From Africa: New Francophone Stories

Our Neighborhood Fool

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 [97], (15) Lines: 325 to ——— 0.0pt PgV ——— Normal Page PgEnds: TEX [97], (15) patrice nganang Our Neighborhood Fool People are saying that Kamga the Fool is dead. The rumor is getting stronger and stronger, and all around me whispers are turning into loudly repeated statements of fact. They say that his body was found in a gutter, half eaten by maggots and rats, lying in his own shit — a pile of rotting meat. In my mind I see him: about forty years old, with the shoulders of a mason and the quick temper of a taxi driver. How could someone who was so totally bantu1 in his demeanor, in his reflexes, turn into a soup of meat, mud, and crap there in a gutter? No, it just can’t be Kamga — I swear it. And those who knew our neighborhood fool will swear right along with me, even on their fathers’ names. But, then, who didn’t know him? I remember his explosive appearance one morning in the streets of our little neighborhood. No one knew where he came from. He was just 1. Bantu: a linguistic family found from central to southern Africa, including several ethnic groups in Cameroon, such as the Fang-Beti and the Bamileke. 97 nganang 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 [98], (16 Lines: 34 ——— 14.0pt ——— Normal P PgEnds: T [98], (16 there, like Adam without a fig leaf, naked as a jaybird and dirty as a dog. The well-defined muscles of his solid flesh, rippled like a washboard and covered in a thick forest of body hair and mud, drew the eye down to a remarkably long penis. A man made for that bedside sport but forever sidelined by society. A lunatic — clearly on the run from some asylum somewhere. Or someone with a ring from one of those secret societies. “That man isn’t crazy,” some woman said. Hearing her, all the men burst into laughter. But not one of those men would have been comfortable seeing him approach his woman. Who knows? For a lot of us, he was a sort of sympathetic character, just because he was covered in mud. But because he was crazy, we didn’t pay him much mind, given all the serious things that took up our days. Because he was crazy, he didn’t really count for us. We all laughed at him — the kids especially. They just wouldn’t leave him alone. A lot of the young people, though, those of my generation, will admit that seeing him, seeing that fool, was the first time they had ever seen a specimen of naked manhood like you see in biology books. Of course, that was before television. Whenever he passed by, the women would all turn away. If you could read the secrets of their erotic dreams, though, many would have preferred to find him in their bed instead of the pot-bellied guy who snored away every night at their side — at least if he were a little cleaner, that is. But those are the types of things you just don’t say out loud. So, out of modesty, the women all hid their faces whenever he passed by. But Kamga was a talker. A real loudspeaker. No one knew where he came from, but wherever it was, he had come a bit too soon for us. Much too soon, really. A lot of the men would have liked to hide their faces too, to retreat back into their underwear, when they heard what our neighborhood fool had to say. At that time, you know, it was still a good idea to claim afterward that you had plugged your ears. This guy here pretended not to listen, and that one 98 Our Neighborhood Fool 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 [99], (17) Lines: 359 to ——— 0.0pt PgV ——— Normal Page PgEnds: TEX [99], (17) there hurried on his way whenever the fool’s...