Possessing the Secret of Joy - Alice Walker [37]
Within minutes all of M’Lissa’s guests poured out of the house, as if scattered by her cane. They scrutinized me as they passed. Perhaps they thought me an important dignitary. As their car motors were turning over, shattering the quiet, the young woman returned.
You may go in, she said, with a smile.
What is your name? I asked her.
Martha, she replied.
And your other name?
Mbati, she said, her eyes twinkling.
Mbati, I said, why do the people come here?
The question surprised her. Mother Lissa is a national monument, she said. Recognized as a heroine by every faction of the government, including the National Liberation Front. She’s famous, she said, shrugging her shoulders and looking at me as if puzzled I didn’t know.
I do know that, I said. I read Newsweek.
Ah, Newsweek, she said.
But what do they talk about with her?
About their daughters. About the old ways. About tradition. She paused. It is mostly women who come. You may have noticed this by the people who just left. Women of a certain age. Women with daughters. Frightened women, often. She reassures them.
Oh? I said.
Yes. She knows so much and says such bizarre things. Why, do you know, Mama Lissa claims there was a time when women did not have periods! Oh, she says, there may have been a single drop of blood, but only one! She says this was before woman’s capture.
I couldn’t help laughing, as Mbati was doing.
She just sits and talks; holds court. It hardly matters what she says. She is probably a hundred; everyone wants to have been in her presence before she dies. So much, as you know, has fallen apart here: independence is killing us as surely as colonialism did. But then, she added, sighing, that is because it isn’t really independence.
Mbati takes my hand and pulls me slowly forward, still speaking quietly. She is a link with the past for us; especially for us women, she says. She is the only woman honored in this way by the government; she is an ikon.
How is it possible, I think, as Mbati leads me into M’Lissa’s sparkling hallway and pushes me into M’Lissa’s room and toward a snow white bed, that my mother has lived and died; Mzee has lived and died; the Frenchwoman Lisette has lived and died; I myself have lived and died—in and out of the Waverly, in and out of my mind—many times. World wars have been fought and lost; for every war is against the world and every war against the world is lost. But look, here lies M’Lissa, propped up like a queen in her snowy bed, the open window beside it looking out into a fragrant garden, and in the distance, above the garden, there is a blue mountain. She is radiant, and her forehead, nose, lips, teeth, cheeks smile at me. I bend to kiss the top of her head, her white hair a resistant brush against my lips. I take her hand, which has the feel of feathers, and stand a moment looking down at her. Her whole body is smiling her welcome; except for her eyes. They are wary and alert. I had thought when people aged, their eyes went bad. But no, she sees me clearly. Hers is an x-ray gaze. But then, so is mine, now. What is that shadow, there in the depths? Is it apprehension? Is it fear?
PART ELEVEN
EVELYN
MBATI IS TAKING THE STAND. She wears no makeup or jewelry and her hair is short and natural. There is a simplicity about her that dignifies the whole room. When she speaks the warm quietness of her personality soothes the court, even if the hoarse cry of the ceiling fans becomes more grating than ever. She is the daughter I should have had. Perhaps could have had, had I not aborted her out of fear.
I float up to the stand and hover, a large dragonfly, in front of her. Reaching out, I take her smooth hand in mine. Her eyes widen: with wonder; with delight. Come, I say to her, smiling, I am your mother. If you take my hand before all of these people, all of these judges, all of these policemen and warders and rubbernecks in the audience, you will discover that the two of us can fly. Really? she