and began to claw at the rubble like a dog, but I was pulled back by the boy, Dol Biong. Emily, Emily, they are all dead, they are all dead, he said and I struck at him tears washing away the sticky blood, but he held me. Come with me he said there is nothing here, and after the bombings the Baggara always come. I cried no no and ran away from him to the dorm tent, I suppose I was thinking that somehow she was still there God had brought her away from the church at the last moment but no, and I saw that the refugees were already looting the possessions of the dead helpers. And why not? But still I screamed and beat at their dull black skins and forced my way to where Nora and I had slept and took the old rucksack she kept her things in and swept into it her crumpled clothes her little carved crucifix her rosary and some of her books, things that smelled of her alive I wanted to cover the stink of death that came from the ruins scorched hair and bone and the barbecue smell that’s the most hideous thing about burning people your belly says mm good meat! Despite what you know.
Come come he was tugging at me and we pushed through the mob and out into the compound. The SPLA who had gone to church had neatly stacked their rifles outside with their bandoliers and I saw Dol grab an AK and some ammunition. I saw he had a bag too. As we left I saw also the child who had saved me by running out, a bit of debris had ripped her from my arms and taken off half her head I envied her I wanted the flies to be eating me too. But I followed him, and again why not? Nora was gone and God was finally silent in my head, no medieval saints to guide me today only a Dinka boy.
We walked east. This was thesudd itself, meandering rivers cutting across clay plains, and papyrus marshes that in the wet season make huge rafts of matting that sometimes blockade the rivers.Sudd means blockage and gives the nation its name. It was the end of the dry season and so travel was easier than it would have been at another time. There was just enough water still on the land, and he had brought food, bean cake, mashed groundnut, dried fish, cooked rice. We barely talked. I sat where I was placed, I moved when tugged, when food lumps were placed in my hand I carried them to my mouth.
Several times we hid from Baggara raiders. The Baggara are Arabized tribesmen who traditionally prey on theabd, mainly the Dinka but also the Nuer. We hid in the grass, he with his rifle ready, I silent but uncaring. It’s hard to recall emptiness, there is nothing there to respond to the world. I know we crossed rivers and there were crocodiles and hippos in the deep places. He was a fearless boy, but he was wary of hippos, ridiculous beasts that kill more Africans than crocodiles do, yet another example of God’s deceptive ways. Once we waded across a wider river than usual and he said that is the Pibor and this is my land. Now we stayed at night in villages, in the round houses of the Dinka. Dinka manners require eating with the mouth open, but what did I care? It was a sad country then, the GOS was expelling Dinka from the oil lands, pushing them east, stealing their herds, making them paupers, arming the Baggara and the murahileen, the Muslim tribal militias, who took the girls and boys for slaves. No one paid me any mind. I crouched against the wall invisible. But him they treated well. Every Dinka is an aristocrat, but some lineages are especially honored, and he was the last of his line, the last male descendant of Peng Biong and Atiam, the holy woman. There I first heard the song
In the days of Peng Biong and Atiam
No one could count our cattle
The holy people took us across the river
To rich pastures
But now the land is full of sin
And our wealth is no more
No one has the power of spirit
Unless Atiam and Peng Biong return
From their graves
How long we traveled I don’t know. It was Ker by their reckoning, the first division of the rainy season, and all that the people talked about was the rains being late. The sky was a thin stretched hot membrane the clouds hung on the horizon and never seemed to come nearer they seemed painted on blue china. The more we traveled the emptier I became as all the days resolved into the same day, endless. He was refining me in His holy fire to make me a fit instrument of His will. Now I know it but not then.
So we arrived one night at a reed-thatched hut such as the boys make when they go on the summer herding, thetoc, and abandon to decay when they leave. There was a dead thorn tree nearby and the boy built a little fire of thorn sticks. We ate, we slept.
I awoke in the dark, and the hut was full of smoke, so thick I thought I must choke, but there was no rasp in my throat, and in the center of the smoke a flame glowed but not from a little fire of sticks, it was bright as a welder’s torch. And the hut was full of beings, too, huge, inhuman, full as a crowded elevator, I could feel them pressing around me, not with my senses but with my soul and this host cried holy holy is the Lord of Hosts the whole earth is full of His Glory. Now imagine the worst embarrassment you have ever felt in your life the greatest shame that you know will stay with you all your days and I say that is nothing to what I felt then, I fell on my face and ground it into the soil, pissing my pants in terror, earth gritty in my mouth, clawing with my hands until my nails cracked digging with my knees to get away from It, light too hard to stand, away from Him. No no I said aloud I’m too filthy filthy but they held me and pulled me back and I howled in pain. And I saw one of them take a coal from that fire and it placed the flaming coal on my mouth (and it burned with the most terrible pain, but my flesh was not consumed) and it said lo your sin is purged.
Then I heard His small clear voice in the center of my head saying
Whom shall I send and who will go for Us?
And I heard my own voice saying aloud: Here I am. Send me.
And the Lord said, go and save this people who are despised and afflicted and make them understand My words with their hearts and convert and be healed. And lead them in the ways of righteousness for My name’s sake, for they will be a great people.
Yes, what they call a topos, a set-piece chunk of religious experience, but who knows but that it’s always like that when God chooses you, like chocolate ice cream it is always what it is or a hand in cool water, real. Maybe Isaiah also had to change his shorts, Scripture is silent here.
The remainder of the night was interesting too. Nora was there and St. Catherine of Siena and the Devil as well. I was so happy to see Nora again, covering her hands and face with kisses and she said don’t be stupid girl don’t you know when you love someone they live forever and surely you didn’t think that the communion of saints was just a figure of speech? I was surprised to see my old shiny man there it now being holy ground, but when you think of it he has to be there to twist every good thing to evil if he can it is the way we play here on earth and he said congratulations we’re both working for the same outfit now and I told him to be quiet and sucked him into me again.
Then the morning and I was a different person, so different that Dol looked at me strangely. I ate with good appetite, more than I had for days, I was empty and needed my strength to do God’s work, but I wanted more than a handful of bean paste I said I needed meat and he said there is no meat Emily the bush meat is all gone because of the war and all the hungry people. But when we came out of the hut we heard a thrashing in the reeds and out stepped a little reedbuck kid and stood there and I took our rifle and killed it with one shot and butchered it and we built a big fire and ate our fill of meat. Then we packed and I picked up a staff of thorn wood and set off. I set the pace now, no longer having to be tugged along, amazing the boy.
I saw his dismay and said I am not a witch nor have I been witched in the night, but the Lord (Nhialicas the Dinka call Him) has enlarged my spirit and told me to save the Monyjang Peng from the wars and the slavers and make them great in cattle again as in the time of Atiam. At this his eyes grew wide and he said but you are a pink foreigner. I said I am not very pink at all anymore and also, who saved me when the church was bombed and who sent the meat to us and who made you follow me around like a calf after a cow in Pibor? You knew it in your heart already. I saw in his eyes that he believed and that made me believe the more and so we set out again for Wibok.
We crossed the Kongkong the next day and there was Wibok close by the river. Nora had told me that it was once a place of considerable importance. Located on the confluence of the Kongkong and the north and south forks of the Sobat, it was the seat of abeylik in the Turkish days. Muhammed Ali, the khe-dive of Egypt, had built a fort there nearly two centuries ago to overawe the Abyssinians and also as a barracoon to confine the slaves he took in huge numbers from the lands between the Nile and the other rivers. The Brits had taken it over in their day and
