Black Mamba Boy Read online

  Fresh air blew in through the gash in the door, and he put his mouth to it, sucking the sweet air into his burnt throat. When his legs and arms stopped trembling, he pulled himself weakly through the shredded door. Outside, everything remained the same, rockets still cascaded down, fulminating angrily, striking men and mules. Jama looked behind him and in the phosphoric light saw the bulabasha’s shaved head; it had been blown away, and lay at rest by the blackened, shredded leg of an Eritrean askari. The men were all dead, but they looked like they were playing, their legs splayed in dynamic poses, their shirts ripped open, their limbs entangled without care of rank or race. Lazy dogs, Jama thought, why don’t they get up and walk like me? But then he realized. They were not Muslim, God would leave them where they fell because they had denied him, while Jama could wander until Judgment Day consigned him to his rightful place. So he wandered, fearless, aimless, with the power of a zombie, back down the narrow pathway to Keren. As the sun crept out of its bunker, Jama realized that it was sweat soaking his clothes, not blood, and he carried on walking.

  He reached Keren and attracted jeers and laughter from drunks squatting on the sidewalks. He looked like a cartoon character, his face blackened with ash, his shirt blown open, and his wavy hair, thick with dust, standing on end. Jama kept his head down and wanted to walk straight through town but was stopped.

  “Ascaro, which position have you come from, looking like that?” asked the sergeant blocking his path.

  Jama’s clothes stank and still appeared to be smoldering. He looked up into the sergeant’s blue eyes. “Arms store number fifteen. The rest are dead.”

  The sergeant looked up toward the mountain and tutted. “Go back then, we are still fighting. You can’t leave your position unless you have been told to. When will you askaris learn some fucking discipline? It’s because of you people that we’re losing this war.” He took a long breath. “Take another uniform and some food from the supply depot, get the men at the depot to arrange a few other askaris to go with you.” He ripped off an order sheet and thrust it into Jama’s hand. Jama’s eyes bored into the sergeant’s back.

  Askaris marched past Jama with shifty glances in his direction as if he would spontaneously combust, but he had fought off death, and inside he was triumphant. His life took form around him again, his heart beating, warmth returning to his skin, and all around Italians bellowing commands and insults. He tried to imagine the expressions on Shidane’s and Abdi’s faces when he told them that he had miraculously survived while all the others had been turned into mincemeat.

  He smoothed down his hair and approached an angry-looking Somali. “Uncle, where is this depot place?”

  “Waryaa, look at the state of you, tolla’ay, what have they done to us? Fuck the depot, get away from here, I’m warning you to stay away from that hellhole. They killed one of us there last night, in cold blood, a young boy like you. Run now, if you know what’s good for you,” the man raged.

  The uncle seemed crazy. He was wearing an army shirt with a ma’awis wrapped around his waist, and he kept clutching at his groin. Jama roamed all over town until he found the depot, calm, businesslike, and sated after the night’s bloodletting. Alessi, Tucci, and Fiorelli were the hardworking, baby-faced army mules that they seemed; they served Jama quickly and politely, even dropping a couple of out-of-date chocolates into his bag as a treat. Jama filled his flask over and over at the tap and then went into the daylight, ready to find Shidane and Abdi and show them the carnage at the cave.

  Abdi was close by, crouched down by the perimeter fence. Jama raced up to him, trying to form the story in his mind. He knew that his mother had placed a shield of the coolest air between him and the rocket, but the boys would never believe him. He looked around, needing Shidane to hear the first telling of it, too, when it was still spicy and dramatic.

  “Ascaro Abdi, you will never guess what happened to me. Look at me Abdi, look at me.” Jama pulled Abdi’s chin up so that he faced him.

  Abdi was muttering and rocking on his heels, covered in dust, his jaw trembling. Jama saw a stain of rust-red blood on Abdi’s shirt. He tried to put an arm around Abdi and gather him closer but Abdi shot to his feet and started yelling. He picked up rocks and threw them with all his might at the compound, and a rock bounced off the tin roof before Jama dragged him away.

  “Where’s Shidane? What’s happened, Abdi?”

  “Come with me, Jama. You want to see, come with me,” shouted Abdi, and he abruptly began running, Jama chasing after him.

  Abdi led him to a clearing beside the road, before stopping and turning toward Jama. It was the first time Jama could look into Abdi’s eyes, and they were chilling. Under the furrowed eyebrows they were wide and lost, behind them nothing, a bare ruin. His mind had been startled from its temple and had circled above before flying away. Jama took a step back, but Abdi grabbed his hand in a hard, clumsy grip and pulled him forward.

  Abdi’s face was ripped open by a smile. “Look, there was nothing here when I buried him, and now this bush.” Abdi pointed at a huge sprawling shrub, its grasping leaves violently green and alive.

  “Who did you bury here?”

  “Shidane, of course. I buried him myself. Where were you, Jama? We could have saved him.”

  Jama started to tremble and Abdi stared at him before pulling a disgusted face and turning back to the bush. “When I left, nothing, and now this.”

  The bush frightened Jama, it seemed to grow in front of his eyes, and it shone independently of the fading light.

  “Who killed him, Abdi? What happened?” said Jama numbly through his tears.

  “Who do you think, idiot? The people I saw you with at the depot, they ate him and threw out what they didn’t want.”

  They were in a valley, desolate, gravelly and full of craters, and for a moment Jama felt like they were standing on the face of the moon.

  “Let’s go, Abdi, come with me, let’s go to Egypt. I have enough food on me, come, get up, let’s go, enough,” coaxed Jama in a panic. He felt cold and dead again.

  “I would rather die than eat their food. I’m staying here with my blood, you can go where you like.”

  Jama’s sobs became louder and louder but Abdi just snarled at him, “Leave me alone, take your stupid noise somewhere else.”

  “I’m not leaving you,” cried Jama. “What happened? You just went on an errand, Abdi, what happened?”

  In a monotone, Abdi told him about the rice, the shack, and the noises, and by the end Jama understood and could look into Abdi’s eyes without flinching. As evening fell, a large full moon sat imperially in the sky, glaring down at them, and as Jama collected firewood, Abdi picked up rocks and threw them at its white, pockmarked face. His feet kicked up fine dust as like a dancer he leaped up at the moon. Jama turned his back on him and got the fire blazing with a box of matches Shidane had given him. Afterward he held the box tight in his hand and prayed for Shidane’s soul. They both slept without eating, as if in sympathy with Shidane, who would never eat again, or boast about his cooking again, who was now a meal for worms. Jama wrapped Abdi in his new shirt and lay down, nearly on top of the fire, afraid that the chill inside him would freeze his heart. He could not sleep. Morbid thoughts ran through his mind; life was tenuous, there was no value to it, each day brought the threat of annihilation, or the loss of those you loved. He eventually fell into a sleeplike state, beside the smoldering heap of the burnt-out fire. At dawn, Jama woke as cold as death, his feet in the tight roots of the bush. As he paced around, waiting for Abdi to wake up, his feet gained feeling; they were like the hooves of a racing camel, like Guure’s feet, not happy unless they could feel miles of earth passing underneath them every day. Ambaro always said, “The only thing that comes to you if you sit around is death”; this was his family’s only philosophy. Jama felt an urgent need to empty his bowels, and walked away to relieve himself. From where he crouched, Abdi appeared consumed by the bush. Jama quickly finished and ran to wake hi
m up.

  “I told you I was staying here,” Abdi snapped. His eyes were still vacant, but now he hit and pinched himself, and muttered prayers under his breath, seeming embarrassed by Jama’s presence.

  “You can’t stay here, they will throw us down the mountain as deserters. You can’t do anything for Shidane now, let’s go,” Jama begged.

  “You go, I will catch up with you,” stuttered Abdi. Jama was keeping him from something and he was growing agitated. Jama looked around him, at the gray mountains echoing with the distant din of guns, the dusty road snaking away. He gave half of his food ration to Abdi, held his skinny body for an awkward embrace, and then walked away.

  Jama took off his mutilated army shirt and marched away from Keren, jumping into bushes when he heard convoys approaching, chasing after traders who fled on their camels when they saw the half-naked mad boy pursuing them. At nightfall he stopped, lost and hungry. With his dwindling flour ration he made gloopy tasteless pancakes, threw them down his throat and ate sweet, yellow meke berries he had picked along the way. Unable to lie still, he started walking by moonlight as well. He had long left the straight slave-built road and now just followed the magnetic pull of the stars. As the sun came up he saw more evil, corpses crushed by British tanks rushing to victory, the dusty white tracks still visible on the black men. Jama broke into a cold sweat and struck out in a different direction. The straps of his sandals had broken, and the loose soles rubbed against his blistered feet. He sucked on stones to ease his parched throat. By a ravine he staggered to a stop and fell asleep, lullabied by the gurgling water. For a long time Jama heard whistling, but in the no-man’s-land between sleep and wakefulness, he ignored it. When the whistling turned into humming and laughing, he shot up. He scanned around: nobody, just scrub and silence. He lay down again, only for the whistling to start as his head touched the ground.

  He stood up with a roar. “Soobah! Come out,” he yelled. Only a child would play like this, he thought. He stood stiffly, chest out ready to fight. A hand waved out from behind a tree, but Jama didn’t move.

  A man in white Somali robes came out into the open and smiled. He looked familiar. Jama squinted at the face, trying to place it.

  “What do you want?” Jama shouted over.

  “Don’t you recognize me?” With a sad smile the dark figure beckoned for Jama to follow. Jama picked up a jagged rock and followed the apparition; they didn’t talk.

  It took Jama a long time before he accepted who had that dancing stride, those long fingers that clicked gently with every step, that face that carried the blueprint of his own. “Father, it’s too late,” Jama said.

  Guure led Jama away from soldiers, crocodiles, leopards, to sanctuary; it was all he ever would do for his son. Jama cried when the apparition disappeared near a burnt-out village, and he searched amid the scorched tukuls, stepped over cold ashes, spilled pots, and lost shoes. He entered the skeleton of a hut, only to jerk back at the sight of a young child cowering in the corner. Jama turned to run away from this village of ghosts but the young boy ran after him, grasping at his shorts. Jama stopped and looked at the boy, whose ribs hung out, the skin on his old-man face loose and his eyes like two large moons, he was definitely alive. Jama opened his knapsack, retrieved flour and his water flask, stoked up a fire, and began to prepare bread. While he worked, the child stuck to his side. He had finished the water in the flask, and now silently watched the bread take form. Jama felt no warmth emanate from him. As soon as the bread was cooked, the boy grabbed it from the fire.

  He could not have been older than seven. Jama shook his head and asked, “Why are you here?” The boy was still laboriously eating the bread.

  “I am waiting for my family to come back.”

  Jama had not seen civilians for days. “They won’t come back,” he said flatly, holding out his hand for the boy.

  “What is your name?” Jama asked as the boy put his small cold hand in his grip.

  “Awate,” he replied.

  “Come with me, Awate, I’ll take you somewhere safe,” Jama said, unable to leave this small human spirit in the dead village that his father had led him to. Awate knew of a town nearby and directed Jama as he carried him on his back, holding him too tightly around the neck. Awate had been playing in the woods when bombs had fallen on the village, and had run back to his tukul to find his mother and brothers gone; he had been alone for days and he clung now like a leech to Jama’s skin.

  Jama and Awate fled into the lowlands around the Gash River. In a few days they had left behind the rubble and burnt vehicles and reached the date palms of Tessenei. British soldiers had taken control of Italian East Africa, so Jama threw away his army papers before lining up at the checkpoint. Jama went to the river, bathed his feet, closed his eyes, and rested on the quiet bank. He tied weights to the images of corpses, burning men, and lost eyes lodged in his mind, and plunged them to the bottom of the river.

  GERSET, ERITREA, JULY 1941

  Jama waited a long time for Abdi, hoping that he would come around the bend one day, a little dusty, a little thirsty, but otherwise well. Sometimes casualties were brought to Tessenei on stretchers after stepping on mines or triggering booby traps. Jama would rush out of the shop to see the victim’s face but they were always high-cheekboned Eritreans. Jama wanted to search for Abdi, but the countryside was now a battleground for militias and shifta bandits. Shidane’s grave was a meeting place for robbers who gathered under his shade to share their loot. Jama wondered if Shidane’s ghost had called them to him, his spirit sitting beside them in delight as they counted and plotted. After bandits attacked Hakim’s shop, shoving their pistols into Jama’s face and grabbing sacks of grain and money, Jama remonstrated with Shidane, and they never returned. Ordinary Eritreans were also in a rebellious mood now that Italian power had been revealed as nothing more than a magician’s trick. Every man and boy had a pistol, rifle, or grenade. When Italian prisoners of war passed through Tessenei they hid their faces from the men they had tortured and the women they had raped. Even after the carnage at Keren, the ascendancy of the European was jealously guarded by the British, who pampered the Italians and protected them from any vengeance. When bandits attacked Italian villas or shops, British troops conducted house-to-house searches until weapons and suspects were handed over.

  Jama lived a simple existence in Hakim’s shop, quietly watching the world pass by, everyday routines, miracles, and tragedies filling his days. He felt no joy or misery, just a deep yearning for all the things he had lost. The war was over but it had taken everything with it, and reduced his world to an oasis of peace surrounded by a scorched wasteland. Former askaris came to the store and made chitchat with him, some drank too much, some pretended to have forgotten all about the war but still there was the never-ending inventory of lost souls. “So-and-so died of shrapnel wounds”; “Tall Mohamed was hanged”; “Hassan was ambushed by shifta”; “Samatar went missing.” Jama could not stop listening even though he was sick of death; he wanted life in its purest form, like birds had, not this stunted thing that the askaris endured. Jama asked the men to look out for Abdi and to tell him that Jama Guure was waiting for him in Tessenei, but Abdi had disappeared, flown away on invisible wings.

  Jama listened to the neighbor’s cockerel sound its alarm, its crowing muffled by the other morning sounds, buckets of water sloshing, fires crackling, men and women greeting one another, mules braying, babies crying. Hawa, an old woman wrapped in red cotton, came limping into the store. She heaved and panted, on her back a sack of chickpeas, and her muscular arms threw the heavy load at Jama’s feet.

  “Good peas, the best I’ve grown in a while. I’ll want a special gift from you, my little Somali,” she said, holding out her hand.

  “If I were the boss, you could have anything in the shop, aunty.”

  Hawa waited for Jama to weigh the sack and hand over her payment of sugar. He was always generous, giving an extra spoonful to his regulars. Hawa tweaked his c
heek and placed the packet under her arm. It would take another hour for her to walk back to Gerset and her home in the Kunama settlement. The sky was clouded over, threatening a downpour.

  “Stay here, Hawa, wait for it to come and go,” said Jama, lighting a cigarette, phosphorus and tobacco sharp in his nose.

  Hawa trundled back to him, closing her eyes to breathe in the smoke. “Give me one, you naughty Somali, or I will report you to the boss.”

  Jama broke the cigarette in half and gave her the lit end. “It’s the last one,” he said apologetically.

  He thrust the other half behind his ear and checked for rotten fruit in the piles delivered by local farmers that morning. Most of the bananas and oranges were stunted little specimens, bruised and misshapen. He removed the ones that were overripe and shared them with Hawa. As they ate, the rain began, the first real downpour of the rainy season, and the wind blew in, spraying them with water. Awate came running in on his way home from the schoolhouse. He was drenched, his thin clothes plastered to his body.

  “Jama, I came top in my class today. Teacher said if I carry on like this, he will send me to his brother’s big school in Kassala.”

  Hawa ululated and smoke escaped in spirals from her mouth.

  “Manshallah, Awate, you will go to Kassala, but dry yourself, you don’t want to get sick,” Jama admonished.

  Awate lived near the shop with a distant aunt of his father’s but he visited Jama every day to grab sweets and share his achievements. His face had filled out and he looked nothing like the wraith Jama had found.

  Hakim, the shopkeeper, at first kept a close eye on Jama—“I’ve had boys work for me and rob me blind, my rule is any thieves get a taste of my switch”—but he never had to use it on Jama and soon left him in charge when he went to buy stock fifty miles away in Kassala. Although he had the largest store for miles, with villages nearby supplying him with sorghum, millet, maize, and sesame, Hakim was not a natural capitalist, constantly giving his spoiled children money from the day’s takings and keeping the best meat for his family. Jama sometimes thought Hakim had a shop only so that he could have an endless supply of delicacies to shove into his small, wet mouth.