The Biafran Recruiters: A Nigerian Civil War Story
odera
Monday, January 8, 1968. At five in the morning, Oderah, almost six years old, had been awake for some time. Sandwiched between Kenko and Bartholomew, on a narrow handmade bamboo mat, he re-examined the ceiling and repeatedly looked at the blank walls. Where two walls met, he looked down, pondering the Unukwu-Udu Mmiri, a gigantic, wide earthenware pot containing drinking water, covered on top with a flat saucer on which rested an inverted cup without a handle. .
Oderah and her siblings slept in one of those hidden rooms in the middle of a house. The only rear window attached to the room was closed, so it was hard to tell if the night moon was late in rising or the rising sun was early. Still, all Oderah thought about was how to get up and leave without waking her brothers.
Farming, weaving, breeding, selling, gathering and tilling keep children in overdrive in times of war. How Kenko and Bartho managed to stay asleep despite the tasks ahead puzzled Oderah as she tried to control her inner turmoil. Perhaps they came to sleep with him late at night. As soft as palm oil, this rug made no noise when laid.
‘Due to the circumstances of the war,’ he felt, ‘three brothers are now tied together on a narrow mat, on a cold concrete floor in a small room. But for how much longer?’ Whenever one of them was awake, he wanted to escape from the others and continue with his own enterprises.
The adults had been out of action, many never returning to their villages; many more, fearing recruiters, hid. The sons of war will do everything they can to help, to stay alive for the duration of the war.
No one does any work lying on a cold mat. All she had to do was reach the doorknob, three feet away from her toes. ‘How useful this latch has been,’ he thought, ‘opening the door every time it is turned, without letting out a squeak.’
What he was concerned about at the moment was how to get up cleanly off the mat, without waking up Kenko or Bartho. Once on his feet, he could tiptoe toward the door that gave way with the sound of a pin dropping.
If Oderah had slept on her stomach, none of this would have mattered. Like a monkey on all fours, he would have crawled back, cleared the doormat and his brothers, and stood up when he was near the doorknob. Regret filled his small heart.
Going from a supine sleeping position to a prone position in such a confined space would incur the fury of Kenko, who would surely, even in deep sleep, deliver a precise elbow strike aimed at the offender’s ribs. Also useless, slippery carpet with no grip, was the idea of sliding backwards across the carpet.
There was only one viable option left. Beside his three heads, within arm’s reach, indeed, was a sofa as solid as a termite mound, with four iron legs. Time and time again, Oderah had used the lever on the couch to push herself off the mat. This morning should be no different.
Lying on his back, he reached over his shoulder with one left hand to grasp the nearest iron leg of the sturdy sofa. Similarly, his right hand caught on another iron foot. Using the muscles in his chest to strengthen himself, careful not to tangle with his brothers, he lifted his entire body onto the smooth surface of the carpet like a dice on a checkerboard, stopping when he reached her. near the top end.
As he pulled, like an acrobat spinning headfirst, he somersaulted, adjusting himself into a crawling position. Back on both feet of him, he waited for a reaction. Without camera. His movement had been flawless, and Kenko didn’t throw an elbow. He tiptoed halfway around the mat and reached the door, turned the knob, and crossed the short but wide hallway behind it.
Further away and slightly to his right was the kitchen, its door unable to lock, open enough for Oderah to enter without lifting a finger. On one of the low wooden shelves was a box of matches. Oderah retrieved and lit a match and guided the flame to a nearby spot. ogbeidimbua locally made incandescent device, comparable to a candlestick supported by a hollow glass vase.
Happiness lit her face as, scanning the kitchen for clutter, she noticed that her drum was still exactly where it had been, in a corner behind the kitchen door.
He took the paint can by the curved metal handle and lifted it onto a low wooden stool in the center of the kitchen, next to a mortar and pestle. A metal knife with a hard edge at the top opened the lid with ease each time he came to inspect, which was usually several times a day. He grabbed a knife, but soon after changed his mind. One of the rodents might be ready to jump out of the drum and escape.
Put the knife back on the wooden shelf, Oderah told herself. Having obeyed, she placed an eye on the diamond-shaped vent in the center of the lid cover. Five trembling shadows assured him that the five rodents were still alive.
Delight and dignity descended on him. He was beginning to be a man who took pride, not only in keeping the peace among these captured creatures, but also in maintaining himself. Who knew how far this company could go? If the mice would reproduce and learn to live amicably, he might have enough to feed other famine-stricken children in the village in times of war.
Behind every delight follows regret, and so it was with Oderah. Inside the drum, she remembered, was a freshly injured rat and a predatory neighbor. The predator, a plump rodent with the jaws of a tiger and the furry neck of a chimpanzee, had bitten into the back of her skinny relative’s thigh. Staring at the long-necked, furry rodent had discouraged him, on many occasions, from threatening his neighbors. Once again, Oderah reached for the metal knife to open the lid.
Just as he bent over the box again, a sound came from the backyard behind the kitchen. Still holding the metal knife, he took two steps toward the rear windows, undid the vertical latch, and silently opened the glass of the left side window.
Although the moon had not fully receded, there was only a glimmer of sunlight, not strong enough to disperse the stubborn fog of the town, making it difficult, but not impossible, for a reasonable eye of a perceptive observer to penetrate.
Looking down for the source of the noise, Oderah saw the backs of the two Leopards as they clung to the top edge of the block wall, their feet about to land in the backyard. Every child in the neighborhood knew how the recruiters paraded their captives through the earthy streets of town, but none, that Oderah could tell, had seen them scale a fence.