7
It was while seated in their usual place facing the Museum of Arrested Motion that Tajirika, out of nowhere, asked Vinjinia how she had come to be the guest of honor at a women’s ceremonial dance, warning her not to lie because he had seen, with his own eyes, photographs of the occasion. She assumed he meant press photos, although she had not seen any. Without mentioning her visit to the Wizard of the Crow, she described her fruitless search for Tajirika and finally her decision to confront Sikiokuu at the official opening of Kaniürü’s office, where some women dancers whom she had never met forced his hand. But it did not really matter that she had never met them, and all he should know was that but for those dancers he would never have been found alive.
It was Tajirika’s turn, and he too omitted any reference to his encounter with the Wizard of the Crow in prison, his commanding a whole camp with only a bucket of shit, and his bargaining his way to freedom by betraying his friend and benefactor Machokali. Instead, Tajirika described how he defied those who had arrested him and threatened to report their criminal mistreatment of him to the Ruler. It was then that the officials told him that the involvement of his wife with subversive female elements was the real reason they had arrested him, and, to prove it, they showed him photographs of Vin-jinia seated in front of the dancers.
The shock on Vinjinia’s face made Tajirika believe that she knew nothing about the pictures. She did not deny that there were people with cameras there, but she had assumed that they were from the newspapers. And why would newspaper people take the pictures of her and the dancers and erase the images of Sikiokuu and Kan-iürü from the scene, since they were the chief dignitaries at the ceremony?
“There is more to these pictures than meets the eye,” said Vin-jinia, shaking her head from side to side.
Her words stung Tajirika into silence. So that was why Sikiokuu did not want him to talk to Vinjinia about the pictures? So that’s why he had forbidden him to beat her? Now he recalled how Sikiokuu had recently put the phone down while Tajirika was about to seek permission to beat Vinjinia. His anger drove the matter of his abduction into the background.
“Let me get ahold of Minister Sikiokuu, and I will teach him never to toy with me again,” he said at last.
He could not figure out the form the vengeance would take. He even thought of hiring professional assassins to finish off Sikiokuu, but he had no clue as to where to find them. Besides, that was risky and would take time to arrange; he wanted instant vengeance. Tajirika’s failure to settle on a course of action made Sikiokuu’s lies burn even more. Why had he lied to him? To make him cooperate against …
Suddenly Tajirika knew what he would do: he would refuse to conspire against Machokali.
He went to the office to call Sikiokuu.