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"One-legged man, my people never ask questions. What is known, but ought to be told, will be told in good time. Tonight, a great wind from far away has reached our village and time has come for me to ask. You are not a warrior any more, neither are you a hunter nor a magician. So, tell me the truth. Where does the master of your people come from?" I understood nothing. "What do you mean where from? Our ruler was born among our people. We have royal dynasties where our rulers come from." "But I begged you. Why do you refuse to tell me the truth? Nobody but the Big Wind will hear us. Surely, the master of your people isn't a man, he must be superhuman?" "How do you mean isn't a man?" I started to tell her that he is in fact a woman, a queen, but the old woman interrupted: "How could a man from distant lands know about our island? How could a man send his soldiers across the wide and invincible sea just to conquer our island? Why would you invoke powers of the earth just for the sake of reaching our sandy beaches and dense forests? You have not noticed, but my people have not slept a wink since you arrived. Great fear has enveloped everything. We have started to fear even the Great Spirit, the father of our island, because he is reluctant to speak to us. Fear is now stronger than the need for sleep or food. Even for the hunt." "What have we done to you to scare you so much? Look, we are not doing anything bad to you." "Our kinsmen people and our magician who has gone crazy since you arrived, have been sitting for nights on end thinking what your people's master from afar knows about our island that we do not know? It must be something horrible and great, a secret stronger than all my people, bigger than all this endless water over which you have come, when he decided to send you away from your home, from the colour of your skin and your own language, to our island. We are shivering in the cold water of frozen life trying to work out what could be there in these green forests, which themselves are shaking with fear. Why did he send you on a journey where no man born to a woman would send his warriors, be they slaves like you." "What slaves?! We are the honorable soldiers of Her Royal Majesty! We all joined..." I wanted to explain to her that our country was free, big and powerful, to talk about our civilization, schools, universities, science, charts and maps on which their island can be clearly seen, of our high ranking among other nations, but the old woman put her hand on my mouth: "Tell me. Where does the master of your people come from? Who told him about us and what was he told. What does he know about our shores that we don't know?' For a long time, while the strong wind kept us pinned against the wall of her hut, the old woman kept on crumbling a clod of earth in her hand, opening her fist and looking at it. "If only I could see, from a distance and secretly the miraculous master who rules over you. If only I could see the way he walks, I might be able to work out or guess something about him. I have heard that my kinsmen headed by the magician spent many nights discussing the idea of poisoning or murdering you while you were asleep. But our warriors never kill other master's slaves. It would be a disaster for my people if we were to kill you again, since in your far country, you, being the slaves of your master, you are already dead. While you were sleeping, our male people carefully examined your weapons and they found nothing. They are a bit stronger and a bit more ornate than ours. Nothing else. They hold no secret, magic or witchcraft unknown to us. That is why we could not kill you. Your weapons convinced us that you were nothing but slaves whose master did not want to give you the weapons usually possessed by those who were not human, and yet he sent you on this far and dangerous journey across the great sea. Maybe the time has not yet come to say what ought to be said. Or it may be that you know nothing about what I am asking. Perhaps my femininity deceived me. Looking at your white, soft face and into your eyes when you opened them lying in my bed, I thought, it seemed to me, that you knew you were the white message sent to us. Now that you are no warrior and no hunter, you can reveal the secret to me in front of the Big Wind. And you, you are silent. You must have done something horrible to my femininity when you managed to deceive it, because I have never yet been mistaken in reading a face. You came to me across the great sea with a face as clear as the forest moss washed by rain. And look here, now you even refuse to tell me why this is not the right time to know what should be known or how you will give me a sign when the time has come." (Translated by M & J & M) |