For the whole day, in this isolation, sat the girl Bakuma, Marufa’s useless love charm clutched in her hand, as bewildered as if the earth had suddenly turned inside out under this fact so stupendous and stupefying. She did not weep. She squatted in the door, her eyes staring with the glazed inquiring expression of a dying gazelle, a bronze question to Fate. At the feeding time her mother threw her bananas into the circle. Bakuma looked at them as they flopped near to her as if she did not realize what they were. She made no stir to cook or prepare them. The cool twilight came and passed like a blue breath. Above the insectile chorus of the night beneath the crystal stars came the faint thrumming of a drum from MKoffo’s hill. The sound of music and dancing reminded Bakuma of her ambitious dreams. She could neither weep nor wail; she merely emitted a faint gasping sound. But her mind began to work jerkily, yet more fluently. Visions of the form of Zalu Zako were weaved and spun in the darkness: the lithe walk of him, the haughty carriage of the head. Slowly greened the sky until the banana fronds were etched in sepia against the swollen moon. The dismal croak of the Baroto bird shattered the black cocoon of Bakuma’s mind.
“Aie-eee! the foul bird of my despair!” she wailed, and at last wept. Then she rose and flitted like some green ghost into the plantation and across to the place of water where her lover had first spoken her sweet, recking naught in her mist of despair of spirits of the night nor of the breaking of the magic circle. The moon spattered the squatted form with blue spangles and turned the falling tears to quivering opals. Bakuma broke into wild lament.
“The black Goat hath cried three times in my hut! My soul hath wandered and been caught in a trap! Aieeeeeeeeeee!
A wizard hath stolen a hair from my head! The beak of Baroto pecketh my gall! Aieeeeeeeeeee!
A rival hath lain in wait for my love! She hath slain my bird in the nest of his breast! Aieeeeeeeeeee!
A porcupine dwells in the place of my heart! The bird of my soul is fluttering faint! Aieeeeeeeeeee!
An ember of fire hath entered my mouth! The milk of my breasts is curdled to-night! Aieeeeeeeeeee!
The strings of my bosom are tied with fine knots! My belly is void! My nipples are dead! Aieeeeeeeeeee!