Ways of Dying (10 page)

Strangers would stop the two children on their way to school and comment, ‘What a beautiful little girl. And look at her brother! He looks like something that has come to fetch us to the next world. Whose children are you, my children?' And Noria would give a pained squeal, ‘He is not my brother!' Sometimes we would stop them when they came back from school. We would tell Toloki to run home while we detained Noria for a few moments of her laughter. She enjoyed all this attention, and as she grew older she devised ways of using it to her advantage. She knew that her influence came from her ability to give others pleasure. She could give or withhold pleasure at will, and this made her very powerful.

The older Noria grew, the further away she drifted from Toloki. She began to wear shoes, and this enhanced her feeling of self-importance. She developed other interests, and no longer played with Toloki. Even in class, ho would not see her for days on end. He would only have a glimpse of her on those afternoons when she went to sing for Jwara.

Noria would leave home in the morning wearing her beautiful gymdress, and carrying her schoolbag. When we saw a schoolbag for the first time, it belonged to Noria, of course. She would walk with the other pupils only as far as the general dealer's store, where she would disappear in one of the pitlatrines. A few minutes later she would emerge wearing the polka-dot dress that That Mountain Woman had bought her in town against Xesibe's wishes; he said that village girls of Noria's age did not wear ready-made dresses, but his words went unheard, as usual. Her face would be pale with powder, and her lips red with lipstick. Her gymdress and khaki shirt would be neatly folded in her schoolbag. She would then catch
the bus to town, where she would give pleasure to bus drivers and conductors. Later, when there were mini-bus taxis that raced between the village and the town, she would ride around in these taxis, dispensing pleasure to the drivers, who would buy her gifts and flatter her. In the afternoons, she would go back to the public toilet, change into her school uniform, remove her make-up, and go home.

We saw all the things that Noria was doing, and we made the mistake of telling That Mountain Woman. She was very angry with us, and called us children of puffadders. She said we were consumed by the worms of jealousy in our sinister hearts because Noria was beautiful, and had the power to give or withhold pleasure. She went on to say that our mothers were whores who had regretfully made bad jobs of aborting us. This last one did not surprise us in the least. After all, That Mountain Woman once called her own husband, right there in front of everybody, the product of a botched abortion. Obviously it was a favourite label that she gave to people she did not like.

We did not argue with her. At that time she had begun to practise full-time as a medicine woman, and it was a credit to our wisdom that we did not challenge the razor blades in her tongue. In any case, even before she converted one of her rondavels into a consulting room where people came to be cured of ailments caused by wizards and witches, while she was still using her medical skills only for the benefit of her family and friends, we were wary of exchanging words with her.

There was a young man we used to see sauntering, or perhaps loitering, near Xesibe's homestead. He was very scrawny, and looked as if his mother had not fed him properly when he was a baby. He would walk up the pathway past Xesibe's houses, and then back again, whistling to himself. He performed this strange ritual mostly on weekends, in the evenings when the herdboys had already confined the cattle in their kraals, and were sitting around the fire roasting maize, and telling lies to
one another. Sometimes Toloki would be sitting with those herdboys, reliving the time when he was one of them before he went to school, and shaping cattle and horses with the red clay that the boys brought him from the river-banks. He was much older than these boys, but he preferred their company since they did not have terrible things to say about him. They did not judge his looks as harshly as their parents did. In fact, he was their hero, as his deft hands could shape clay cattle that looked like real cattle.

Xesibe suspected the scrawny man of being a thief, who was coming to survey his big herd of cattle, with the intention of stealing some of the animals in the future. But the herdboys told him not to worry, the man posed no threat to his animals. Perhaps they knew something that he did not know. However, the fact that Noria would suddenly come alive whenever she heard the whistle did not pass unnoticed. She would put on her shoes and trip out of the house.

‘Where are you going at this time of the night, Noria?'

‘I am going to sing for Toloki's father, father.'

Xesibe had learnt never to complain about Noria's activities with Jwara, lest he invited his wife's scabrous tongue. That Mountain Woman, on the other hand, did not seem to notice what was happening, since she spent most of her time locked up in her consulting room, extracting evil spirits and demons from ailing patients, and administering love-potions to the lovesick and the lovelorn.

Noria did not go to sing for Jwara. Instead she went to join the scrawny young man, and together they would disappear behind the aloes. The herdboys enjoyed those moments, and would tiptoe to the aloes, and peep through the thick pointed leaves. They would then breathe heavily, and those who had already reached puberty would wet the pieces of cloth that covered their groins. They enjoyed these escapades, and whenever they saw the young man, they would become excited, for
they knew that he embodied pleasures that were beyond imagination. Spying on his antics with Noria was certainly a much better experience than molesting goats in the veld. Toloki had once joined them in watching one such performance, but was so disgusted that he vomited. Since then, he was satisfied with only hearing the stories that the herdboys told about the pleasures behind the aloes, without seeing them for himself. Late in the night, when the fires had long since turned into ashes, Noria would slink back into her father's house, with pieces of dry grass stuck to the back of her head.

That Mountain Woman finally noticed that there was a scrawny young man who was paying particular attention to Noria. But at the time she did not know of the adventures behind the aloes.

‘Who is he, Noria?'

‘His name is Napu.'

‘Where does he live? Whose child is he?'

‘I do not know his parents. He lives in town.'

‘What is his job?'

‘He is a labourer in a brickmaking yard.'

‘Did I bring you up to waste your life with mere labourers? Do you want to end up with a man who is as useless as your father?'

‘But father is one of the most successful farmers in the village, with many cattle too.'

‘He is still useless. And don't you answer me back. Your labourer, what does he have?'

‘Nothing yet.'

‘I forbid you to see him, Noria. You will be married to a teacher, or a clerk of a general dealer's store.'

A few months later we heard that Noria had run away with Napu. They were living together in a shack in the brickyard in town. That Mountain Woman was not amused. She felt that Noria had let her down. Xesibe rubbed salt into the wound,
saying, ‘You see, Mother of Noria, it is all your fault. Now you are paying for spoiling this child.' That Mountain Woman told him to go empty his bowels out there in the dongas, and that was the end of his I-told-you-so attitude.

We later learnt that Noria ran away because she was heavy with child. That Mountain Woman said she was very stupid to run away from home for such a trivial reason. Didn't she know that her mother had all the herbs to destroy the stomach even in the fourth month? Was she not aware of the young wives of migrants, who made mistakes in the absence of their husbands, and who came to her for assistance? If she could help strangers correct their mistakes – for a sizeable fee, of course – she would have happily helped her own daughter. Xesibe was more concerned with the shame that his family would suffer. No one from the young man's family came to negotiate lobola, and no cattle were paid to his kraal for the hand of his only daughter. Surely he was going to be a laughing stock. That Mountain Woman forbade anyone to go to town to see Noria. ‘She will come back,' she said. ‘I'll make her come back.'

But Noria did not come back. Although the town, which used to be two hours away by bus, was now only one hour away since the mini-bus taxis were introduced, we did not see Noria for a long time. We heard that after signing papers of marriage with her in front of a magistrate, Napu had taken her to his home village in the mountains, and had left her there with his grandmother. Napu did not have any parents, and was brought up by his grandmother. His intention was that Noria should stay there until the baby was born. His grandmother would help her nurse the baby. It did not worry them much that this was already against the custom that the first child should be born at the mother's home. Their main concern was that Noria's parents should not find her. And indeed it would have been impossible to find her in that mountain village, so far away from everywhere else.

Noria later told us of the things that happened to her in that mountain village. Napu's grandmother was a vicious woman whom Noria suspected of being a witch. Her homestead was composed of only one hovel, and her only means of survival was through the monthly allowance that Napu sent her.

One day, an old man came to visit the grandmother and stayed until late. At night, the two old fogeys mixed some herbs, boiled them, and put the water in an old rusty bathtub. Next they ordered Noria to take off her clothes, and take a bath. But she refused. They were angry with her, and cursed her, saying that she was going to suffer before she could see her child. It was late at night, and the old man did not go away. Noria decided to spread her blankets on the floor, and sleep. When they thought she was fast asleep, the grandmother stripped naked, and danced over her, chanting in some strange language. The old man just sat on the bench, and mumbled unintelligibly as if he was in a trance. Just before dawn the old man finally left, and the grandmother got into Noria's blankets and fell fast asleep.

The next morning, Noria was extremely uncomfortable in the presence of the old hag. But the grandmother was all sweet like honey, and behaved as if nothing had happened. Noria avoided her assiduously. At midday, by some stroke of good fortune and coincidence, her husband arrived. Noria was besides herself with joy. But for some strange reason that Napu could not understand, his grandmother was very angry to see him.

‘What do you want here?'

‘Oh, I just came, gran'ma. Just to see you and Noria.'

‘To see us for what? Are you not working?'

‘I got a lift from the truck of my employers. They came to deliver bricks for the construction of a general dealer's store in a village not far from here. So I thought I would come and see if the baby was born yet.'

‘Well, you can see that the baby is not born yet. So what are you going to do about it?'

Noria was already into her eleventh month of pregnancy, but there was no sign of the baby. The old hag blamed Noria's own people for bewitching her. She, on the other hand, suspected the old hag, although she never before voiced her suspicions to anyone. In the presence of the grandmother, she told Napu what had happened the previous night. The old woman was shocked beyond words that an innocent-looking girl like Noria could be capable of inventing such dreadful lies about her. ‘What snake is this that you have brought to my homestead, Napu, who is bent on poisoning your relations with your own grandmother who brought you up when your own parents had taken to the world, abandoning you as a baby?'

Obviously Napu did not believe Noria. But she insisted that she was going away with him. ‘I am not staying another night here with your grandmother. I am going back to town with you.'

‘She is not going anywhere, Napu. You cannot be controlled by a woman.'

‘Oh, yes, I am going. If he does not take me with him, I'll walk the road alone. The roof of my father's house is not leaking; I'll go back there.'

Napu relented, and agreed to take Noria back to town with him. She went into the hovel, packed her few items of clothing into a pillow case, and stood outside, waiting for the road. Napu said good-bye to his grandmother, and they walked away. The grandmother shouted bitterly after them, ‘You Napu, you will see the eyes of a worm! You have married that lying bitch from the lowlands! Now you are going to spend all your money on her, and I will not see even a black cent from you!'

By the thirteenth month, the lovestruck couple began to consult diviners and herbalists of all types. Where was it heard of that a woman carried a baby in her stomach for so many
months? Experts mixed herbs for them, asked them to slaughter animals, and performed mysterious rituals in their brickyard shack. But still the baby refused to come. Napu finally ran out of money and could no longer afford the experts. He could not send any more money to his grandmother either, and she piled more curses on the hapless couple. Friends advised Napu to send his wife back to her home to work things out with her family. There was no doubt that That Mountain Woman had put some curse on her. When this rumour reached the ears of That Mountain Woman, she vehemently denied the accusation. ‘How can I put a curse on my own daughter? In any case, I do not mix medicines that hurt people. My medicines only heal and bring good fortune, and wealth, and love, and fertility. I am not a witch. I am a doctor.'

One evening we saw Napu and Noria alighting from the bus that came from town. Noria was wearing an old donkey blanket, and she had covered her head with it so that we would not see who she was. But we knew immediately that it was Noria. Her willowy stature gave her away. She looked and walked very much like her mother in her younger days, when she first came to the village. Oh, yes, we all knew that when That Mountain Woman came to our village she was in tatters. She was strikingly beautiful, but was in rags. It was the unappreciated Xesibe who made her a person. Anyway, to go back to Noria, she walked home barefoot, as her shoes had long since worn out. Napu followed her hesitantly.