of the Wakambi for all time. Men were elected to look after these drums and this became their sole duty in life. These ‘Drummers of High Honour’ had to daub the instruments periodically with animal fat to preserve both the wood and the skin. When a drum was attacked by a wood-boring pest they had to wrap it in wet animal skins and then leave it to steam in a hollow anthill which had been heated by a fire till it was red hot.
When a drum deteriorated beyond repair it was the duty of the oldest woodcarver to carve a new one – an exact replica in every detail, and the old one was buried with the full burial honours with which a chief is buried.
Marimba’s drums became so popular that even the Masai copied them, but not for peaceful purposes. One day when Mpushu was carrying a number of drums to a village of the Wakambi he was set upon by three Masai who knocked him flying into a muddy stream and stole off with the drums, but only after requesting him to fetch some more as they would like to steal those too.
The Masai were the first to use the drum for relaying signals, especially military signals.
Give a Masai a stone and he will hit something or somebody with it. Give him any piece of wood and he will turn it into a club with which to brain you. ‘Peace’ or ‘peaceful’ are words that do not occur in the vocabulary of the Masai. To them these are absolutely meaningless abstractions.
With the birth of the drum came the birth of new dances in the land of the Wakambi – dances like the bupiro-mukiti, or the dance of life, performed by both male and female dancers, or the chukuza ya sandanda, the dance of the baboon, which is performed by male dancers only. This is the most muscle-punishing dance that can ever be performed. All these dances were invented for one reason only – expression of tribal religion and the release of that beneficial life-force dormant in every human being, but which, when released, makes one feel closer in the ‘arms of Eternity’.
Also some of the dances performed by young people, like the famous ‘love dance’ of the Kavirondo, and the gqashiya of the Nguni, were invented so that the young people might find an opportunity to use up their excess energy.
Little Nonikwe was waiting. She was waiting with great impatience for something big and exciting to happen and she could hardly conceal the wild excitement she felt; it lighted her face like a midnight beacon. This was all because Nonikwe knew something the other girls in her village did not know as yet. She knew that the Great One, Marimba, was on her way to spend the night in the village – the very village in which Nonikwe’s uncle, Mutengu, was headman.
Little Nonikwe was a pathetic creature. She was not only a hunchback, but she was also totally blind. But all this was amply compensated by the great and rare gift the gods gave her of seeing things clearly long before they happened.
This gift had saved the little hunchback child from being destroyed at the age of eight as all crippled and deformed children were normally destroyed according to the laws of the Wakambi. A child born with any defect was, however, allowed to live till the age of eight to see if it had any special gifts like seeing into the future or the past, reading minds or communicating thoughts to animals.
Little Nonikwe was allowed to live and she lived like a chieftainess in her uncle’s village. She was the most well-hidden and well-guarded piece of property in the village, and this was because Mutengu had a bitter rival and enemy in another new village just beyond the river. This enemy was Lusu, the father of Nonikwe herself. When Nonikwe had been born, Lusu had been so disgusted with the child with which his wife had presented him that he had publicly declared that his wife had slept with a night-walking demon.
Nonikwe’s mother had been disgracefully driven from Lusu’s village and had sought refuge in the village of her brother Mutengu, where she died of a broken heart two moons later. Years had passed, the little girl had grown, and soon word had got around that she was a Blessed One, gifted with powers beyond human concept. When he heard this, Lusu the rascal tried to move the very stars and the mountains to get Nonikwe back. Mutengu had not only refused; he had seized Lusu and beaten him within a thumb’s length of his fat and rascally life.
Mutengu and Lusu had since been deadly enemies and to get his own back, Lusu developed the habit of reporting directly to Marimba with all kinds of accusations against Mutengu – acts of corruption and many breaches of the laws of the Wakambi. These accusations were, of course, utterly false and unfounded.
Eventually Marimba decided to pay Mutengu a secret visit in order to find out for herself if he was really as corrupt and evil as Lusu had made him out to be.
But Marimba had forgotten about Nonikwe. The little hunchback had actually dreamt what the great princess intended to do and woke up early that morning to warn her uncle to expect a secret visit from his queen some time in the afternoon. Mutengu, though startled by this warning, had acted quickly upon it because the blind little hunchback had never before been wrong with her predictions. He had ordered scouts to be posted to give him early warning of the approach of the great queen and her retinue. He had made his wives prepare all manner of food to give the peerless Marimba a welcome feast fit for one of her high and queenly position.
Mutengu had nothing to fear from a visit by his chieftainess because he had no secrets to hide. And not only was he as loyal as the southern wind but he was also as honest as a worker bee. But he did not want to be caught unprepared in anything and he was a strong believer in giving each and every visitor to his village a welcome in accordance with his or her stature.
Mutengu was a very popular headman. Every man and woman in the village could vouch for his great kindness, courage and honesty, and they were all prepared to defend him with their lives against any scandal-mongering back-biter.
The huge clay pots were full of delicious buffalo meat. There were great basins full of well cooked yams and corn cakes. There were also wooden trays full of roast wild fowl, partridge and guinea fowl. There were baskets full of wild figs and stewed marulas, and large cakes of fresh honey from his own beehives. Mutengu was the first man in the land of the tribes to keep bees. He kept them in hollow anthills, and handled them after drugging them with dagga smoke. He had also discovered that bees were inclined to leave him in peace when he dressed himself in a hyaena skin kaross.
Thus the great feast was prepared and brought in readiness for the unannounced arrival of the great queen Marimba. All the villagers settled down to await the arrival of someone who did not know she was already expected, whose surprise visit was a sursprise no more. Visitors from surrounding kraals and villages came as usual to have a free meal in this generous headman’s village, and as usual they told him a lot of tales-that-are-not-true and departed with full bellies and oily smiles. It was also customary for angry men to bring their disputes to Mutengu’s kraal and long arguments and trials took place under the Tree of Justice in the centre of the village. Fines were paid in ivory, ebony, and copper ore, and malefactors were taken outside and executed.
Life was taking its normal course in Mutengu’s village. An old and very tired-looking man came into the teeming village at midday accompanied by his remarkably beautiful daughter and begged a guardsman at the gate to let him spend the night in their spare hut, as he was very tired and had come a long way. This was not unusual and the guards were all too happy to admit the old doddering traveller and his daughter. The shy, beautiful girl greatly interested the burly guards and many were the ravenous glances cast in her direction.
The old man was given the whole haunch of a buffalo and asked to eat his fill; what was left he could take with him on his journey the following day.
The
