Come and Help Me See
I began my stay with Chief when I was fourteen years old. Poverty made my parents all too eager to let go of me. I was a proper village boy, the type that sets traps for bushmeat and eats palm nuts for breakfast. I was very brown from sun exposure when Chief came to get me but after staying with him for a year, my fair complexion was evident.
When my friends heard that I would be following Chief to the city, they were very happy for me. They gave me solid advice, told me that madam’s always like their house boys, and warned me to comply if Chief’s wife showed any interest in me.
“What if she is a wicked one that beats her helps?” I asked them.
Onye and Chidi looked at each other. “Then you avoid her,” Chidi said.
“Very good advice. I hope you get the good one sha.” Onye said and wiggled his eyebrows at me.
What I saw at Chief’s house was unlike anything I had ever dreamed up. The man did not only have one wife, he had four. None of them particularly inclined to talk to the house helps, much less show an interest in them. I met other workers there, but my favorites were Cook and Maid. Cook manned the kitchen, while Maid cleaned and washed clothes.
I was told that all ten of Chief’s children had been sent abroad for schooling or marriage. Money was flowing in that house. All the wives dressed gorgeously every day, even on days when they were permanently locked up in their rooms. When I remarked on how peaceful the home was, Cook and Maid burst into laughter.
“Peaceful ke? All these women are tyrants. They used to bring down the neighborhood, fight in the streets. They all just discovered they were evenly matched.” Cook said.
And it was true. I began to look closely and discovered that there was war racing in that household but it was a silent battle. They fought over everything Chief did for them and their children. It was one Sunday and everyone was going to church. All the women were well dressed and ready except the third wife who was stalling inside the house.
“Where is Chief?” The first wife asked. She was an older woman who loved to wear heavy jewelry over her saggy neck skin.
“He is inside” the last wife answered.
“What is he doing inside?”
The younger woman scoffed, “how am I supposed to know? Am I inside his trousers?”
“Is that not where you want to be? You and that foolish thing inside now, using charms on my husband” The senior wife said, her eyes spitting venom. The younger woman mumbled something inside her mouth.
“What did you say?” The first wife asked, advancing on the other wife.
“Enough!” It was Chief’s voice. He had come out just in time, fortunately for the women, and unfortunately for us who had been looking forward to the early morning brawl.
It was because of this division among his wives that chief never rode with any of them, instead preferring to ride with the staff.
“I want to marry another wife,” he said to us that morning on our way to church. We all kept straight faces, resisting the urge to look at each other. I could not believe it. The man already had four wives that he couldn’t manage. What did he need another one for? Was he bent on making sure all the rooms in his house were occupied?
We were looking at a chronic polygamist. He had wives of all ages. The last one, less than thirty years old. He had both male and female children. It was difficult to conclude what his problem was.
“He just wants a new woman,” Cook said that evening.
“Men sha. What happened to these four?” Maid asked in disgust.
“They are sour. Hahahaha” Cook said and laughed. I tried to join in but Maid’s murderous look stopped me. Yet I was somehow enthusiastic about this new wife. My friends in the village had given me a charge when I had left the village and I was yet to fulfill it. Perhaps this next wife would be young enough, and pliable enough to develop some interest in me.
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When Madam came, things changed for me. She had always been jovial, from the day she walked into the door of the sprawling mansion. She had dragged her bag from me when I attempted to take it and smiled to show she meant no aggression. That was how she was with us till the end, smiling and laughing at our jokes. You would almost always meet Madam in the kitchen, listening to I and Cook tell tales of happenings in the house.
We told her about the nagging and quarreling habits of the other wives but she just laughed at it. There was not a gossipy bone in her body. She was the person that taught me that everything is not black and white and you need to understand the contexts of stories before judging. When we tell her all those tales, she would always ask “why did she say that?”, “Why did she do that?” And we would flounder.
She was Chief’s fifth wife and relatively young compared to the rest. One day we asked her if she had gone to school and she said “School? No. I’m not a smart girl” Then she smiled as though it was conclusive that she was not smart. I, Cook, and Maid laughed at her calling herself a girl. Why would a married woman call herself a girl? But at twenty-something, she was really just a girl. Naturally, I felt some kind of kinship with her. I too was young and uneducated.
Chief was a rich man who traveled the world and made more money with every country he stepped on. He was a man of the overseas. A Yoruba man who never spoke Yoruba but chose to speak English that always sounded like it was coming from his anus. Chief was not a bad man. Some people would even say he was a good man. He helped people with money when they needed it, and he didn’t flaunt his wealth too much. His greatest vice was marrying many women and his younger sister who had just recently returned from Europe never failed to tell him that.
She hated all Chief’s wives but hated Madam more. Perhaps it was because of her lack of education or just because she was the fifth and five is a large number when you are talking of wives. She would often try to sit her brother down and have a heart to heart talk with him on the matter, but Chief never listened to her. What did he care? He wanted more women and was rich enough to get them(and care for their needs) in large numbers.
There were many staff in the house but most of them lived on the compound, outside the mansion. Only I, Cook, and Maid lived inside. You can see that I had no solid title, I was simply, boy. Chief’s boy to take care of his clothes and shoes, not to wash them or iron them but to ensure they were there when he needed them and carefully selected for every occasion. His wives could have easily done it but Chief was not one to give his wives work. Afterall their primary duty was to warm his bed and even then, Chief was not one to give his wives work.
Chief was a short thin man who loved his clothes fitted to his body so he could retain the semblance of a young and agile man. Soon, I was able to fit in his clothes and when Chief was not around I would stand in front of the tall mirror and puff my chest. On such a day, Madam walked through the open door and found me. She was fond of idly walking around the house for lack of something to do.
That day, I nearly pissed in my pants from terror. I knew Chief would surely fire me if he found out and then I would go back to my poor parents in the village. I could see their disappointed faces already before my eyes. Madam walked towards me smiling. Not the evil smile most women put on when they are about to make you see hell but a friendly one. She arranged my tie properly, patted me on the chest, and said “fine boy”
I was elated. Madam thought I was fine. It was a totally unfair thing, happening to a boy like me who had never been touched by a woman. I was tongue-tied and Madam, she was beautiful. Slim and shapely, with long lashes and that pawpaw skin Igbo girls always seem to have. She was even beautiful inside, with a good heart.
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Yet with all her beauty, Chief barely visited her in her room. Not long after that day, gossip began to fly that Madam was inviting Cook into her room. The rumors were true. From my vantage point in the corridor, I would see Madam boldly usher Cook into her room. This continued for some time and I grew jealous and confused. Why had Madam not called me into her room? She had called me a fine boy, why Cook with his spindly legs and bent back?
I became depressed. It came as a shock to me because I had been previously unaware of my feelings for Madam. Seeing her drawing another male close to her made me very jealous and sad. She noticed.
“Boy. Why is your face long like that?” She would ask.
“Nothing” I would reply and leave the room.
“Am I now a foul smell that causes people to vacate rooms?” I would hear her asking Cook behind me.
After a while, Madam discarded Cook and began to invite Maid into her room. Maid would hurry back from her evening classes and rush into Madam’s room. This time was also different, unlike Cook who always sneaked out of the room, Maid was bolder. Madam and Maid would come out of the room holding hands and laughing, then Madam would squeeze Maid’s hand and Maid would squeeze back. I watched them every night, forfeiting hours of my sleep but I didn’t care. I would later find out that I wasn’t the only one watching.
I returned home one day to hear that both Cook and Maid had been fired. I rushed to the living room as fast as I could to find out more about the matter. Madam was kneeling on the floor, her hair was askew and there was blood on her face from shallow cuts. Three women were sitting in the room, with Chief in the middle. One of them I recognized as Chief’s mother, his younger sister was very familiar to me. The other one, although she resembled them, was not someone I had seen before. I concluded she was Chief’s other sister. They must have come to beat Madam.
They kept talking and shouting at the top of their voices. Madam could not speak or at least try to defend herself. What would she say? She could not speak English with these women, neither could she fight them as they were clearly stronger than her. Chief himself was powerless. He could not defend the beaten woman, he knew Madam only in a certain way and even that way was now being held in question. Madam was beaten some more and paraded through the streets as a whore who enjoyed sleeping with both men and women.
Those days were one of the saddest days of my life and I never felt more powerless. It further strengthened my resolve to make something of my life. If I was rich, no one would be able to humiliate someone I loved. With Cook and Maid now gone, I took over overseeing affairs in the house. I became more of Chief’s right-hand man than his boy and I spent ten additional years of my life with him. During those years, I was able to complete my primary and secondary education and I left the job, biding Chief a fond goodbye.
I went ahead to go to a teacher training college and then a university. The woman I married was a tall, shapely woman with pawpaw skin like Madam. Many years later, I was shopping in a supermarket when I ran into Cook. His whole head was grey and he was even more stooped than ever before. When he saw me he exclaimed “Ah! The boy has become a man. He took me to his home and after we had dinner I asked him the question I had been dying to ask for years.
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“What really happened with Madam?” I asked. Cook lowered his head in deep sadness.
“After I was sacked I returned to my hometown to survive. It was only many years later when I returned here that I heard the full story.” He said.
“What is the full story?” I asked. I was impatient, he wasn’t giving me what I wanted.
“On those evenings when Madam would call me into her rooms, she would be holding something in her hand like it was an idol,” he said, his brows furrowed.
“What did it look like?”
“Paper on plastic. The paper had drawings of drops of blood and small baby heads on it,” he said.
“A menstrual cycle chart,” I said in wonder. “What else?”
“She would have me count the days from the day she marked on her…chart. Then I would count it on the calendar and mark it. Telling her how many days away it was,” Cook said. He raised a hand to his head and scratched the grey tuft.
“She was trying to conceive.”
“Yes,” he said earnestly, “…and when I warned her that people would begin to suspect our visits she looked so surprised. A very innocent woman, our Madam.”
“That’s why she began to invite Maid instead. At least people would not suspect a woman,” I said, laughing bitterly. Cook looked at me, then shook his head.
“This world is a wicked one, boy.”
“Why did she not learn to do those things herself?” I asked. I was looking for a way out. A reason to say yes, Madam deserved what she got.
“She might have in the end but…” Cook said.
“She was not a very smart girl,” I murmured, my voice going quiet as I recalled all those memories of us laughing in the kitchen.
“Sometimes I wonder what became of her,” Cook said.
“Me too” I replied. The darkness covered us as we remained in silence. Both of us, too heavy with despair to get up and light the candle. We sat there for a long while, agonizing in silence, till Cook’s wife brought in a lamp.
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