They were waiting for Haji on the platform. He squinted at them through the window grime. They were the only whites waiting for the train. The woman’s golden hair spilled everywhere around her face. The man smiled at the strangers on the platform around him.
The boy soldier pushed open the door toward the front of the car and walked quickly down the aisle to stand over Haji. His rifle was very big and he wore two belts of ammunition across his bare chest. “Get off,” he said. “Bring your belongings.”
“I have nothing,” Haji said.
“Yes. You have something,” the boy soldier said. He was much younger than Haji. Maybe ten. Maybe eleven.
Haji got up and the boy soldier prodded him in the back with the butt of the rifle as he hurried down the aisle.
Haji was careful lowering himself from the train. He had never traveled on one before. As his bare feet touched the warm concrete platform someone called to him from above. Two more boys were lowering the box with a rope harness from the roof of the passenger car. The platform was very crowded. The white man smiled at everyone.
“Here, bwana!” The boy soldier waved and called out from the car behind him. “He is here!”
The white man saw the boy soldier waving and pointing. He took his white woman by the arm and forced himself through the crowd. “Haji?” The man called out his name. Haji said nothing. He did not know why. “Are you Haji?”
“Yes, , the boy soldier said as they drew near. His teeth shone like pearls. “This is Haji. He is very glad to find a good home with you. He is happy to his new American mother and father. It is like to him a dream.”
The woman put her hand across her mouth. The man smiled at the boy soldier and everyone around him. Then he looked at Haji. “Hello, Haji. It is so nice to finally meet you.” The man stuck his hand out. Haji had never touched a white man before.
The woman crouched down and looked into Haji’s eyes. “Hello, Haji,” she breathed. “I have been waiting for a long time.” She smiled at him. Her teeth were yellow. “My name is Mary.”
“Okay, bwana. Good, good. He is yours.” The boy soldier smiled and slung the rifle across his shoulder. “Here are his belongings. It is everything.” He pointed at the box.
It was a square wooden crate, too big for one man to carry by himself. There was no handle, only six simple sides hammered together with nails. “That is not my box,” Haji said.
The boy soldier laughed. “Goodbye, Haji,” he said. “Goodbye, bwana. Sweet dreams, mwanamke mother.” He blew the white woman a kiss and turned to climb back into the car.
“Bwana,” Haji said, looking up at the white man. The man didn’t hear him and took him by the hand. He called to two men in the crowd and they came. He asked them to carry the box. They looked at Haji and then at the box. One of them swore an oath under his breath and they both bent over to lift it.
“Bwana.” “Bwana,” Haji said again, shaking the white man’s arm. The man looked down at the boy and smiled. “It is not my box. I have no belongings.”
The man stopped smiling and looked confused. He looked to his white woman. She shrugged her shoulders. He looked into the car for the boy soldier. “I don’t understand. Did they bring the wrong box?”
“No. I have nothing.”
“But surely you must have some belongings.”
“I have nothing. Please, bwana. Do not bring the box.”
The boy soldier hung his head from an open passenger car window. “Those are his belongings, bwana,” he called out smiling. “He is only a boy. He is confused.”
“It is not my box,” Haji said again.
The boy soldier stopped smiling and his rifle appeared in the window. “Haji, do not be difficult. Take with you your things.”
The white man held up his hands. “It’s okay. We are going. We will bring his things.” The boy soldier laughed behind them as they pushed through the crowd. The white man led Haji to the only car parked near the platform. He instructed the two men to strap the box on top. Then they climbed into the back of the car. The white man was looking back at the platform and smiling at everything. Then he looked down and admired Haji. So did the woman.
Haji smiled back at the man. He smiled as wide as he could. “It’s okay, bwana. I, too, am very afraid.”
It was not until Haji lay eyes upon the box that he realized why Mamangu had sold him.
They rode all the way to Nairobi without stopping. Haji eventually fell asleep. He awoke on Mary’s shoulder. She was stroking the side of his head. “I am sorry,” he said and he sat up straight.
“No. It’s all right. Look.” Mary smiled down at him and pointed out the window. “Have you ever seen the city before?”
A giraffe walked among the wild grass in the field next to the car. Tall spires of glass and steel touched the sky in the distance. The air shimmered with heat on the horizon.
Haji put his hand on Mary’s belly. She frowned and looked down at his arm. The man leaned across the seat. “Have you always been empty inside?” Haji asked.
“Don’t,” Mary said and pushed his hand away. She looked at the man as if she half expected him to say something.
“I am sorry, bibi. It comes to me like water through a river. You can never have children.”
Mary’s eyes widened. The man touched him on the shoulder. “How could you know that?” Beads of sweat had broken out across his forehead.
The boy looked down at his lap. “Mamangu,” he whispered. “She was the waganga in my village.”
Mary turned away to look out the window. Her shoulders trembled even through the heat. “Waganga”?” the man asked. “I don’t know that one.”
“My mother. She was the witch doctor in my village.”
After a while, Mary took Haji’s hand and held it in her lap. There was not much else said until the airport.
Haji knew that it was an airplane and that it was built by men with machines. But he was fascinated nonetheless, and a bit terrified, to be carried across the sky in the bowels of the metal bird. He closed his fist around the ostrich bone in his pocket and mumbled the Song of the Hollow Man under his breath for lightness. During the prayer he felt Mamangu watching him with her seeping black eye. Magic attracts magic. She had heard his song.
Haji felt the wings lighten and the metal bird climb as his stomach gently dropped. When it was done, he opened his eyes and shook Mamangu’s eye out of his head. She fell away from his mind.
No more spells. It was too dangerous.
The plane landed in a place called Amsterdam thirty minutes earlier than expected. The passengers and the crew were baffled. The control tower was taken by surprise. Everyone talked. The man, Steven, smiled at everything around him. They were held over for the night. Haji slept in a smooth leather chair that seemed to swallow him whole as Steven and Mary dozed on either side. By morning they had taken to the sky again and they began to cross the great ocean.
America was close.
That horrible bond they shared, mother and son. Like a black-veined worm shared between the beaks of bird and chick, Haji could feel Mamangu’s excitement, and he grew frightened.
After twelve hours the plane landed. Atlanta was bigger than Nairobi. They climbed into a pickup truck and some men in blue uniforms lowered the box into the back. They drove north through the city until its tall spires shrunk into long sprawling concrete giants. The road grew narrow and the sun fell again and so did Haji into sleep. He awoke later to lines of trees whistling by on either side of the road. “Almost there,” Steven said.
The truck veered off the road onto a gravel path that twisted back up into the woods. At the far edge of the trees they came to a rolling plain and a band of horses held within a wood-planked fence. A little house stood beside the fence, and behind it, a barn.
“This is home, Haji,” Mary said. He had never seen a place so strange.
“It is beautiful, bibi. But I am scared to be here.”
“Call me Mary.”
“Yes. Mary. I am sorry.”
Mary lifted his chin with her finger. “I know that it is different, Haji. Don’t be afraid. You’ll have a good life here.”
Steven panted as he pushed the box to the edge of the truck bed. “Mary, can you give me a hand with this?” Haji stepped away from the truck and watched as the white woman got beneath the box and grunted as they heaved it off of the back of the truck. Steven grimaced as the two of them carried it toward the porch of the house.
“Let’s lay it in the yard and open it up,” Steven said. “We’ll carry his things to his room.” Mary nodded at the grass.
Haji cried out, “No!”
They froze and turned to look at him, both trying to hide the strain on their faces from the weight of the box. “What’s the matter, Haji?”
Haji’s mind reeled. “Please,” he explained. “Can we not open the box today?” I—I miss my home very much.”?
They eased the box to the ground and walked over to stand beside the boy. Steven put his hand on Haji’s shoulder. “It’s all right,” he said.
“We can open it later,” Mary agreed. “We have some new clothes for you in your room. We’ll put the box in the barn for tonight.”
“Yeah, besides,” Steven said. “There’s something there I want to show you, Haji.” He smiled.
The barn was big. On one side there were tools, a little blue tractor and bales of hay stacked to the ceiling. The other side had been divided into stables, each with floors of straw and its own gate that led outside to the fenced pasture. In the stable farthest from the big front door there was a slender golden-coated horse with white mane and tail. She flapped her lips and showed her teeth as they opened the big door and carried the box inside. Haji saw the horse in the stable and walked over to look at it.
“Isn’t he beautiful?” Steven asked after they had set the box in a corner by the mountain of hay.
“Yes, bwana.”
“You like him?” Mary asked.
“I do not understand,” Haji said, standing in front of the horse now and holding out his hand. “Yes.”
“He’s all yours,” Steven said, smiling.
“We will teach you to train him and walk him. Eventually you can saddle him and ride him around the farm.”
Haji didn’t know what to say. The horse could have fed his entire village for a week. The sacrifice of its head to Mamangu’s meshetani could have made her powerful enough to see the future. He ran his fingers through the young horse’s mane.
“Well, Haji?” Steven asked, laughing.
“I’m sorry, bwana, Haji stammered, looking back at his new mother and father who were holding hands behind him. “I’ve never been given anything before.”
“You will have to figure out a name for him,” Mary said.
“Thank you for this gift.” The boy looked behind him at the wooden box on the floor. Then he looked back at the horse. It flapped its lips at him, begging for his hand. He looked at its mouth. “Kuponyoka.” The boy turned back to face Mary and Steven and he said it again, louder this time, while forcing a grin. “Kuponyoka.”
“Kuponyoka it is,” Steven said, clapping his hands together. “Let’s get you inside and draw a hot bath. I’m sure you’re up for some food as well.”
“Yes. Come on, Haji,” Mary broke in. “I’ll show you your room.”
Haji did not sleep well the first night. The walls were too white. The bed was too soft. After hours of tossing and turning he finally fell asleep on the cold hardwood floor. The new land was very different. The food made his stomach turn. The soap irritated his skin. It would all take some getting used to.
Mamangu’s box occupied his thoughts the most. Eventually, it would be opened.
As the days passed Haji began to get used to things. Mary began to teach him his chores, which he accepted gratefully. He took care of many of the animals on the farm. He fed the chickens, cleaned the coop, put down fresh straw in the stables. Mary showed him how to lead some of the better-trained horses. If time allowed it, early evenings were spent with Kuponyoka.
Haji and the horse formed a bond early on; Kuponyoka took well to his leading. When Mary was occupied with a mare that had come down with thrush in the pasture one afternoon, Haji snuck into the stables and chewed on some of Kuponyoka’s fresh excrement. It took a night of prayer and spells to complete the act, but, by morning, Kuponyoka looked surprised to find that Haji could speak to him in his own language.
“I have to say it is strange,” Mary said one evening as she watched Haji lead Kuponyoka in the training circle. “Most of the horses used to sleep in the stables at night. We’ve always left the gates open in case they felt the need to get out into pasture. Lately, they’ve all been sleeping outside. They only go to the barn when they are out of food.”
Haji began to grow nervous that Mary would consider the box.
Days passed. She said nothing. Then it rained for three days straight. Not once did the horses retreat into the barn for shelter.
Haji found Mary in the barn on the first clear morning with her hands on her hips, looking at the box in the corner. “You know, Haji,” she said. “We never did open up your things. I want to learn more about what your life was like before I met you. Besides, we need the room in the barn.”
“Please,” Haji stammered. “Don’t.”
“Why? Everyone has a past, Haji. You cannot keep it in a box forever.”
Haji looked down at the ground. What could he say? That Mamangu was the most powerful waganga in the five villages? That she fell in love with the devils in the trees and made him watch as she succumbed to them in the dark? All of the horrible things he had seen in his short life were locked away in that box. He prayed that she not open it. But he said nothing.
Mary looked at the boy for a few moments. “Okay, Haji,” she said finally. “I’m going to talk to Steven about this.”
Mary did talk to Steven, and that afternoon Haji found himself standing in front of the box again with both of them standing beside him. Steven held a flat bar in one hand. The other he placed on Haji’s shoulder.
“It’s time to get this out of the way,” Steven said. “We can do whatever you want with the things inside.” He smiled.
“I am afraid, bwana. Very afraid.” Haji put both hands over his eyes.
He heard the flat bar squeak between the cracks and heard the box splinter as Steven grunted with the weight. This happened six times. Each time Haji flinched. Then there was silence for a few moments before Mary finally spoke.
“Oh, dear. Haji.” Her voice was quiet. “It’s no wonder.”
Haji peeked through the space between his fingers and found them standing over the open box. Steven’s held his hand over his nose as if he smelled something. Mary’s eyes were filling with tears. She backed away from the box and turned to Haji. He put his hands down and looked up at her. She bent down and threw her arms around him.
“I don’t know what your life was like over there, Haji,” Mary whispered. “And I won’t pretend to know how you felt about it. But please try to understand that Steven and I are committed to taking care of you over here.”
Steven shook his head. “I’m sorry, Haji,” he stammered. “I mean no disrespect. I just don’t understand how anyone could have lived this way.”
Haji stepped toward the box and looked inside. There were piles and piles of clothes. Children’s clothes, stained and torn and filthy. A peculiar smell wafted into the air of the barn. It was like urine and feces mixed with rotting vegetables.
They were not his clothes. They belonged to the children of the village. Those poor children. They wouldn’t need them now where they were going. It was a reminder from Mamangu: “Don’t open your mouth. Or. You. Will. Be. Next.” Haji shuddered, but he was glad, in the end, that there were only clothes in the box.
“I apologize,” Haji said, struggling for an explanation. “I was embarrassed to open the box. That is all.”
“It’s nothing to be embarrassed about.” Steven leaned the flat bar against the side of the box. “What do you want to do with all of this stuff, Haji?”
Haji looked at the box for a moment. “Burn it,” he said. “Burn all of it.”
He had to be sure.
It began to rain. Haji wondered if it was Mamangu. Giving all of the children to the meshetani could have enabled her to call the rain.
Kuponyoka stood well outside the barn in the pasture. His golden mane was damp and matted against his glistening back. Haji looked at him as they crossed the yard to the house. Kuponyoka looked right back.
“Do not come near the barn tonight,” Haji said.
“What was that?” Mary asked. “Haji, honey, are you all right?”
“Yes, Mary. I am fine. Just clearing my throat.”
The horse shook himself and turned away to walk toward the far edge of the pasture.
In the kitchen, Steven handed Haji a towel and smiled. “I don’t think you had the words out of your mouth before the thunder clapped.” He put his hand on the boy’s shoulder. “When it clears, we’ll take the box out behind the house and have ourselves a little bonfire.”
It rained hard for the rest of the evening. The rain pelted the fields and muddied the yards around the house. Steven shook his head and leaned against the door jamb looking out at the torrent. “We’ve been in a drought for a year and a half,” he said. Haji shuddered even though he was dry.
They shouldn’t have opened it.
It was not his. It was not hers. And it was too late now to do anything about it.
He was sorry that he could not warn them. He must let the bones scatter as they must. It was time to worry for himself.
“Bwana,” Haji said. “Thank you. Thank you both very much. For everything. I am so sorry.”
“Don’t be silly, Haji.” Mary smiled and threw her arms around him. “We love you. Very much.”
Haji pretended to fall asleep in his room on the floor beneath his bed. He waited until long after the lights flickered out throughout the house before creeping across his room to the window and lifting it open. He made no sound as he lowered himself into the damp mud of the yard. He was used to sneaking through the jungle. He crouched down low and kept his eyes on the barn as he crept across the yard toward the pasture.
When he reached the pasture fence, he lifted himself up and swung a leg over. Some of the older horses noticed him and stomped their feet and snorted. Kuponyoka stood calmly under the boughs of a low-branched tree.
Haji wiped the rainwater from his forehead and padded through the puddled pasture toward the horse. He put his hand on Kuponyoka’s muzzle and stroked it and said, “Do you understand your name?”
“I understand it not,” Kuponyoka replied. “It is unfamiliar to me.”
“It means ‘escape,’” Haji said. He ran his long black fingers through the horse’s wet mane. “You are a good horse. You would have been worshipped and respected in my village. In better times.”
“Thank you,” Kuponyoka replied.
Haji stood rigid then. He felt Mamangu’s black eye upon him.
He had been right all along.
One of the older horses whinnied and kicked at the side of the barn.
Haji put his hand on Kuponyoka’s muzzle and whispered something into the horse’s ear that he once heard Mamangu say to a tiger. As he spoke, Kuponyoka’s eyes began to glass over and his belly swelled and sagged. Haji pressed his forehead against the beast’s lips, closed his eyes, and said a prayer.
Haji looked into Kuponyoka’s eyes. They had gone completely white. The boy pried apart the horse’s teeth with both hands until his jaw was open wide. He stuck his arm as far as he could down the horse’s throat. Kuponyoka kicked at the dirt and made swallowing sounds as Haji’s hand thrust deeper.
When the boy was in up to his shoulder he put his other arm in and the horse began to gag. Haji dipped his head in and pushed against the back of Kuponyoka’s throat until his lower jaw gave way and stretched all the way down to the top of the pasture grass.
The boy swung his leg in and pushed himself into the horse up to his waist.
He put his other foot in and pushed against the back of Kuponyoka’s teeth until he slipped into the horse’s belly. Kuponyoka’s mouth shut behind him and Haji felt himself in a warm slippery darkness, curled into the fetal position.
He closed his eyes and focused. Then he opened them and saw the world through Kuponyoka’s eyes. He made a fist and pushed down against the horse’s belly and the beast took a step forward. He looked across the pasture and saw that the door to the barn had been pushed open.
Mother. Kuponyoka snorted and kicked at the ground, prancing nervously from side to side.
Mamangu scuttled into the yard and crouched into a pouncing position. She had turned herself into a spider, her black carapace as big as man’s torso, her bulbous eyes darting in every different direction. Her fur-covered fangs dripped with venom.
The horse that had kicked the barn was closest. When it saw the spider, it stood up on its hind legs and kicked and whinnied. Mamangu made a skittering sound and jumped over the fence onto the horse’s back, her eight spiny legs wrapped around its belly, her fangs sunk deep into the back of its skull. The horse’s legs wobbled at the knees and it collapsed into the mud. Mamangu sucked him dry and her back end swelled and flushed crimson.
When she was finished she climbed off of the corpse and stared at the other horses across the pasture.
“Be brave,” Haji said and Kuponyoka’s belly tightened and squirmed and belched with nerves. The horse backed slowly beneath the boughs of the tree into the shadows. Haji felt Mamangu’s black eye upon him and closed his eyes and prayed.
Mamangu stared for a moment more before leaping the pasture fence and scuttling across the yard toward the house. She climbed up into the open window of Haji’s room and was gone into the quiet dark of the house.
“Now,” Haji said and opened his eyes. “Run. Escape.” Kuponyoka flinched and tore off across the pasture in a fury, away from the house and the barn toward the tree line that marked the outskirts of the farm.
Haji heard someone scream from inside the house behind him. Kuponyoka whinnied and kicked his back legs so that his front moved faster.
Poor Mary. Poor Steven. They would end up much like the children of his village. Wrapped up and sucked dry. A gift for the devils in the trees. Haji had escaped the dread of his homeland, but Mamangu had followed him in the box.
Kuponyoka jumped the pasture fence and fled into the dark. Haji kept him going until he collapsed deep within the woods. The spell was weakening and the horse began to choke to death. The boy forced himself back up through the back of the horse’s throat and kicked at the back of his teeth until Kuponyoka opened his mouth. He coughed Haji out onto the grass, wet with the bile and blood of the horse’s insides.
Haji lay there for a long time looking at Kuponyoka as his belly crumpled and withered and his jaw hung open on broken hinges. The horse’s long tongue spasmed onto the dirt and his breath came in quick pants before he died.
“I am sorry,” Haji whispered. “You were a good horse.”
The boy stood up and looked around him in the dark. The rain began to wash the horse blood from the top of his forehead. He reached into his pocket and squeezed the ostrich bones and said a prayer to the Hollow Man to guide him swiftly away from his mother, and he began to walk briskly on light bare feet through the woods into the darkness.