The Drinker of Horizons by Mia Couto

Author:Mia Couto
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

* * *

I dream I am traveling on a ship under the command of a black captain. The ship is called the Europa, and its hull is painted in bright colors like African textiles. Its masts are trees and provide the deck with shade. The wind scatters leaves over the sea.

A light tap on the door interrupts my dream. It must be Dabondi, I think, still half asleep. I tidy my hair and, with uncharacteristic difficulty, tie a capulana around my waist. I’m five months gone, and before long I shall be devoured by my own belly.

There’s another tap. I open the door slightly. It’s the missionary, Roberto Machava. My visitor’s hands hurriedly anticipate his face:

Look at this sketch, he tells me.

I tremble. It is a drawing in color which I did for my father when I was a child. It showed a burnt-out village and bodies lying across the ground. Underneath the figures, a caption is written, a promise of vengeance against Ngungunyane’s troops.

How did you get hold of this piece of paper? I ask, alarmed.

Let me in. I can’t talk out here in the passageway.

Come back another time.

Now’s the best time. They’re all busy preparing for our arrival at the next port.

The pastor comes in and remains leaning against the door as if he wanted to reinforce it. He stops talking in Portuguese and explains himself in his mother tongue. Machava had crossed the River Save and visited my father, Katini Nsambe, and his current wife, the sorceress Bibliana. My father was sure the missionary would find me in Lourenço Marques. When he gave him the drawing, my old father was categorical: Give this to Imani so that she won’t forget what she promised.

I made the same promise, Machava declares. I am also seeking the same revenge and I need your help.

Ask Zixaxa to help you.

Anyone but him. I and my companions are prisoners thanks to that traitor.

He opens the door, peers down the passageway to make sure no one is listening. Then he closes the door again. His face is close to mine as he confesses: I’m preparing a revolt. I shake my head and he repeats: That’s what I’m preparing, a bloody rebellion. The plan is simple, but of a chilling logic: He is going to kill the king of Gaza. Without Ngungunyane, the Portuguese will arrive in Lisbon empty-handed, without any proof of the crushing victory they so fervently proclaimed. If we kill him now, Machava argues, it will be impossible for them to preserve the corpse until we arrive in Lisbon. The European nations would think Portugal had tried to put on some clumsy show for effect. The missionary’s plan has a perfect end result: In the Mozambican interior, Protestant followers would insist that Ngungunyane was still alive, wandering through the mountains of the Transvaal. And who, in such a world, could prove the contrary?

I’m going to tell you what you’ve got to do, the missionary declares.

No, say no more! I’m not ready.

I am

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