Kuartam Part 5

The Wife
Yanua decided to go into the jungle, and so, after a brief stop at her hut, she made her way out of the clearing in which they all lived. But just as she was on the edge of the forest, one of the village’s young warriors approached her and asked her what she was doing. Once Yanua had told him, he couldn’t help but throw up his hands in horror at the thought.

“I insist that not only I, but also all of the community’s bravest men, accompany you into the forest. It’s dangerous for a woman to go into the forest and carry out what you plan to do alone.”

“Let me tell you this- I’m not afraid.”

“But, as a man, I cannot let you go alone. I would forever regret it. Please, let us come with you if only to put my mind at ease.”

Yanua sighed. “Very well, if you like.”

“And I see that you are carrying your husband’s axe with you.”

“Yes. Since he is no longer here, it now belongs to me, doesn’t it?”

“I suppose so. But let me carry it for you. It’s so heavy and I could protect you from any danger we might come across.”

She shook her head in stubborn refusal and gritted her teeth as she stared intently into the forest whilst he, acknowledging that she would not be moved on the subject, hurried off fetch the other men before she went without him.

Quickly assembling themselves beside the widow, those other men had a similar attitude to the first warrior regarding what they saw as the woman’s crazy intrepidity.

Nonetheless, into the jungle they went in search of her husband’s body. The men tried to surround Yanua and tried several more unsuccessful attempts to seize the axe from her iron-fisted clutch. Her eyes burnt with determination as they journeyed onwards to fulfil her destiny.

It did not take them long to discover the lifeless body, because the woman knew which part of the woods they were likely to come across it: her husband’s favourite part. His favourite part of the woods had been, of course, the place where you could find the most tree frogs.

There they found only half of his body, for the jaguar had eaten the other half. It was his bottom half, from the waist down, his legs blueish with cold, every scar since infancy on display for all to see. His clothes were torn to rags to the point of humiliation. The men had thought to bring along huge banana leaves so as to cover him and spare his widow any shame when the body would be taken back to the village.

The men then asked if they should take the body away, but she shook her head. Again, they found this strange, as tradition said that the man must be given proper burial rituals, but the woman seemed to have other ideas. Believing the task to be completed, they turned back towards the village, all except for the first warrior to whom she had explained her plan. He stood rigidly by her side and watched her.

“Why aren’t you following the warriors back to the village?” he asked. “Please, let’s go. We’ve seen with our own eyes what happened to your husband. There’s nothing left to do now. You’re just a woman. You shouldn’t be out here alone.”

Her reply was a simple “no.”

She would not be moved. She wished to be left alone in the jungle and she did not waver in her decision.

The warrior shook his head and sprinted back home without her.

TBC…