The episode of the bleating heart By Onuora Nzekwu
We came across this excerpts from a work of fiction by then Onitsha journalist Onuora Nzekwu in the 1960’s. According to the respected historian Richard Henderson, “the scope, range, and sociocultural importance of “traditional” activities during the early 1960s is nowhere better limned than a fictional event described in a remarkably vivid novel of that time, “Wand of noble wood“, written by Onuora Nzekwu whose tale about Ndi-Onicha (those who trace their origins to what he calls “Ado“) is set in the Nigeria of 1959.
Call it The episode of the “bleating heart”.
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Peter, the first-person protagonist of the novel, is (like Nzekwu himself at the time) a journalist working for a national magazine and living in Lagos. A “real Onitsha man” (that is an indigene, native of the Inland Town), Peter listens frequently to his internalized voice of a deceased respected elder who repeatedly reminds him of appropriate traditional perspectives and behavior.
Inquiring from associates about the recent ill health of another Onitsha man named Mr. Agbata, “a kind, elderly gentleman with whom I had made friends”, he learns that the old man has now become seriously ill and is calling his children to come to his room in the hospital. Peter joins Mr. Agbata’s son and daughter to go there, arriving to find five Onitsha men, all old friends of the invalid, including Mr. Odinfe who is a hospital nurse working at that location.
As they enter Mr. Agbata’s room, an attendant blurts out, “I can’t make him stop, Mr. Odinfe. The number of people this man claims he has killed! It’s horrible…”
The room is filled with the overpowering stench of death, and the nurse says, “He should have been dead these eighteen hours. As you see, he is beginning to decompose, even though he is still alive.” Mr. Agbata, now only a skin covered skeleton, is muttering to himself. Soon his words become clear.
“‘Ha ha ha!’ He made these sounds in an attempt to laugh. ‘Didn’t Emena say he was strong and wise? Did he not say he was powerful? … Yet he could not survive the simple test to which I put him…. He could neither stop my magic arrow from entering his side nor wrestle with it for long…. Or is it Ikebundu, that man who was so proud after taking the ozo title? … He only breathed the air, which I set in motion with my leathern fan … and that sent him to his death two days later…. Where is Oduanu?’ he asked, and stared at Miriam (his daughter) long, without blinking. ‘Yes, it was you, Miriam… it was you he beat. In revenge I touched him with my fan and that alone sent him to his grave.’ His powerful voice sank again into a mutter.”
Attendants want to stop the old man from continuing this monologue, but Mr. Odinfe deters them: Mr. Agbata cannot die until he completes his confession, “‘enumerating the names of all he killed both those who offended him and those he used as guinea pigs for newly acquired magic powers.’”
Mr. Agbata speaks again: ”‘Ben,’ he said, addressing his son. ‘You want to kill me, eh? You are too young; besides, you have no weapons.’ He paused to breathe. ‘You know that goat that always refuses to leave the kitchen? It has no heart. If you can discover its heart then you’ll know why you can’t kill me.’ He paused. ‘I am very strong. Did I not kill doctors and witches by pointing a finger at them? That’s how Nwachukwu, Odum and Ananka died.’”
As they convey the old man by ambulance back to his long-time home in Lagos, Mr. Odinfe wonders aloud if “he has one of these magic threads that chain life to a dying body.” At home, apparently having finished his confession, Mr. Agbata still cannot die. Mr. Odinfe directs his children to “Search the house from top to bottom. Turn everything inside out. Look for anything unusual and report to me.”
They search every room in the house, to the rooftops, finding nothing. Then, near midnight, the dying man calls out: “I am tired, I want to go home.” When his relatives are assembled, he directs a word of benevolently paternalistic advice to each person present, and asks that his corpse be taken home to “Ado” (an esoteric name for Onitsha) for burial. Meanwhile, Peter observes that the bed on which Mr. Agbata lies has been boarded up on all of its lower sides. “None of his children knew when this was done… (but) it was strictly understood that only he must make his bed.” Now Mr. Agbutu asks his son to remove the board on one side. Though it is dark underneath, someone brings a portable lamp which reveals what lies below: ” …its light shone on a black cloth which hung down, cutting off the space beyond and whatever was there. Ben raised the cloth and then we saw it… The space was empty, but at a point underneath his pillow, hanging from the spring of the bed, was a string of black, red and yellow threads. At the other end of it was the fresh bleeding heart of a goat. Surprisingly the heart was contracting and expanding. It was suspended over a hole dug in the floor.”
After making allusion to his great powers, Mr. Agbata orders them to cut the thread. One of the men who has come from the hospital finally complies, and “As the heart fell into the hole, two things happened: the dying man breathed his last. The old goat bleated urgently, ‘Kpaa! Kpaa!’ and became silent.”
Culled from A Mighty Tree
InlandTown! 2015.
