The Wife's Tale

  PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF CANADA

  Copyright © 2018 Aida Edemariam

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Published in 2018 by Alfred A. Knopf Canada, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited, Toronto, and originally in United Kingdom by 4th Estate, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, London. Distributed in Canada by Penguin Random House Canada Limited, Toronto.

  www.penguinrandomhouse.ca

  Alfred A. Knopf Canada and colophon are registered trademarks.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Aida Edemariam, author

  The wife’s tale : a personal history / Aida Edemariam.

  Issued in print and electronic formats.

  ISBN 9780307361714

  eBook ISBN 9780ß307361738

  1. Yetemegnu Mekonnen. 2. Women—Ethiopia—Biography.

  3. Ethiopia—Biography. 4. Ethiopia—History—20th century.

  5. Ethiopia—Social conditions—20th century. I. Title.

  CT2158.Y48A77 2018 963′.05092 C2017-906518-1

  C2017-906519-X

  Cover design by Rachel Cooper

  Cover photograph supplied by the author

  v5.2

  a

  For Rahel

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Map

  Pagumé: The Thirteenth Month

  Book I: 1916–1930

  Meskerem: The First Month

  Tiqimt: The Second Month

  Book II: 1931–1941

  Hidar: The Third Month

  Book III: 1942–1953

  Tahsas: The Fourth Month

  Book IV: 1953–c.1958

  Tirr: The Fifth Month

  Book V: 1959–1989

  Yekatit: The Sixth Month

  Megabit: The Seventh Month

  Miyazia: The Eighth Month

  Ginbot: The Ninth Month

  Sené: The Tenth Month

  Hamlé: The Eleventh Month

  Nehassé: The Twelfth Month

  Pagumé: The Thirteenth Month

  Chronology

  Glossary

  Acknowledgements

  Illustrations

  Detail left

  Detail right

  PAGUMÉ

  THE THIRTEENTH MONTH

  Rains broken by occasional sunshine. Examination of boys in church school to decide who will be deacons. End of fiscal year. New Year’s Eve.

  Four coals huddled into a low clay pot, glowing red through their films of ash. My grandmother reached in among the folds of her shawl and drew from a small pouch a kernel of frankincense. She dropped it among the coals and at once it melted, hissing, releasing sweet smoke that rose and tangled with the smell of roasting coffee, of rain gathering beyond the open door, of unfurling earth.

  If it rains on Ruphael’s Day, my grandmother said, the water is holy. When we were children we’d tear off our clothes and dance through it singing. And if there was a rainbow it was as though Mary’s sash had been thrown across the sky.

  Above our heads, on the corrugated-iron roof, the rain began. Thud. Thud. Thud-thud. Each drop carrying with it a sense of great chill distances travelled, of interrupted speed.

  And all through Pagumé anyone young went down to the rivers before dawn, said my grandmother. You had to get to the water before the birds could taste it. She held the round-bellied pot high, so the coffee clattered into the little porcelain cups. Added sugar, or salt, or tiny tear-shaped leaves of rue, passed the cups around. I’ve never liked rivers, though, nor lakes, she said, not since I was a small child.

  But even though I was afraid I begged to be allowed to go. I was staying with my grandmother. She was kinder than my aunt, especially when I wet the bed. She’d just turn the jendi over, change the bedclothes. She was patient with me, and loving. Like my mother – and at once my own grandmother was crying, tears spilling into her shawl.

  Ayzosh, Nannyé, I said. Ayzosh. Take heart. Yibejish, lijé, she answered. Yes, child, may you be saved. Ayzosh. Yibejish, wiping the wet away. I miss my mother, she said. I know, I answered, I know. So what happened at the river? Steering her back, to distract her as much as anything. Pushing her on, as I did more and more often, knowing many of the stories, but knowing also that there were more, told and retold for decades, shaped, reshaped – or sometimes, when enough time had passed – cracked open in the telling. What did you say? How did you feel, and what do you feel, now?

  Sometimes the answers were immediate. Well, I said this, of course, or no, I don’t remember the date, or the time, only that the feast of St John was approaching, and I had so much work to do. Or not now, or I’ve told you that before – though often you could tell it was a rote demurral, that she wanted to continue. Other times the reply was a small smile and a twist into shyness, no, no, those things are not spoken of. When were you happy? I asked once. I’m never happy, came the answer, I’m always crying. All of my life is painted in tears.

  The third round of coffee had been drunk, the dregs slopped out into the yard. The smoke drifted into the corners and disappeared. Nannyé held out her hands, palms heavenward. May He bring justice to the wronged, to the poor, to the oppressed. May He clothe the naked and liberate the crucified. May He protect us, and bless us.

  I dipped my head. Amen. We watched as sunlight flared through the steam rising from the wet ground, and through the open door. Birds sang.

  At last I was allowed to go, she said. We left our houses excited, in the dark, and walked down into the valley. The Qeha had been filling all the rainy season, it moved fast and deep. The other children took off their clothes and jumped in. They cupped the water in their hands and threw it high. They laughed and splashed and wrestled. I edged forward. The water crept toward my toes. I started to move forward again, but I couldn’t bear it. I screamed. And I ran.

  She laughed, a laugh that took her over as utterly as her tears had a moment earlier. A complicated laugh, deep and delighted but serious also, for in fact she was still afraid and always would be; because she remembered the child she had been so clearly; because in many ways she was still that child.

  BOOK I

  1916–1930

  Credit 1

  MESKEREM

  THE FIRST MONTH

  Floods recede. Yellow masqal daisies cover the land. New and fallow fields ploughed for cultivation.

  AND WHEN THE MAIDEN WAS THREE YEARS OLD IYAKEM CALLED HIS PURE, HEBREW MAIDSERVANTS AND PUT CANDLESTICKS WITH WAX CANDLES IN THEIR HANDS, AND THEY WALKED BEFORE THE MAIDEN AND BROUGHT HER INTO THE HOUSE OF THE SANCTUARY…THEN THE PRIESTS TOOK HER, AND ESTABLISHED HER IN THE THIRD STOREY OF THE HOUSE OF THE SANCTUARY…AND HER KINSFOLK AND THE PEOPLE OF HER HOUSEHOLD TURNED AND WENT BACK TO THEIR HOUSES IN GREAT JOYFULNESS, AND THEY PRAISED THE LORD GOD, AND GAVE THANKS UNTO HIM BECAUSE SHE HAD NOT TURNED BACK…AND MARY DWELT IN THE HOUSE OF THE SANCTUARY OF GOD LIKE A PURE DOVE, AND THE ANGEL OF THE LORD BROUGHT FOOD DOWN FOR HER AT ALL TIMES.

  – LEGENDS OF OUR LADY MARY THE PERPETUAL VIRGIN AND HER MOTHER HANNA

  By the time the attention turned to her, she was in an agony of restlessness. She had tried to concentrate, to follow the familiar shapes of words she did not expect to understand, to feel their practised roll and pitch, to distinguish between the voices, now muttering, now confident and clear. She had tried to stand still; the effort made her aware of each limb, each finger and toe, of he
r head balanced on her neck, of the netela, so fine it was near weightless, that covered her head like a cowl. If she moved it gave off a faint scent, of sunshine and new-spun cotton, a wide, outside smell that cut across the eddying incense like an opened window.

  She wished she was out there now, playing. Sitting on her haunches to throw a smooth round stone into the air, using the same hand to pick up more stones, then intercept the first stone’s descent. Or games that went on and on, till bats swooped and looped through the dusk. Coo-coo-loo! the other children would call, speeding to hiding places. Not yet! she would call back, from her perch on a pile of rocks. Coo-coo-loo! Not yet! Coo-coo-loo – Now! And they would race toward her, vying to touch her skirt and claim themselves safe, making her laugh and laugh. A far better feeling than the time she had ripped up a perfectly good dress to make herself a doll, thinking to strap it to her back as if it were a child. Oh, the whipping she had got then! And the doll had felt too light, lacking the heft of a real baby. It was more fun to play mother with the neighbourhood children. Or weddings, wrapping dolls in scraps of red and green silk and walking them bandy-legged to church.

  She shifted, stood still again. The long black cape was lined, the gold filigree around the collar and down the front made it heavy, and it was getting heavier. She hugged herself tight, underneath it. Her stomach was so empty.

  The wall of clergy changed position. A book was opened, one wave-edged vellum page at a time. A pause, and a priest looked at her. At once she looked down. Bare toes on a faded, fraying carpet. Hers, theirs. So many of theirs.

  Repeat after me. If he is ill – if he is ill. The fact of her voice loud to her. Her breath warm tendrils moving across dry lips, dust swirled along the ground by an afternoon breeze. If he grows thin – if he grows thin. Or darkens – or darkens. If he suffers – if he suffers. Or is in trouble – or is in trouble. If he becomes poor – if he becomes poor. Even if he dies – even if he dies. I will not betray him – I will not betray him. A turn away from her, and another voice, a man’s. If she is ill – if she is ill. If she grows thin – if she grows thin. Or darkens – or darkens. The priest took her right hand and placed it on his cross. Then he took another hand and placed it on hers. I will not betray her.

  A ring was threaded onto her third finger, another onto the man’s. It would be years before she understood what she had promised. For the moment all she knew was a thickening of the air, a seriousness, a flutter of – what? Apprehension, perhaps.

  More prayers. A prayer for the rings, and a prayer over their capes. A thumb slick with holy oil tracing a rough cross onto her forehead, and a prayer over that. Hands bearing cushions, and on the cushions crowns, high straight-sided traceries of gold. A priest held one aloft for a long moment, then settled it on her head. She stepped back under the weight. Felt the figure next to her receive the weight too. The prayer of the crowns, and only then the church service.

  After the bread and the raisin wine, taken under a tilting roof of heavy brocade; after they had bowed to kiss the threshold of the holy of holies; after they had walked slowly around it, once, the priest extended his cross for them to kiss. It was cold, and smelled of earth after rain.

  Ililililil! cried the women.

  The sun had burned the mist out of the cedars and hurt her eyes, so she had to use her feet to search for the steps of the low, humped building.

  Ililililil!

  Out here the trilling was thin, echo-less. Cockerels crowed, and crows answered. Kwaa. Kwaa.

  Ililililil!

  The congregation assembled at the bottom of the steps and began a slow procession around the churchyard. Past the bethlehem, with its protective ring of dark evergreens, its nuns picking through baskets of wheat for the eucharist bread; past a young olive tree, leaves quivering silver. A long, stately walk around a central absence: the foundations of the main church were partly covered over with vines and moss, partly naked, as though they had been exposed yesterday. When the circuit was over the congregation settled under trees to listen to the sermon, and to praise-couplets composed for this day. Then, finally, ‘May He bless you. May He multiply your seed as the stars in the sky, as the sand of the sea. May He make your house rich as the house of Abraham.’

  Ililililil! Ililililil!

  As they picked their way out of the gate and started down the road she noticed that the streets and alleyways, usually so busy, were silent, that doors were shut tight. Wobbles of woodsmoke, the odd dog foraging among the stones and bones, roosters crowing as always, but otherwise an unnatural hush.

  She began to see the holes – ragged holes, punched through sturdy mud walls – and to glimpse the homes inside: raised wooden beds strung with leather, pots and pans, dividing curtains. Once she saw directly through to a front door, barricaded against the disease until the house’s inhabitants could fashion their escape. The women noticed her looking. They drew the netela further about her face, and hurried her on.

  And then the feasting began. She knew – because she had helped, or been told to run off and play because she was getting in the way – that the women had been cooking for weeks. She had watched the huge earthenware gans of grain in the storehouse deplete, and those of mead and beer multiply, had watched the pounding, the chopping, the sifting, the kneading, had stared as shouting men whipped and dragged five bullocks through the narrow gate. The blood had dried into dark tributaries around the stones in the yard, and now in a corner a dog gnawed at a horned skull.

  She was used to eating separately from the adults, to being silent unless spoken to. Silent she was still, but in a confusion of pride and worry. Here was all the attention she had ever wanted – but in such an inversion of her usual state! Everyone made a fuss of her, kissed her, hugged her; even her aunt coaxed her to take sips of mead or, collecting together a little heap of the best pieces of meat, the whitest injera, fed her. She opened her mouth politely, tried not to gag.

  Poems again, more joy-cries. Someone beat a drum and was instantly shushed. At this her whole body rose in protest. She thrilled to drums, to music; hearing even the most distant party would slip down the lanes to join in. Why could she not do this now the drummers were in her own home? Her mother noticed. ‘My heart, please understand. It draws attention. If we play the kebero, if we dance, the evil eye will notice us and the disease will come here. It’s killing people. Remember that lady from the market? She said her waist ached, she had a headache, she rattled with fever. She died yesterday. We cannot risk that. Please understand, child.’

  She would always remember no one danced at her wedding. And for the rest of her life she would try to make up for it, threading her way into the centre of the room, placing her hands on her hips, crooking her neck and – especially after her husband died – showing everyone how it ought to be done.

  * * *

  —

  The next morning she was given a new underdress. Then another, for warmth and volume. The main dress was a mass of soft white muslin edged in red. A necklace, corded black silk wound round with delicate gold chains, so long on her eight-year-old body that its two stubby gold crowns swung well below her waist. Silver anklets. A wide, light netela, draped generous around her shoulders and chest, up over her head, then around her shoulders again to secure it.

  ‘Nigisté,’ said her mother. ‘My queen.’

  A scatter of hooves, footsteps, a tumble of voices, and then one of the groomsmen, a relative of theirs, bowing in through the door, bowing to the women. How did you spend the night? Well, the women answered, thanks be to God, and you? Well, well, may His name be praised, may He be thanked for bringing us this day, may His honour and glory increase, and she was lifted up, up through a welter of hugs and kisses, prayers and instruction, into the brightness outside.

  The elders were waiting. Past the women, first. Past her smiling grandmother, her aunt. Then the men. May you be given a long life. May He watch over you and keep you, rain blessings down upon you. Her father kissed her. May He go wi
th you, child, all the days of your life.

  Gently the groomsman placed her on a waiting mule. Then, because she was too young to control it, he mounted too, and, passing an arm around her waist, grasped the reins. Firmly he pulled the animal’s head round; slowly they moved out of the compound, and left her family behind.

  At first she concentrated on their mount, on the animal’s rough narrow back, the part in its mane a dark bolt of lightning. The balls of red wool sewn to bit and bridle that shook at every step. The embroidered saddlecloth. The side of its face, unfeasibly long lashes blinking away flies. The uneven rocking as it searched a path through the stony streets.

  After a while she became aware of the running children, the women on errands, the yodelling calls of door-to-door salesmen, the compounds whose walls reflected the sound of their mule’s hooves back to them. And the other hooves, too, clopping out a ragged counterpoint. She knew what they carried: narrow embroidered dresses she could wear now; big square dresses, for when she was older; a length of perfectly white, perfectly even cotton; delicate shemmas; thicker shawls edged with wide red bands; fine basketwork woven by cousins over the long rainy season; twelve grey-tinged salt amolés in lieu of silver; gans of dark beer; a case of cured goat hide, just the right shape for a psalter. The slave girl, Wulé, walked alongside them. Another groomsman. And him.

  They were led not to the wide das, where, under a temporary roof of saplings and branches, the wedding guests had already gathered, but to the bridal hut nearby. She felt him sit, felt the groomsmen take their places, took her own.

  Ilililililililil! Ilililililililil! She recognised none of the women, but the sound was the same.

  The noise from the das rose and rose. Rushes of music, a drum – there was no illness in this part of town. Every so often men came to the door, carrying fluttering chickens as offerings to be made into stew for the bridal party; women with fistfuls of pancake and butter, rich food they held direct to her mouth. But she was not hungry. And she still could not trust that she would not wet her bed at night. So she shook her head and refused it all.