All the jail cells were currently unoccupied, and although they were undoubtedly better than anything the girl had ever slept in, somehow it did not seem right. And since he couldn’t very well invite an unmarried white girl to stay with him, well, that left only one other solution as far as the young captain could see.

“Amanda?”

“Yes?”

“Do you have room for the girl here?”

“Yes—but do you think she will stay?”

“This is outrageous,” said Mr. Gorman. “This is a savage we’re talking about. She can’t stay inside—not with my daughter and wife here.”

“Then perhaps your wife and daughter should sleep outside,” Amanda said.

“Why you impudent little thing! I will be sending a telegram to the Mission Board in the States first thing in the morning in which I will be reporting your abominable behavior. I am sure that the Board will demand that you return on the very next plane.”

Amanda blanched. “I’m very sorry,” she said. “I often speak before I think. It’s my worst habit; one that I pray that I outgrow. Please forgive me, Mr. Gorman. Mrs. Gorman. Peaches.” Mother and daughter nodded, but the father didn’t seem to have heard her.

“Peaches can move in with Father and me,” Mrs. Gorman volunteered. “And we can shove the bureau in front of the door. I’m sure we’ll be just fine. But it’s you and Dorcas that I’m worried about.”

“May the Lord guard my tongue,” Dorcas said. “We’re talking about a Mushilele girl—at most a Mushilele woman. She’s unarmed. She’s not an army of Amelekites, for Pete’s sake. She’s as afraid of us as we are of her—perhaps ten times more so. She isn’t going to come anywhere near us. No, the real question is, Where is her father going to spend the night?”

“Her
father
?” Mrs. Gorman said. “Where on earth did he come from? I didn’t hear any planes land today.”

“Don’t be daft,” Mr. Gorman said. “She’s referring to the native who came with her. That great big fellow just outside with the six-foot bow and the monkey-skin quiver full of arrows.”

“He’s not really her father, is he?” Peaches said. “I mean, not
really
.”

“Of course not, dear,” Mrs. Gorman said to her daughter. “Now run along, honey. I spotted a collection of Grace Livingston Hill novels in the living room this morning. Why don’t you pick one out and take it to my room?”

“But Mother, you said those were trash—”

“Now be a good girl and just do as I say.” The spoiled teenager stomped away in a huff, in total contrast to the poor but apparently calm Mushilele girl Pierre had found himself forced to bring in.

Orders from the top aside, looking at her now in Amanda’s kitchen, it was clear to Pierre that this strange hybrid girl could not be anywhere else except for somewhere in the civilized world. It would have been morally wrong to leave a girl of her complexion, of her genetic heritage, to be raised by the Africans out in the bush. It just wasn’t done. Case closed. Besides, her very existence under these circumstances bespoke of a crime, and that, of course, had compelled him to act in the first place.

Ugly Eyes could bear it no longer. She had done everything as Father had commanded her to do up until now. She had followed him in silence. She had climbed into the metal elephant, and when it bucked and roared into life, she closed her eyes and shivered, but she did not cry out. When the nighthawk flew in through the metal elephant’s eye and the silly foreign women screamed, even then Ugly Eyes had remained as silent as the striped antelope that haunts the forest shadows.

But now it seemed that the
Bula Matadi
wished to separate her from her father. The young one, who had been gabbling at Ugly Eyes in her incomprehensible tongue, had grabbed one of the younger girl’s wrists and was attempting to pull her deeper into the strange house built of stone. This meant that Ugly Eyes could no longer see her father.

Ugly Eyes felt her knees go weak. At the same time her heart began to pound between her ears, and she felt as if her body would burst out of her skin if she had to endure this feeling for one more second. Something had to happen; anything! So that’s why Ugly Eyes lunged forward and bit the younger
Bula Matadi
on the arm. She had no intention of eating her—or even just killing her—but something had to happen.

The young
Bula Matadi
screamed and dropped Ugly Eyes’ wrist. Perhaps that might have been the end of the violence had not the old man—not the one with the gun—jumped into action and struck Ugly Eyes with the back of his hand. Hard. Hard enough to knock her across the large stone room. Then all the women screamed, and this time the young man—the one with the gun—hit the old man. Then there was silence, except for the deep breathing that comes with intense emotion and sudden exertion.

At that point Ugly Eyes was grateful that Father heeded his own council and did not come inside and become part of the fray. Father could have—would have—killed everyone, even the young
Bula Matadi
with the gun. Only one person in Ugly Eyes’ village owned a gun; that was Born With One Fist Extended. He had built his own gun; having made it from memory preserved from his service in the
Bula Matadi
’s army. Born With One Fist Extended had actually managed to take down a she-buffalo with it by hitting her at the base of the skull where it meets the back of the ear. That was the occasion of a great feast, and was also the only time that Ugly Eyes could remember when her father’s position in the tribe had been threatened.

Ugly Eyes struggled to stand before Father could see her lying on the floor. “You are very fortunate,” she told her onlookers. “Had this happened in our village, you would not live to tell your children about it.”

She turned to the old man who had struck her, and took some small pleasure in the fact that now, under the younger man’s intense stare, he seemed to have drawn back into himself, like a chicken in a rainstorm.

“You, old man,” she said, “have an especially large head. Your skull—after it has been cleaned thoroughly by ‘the ants that travel’ will make some lucky man a very nice drinking cup. It is so large that it will not have to be refilled. As for the rest of you—bah, you are a mixed bag at best. There is not one man in our village with an appetite so strong that he would take to the bed the most desirable of you. You are as white and ugly as the grubs that feed on logs that litter the forest floor. Truly you disgust me.”

The Headhunter marveled at all that he saw that day. The
Bula Matadi
were a clever race to have produced such astonishing things—even if they did so on the backs of other peoples. A metal elephant! One could slice off as much meat as needed, yet the beast did not die. To the contrary.

There was a secret location on the stomach where one could grab a strip of skin and pull. The stomach then opened wide and as many as three people could climb inside and be seated. Perhaps the most difficult thing to believe was the fact that somehow this man-made beast could be made to obey, to move along the
Bula Matadi
’s wide trail at the speed of a plunging eagle.

With such a means of locomotion at their disposal, the Bashilele could relocate an entire village under the cover of one night! Never again would the Headhunter’s people have to live in fear of marauding tribes or vengeful
Bula Matadi
. Of course first one had to learn the ways of the white men and that would require a great deal of courage, for they were a strange, dangerous, and unpredictable people. But a people, nonetheless—of that he was sure, unlike some of the more ignorant members of his tribe. Ugly Eyes had taught him that. And as Ugly Eyes learned the ways of the
Bula Matadi
, she would teach them to him.

Someday she might even take a
Bula Matadi
man as one of her husbands, and in the course of time bear that man children—
yala
! Would those children also be white? Perhaps so—although most likely not. Ugly Eyes had been living a long time with the Bashilele people, and she was one of them. Her whiteness was but a thin layer that did not extend down to her soul or to her woman parts; of that the Headhunter could be sure. In the meantime, why was he not showing a father’s concern? Was he not afraid for Ugly Eyes? Was she not as much his daughter as if she had been born of his wife? These were silly questions to ease the mind; Ugly Eyes was not only his daughter, she was much more than that! Let it be known that Ugly Eyes was as brave as any son—and as clever as any two sons. Yes, let that be known.

In the meantime—and this he had made very clear to his daughter—they were not to give the white man the satisfaction of knowing that anything he did, or said, had any effect on them, the representatives of the Bashilele people.

In the end it was decided that father and daughter should be kept together
temporarily
in what used to be the woodshed (in the days before the Missionary Rest House was hooked into the boundless electricity supplied by the falls)—no matter how improper it might appear to Mr. and Mrs. Gorman to have a black man spend the night alone with a young, nubile white girl. Normally, this strange girl’s whereabouts would have been of no further concern to Cripple (given that she’d lied about speaking the Bushilele language)—but since the woodshed was where she kept the uniform that the white
mamu
now required her to wear, it was ordained that the two strong souls should meet again.

“
Aiyee!
” Cripple cried upon opening the door to the woodshed the following morning. The white Mushilele girl was supine upon a very comfortable-looking sleeping pad on the cement floor, covered by a real blanket. She appeared to be alone; still, Cripple half expected the girl’s father to leap down from the rafters and lop off her head. She glanced up and was vastly reassured by the same cobwebs that had not seemed so friendly the day before.

Meanwhile the girl jumped to her feet and was hastily attempting to dress in some of the real
mamu’
s clothes. Frankly, it was more than Cripple could bear. First the luxuriously soft sleeping pad, and now these rich clothes! Even Cripple had yet to be favored by any of the white woman’s castoffs.

“What has this wretched creature done to deserve such favoritism?” she cried. “Anyone can be born with a sickly white skin. I too would have been born with such a hideous condition, had but I known the treasures that lay in store for one such as this.”

“Then truly it is a shame that you did not listen to your mother’s womb,” one of the spiders in the rafters said. “I listened, and as you can see, I have been richly rewarded.”

Cripple raised a clenched fist. “So now even you spiders mock me?”

“Oh you silly Muluba woman,” said a voice closer at hand. “How much palm beer did you consume last night?”

Cripple dropped her fist and stared at the white African. “If it were possible that you could understand me, I would not speak thus; I drank no beer last night, nor did a drop of honey wine pass my lips. I am not a betting woman, but if I were, I would bet the lives of my sister wife’s children that you spoke just now. For either that is the case, or I have crossed over to the land of departed souls and we are both dead.”

The white girl clapped her hands and laughed. What impertinence that child showed!

“We are neither of us dead,
Mamu
,” she said. “It is me, the wretched white creature that you tore from the bosom of her mother yesterday in the Bashilele village.”

“Nonsense,” Cripple said. “You are speaking to me in
Tshiluba
, which is my own tongue, not yours. You would have no way of knowing my language.”

“
Mamu
, how is it that you supposedly came to know
my
tongue?”

“Well, I had a friend—but I lied.” Cripple’s ears burned with humiliation. “You overheard that conversation? Why did you not say something?”

“
Mamu
, it was not my conversation.”

“
Tch
, you are most annoying. So tell me then, from whom did you learn to speak like a civilized person?”

“I learned to speak thus from my mother and father,
Mamu
. But I learned
your
tongue—this primitive tongue—known as
Tshiluba
, from my mother’s dear friend, Iron Sliver, who learned it from her mother.”