Neighbors heard angry voices and poured into our compound looking at everyone’s face in askance. Children gathered and gossiped. They could not remember when last my mother had engaged in a fight. They had known her to be gentle and problem free. They listened to each of the two women tell their own side of the story and shook their head over Udodi’s mother’s story. As she shouted, Mother waited patiently and did not interfere, but when Mother spoke Udodi’s mother interrupted her intermittently. Mother’s attitude to the situation had been her way of life. She does not fight a fight of blame.
‘I don’t blame you Nnenna. I should blame the evil that caused all these. For once it serves your son right. My son had been a laughing stock in the entire village when your son stripped him. I blame death. He would have been like many other children who could walk around freely because they have people that would speak up for them. I am not dead and I am not afraid. I have already warned him not to make trouble with anyone. I shall always speak for him. Nnenna, now answer me, why did your son and his foolish friends go ahead…’
‘Don’t call my son foolish,’ she shouted back at Mother. ‘Call your son foolish,’ she said, her entire body shaking with rage.
‘Yes, answer me, your son undressed my son off his abanto on his way back from the stream this morning and played with his nakedness. Each day he comes back home in tears over your son’s molestations,’ Mother said and broke down in tears.
Stunned, the woman took her son and went out from our compound, blaming him. He was a really bad boy among his peers. To be young and be bad is really a bad thing. I shouted at Udodi’s mother for making my Mother cry. It was a sin I committed because of Mother. I never wanted her to be punished for my trouble. I could die for her to be happy. Neighbors said few things and dispersed.
It was the first time in my life I had shouted at a grown up.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Mother Falls Sick
It was now eight years or more since the death of father. I do not know exactly, for we counted years based on seasons and farm rotations. We had farmed on the same land where he did his last planting twice and it was done once in every four years.
I and my younger ones were growing rapidly and Mother was happy. Our daily ration increased and so did our demand for clothing. Mother was not willing to seek help from anyone, even her own parents. She wanted to carry the burden all alone. Mma had recovered from a sickness that could have eaten her head. At least, we were glad that she survived it. Her sickness was so sudden and intense that we thought she would die. Her chi was alive as Mother had always told us and that was why Mother maintained that she bears her name as she too told us that they had the same kind of chi with a soft heart. She never ate anything for five days.
She had grown no sign of sickness and one night she suddenly began to shiver. It was oyi omuma, a very great fever that sucks blood like a tape warm. It could take as short as a night to suck all the blood in the body and kill the person in less than two days. We did not go to the farm for three days. We were close to her, checking her and providing her the prescribed medication. I helped Mother and we brought her to the fireplace on a mat and built a fire. She was covered and was rubbed all over with kernel oil. It was called ude aki and it was used to keep a sick one in check especially at night when the earth is too silent for humans to talk. During these times, the pagan Igbo’s believe that it kept off the bad spirit from coming to torture the sick living.
Mma was very important to the family and I had wondered how Mother would cope without her. So she kept vigil at her side and knelt most times, feeling her temperature with her palm and saying her sorry. At last the sickness vanished.
It was a relief to mother, to everyone. Gradually, everything would be normal again. We knew that though no one was standing for us, no help was in place, but our faith was strong.