A Man of the People by Chinua Achebe Read Free Book Online

them the cook had bought the coffee that had nearly cost him his life. The matter having been resolved to everyone's satisfaction I began to feel vicariously embarrassed on behalf of Chief Koko. If anyone had asked my opinion I would have voted strongly in favour of our leaving right away. But no one did. Instead Chief Nanga had begun to tease the other. 'But S. I.,' he said, 'you too fear death. Small thing you begin holler "they done kill me, they done kill me!" Like person wey scorpion done lego am for him prick.' I saw his face turning towards me no doubt to get me to join in his laughter. I quickly looked away and began to gaze out of the window. 'Why I no go fear?' asked Chief Koko laughing foolishly. 'If na you you no go piss for inside your trouser?' 'Nonsense! Why I go fear? I kill person?' They carried on in this vein for quite a while. I sipped my whisky quietly, avoiding the eyes of both. But I was saying within myself that in spite of his present bravado Chief Nanga had been terribly scared himself, witness his ill-tempered, loud-mouthed panic at the telephone. And I don't think his fear had been for Chief Koko's safety either. I suspect he felt personally threatened. Our people have a saying that when one slave sees another cast into a shallow grave he should know that when the time comes he will go the same way. Naturally my scholarship did not get a chance to be mentioned on this occasion. We drove home in silence. Only once did Chief Nanga turn to me and say: 'If anybody comes to you and wants to make you minister, run away. True.' That evening I ate my supper with Mrs Nanga and the children, the Minister having gone out to an embassy reception after which he would go to a party meeting somewhere. 'Any woman who marries a minister,' said his wife later as we sat watching TV, 'has married worse than a night- watchman.' We both laughed. There was no hint of complaint in her voice. She was clearly a homely, loyal wife prepared for the penalty of her husband's greatness. You couldn't subvert her. 'It must be very enjoyable going to all these embassy parties and meeting all the big guns,' I said in pretended innocence. 'What can you enjoy there?' she asked with great spirit. 'Nine pence talk and three pence food. "Hallo, hawa you. Nice to see you again." All na lie lie.' I laughed heartily and then got up pretending to admire the many family photographs on the walls. I asked Mrs Nanga about this one and that as I gravitated slowly to the one on the radiogram which I had noticed as soon as I had stepped into the house earlier in the day. It was the same beautiful girl as in Chief Nanga's entourage in Anata. 'Is this your sister?' I asked. 'Edna. No, she is our wife.' 'Your wife? How?' She laughed. 'We are getting a second wife to help me.' The first thing critics tell you about our ministers' official residences is that each has seven bedrooms and seven bathrooms, one for every day of the week. All I can say is that on that first night there was no room in my mind for criticism. I was simply hypnotized by the luxury of the great suite assigned to me. When I lay down in the double bed that seemed to ride on a cushion of air, and switched on that reading lamp and saw all the beautiful furniture anew from the lying down position and looked beyond the door to the gleaming bathroom and the towels as large as a lappa I had to confess that if I were at that moment made a minister I would be most anxious to remain one for ever. And maybe I should have thanked God that I wasn't. We ignore man's basic nature if we say, as some critics do, that because a man like Nanga had risen overnight from poverty and insignificance to his present opulence he could be persuaded without much trouble to give it up again and return to his original state. A man who has just come in from the rain and dried his body and put on dry clothes is more reluctant to go out again than another who has been indoors all the time. The trouble with our new