Ofoedu visited Nwaka’s hut with two elders the following morning. They searched his compound for a while, and looked in the barns, scattered pots, and the firewood for the kitchen before they returned to the entrance of the hut. “Did the gods grant life to the owners of this hut?” Ofoedu asked. It was his form of announcing his presence. There was no reply. The two elders bent down at the eaves of the thatched hut that stuck out. They entered the threshold, and one of the elders whined. He was too impatient to wait like Ofoedu. The elder knocked at the door, and Nwaka came out. The greetings were brief, and the elders went straight to the point after a few proverbs were said succinctly. “Where is your son?” Ofoedu asked. “He is inside,” Nwaka replied. “We must see him.” “The morn

He jerked as the sun shone brightly in the sky as if setting itself ablaze. Shading his eyes from the hot sun with two hands thrust forward, he felt the pain of a tight grip on his neck, squeezing his nape. It was a rope. He shifted his body and worked with his hands, loosening the rope that was strongly tied around his neck. After much struggle, the rope finally let loose, allowing fresh air to pass through his wind pipe. He gasped. Dragging himself to a crouching position and pulling himself persistently, he moved slowly with the help of his bloodstained hands towards a mango tree nearby. He stumbled on a stone as he moved a few strides, crashing his head on pebbles lying aimlessly on the sand. Drops of fresh blood poured out from the wounded spot and a white flesh appeared. He groaned and trudged, clinging to his forehead and wheezing loudly and slowly. He tried to cry for help but his vocal organs failed him and only a breath of hot air came out from his mou

 Akwaudo carried her husband's food and departed to his hut to serve him. The style of building in Umuise was not so different from other villages. The huts of the men were usually built separately from the huts of the women. A man is entitled to his own hut while his wife or wives are entitled to their separate huts with their children. This was done to create privacy for the men. In Okoli's compound, there were only two huts. One hut was for him while the other was for his only wife, Akwaudo and their son, Ifeme. Okoli had made a firm decision not to take another wife, though some of his relatives had advised him to marry a younger wife who would give him more children. His reason, was the simple belief that having more than one wife was having more troubles so he had decided to stick with his only wife. Okoli and Akwaudo have been love birds since they were teenagers. During those teen years, they exchanged messages and gifts

Walking down muddy floors with bare hands apart, feet clustered together as the bells of frights rang so hard that one could swear he felt a limp or two within, Okoli rushed to the scene of his unconscious wife with Nnadi by his side. His blood was heating up and all he could feel was death as he laid his eyes on the body of Akwaudo lying still on the floor with Ifeme holding her chest and trying to bring down the pressure that was inside her. Okoli instructed Nnadi to get some water and some herbs while he checked her pulse."What happened to your mother? Why is she in this state?" Okoli asked Ifeme."I saw her like this when I entered the room. I am even surprised to see her lying almost like a dead hen when she was perfectly normal some minutes ago," Ifeme replied."Something is wrong somewhere. Someone or something must have made her faint. People don't drown in water easily without being lured by something they did not notice."

Ibekwe smiled in his mind as they left, feeling comfortable that he had been accepted into Okoli's family with just a simple pretentious act. He felt relieved knowing that he had done things his way rather than wait for Ifeme to act for him. He stretched out full length upon the bamboo bed and groaned. Then a voice came to his mind, telling him that what he was doing was wrong. The voice pestered him like a faithful fly disturbing a sleeper with no thought of mercy. It was his conscience. The loud demand of the tensity of his own body was a voice on its own that seemed to drown out the voice of his conscience but it didn't. He tried to stop the voice from rebuking him but he couldn't. In the frigid lightness of the room, it seemed that he was on some vast loop that spun him faster and faster, not looking at him, not stopping. He was conscious of nothing now but what his inner voice of morality wanted. He lay still, hearing the crow of two or three cocks and feeling the desires of hu