CHAPTER 2
The Walk

Nasomi and Naena were scouring pots the next morning when Tambo appeared at the gateway. Naena was the one who saw him and she nudged Nasomi. They both stood and wiped their hands on their wrapping cloths as he entered. He was smiling.

“I found the place,” he said, looking quite pleased with himself.

“My Chief,” Nasomi and Naena said together, curtsying.

“You came here, My Chief?” Nasomi asked. She became conscious of her and Naena’s appearance: unoiled skins, undone hair, wrapping cloths with sodden patches. And also the small drab house, the unremarkable yard with a falling fence around it. Two hens chased another right past Tambo’s feet, clucking too loudly.

He returned the compliment. “Ladies.” He didn’t seem bothered by the poor surroundings. “I asked around for a farmer with a daughter called Nasomi. I got lost through some of the ways, but I persisted.”

“You have to forgive us, we didn’t expect this,” Nasomi said. “We were going to come to your home this evening for the meeting.”

“I told you I’d come to find you. There’s no need for the meeting now. I have set things right.”

“You mean the farm? It is ours?”

“Yes. Entirely. I convinced my father to let the matter go. We have more than enough land, and it was a matter of inquiring about the deed. Is your father home?”

“Let me get him. He will be glad of this.” She rushed into the house and found Father dozing on a stool next to his pallet. He had said he needed to pray. It seemed he needed sleep more.

She knelt before him. “Father?”

He lifted his head to look at her like he’d been expecting to see her there. “Mhmm?”

“Father, Lord Tambo is here. He has some news about our land.”

He opened his mouth and paused, as if not comprehending. “Lord Tambo? Who is...? He’s come here? He’s outside our house?”

“Come, Father.” She took him by the hand and led him outside.

“My Chief,” Father said, touching his heart and dipping his head.

“The Mara bless you,” Lord Tambo said, gesturing for the man to be at ease.

“When my daughter told me there was a lord at the door, I thought it was your father. Where are your attendants, My Chief?”

Tambo stole a glance at Nasomi, gave a dismissive laugh. “I sent them on an errand. I thought to personally bring this news to you. The land…”

“Yes?” Father shuddered.

“It turned out our deed was old and invalid. We didn’t realize my great-grandmother had gifted the land to the king and somebody forgot to get rid of the deed. When Father stumbled upon it… Well, he thought we had land no one had reminded him of. But it is all yours now.”

Father did a stiff dance of wiggling his shoulders and pumping his fists. “Ahhhh! This is so wonderful! I don’t know how I can thank you, My Chief.”

“No need,” Tambo said. “My father was quick to understand and leave the land in the hands of a hardworking citizen like you. I have also provided you with two workers to help you with the season’s growing.”

Father couldn’t help but take Tambo’s hand in both of his and shake it. “You are a good lord. Nasomi, I will go to the field now. The weeds won’t pluck themselves.”

“But you need to eat first, Father.”

“You will bring me the food. The sun won’t wait. Give Lord Tambo some cornwine.” He dashed back into the house.

“You have brought joy to Father,” Nasomi said to Tambo. “He was sick and worried.”

“I’m only happy to.” A moment of heavy silence fell upon them, the three exchanged looks.

“This is my cousin Naena. She is the daughter of my mother’s young brother…”

Naena nudged Nasomi in the ribs. “You don’t have to say everything, Somi. You will bore the lord.”

“Please, you can tell me everything,” Tambo said with a laugh. “I wouldn’t mind listening to your family history.”

“Sit for some cornwine,” Nasomi said. “I will bring it shortly.”

“No, no. Don’t trouble yourself. I’ve had a lot to eat already.”

Another bout of silence.

“I will go now,” Tambo said.

“Thank you, My Chief,” Nasomi said. “For this gift. It is a good thing.” Naena gave her a disbelieving look, as if to say, Are those the best words you can speak?

He smiled and turned. He walked away slowly, deliberately. He was in no hurry. He placed his hands at his back, turned his head left and right and skyward to study whatever caught his attention. A man with few troubles in his life, Nasomi thought.

Naena poked her. “How can you be so dim, Somi?”

“What?”

“He wants you to follow him.”

“That can’t be right.”

“Don’t be silly. Learn to understand the clues. Go after him, now, or I will.”

“You wouldn’t.”

Naena took two steps forward. Nasomi grabbed her hand.

“I will go. Stubborn you.”

She trotted some of the way, walked the rest. When she was almost upon him, she felt so stupid. I shouldn’t have come, she thought. When he turned and saw her coming, he stopped. She would tell him she was going to see an uncle and walk past him.

“Nasomi,” he said, sweetly and without surprise. “Have you seen the new aqueduct being made?”

“Glimpses of it as I move about the city. I have meant to take a good look one good day.” She lied. She didn’t care about construction.

“Today is a good day then,” he said.

“Well, I can’t go like this.”

“I will wait.”

She hesitated, thinking he was jesting. But he smiled reassuringly. “I won’t be long,” she muttered, and she ran back. She rushed past Naena even as her cousin asked why she was back so soon. She went to her room with Naena in tow.

“What are you in a hurry for?”

“He’s taking me to see the aqueduct.”

“Ooh. Let’s get you dressed properly.”

Nasomi chose a supple seamless dress, the fabric brown from years of being worn. It was her favorite, and she thought the fading made the dress look better. Naena was about to comment when Nasomi gave her a look that said, I am wearing this!

Naena shrugged. “Your hair.”

“Have you seen his?”

They both laughed. “Let me do something quickly,” Naena said. “And wear my sandals. Yours will break before you take five steps.”

“They never break.”

“Wear mine still. You know they’re better.”

Nasomi tied the sandal straps around her shin as Naena worked on her hair. Naena gathered and wound Nasomi’s hair into a high chunky bun. “You look like a tree. A tree in love.”

Nasomi poked her. “It’s only a walk. Don’t be too quick about things.”

Father called from the living room that he was going, singing and whistling as he went. Nasomi waited for him to get to a good distance before dashing out. At the gate, she called back to Naena, “Take some food for Father in case I am gone for long.”

Naena scowled and folded her arms, but Nasomi knew she would do as asked.

She fell in by Tambo’s side. With his hands in his pockets most of the way, they walked through the streets and alleys of the district. Ninki Nanka was a middle-class district, the abode of farmers, merchants, fishers, workers of cloth, and messengers. Although she had lived her life there, Nasomi thought it was a good place to stay. Even as she and Tambo walked into the next district, Mokele, the differences were obvious: Mokele’s streets were narrower, winding and cutting and veering in undefined patterns; the huts were smaller, clustered; and every few paces, a vendor was trying to sell them something: fresh mangoes, sweet potatoes, sandals, goats, chickens, “sticks that catch fire quicker”.

The new aqueduct passed over the edge of Mokele, held thirty feet in the air by towers that were being constructed twenty feet apart.

“It goes higher as you get closer to the North Gate,” Tambo said. “It is more stable than the old one, longer even by fifteen gardens. When it is complete, they will set to renovate and extend the first one.”

Father used to take Nasomi to the first one numerous times when she was young. He lifted her onto his shoulders, told her to look up. The aqueduct had looked like it would topple on her, and the dizzying effect was excitingly terrifying when he spun her around. Beneath a part that leaked, she had held her mouth open for a drop of water that fell every four heartbeats. Most of them hit a part of her face other than her mouth, and she enjoyed adjusting her position in the hopes she would get ingest the next drop.

“Imagine climbing up there and going all the way to the wall,” she said.

Tambo raised a brow. “Who would want to?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. I am just imagining things: people are chasing you, the gates are locked, and that’s the only way out.”

“I'd go to the parts of the wall with gaps, try to squeeze myself through one.”

“The gaps are being guarded by soldiers. Soldiers who have been bewitched to do nothing but kill you.”

“That person should be brave then, climbing so high and going against the water flow. And you do have quite an imagination. I like it. If only we were younger. We would have tried it.”

As her eyes followed the winding of the duct, her hand brushed against his. She flushed, but when she looked at him, he didn’t seem to have noticed.

“The whole thing has needed over five thousand bamboo trees, fifty-six gallons of tar, miles and miles of timber, I-don’t-know-how much stone-weights of rocks, and the rope required could be thirty-eight miles long.”

“Impressive,” Nasomi said. She touched one of his rings with her finger, feeling the texture of the ruby gem.

He looked at her and smiled. “The amount of labor is staggering. It has needed three hundred men and women, thirty-seven oxen, forty horses. The wagon that brought the largest boulder - for the pillar over there - was so long it had a dozen pair of wheels—”

And I thought I was the shy one, Nasomi mused. She gave him a slight pinch on his arm above the wrist.

He reached out to her and she evaded his hand. He reached again and she jumped out of his way.

“Oh, you think you’re clever,” he teased. He lunged for her. She ran, he chased. When he caught her, she was giggling like a little girl. He pinched her and she chased him through narrow streets of clustered stalls, among mud houses, and through a throng of workers hefting planks. Some of them spouted curses, but upon realizing Tambo’s status, they gave the gesture of respect, saying “My Chief.”

He pretended to be tired, to let her catch up. He took her hand and in silence, they watched the raising of a massive scaffold.

“It’s lovely,” Nasomi said. “The structure.”

“It’s magnificent.”

He escorted her home and went his way.

Later in the night, after a hearty supper of corn pap and cow trotters boiled in beans and pumpkin leaves, Nasomi and Naena sat outside to watch the moon and stars. All the four stars of the Bowl were bright tonight, signaling the advent of the rain season. The moon’s splotches were vividly gray against its luminescent silver. As Father snored loudly in the house, Naena, poking her teeth with a stick, said, “You just have to tell me what happened.”

“We talked and walked and saw the aqueduct. Then I came back home.”

“That’s not saying much, you. What did you talk about?”

“He knows all these things about the aqueducts… you should have heard him talk. Numbers and all that. On our way back, he asked me about my family. I told him about you and Father. I told him Mother died four years ago from ulcers. He asked me if I had been close to her. I said ‘Yes, very. I enjoyed it when she carried me on her back and sang for me when I was ill.”

“‘Sounds like a wonderful woman,’ he said. ‘I said she was.”

“He talks sweetly, doesn’t he? One word at a time.” She mimicked his speech: “‘Sounds like a wonderful woman.’ I can just imagine you there by his side, falling for his voice.”

Nasomi shoved her. “That’s just his accent. They all talk like that.”

“But he does it so well. What did he say about your eyes?”

“He didn’t mention my eyes.”

“Oh, swallow him! How can he not talk about your eyes?”

“Watch your language, Nae. How is he supposed to notice my eyes on the first day?”

“Second day. Your eyes are the first thing everyone loves about you. Is he timid?”

“Not particularly.”

“You asked about his family?”

“Yes. He has two brothers and a sister. I can only remember her name, Teeyana. The other two I forget. He’s firstborn, and will inherit the lordship.”

“That’s too shallow. Give me the intimate details.”

Nasomi shook her head as she laughed. “What surely can I know in just a day about someone?”

“You’re afraid of asking questions. Take me along next time and I’ll show you how to talk to boys.”

Nasomi pushed her again. “He’ll get bored with me.”

“It shows that he likes you. He must be on his lordly bed right now looking at his ceiling and thinking of you.”

“I doubt it, Nae. What have I got to offer?”

“Well, let me count.” She brought her palm to Nasomi’s face and folded the first finger. “First, your eyes.”

“What with you and my eyes, please?”

“They are lovely Nasomi. So brown and shiny.”

“And my face? The rest of my figure?”

“Look at you saying figure. It is not so bad, with your thick hips and tall legs. Good enough to attract a lord.”

“You’re full of teasing, Sister.”

“Second, you cook well. Who doesn’t like good food? Thir— What’s with your face?”

Nasomi was squinting at the gateway. “I’m having that feeling again like I’ve dreamed this before. It was exactly like this, you and me talking, and at the gate, a small cat passed.”

Naena looked at the gateway and back at Nasomi. “And third is this,” she said, making a sweeping gesture with a hand of three folded fingers. “This weirdness of yours. He’s going to love that, I tell you. You and your deja vus.”

Nasomi shrugged. She yawned, and so did Naena. “You’ll do my hair tomorrow?”

“Of course. First thing in the morning, before your boyfriend comes.” Naena escaped from an impending pinch.

“He’s not… Ah, there’s no convincing you.”

“No, there isn’t.” Naena stood up and stretched. “Let’s go to sleep.”

Nasomi stood and followed her cousin into the house. As she closed the door, she lingered a while, looking toward the gate. A ginger cat with white stripes appeared. It scratched at something on the ground, waited, and bounded out of view.