The Man in the Moonlight

     It was one of those village nights magnificently lit by a full moon-grey and radiant-perched in a spotless navy blue sky except for the myriad twinkles of stars-million years away. One walked on the murram road connecting our village to the outside world and black shadows of different trees lined the road-splashed in stillness-ghostly like. Toward the market, a few shops with electricity and a bar taking advantage of the august season-drying the pockets of the young and the middle-aged and further into the small streets of the market-more yellow flickers of oil lamps perilously hung on rusty, sooty wire mesh on poorly stocked shops and the same sad scenario was repeated on even more shops one continued to encounter. No recent death to grieve about or to elicit any outburst of lamentations that such a radiant night would pass us the villagers.

      I dragged on my dusty feet not wanting to reach home early. The brilliant bathe under the illumination of the full moon continued to fascinate me and I felt like freezing the night. Never slipping from reality. For surely the night would die-however radiant and dazzling it was and day would be born to usher the sun with its morning glory of peace and serene temperatures but with its continued fragmentation-a brutal design of terror-scorching and hot as hell would be revealed.

    But before I could surface from my romantic reverie, there I stumbled upon him: a dark figure-a man by a closer scrutiny-roughly in his early 50s with bushy like moustache stuck out like a hand brush, his face was concealed with a tilted brown fedora hat with a gleaming ring round it and his waist coat had peculiar bulge at the front pockets. His charcoal grey trouser clear under the moonlight was dirty at the hems like he had been wading in loamy mud and he was rooted to his spot like a statue with both hands clasped at the back and knees in an obtuse like angle.

      I continued to study him closely and there he intruded into my thoughts: “May you show me where the path leads to…I mean, son, where is the short cut to the market?” His voice was awkward like a dusty flute, and it had a colourless slur like he needed to cough a bit to unclog the dust. And coincidentally he coughed and spat twice but with a lot of determination and the saliva nearly landed on my sandals. I tensed.

      “I-I-I-don’t know…”I fumbled almost in a whisper of terror but he seemed to have misheard me.

      “You said where son?” His voice had metamorphosed to now that of a seasoned street beggar.

      “I don’t know! That’s what-“I halted to recheck my new found guts, still instinctively astonished by this figure under the moonlight and right at our gate. He remained unmoved perhaps also studying me, hands still clasped at the back.

  My brain begun to tick, what next? Scream for assistance or still with hold and observe my specimen? Here I was a mere houseboy in another county far way from home, unfamiliar to the area-barely six months old and now this figure ambushes me with questions of shortcuts and son…son…”

      An over speeding motorcyclist with three customers on tow zoomed past us and the man trembled a little like he did not like such things. He twitched his nose to block the dark blue diesel smoke that the racing man had left in his course and now even shook his head. So he cared, I wondered. No, it was just hypocrisy. Deceit. Perhaps a tactic. Who remained that cared that anyway? I don’t how he would react to discover that the over speeding motorcycle actually belonged to the area chief who was supposed to reign on such wayward drivers. If the government twisted law who was an ordinary citizen not to do the same? Another cyclist sped passed us with the same speed and the stranger now looked agitated and clicked and mumbled some inaudible words of “…ah this world but the speed where to…?”

   I was getting terribly nerved. I wanted to get home and continue with the house chores so that I could sleep early. Ma’am would be really furious. With the news from the city that her husband was polluting the moral purity of the capital-painting it red with all ages, her foul mood wanted her to let it on someone. Something. And it was apparent when she hurled her whisky bottle at Golden-the house cat.

   “What’s your name boy?” he slightly roared, like a command and the rusty tone was gone. I was almost collapsing with fear. My legs had turned jelly and I could feel my whole body withering like a leaf about to snap in a windy weather. What did he want to know my name for? Who was he and what was his mission?  I mean his intention really? At our gate and at this hour of the night. I tried to engage my mind to at least summon reason even if my legs had now been immobilized.

       “You are… you- I mean but I don’t know you well…” I replied curtly to his plain astonishment for I saw I slight contortion on his apple-shaped face-sallow and shabby as now revealed by the slight tilt of his fedora hat. He hastily realized I was again reading him and he adjusted his hat, now blinding all his eyes but the left hand still remained at his back.

        From the fully lit semi permanent house, I noticed Ma’am pacing about the room from this end to that end from the transparent large windows. Earlier on during the day I had done a thorough cleaning of the house including all curtains and they had not been hung back. I had planned to do that this night. By the order of her impatience I could discern a building up of a nasty kind of rage but how could I inform her, them-her two sons, of the stranger at the gate for I did not have a phone.  It had long ago been confiscated by Ma’am because to her I was wasting time contacting my parents how I was doing in my new place of work. I could now contemplate the rubber-whip being lashed on me by Ma’am and her two muscular sons, the lock up at the store for two days-it was always my punishment and the worst I dreaded-starvation! Oh starvation!

        I now begun screaming in a shrill pitch and the man was jolted to his vulnerability. He sprung on me with his two hands to block my mouth and for the first time I noticed the left hand he had kept a best secret was poorly bandaged with a faded white cloth; its like he had used a piece of a rat eaten t-shirt. I wheeled backwards and for a second schemed how to elude my adversary who was steadfast to harm me with a broken bicycle rim glistening in the moonlight. A full torch came sharp-Ma’am and her two sons had heard the ensuing commotion and they now strode to where we were ,armed with shiny pangas I used for cutting napier grass.

      The stranger sensing imminent danger of capture and or being discovered, for the last determined effort waved the rim at my face almost brushing my forehead and bended low then he swooped his hat that had accidentally fell of and hurriedly disappeared into a path of mass vegetation. I heaved a sigh of relief and remembered God instantly at that moment. Ma’am and her two sons had arrived to the scene.

       Her usual sparkling face was now distorted with seething fury and arms were akimbo, extremely shaking. ”So these are the crooks you collude with ah?” she blurted almost breathless as her two lads reached for my earlobes. Before I could explain myself, a blinding smack struck me mute as the dead. A minute elapsed before I could figured out it was Ma’am who had done it.

    “No Ma’am…no…please…”I implored sightless and another thump now banged my head and I knew it was happening again. For about five minutes the rubber whip flogged my bottom, head, back, face everywhere and the supplement was kicks and blows as Ma’am maintained had steady tempo of insults: “Good for nothing…look at you… a thief…a plain fool…no wonder you are poor…” My frantic wails were now subdued by the constant snap of the whip and rains of blows and punches that would not tire.

     Above, the moon was now even brighter-straight-as if trying to illuminate everything below and it dawned on me I could still have played cards with the stranger. Better the devil one did not know than phony angels one was used to.