JU N IO R K IN G ’S BUSINESS edited by Martha S. Hooker
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A story of Africa
A rc e te f a t
by Ruth Samarin
Dim smoky light cast vague sha dows on the low wall of the round mud hut. The grass roof ticked against the cold mantle of night air above it. Two pink-brown scor pions clung to a .roof pole waving their dangerous claws in unison. Around the small night fire lay three sleeping mats. Two were empty but on the third lay a teen age girl, her knees hugged snugly against her chin. Marie stretched sleepily and wondered why her parents were still sitting outside by the cook-fire. A rat darted past the threat en i ng scorpions, knocking grass down on Marie’s head. She sat up and brushed the litter from her hair. Now wide awake, the slender 14-year-old A f r i c a n gi r l crept to the door of the hut to see what was keeping her parents out in the night air. Outside, the tiny village was softly lighted by eight smoking family cook-fires. At each lighted doorway Marie could distinguish familiar forms. Somewhere in a hut
a baby cried. From out across the misty plains came the bark of a jackel and a river hippo answered with a grumpy snort. Marie saw that her own family’s fire was smoking in vain. She won dered what great problem could make her mother and father leave good wood burning with only the night air to warm. She shivered and hugged her arms around her shoul ders. She stepped back into the close, warm hut. Sleep that had al ways come quickly to Marie’s strong body, flitted outside the door like a firefly. Her mind busily re traced the day’s activities to dis cover the cause for her parents’ tardiness. Then through the night air Marie heard the angry voice of her uncle. “He coughs like a jackal,” she thought with distaste. “ If he is making the affair tonight then I know what he is discussing with my parents.” The angry voice of her uncle was a small clue but there had been
other signs during the day. For seven months the ground had been as hard as the house floor, but three weeks of early rain had turned the world from dusty pink to blood red. The earth had become like red guinea com mush between Marie’s black toes. Green weeds were ankle high where before only dust had covered the scorched earth. For sev eral weeks now, Marie’s father and uncle had been tinkering with then- hoses and cout-cout’s while her mother and Aunt Mamfio had sort ed seed and cursed the rats for steal ing half the year’s crop. The trail to the garden that morning had been a happy one. Marie’s mouth was full of song. She skipped across a band of march ing ants and sang out, “Noha is, he build a boat many years ago.” Un c l e Go r o , s k i nn y in his parched skin, muttered something about saving her strength for the hoe. The damp early morning hours when the weeds released their hold
The King's Business/October 1958
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