side to the other. they talked about everything except the thing for which they had gathered.

with which he carried the brown snuff to his nostrils
with which he carried the brown snuff to his nostrils. Dangerous animals became even more sinister and uncanny in the dark." she answered.""And have you never seen them?" asked Machi." said Okonkwo. Smoke poured out of his head. The crowd followed her silently. Okonkwo's first wife. of course. gome. But all of a sudden she would go down again. Okoye rolled his goatskin and departed. and the women had formed themselves into three groups for this purpose." replied Okonkwo. It was already dusk when the two parties came to this agreement."Umuofia kwenu!" he roared. Okonkwo said he was sorry for what he had said. The first day passed and the second and third and fourth."My in-law has told you that we went to his house.

" said Obierika. She was very heavy with child. setting up a wave of expectation in the crowd."That is the strange part of it. and it seemed now as if it was happening all over again. She could hear the priestess' voice. Ezinma. he took up the rag with his left hand and began to untie it. "Where did you bury your iyi-uwa?""Where they bury children.Each of the nine egwugwu represented a village of the clan. He spoke through an interpreter who was an Ibo man. But very few people had ever seen that kind of wrestling before. A man's place was not always there. "who will protect us from the anger of our neglected gods and ancestors?""Your gods are not alive and cannot do you any harm." said Okagbue." But before they went he whispered something to his first wife. He was roused in the morning by someone banging on his door." said the bride. Obierika pointed at the two heavy bags.

He warmed himself in the fire and ate the entrails. Okonkwo brought out l??s big horn from the goatskin bag. Her husband and his family were already becoming highly critical of such a woman and were not unduly perturbed when they found she had fled to join the Christians. although one of them did not speak Ibo. Chielo. Guns fired the last salute and the cannon rent the sky. The crowd burst into a thunderous roar. they could see from his color and his language.""Your chi is very much awake. and all the tragedy and sorrow of her life were packed in those words. The younger of his sons. But her love of wrestling contests was still as strong as it was thirty years ago. Old men nodded to the beat of the drums and remembered the days when they wrestled to its intoxicating rhythm.It was not yet noon on the second day of the New Yam Festival." replied Okonkwo. as husbands' wives were wont to.Okonkwo was beginning to feel like his old self again. "How much longer do you think you will live?" she asked. He could not understand what was happening to him or what he had done.

or waist beads. And so he feigned that he no longer cared for women's stories. but no one thought the stories were true. where titled men climb trees and pound foo-foo for their wives. She broke them into little pieces across the sole of her foot and began to build a fire. He went into the obi and saluted his father. Nothing happened at its proper time. That showed that in time he would be able to control his women-folk. leaving a regular pattern of hair. For three or four moons it demanded hard work and constant attention from cock-crow till the chickens went back to roost. and stayed. "She should have been a boy.During the planting season Okonkwo worked daily on his farms from cock-crow until the chickens went to roost. all the same. and sometimes two rainbows."And so three goats were slaughtered and a number of fowls.Okonkwo was given a plot of ground on which to build his compound. After that they began to eat and to drink the wine."It is not our custom to fight for our gods.

She had already walked so long that she began to feel a slight numbness in the limbs and in the head. a light rain had fallen during the night and the soil would not be very hard. "You fear that you will die. but that year-had been enough to break the heart of a lion. Surely the earth goddess would not visit the sins of the missionaries on the innocent villagers?But on one occasion the missionaries had tried to over step the bounds." said Ekwefi. It had to be done slowly and carefully. He had many friends here and came to see them quite often. whose feeling of importance was manifest in her sprightly walk. Ezinma sneezed. and they no longer spent the evenings in his mother's hut while she cooked.They sat in a big circle on the ground and the young bride in the center with a hen in her right hand. the distance they had covered. They sympathized with their neighbors with much shaking of the head. the tumult increased tenfold. It might happen again this year. who was the priest of the earth goddess. women and children. She remembered that night.

""They have indeed soiled the name of ozo.' said the birds when they had heard him.'Ask my dead father if he ever had a fowl when he was alive. "do you not grow yams where you come from?"Inwardly Okonkwo knew that the boys were still too young to understand fully the difficult art of preparing seed-yams." And after a pause she said: "Can I bring your chair for you?""No. We live in peace with our fellows to honor our great goddess of the earth without whose blessing our crops will not grow. and did as you have been told. what do we do? Do we go and stop his mouth? No. Obiageli took the first dish and returned to her mother's hut. but even now they have not found the mouth with which to tell of their suffering.Ekwefi went into her hut to cook yams. Okagbue worked tirelessly and in silence. women and children. and he pointed to a man who sat near him with a bowed head." he said. When a man blasphemes. They sang songs as they went." Okonkwo said. who has promised everlasting life to all who believe in His holy name.

" she said. Those things a man built for himself or inherited from his father. If the song ended on his right foot."They want a piece of land to build their shrine. She was particularly fond of Ekwefi's only daughter. Was it waiting to snap its teeth together? After passing and re-passing by the church. rubbed his left palm on his body to dry it before tipping a little snuff into it.Okonkwo cleared his throat and moved his feet to the beat of the drums. What would she do when they got to the cave? She would not dare to enter. She was the priestess of Agbala."We still have a long way to go.Many young men and prosperous middle-aged men of Mbanta came to marry her. to inquire what was amiss.Perhaps it never did happen. Early that morning as he offered a sacrifice of new yam and palm oil to his ancestors he asked them to protect him. carrying on their heads various sizes of pots suitable to their years." pleaded from a reasonable distance.As the broken kola nuts were passed round.He took a pot of palm-wine and a cock to Nwakibie.

and you can teach us the things of the new faith. She was full of the power of her god. Her husband and his family were already becoming highly critical of such a woman and were not unduly perturbed when they found she had fled to join the Christians.His father. For two or three moons the sun had been gathering strength till it seemed to breathe a breath of fire on the earth. there was no other way. The New Yam Festival seemed to him to be a much bigger event here than in his own village. They too sat just in front of the huge circle of spectators. close to the Great Shrine. as her mother had been called in her youth. "How dare you. She could no longer think. He had had no patience with his father.Okonkwo was also feeling tired. should bring to your mother a heavy face and refuse to be comforted? Be careful or you may displease the dead."Evil Forest then turned to the other group and addressed the eldest of the three brothers. I cannot live on the bank of a river and wash my hands with spittle." said Ekwefi. lasted only a brief moment.

one of the people of the sky came forward and tasted a little from each pot. Okonkwo worked on the outside of the wall and the boys worked from within. about the next ancestral feast and about the impending war with the village of Mbaino.When she got to the big udala tree Ezinma turned left into the bush. the Creator of all the world and all the men and women. gome. He knew it must be Ekwefi. "that he repeated over and over again a word that resembled Mbaino. Then it occurred to her that they could not have been heading for the cave. greeted themselves in their esoteric language. But 1 thought you would need the money now and so I brought it. At the end. and the crowd yelled in answer. I would sooner strangle him with my own hands. The faint and distant wailing of women settled like a sediment of sorrow on the earth. He brought out a sharp razor from the goatskin bag slung from his left shoulder and began to mutilate the child. We put our fingers into our ears to stop us hearing. Okonkwo was only a boy then and Uchendu still remembered him crying the traditional farewell: "Mother. Nwoye.

where titled men climb trees and pound foo-foo for their wives. If a clansman killed a royal python accidentally. "The world has no end." he said as he broke it. I am not afraid of work. Then the crier gave his message. He could not take any of the four titles of the clan. The only work that men did at this time was covering the walls of their compound with new palm fronds. The elders of the clan replied."I did not know it was you. And if you stand staring at me like that. She explained to her why they should not marry yet."Uzowulu's body. who was greatly perplexed. like something agitating with a metallic life."Don't be foolish. she has told me about it. Many people laughed at his dialect and the way he used words strangely. Okonkwo bent down and looked into her hut.

another man asked a question: "Where is the white man's horse?" he asked. long journey. He held out his hands to them when they came into his obi. Kiaga was going to send into the village for his men-converts when he saw them coming on their own.Okonkwo brought out his snuff-bottle and offered it to Ogbuefi Ezenwa. She was used to Chielo calling her "my daughter. When they had eaten they talked about many things: about the heavy rains which were drowning the yams."What does it all mean?" asked Mr. and two others after her. After that they began to eat and to drink the wine." he said and cleared his throat. who went to plait her hair at her friend's house and did not return early enough to cook the afternoon meal. Do you hear that. to her right and to her left.Although Nwoye had been attracted to the new faith from the very first day.Okonkwo was well known throughout the nine villages and even beyond. It was the day on which her suitor (having already paid the greater part of her bride-price) would bring palm-wine not only to her parents and immediate relatives but to the wide and extensive group of kinsmen called umunna. and others prepared vegetable soup."As he was speaking the boy returned.

"Two years ago. His sons brought out the pots of palm-wine. He was a man of action. and they no longer spent the evenings in his mother's hut while she cooked. But her love of wrestling contests was still as strong as it was thirty years ago. among these people a man was judged according to his worth and not according to the worth of his father. and the man growled at him to go on and not stand looking back. Cam wood was rubbed lightly into her skin. And there he stood in his hard shell full of food and wine but without any wings to fly home. the sun is shining."1 have told you to let her alone. women and children. And so. And so nobody gave serious thought to the stories about the white man's government or the consequences of killing the Christians. But everybody knew that he was going to die and Aneto got his belongings together in readiness to flee. Some of them were accompanied by their sons bearing carved wooden stools." said Okonkwo." he said. We did not see it.

Nwoye stood looking at him and did not say a word. "Life to you. "that was why the snake-lizard killed his mother. "We have men of high title and the chief priests and the elders. Ezeudu was the oldest man in this quarter of Umuofia. But he was struck. His mother's kinsmen had been very kind to him. It was a little village called Mbanta. But that did not alter the facts. The children were also decorated. There was nothing new in that. She knew her daughter was safe. and a little hoe for digging out the tuber." Uzowulu replied. were fixed on her. the fear of failure and of weakness.The old man. quietly and deliberately. "They use medicine.

"Don't be afraid. Uchendu before her. His mother might be dead.Ekwefi did not answer. No. which had been dutifully eating yam peelings. He held a short staff in his hand which he brought down on the floor to emphasize his points. Yam foo-foo and vegetable soup was the chief food in the celebration. In the morning he went back to his farm and saw the withering tendrils. There was authority in her bearing and she looked every inch the ruler of the womenfolk in a large and prosperous family. But it had gone on living and gradually becoming stronger. Everybody knew she was an ogbanje.""They have indeed soiled the name of ozo. a debtor.With a father like Unoka. was quite harmless. "They had been warned that danger was ahead. who walked away and never returned. A steady cloud of smoke rose from his head.

Ezinma was still sleeping when everyone else was astir. Behind them was the big and ancient silk-cotton tree which was sacred."Uzowulu's body.' 'You must return the duckling. The men were seized and beaten until they streamed with blood." Okonkwo thought within himself. using some of the chicken. And if anything happened to her could she stop it? She would not dare to enter the underground caves. for that was his father's name."Have you?" asked Obierika. Ezeudu was the oldest man in this quarter of Umuofia. carrying a wooden dish with three kola nuts and alligator pepper. When Unoka died he had taken no title at all and he was heavily in debt. Because he had taken titles. this medicine stands on the market ground in the shape of an old woman with a fan. I married her with my money and my yams. Their fathers had never dared to stand before our ancestors. Unoka was never happy when it came to wars. and in its place a sort of smile hovered.

An oil lamp was lit and Okonkwo tasted from each bowl.The whole village turned out on the ilo. after the rains. the interpreter." Obierika replied sharply. He asked Okonkwo a few questions about the dead child. He was quite different. and our own brothers who have taken up his religion also say that our customs are bad. I have waited in vain for my wife to return. Ekwefi and her only daughter. Okonkwo's gun had exploded and a piece of iron had pierced the boy's heart. which the first wife alone could wear. and regain the seven wasted years.""I don't know how we got that law." he said. and they nodded their heads. whose sad story is still told in Umuofia unto this day. Men and women. floated on the chaos.

when he was young. But it is not so." she said. He would remember his own childhood."As he was speaking the boy returned. "1 shall wait here." the medicine man told Okonkwo in a cool. Okonkwo did not have the start in life which many young men had. It was a fierce contest." the others replied. but now sat with Okonkwo in his obi."Everybody in the assembly spoke. because it had been inadvertent."It will not be very long now before my in-laws come. who was also a diviner of the Afa Oracle. Okonkwo said yes very strongly.

"Why do you stand there as though she had been kidnapped?" asked Okonkwo as he went back to his hut.Okonkwo spent the next few days preparing his seed-yams. They guarded the prison. She was called Crystal of Beauty." replied Uzowulu. who was laid on a mat. "one would think he never sucked at his mother's breast. "Yaa!". He could hear in his mind's ear the blood-stirring and intricate rhythms of the ekwe and the udu and the ogene. He was called the Cat because his back would never touch the earth. Ekwefi screwed her eyes up in an effort to see her daughter and the priestess. A young man from one team danced across the center to the other side and pointed at whomever he wanted to fight. But it was useless. flat. Okonkwo wondered what was amiss. Then he began to speak.

There was no barn to inherit. But it was the season of rest between the harvest and the next planting season. "I shall not talk about thanking you any more.After the wine had been drunk Okonkwo laid his difficulties before Nwakibie. now said"You told us with your own mouth that there was only one god. He then broke the kola nut and threw one of the lobes on the ground for the ancestors. deeply. But a few years later she ran away from her husband and came to live with Okonkwo. and stayed. "His name is Amadi. And he found that Okonkwo did not wish to speak about Nwoye." said Okonkwo as he took his machete and went into the bush to collect the leaves and grasses and barks of trees that went into making the medicine for iba." Okonkwo said. They were already far enough where they stood and there was room for running away if any of them should go towards them.There were twelve men on each side and the challenge went from one side to the other. they talked about everything except the thing for which they had gathered.