Ancestor Stones - Aminatta Forna [68]
The men slept in tents instead of houses. And mostly washed themselves out of doors. All except one who came and went, who wore long trousers but spoke with a woman’s voice and bathed in another tent some distance from the camp. The chief assigned three dozen men to work for them. They began collecting the mud from the bottom of the river bed. We used to creep up to watch them, two or three of us hiding behind the big boulders. The white men stood on the shelf of the river bank and watched the men from the village digging, loading pans with gravel and rocks which other men carried on their heads and dumped into wooden boxes running with water. That was where all the water was going. There were times the one with the woman’s voice called for a bucket of earth to be brought over, which he spread out on a canvas cloth, inspecting the mud and rocks, crushing some and weighing the powder on a set of brass scales.
What they were looking for nobody knew, but the day they found it — what a commotion! I was washing clothes at the stream. Ever since the men had arrived the water flowing downstream from where the work was going on was too muddy to use, so we had to walk much further upstream to a place where the water was still clear. When I heard the shouts I crept along the waterside and crouched down below the river bank.
The men in charge were behaving like children. Hugging each other, punching arms and slapping backs. The one with the woman’s voice, who I now realised had breasts, they did not slap and hit, but carried on their shoulders singing a song: ‘For she’s a jolly good fellow.’ Then they set her down and spun her around between themselves, dancing like crazy people. All the time watched by the men who did the digging, who were silent, while they waited to be told what to do next.
The white men gave everybody the rest of the day off. As they made their way back along the path to the encampment, I followed them, staying parallel to their position, blending myself into the shapes of the trees, stepping from shadow to shadow, treading lightly so as not to disturb the leaves on the forest floor. It was easy. They made a great deal of noise as they went. The path was narrow and they walked in single file. I recognised the one at the back as the same man who had sent me away that first time.
He was carrying a heavy bag on his shoulders. It caused him to walk at a slower pace than his companions. I watched as the gap between them widened. For a moment he stopped, set down his bag, and wiped his brow with a cloth. Then he blew his nose on the cloth, folded it up and carefully replaced it in his pocket. At that moment I stepped out on to the path behind him, treading on a small twig to catch his attention. Naturally, he swung round, startled to see me there.
We faced each other. He did not recognise me. The boil was gone. I told you I had been washing clothes. I had stripped to enter the water, keeping just a cloth tied around my waist. Now I was wearing only this same cloth. I saw his eyes drop from my face and move down my body, like a slow dribble of sweat. I stepped forward and picked up the bag. It was heavy, but I did not let that show. I placed it on my head. And in that way I walked in front of him, all the way to the camp and back inside.
The tents were taken down, replaced by low buildings with zinc roofs. I had a job in the camp. I worked for the man, who was called Blue by his companions or Mr Blue, like the colour. In the mornings I boiled coffee and eggs for him. He would sit outside the door in front of a table that afterwards I folded and put away, on a chair that did the same. At first I went back to the village every evening,