This conversation isn’t getting us anywhere.
Let me tell you this: For a reporter, you got off to a really bad start.
Why’s that?
You didn’t understand why I destroyed the traps.
And you got off to an even worse start: Before destroying them, you didn’t even bother to speak to the people who’d spent so much time making them.
Do you know something, my writer friend? It would be better if I’d come here to hunt vampires rather than lions. Vampires sell well, and you’d have a guaranteed bestseller.
I blow on the candle and darkness falls over the room. Outside, the full moon awakens some feline restlessness within me. Beneath my closed eyelids, my mind returns again to Luzilia. Suddenly, however, another vision emerges before me. It’s a beautiful young black girl. It’s a local girl smiling on the riverbank. She is faceless, and could be any woman from the village. Tonight, I sleep with all the women of Kulumani.
* * *
I hadn’t been asleep for long before I heard roars. The world remained in suspense. A lion’s growl leaves no silence in its wake.
Can you hear? the writer asked, in a panic.
It’s a lioness. It’s still a long way off.
The roars gradually faded away. Silence fell over the darkness. At last, I could begin my war with the night.
* * *
Ever since early morning, a woman called Hanifa Assulua has been sweeping, washing, cleaning, heating up water, without uttering a single word. Her presence has the discretion of a shadow. Only when she leaves does she address me, but without looking up.
Do you remember me? she asks.
I have no recollection. I explain the fleeting nature of my visit. So much time had passed since I had come here to hunt a crocodile. It had just been a few days and then I’d left and never come back again. I’m trying to excuse myself for any eventual indelicacy. But she seems relieved at my lack of memory.
Tell me the truth: Have you just come here to hunt? Or have you come to take someone away from Kulumani?
Who? I don’t know anyone.
That’s good. It’s not as if there was anyone here.
And she said nothing more to me then or on the following days. She did her rounds devoid of body, of voice, or of presence. As far as the writer was concerned, the woman was our conduit to the village community. And there was more to it than that: She was the mother of the latest victim of the lions. That’s why Gustavo follows the maid’s every step like a shadow. Hanifa is filling a can of water when the writer asks her about the circumstances surrounding her daughter’s death.
What happened that night? Was she out at that time of night?
The lion was inside.
Inside the house?
Inside, she repeats, almost inaudibly.
She points at her chest as if to suggest a further meaning to the concept of insideness. Then she raises the can in her arms, refusing any help to place it on her head.
I have to go home. I still have to cook, to prepare your welcome banquet.
She draws herself up, proud and erect, as if the can of water were part of her body, as if it were the water that was carrying her along.
* * *
The administrator appears midmorning to introduce the tracker who will accompany us on our hunting expeditions. His name is Genito Mpepe, and he’s the husband of Hanifa, the woman who cleans our house. That’s how Florindo introduces him. Then, in veiled tones, he adds:
The girl who was killed … was this man’s daughter …
I roll out a map on the table and ask the man to show us where the victims were attacked.
I can only read the land. Maps are a language I don’t know.
That’s how the tracker answers me. His ways are abrupt, almost rough. I know this type of person. Uncouth in speech, but excellent in the art of hunting. But something makes me think Genito harbors some resentment, some offense toward me.
Am I going to have a right to a weapon?
No. I reply in the same terse terms. The administrator tries to break the ice by exclaiming with exaggerated enthusiasm:
Our hunter has an explanation for the lions’ attacks. Explain this to Comrade Genito, he needs to know …
As far as I was concerned, it was obvious: The country folk had exterminated the smaller animals, the food supply for the larger carnivores. In despair, these had started to attack the villages. People are easy prey for the lions. This rupture in the food chain—I used this precise term with some petulance—was the reason for the lions’ unusual behavior.
Pigs, the tracker says accusingly, turning toward us.
At first I think he is insulting us.
It’s the pigs’ fault! he repeats.
The writer looks up to express his incomprehension. But then he gives up: Incomprehension has been his most notable activity since arriving in Kulumani. At that point, Genito Mpepe concludes:
It was the pigs that showed the lions how to get here.
The wild pigs would visit the kitchen gardens, attracted by the crops planted around the houses. The lions followed on their trail and so broke into a space they’d never dared invade before.
* * *
Later, while tidying my things, I catch the writer taking a look at my diary. I don’t interfere. I let his greedy fingers turn the pages of my little notebook. In fact, rather than finding it irritating, I’m filled with an unexpected vanity at his interest. Could it be that the artist himself recognizes the value of my artistic endeavors?
I don’t know—I’ll never know—what Gustavo thinks of what he is reading. What I do know is that at a certain point, his hands tremble and there’s a glint in his eye.
* * *
The sight of the papers shaking in Gustavo’s hands takes me back to my childhood. Once again, I see the day when Roland was obliged to check the true content of the missives that my mother spent her time composing. And my father, arms crossed on his chest, awaiting the supreme judgment. Indeed, I also asked myself: Were the letters that Martina wrote faithful to what my father dictated?
This is what happened on that occasion: My father stopped his dictation and stood there in silence for some time.
Well, then? his wife asked, seeing him absorbed.
I don’t believe you’re writing down what I told you to, he replied, advancing resolutely toward his wife.
Henry Bullseye brusquely snatched the letter from his wife’s hands. He turned the sheet over, this way and that, next to his face as if he were looking through the paper. For me, this was proof of what I had long suspected: My father couldn’t read.
Roland, my son, come here.
My brother got up, quivering from his soul to his feet. Our old man handed him the notebook, staring fixedly at his firstborn.
Read out loud what’s written here.
Roland stared wide-eyed as if struggling to focus clearly. The lines danced before his trembling hands. His voice was all of a muddle, unsure of where to begin.
Read!
Where, Father?
Read. Read wherever you like.
My mother looked at him imploringly. Roland stared at me aghast, terrified. Then he took a deep breath, and I didn’t even recognize his voice as it rang through the room:
My darling Henry, my beloved husband …
Go on, continue …
… One and only love of my life.
I examined my mother’s face and I saw her sadness, the sadness of all humanity.
* * *
It isn’t long before the welcoming banquet, scheduled to take place in the center of the village, is going to begin. The writer wants to gain time and make use of the hour before it starts to interview witnesses and take down statements. I go with him. We wander haphazardly along the paths of Kulumani. I walk in front, my rifle over my shoulder, my gait military. The writer asks me why I need a weapon in the middle of the day, and in the middle of the village.
Animals have a different way of distin
guishing between night and day, bush and village.
I begin to get an idea of the size of the village. The huts extend over the other side of the river and cover the slopes on the opposite bank. The village has grown since the last time I was here. Those who have settled along the banks of the Lideia are almost certainly war refugees.
The villagers greet us, standing aside to let us pass along the narrow paths. Some seem to remember me. And I go along distributing pleasantries:
Umumi?
Nimumi, they answer merrily, astonished to hear me greet them in the local language.
They smile. But their happiness gives way to a look of apprehension. These men are bound together by the same vulnerability: They are doomed, awaiting the final blow. For centuries they have existed in the margins of the world. That’s why they are suspicious of this sudden interest in their suffering. This suspicion explains the reaction of one of the countrymen when Gustavo asks to interview him:
Do you want to know how we die? No one ever comes here to find out how we live.
Mangy dogs cross our path like wandering shadows. Yet these dogs, at first so shy, surrender to the slightest caress and nestle against our hands as if they yearned to be people. The writer calls them, and tries to stroke them. People watch him, puzzled: They don’t expect dogs to be caressed, much less spoken to. These domestic creatures are never addressed by word, nor are they given any scraps of food: They just eat what they can hunt, so that they won’t begin to take existence for granted.
* * *
Dozens of villagers have gathered together under the mango tree out of curiosity. It’s incredible how someplace so deserted can suddenly fill up with folk who seem to have emerged from the sand. I look at this trading of self-interest with cynicism. The writer is a bird of prey: He seeks tales about the war. The villagers expect some gratification. A gift, in local parlance. How can someone criticize me for my professional activity? I practice hunting. Well, the writer lives on carrion. He embarked on this journey in order to peck at misfortune, among survivors who sorrow in silence.
Scratching at the wounds of the past: That’s what Gustavo is doing by dragging up memories of the civil war.
What do you remember most about the war?
There’s nothing to remember, my good sir, one of the countrymen replies.
What do you mean by that?
We all came back from the war, dead.
I turn my face away. I don’t want anyone to detect the vengefulness in my smile. No war can be recounted. Where there’s blood, there are no words. The writer is asking the dead to show him their scars.
It’s then that I realize what the pleasure is that I get out of hunting: to delve back beyond life, free from being a person.
* * *
The blind man who followed us around the night we arrived is in the crowd waiting to be interviewed. At one point, he leans on the shoulders of the person in front of him and salutes us extravagantly. He is still barefoot, wearing the same military fatigues.
Which army did you fight for? the writer asks.
I fought in all of them, comes the immediate reply. And pointing toward me, he adds: And I remember that gentleman’s voice very well.
My voice? That’s impossible.
Forgive me, I don’t want to offend, but I’d like to ask you a question: Why did they send for a hunter? They should have summoned me, a soldier.
I don’t understand, the writer argues. What’s this got to do with soldiers?
Don’t you see? This, my good sir, isn’t a hunt. This is a war.
It was war that explained the tragedy of Kulumani. Those lions weren’t emerging from the bush. They were born out of the last armed conflict. The same upheaval of all wars was now being repeated: People had become animals, and animals had become people. During battle, bodies had been left in the bush, along the roads. The lions had eaten them. At that precise point, the creatures of the wild had broken a taboo: They had begun to see people as prey. At last, the blind man brought his long speech to a close:
We men are no longer in charge. Now it’s they who control our fear.
Then he pontificated eloquently and without interruption:
The same thing happened in colonial times. The lions remind me of the soldiers in the Portuguese army. These Portuguese took over our imagination so effectively that they became powerful. The Portuguese weren’t strong enough to defeat us. That’s why they organized it so that the victims killed themselves. And we blacks learned to hate ourselves.
The old man spoke, full of certainty, as if he were giving a speech. At that moment, he was a soldier. An imaginary uniform enveloped his soul.
* * *
The writer knows this: The real interview will happen during the welcoming reception scheduled for the lunch to be held in the shitala, the open-sided hall in the center of the village. It’s in this patch of shade that the men habitually hold their meetings. Women are excluded. They don’t even dare walk past this covered space. Florindo Makwala would rather it were taking place somewhere else, more modern, less subject to the dictates of tradition. But the writer was insistent: Under one roof, he would be able to pit all the various explanations for these feline assaults against one another.
The administrator has not yet arrived when, at last, we enter the hall. He was following the protocols of power: He was the one awaited. The elders get to their feet to welcome us. When they greet me, they do so with their left hand supporting their right elbow. It’s an act of respect, a sign of esteem. They are trying to tell me my arm has “weight.”
Finally, Florindo Makwala appears, accompanied by his bodyguard and a secretary carrying a briefcase. An elderly rustic gets to his feet with a certain cautious respect, and welcomes the administrator with the following words:
We never see you here, in this shitala. Welcome to the core of the village. Take a seat, but remember that we are the ones to speak first here …
Very well, the administrator agrees. Afterward, when we’ve finished, I’ll formally close the session …
The old man waits for Florindo to take his seat and then immediately confronts me and Gustavo, hands on hips:
Why are you visiting us?
Haven’t you been told? the writer asks in surprise.
We want to know why we were chosen.
So what’s the problem?
The others, from the other villages that haven’t been visited, will complain. We’ll be victims of their envy, and we, who are already dying, will die even more because of what you’ve done.
We can’t visit everyone, I argue, in support of Gustavo Regalo in his efforts. Besides, what are you talking about? People are dying, and not a week goes by without another victim.
Time isn’t a running race. The legs of time lie within us. Apart from this, many more people are going to die now. By visiting Kulumani, you’re summoning the killer lions.
If you don’t want me here, I’ll go, I declare, getting up from my chair. I’ll go back to the city right now.
The administrator raises his arms anxiously, and tells us all to sit down. Then he addresses the assembly in Shimakonde. It’s obvious he’s trying to correct any misunderstandings that might arise. Silence follows. The flustered old man ends up smiling and addresses us in Portuguese:
It’s all right. Let’s eat first. Then, when our bellies are full, it will be easier to talk.
They give us a plate of cooked mealie flour that’s called shima around here. A huge pot in the middle is filled with chunks of goat. There are whole pieces of the animal there: the head, the hooves, the meat, the horns. I stick with the flour and some dribbles of a sauce whose origins I would rather not know.
Don’t stand on ceremony, Makwala reassures me. This is the goat you offered the villagers.
We are served lipa and ugwalwa, fermented drinks, and I don’t commit the indelicacy of not accepting, although I only wet my lips. Before the meal, a bowl of warm water was passed around for us to wash our hands.
In the absence of a cloth, I let the water run down my drooping arms. We eat in silence. Only the sound of feverish chewing can be heard. Only when the bones, sucked free of all meat, are returned to the pot does someone address us. The old man was right: The atmosphere is less tense, there’s laughter and jokes are told. Gustavo and I are asked if we have wives. They all exchange glances when we reply in the negative.
Neither of you is married?
Suspicion suddenly reestablishes itself: So manlike and yet single? We could only be witch doctors, for only they remain single their whole lives.
Forgive us for doubting, but do you gentlemen live according to the ideology of God?
The old man launches forth again. He comments on our refusal to serve ourselves from the big pot. Who in this world would turn down such an invitation?
They’re deceiving us, brothers. These whites eat meat every day. It’s this greed of theirs that will put an end to the world.
The problem, another countryman corrects him, isn’t what they eat but how they eat.
What do you mean? Gustavo asks.
You eat on your own. Only witch doctors do that.
The man rolls a chunk of shima in his hand, dips it lingeringly in the pureed cabbage, and lets it drip before putting it in his mouth.
People who eat alone have something to hide. You can be sure, Mr. Hunter, it’s not us that have received you badly. You’re the ones who’ve arrived badly.
Let’s put all this aside, the writer proclaims in a conciliatory tone. What I want to ask is this: Are these lions that have appeared real?
What do you mean, real? comes a chorus of voices.
They explain their surprise: There’s the bush lion, which in these parts is called an ntumi va kuvapila; there’s the invented lion they call an ntumi ku lambi-dyanga; and then there are the lion-people, known as ntumi va vanu.
And they’re all real, they conclude unanimously.
All of a sudden a woman’s voice is heard joining in, unexpected and heretical:
It should be another type of hunt. The enemies of Kulumani are right here, they’re in this assembly!
This intervention alarms those present. Surprised, the men turn to face the intruder. It’s Naftalinda, the administrator’s wife. And she’s challenging the most time-honored prohibition: Women should not enter the shitala. Much less are they authorized to state an opinion on matters of such gravity. The administrator hastens to put things right: