CHAPTER TWO
Okonkwo had just blown out the palm-oil lamp and stretched himself on his bamboo
bed when he heard the ogene of the town crier piercing the still night air. Gome, gome,
gome, gome, boomed the hollow metal. Then the crier gave his message, and at the end
of it beat his instrument again. And this was the message. Every man of Umuofia was
asked to gather at the market place tomorrow morning. Okonkwo wondered what was
amiss, for he knew certainly that something was amiss. He had discerned a clear
overtone of tragedy in the crier's voice, and even now he could still hear it as it grew
dimmer and dimmer in the distance.
The night was very quiet. It was always quiet except on moonlight nights.
Darkness held a vague terror for these people, even the bravest among them. Children
were warned not to whistle at night for fear of evil spirits. Dangerous animals became
even more sinister and uncanny in the dark. A snake was never called by its name at
night, because it would hear. It was called a string. And so on this particular night as the
crier's voice was gradually swallowed up in the distance, silence returned to the world, a
vibrant silence made more intense by the universal trill of a million million forest
insects.
On a moonlight night it would be different. The happy voices of children playing
in open fields would then be heard. And perhaps those not so young would be playing in
pairs in less open places, and old men and women would remember their youth. As the
Ibo say: "When the moon is shining the cripple becomes hungry for a walk."
But this particular night was dark and silent. And in all the nine villages of
Umuofia a town crier with his ogene asked every man to be present tomorrow morning.
Okonkwo on his bamboo bed tried to figure out the nature of the emergency - war with
a neighbouring clan? That seemed the most likely reason, and he was not afraid of war.
He was a man of action, a man of war. Unlike his father he could stand the look of
blood. In Umuofia