The Mermaid Beside the Stream: Story of Okagbeng and the Mermaid

By Stephen David Eteng

The Mermaid beside the Stream is a philosophical fiction that depicts an uncommon characteristic of a fledgling entity too soon given to the pursuit of independence. It is a tale about a stripling who desires to be allowed to do things on his own at an age when most children are still totally dependent on their mothers for everything, including blowing their noses.

The young one finally got what he was looking foran opportunity to enjoy a couple of hours of freedom free of adult monitoring. But as almost always happens albeit in disparate forms and shapes to those stubbornly striving for yet unattainable heights, he would encounter a mermaid beside the stream, a terror-inflicting meeting that complicated his world and doomed him and his relatives and friends to a lifetime of adversity.

It seeks to look in-depth into family values, the troubles faced by parents in the upbringing of children; it exposes the mistake inherent in the modern trend of not whipping children when they go astray, with an underlying criticism of embracing the white mans culture at the expense of pure tradition handed down by our African forefathers.

It exposes the debilitating effects of fear and seeks to educate and liberate those who have allowed themselves to be shackled by it.

This book will appeal to all classes for, like the stages of life, it unfolds with bloodcurdling suspenselife from cradle to early adulthood, with each stage underscored by lively original poetry.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Jul 29, 2015
• ISBN: 9781504942584

Stephen David Eteng

The author, Stephen David Eteng, hails from Akugom (1) IjomUgep in Yakurr local government area of Cross River State of Nigeria. He is a police officer of the rank of assistant superintendent of police (ASP) currently attached to Shell Nigeria. He is a communications graduate from the Rivers State University of Science and Technology (RSUST). He is married to a journalist, Daphne, with a son, Jeremiah Jesam Freeman (J. J. Freeman.) He lives and works with his family in the city of Port Harcourt. This is one of many works among other yet to be published short stories and poems. E-mail: [e-mail] Telephone number: [phone].

Book preview

PROLOGUE

In his desire to be allowed to do things on his own, at an age when most children were still totally dependent on their Mothers for everything including blowing their noses, the Stripling, Okagbeng depicted an uncommon characteristic of a fledgling entity too soon given to the pursuit of independence.

In this entirely fictional story, the young one finally got what he was looking for - an opportunity to enjoy a couple of hours of freedom away from adult monitoring. But as almost always happens, albeit in disparate forms and shapes to those stubbornly striving for yet unattainable heights, the young one would encounter a MERMAID BESIDE THE STREAM, a Terror-inflicting meeting which complicated his ‘world’ and doomed him, and his relatives and friends to a lifetime of adversity.

This philosophical tale subtly challenges you the reader to be a part of the moral fabric of the story – the effects and after-effects of the encounter between the young Okagbeng and the mermaid. To proffer answers to such questions as that which the story seems to be posing to a plethora of social ills.

Was it really a Mermaid? Could it be that FEAR was what beclouded his senses to think it was a mermaid? Could the interpretation made by the consulted herbalist be true? Why or what could have pushed Okagbeng to throw stones at the ‘mermaid’ when, according to the herbalist, she had only come to bless the young one? Why could the mermaid not be more open to Okagbeng? Could there have been another divine power at work against or in favour of Okagbeng?

Why could a cure for the resultant sickness of the poor child not be found in either violent prayer as prescribed by some pastors, or within the recommended available orthodox resources and alternatives? Why did it require the intervention of what some would otherwise term fetish and others diabolic remedies, which had such precarious strings attached for the future of the young Okagbeng for the achievement of a respite?

This novel seeks an in-depth look into family values and the troubles faced by parents in the upbringing of children. It exposes the mistake inherent in the modern trend of not whipping children when they go astray, with an underlying criticism of embracing the Whiteman’s culture at the expense of pure tradition handed down by our Africa’s forefathers.

The tale exposes the debilitating effects of Fear and seeks to educate and liberate those who have allowed themselves to be en-shackled by it.

This story will appeal to all classes for, like the stages of life; it unfolds with blood curdling suspense - Life from cradle to early adulthood with each stage underscored by lively original poetry.

CHAPTER 1

Enter Okagbeng Odem-Eteti of Umor-Otutu

I AM OKAGBENG. I am the Firstborn-Son of Blackson, son of Odem-Eteti, native of the quaint Umor-Otutu of Yakurr. Let the River people and the peoples of the forest grove hear it – I am a divine descendant of Ben-Boh-Obase of Cross River State of Nigeria - Giant of Africa.

I say let the mountain dwellers hear of me – the REINCARNATE! of Okagbeng, that Revered first son of Grandpa Odem-Eteti. Who, in an era when the peoples of the pale complexion strove to chase the African out of a black continent! He navigated seven seas, braved the vilest jungles to a foreign territory in search of greener pastures for his ilk, and died valiantly in a whirl of falling forest trees and a stampede of beasts! Let they who pride their breasts with mundane titles know this – I am the one who returns with a bang! I am Okagbeng Odem-Eteti of Umor-Otutu.

THIS IS MY STORY.

Early one Sunday morning in the long-ago, I, Okagbeng left the house. On the way, what happened to the New Testament Saul of Tarsus on his way to Damascus happened to me. It seemed like scales suddenly fell off my eyeballs. I suddenly saw myself carrying out my very first solo assignment since birth; the first real responsibility I had ever been allowed. Yippee! I gloated boastfully, punching into the air with my free hand in excitement of my first taste of INDEPENDENCE! – Nay freedom, from the world of the rather patronizing, sometimes oppressive, exaggerated and boring know-it-all supervision of grown-ups. For some time I would be on my own; I would be free to do what I liked. I thought. It’s not always a child gets this kind of rare opportunity, not at all. No, this was legit, quite different from other times in the past when I had stolen but a few moments, moments that were steeped with fears of being caught. Ah! I would make the most of this! I decided. After all, had I not always angled for some responsibility before now? Had I not always been turned down? Yet this had piqued my desire the more to be allowed to do things on my own. Shoo! They would reprimand me like an errant chicken pecking at the seeds spread to dry in the sun, once or twice even rapping on my knuckles with whatever was in their hands. Keep off silly, you are still too young! But here was I at last..! My chest puffed up in pride and I increased my pace to a swagger in anticipation of the approval I would be getting from everyone who saw me and especially from Aunty Eniwen who, due to her patronizing attitude towards me, I always strove to impress.

I was on an errand this simple; to deliver a flask of fragrant and delicious dried fish pepper-soup spiced with local scent leaf, Nchanwu and boiled pieces of yam, to my Aunt Eniwen who had the night before given birth at the local midwifery nearby.

I must have been just about the tender age of five or six; that phase of youth when the physical world begins to take some form of shape – begins to make some sort of sense – begins to unfurl its compelling and overwhelming complex strata like a flower in the sun to the comprehension of highly inquisitive, receptive, emulative and magnetic little minds such as mine.

It would have been about seven o’clock in the morning. My parents had left home earlier with my younger brother Etengwen aged three, and Oblantamna our sister aiming for two, to attend the first mass at St. Mary’s, being active members of some of the associations at the local Catholic parish.

Having – according to many older relations - begun early to demonstrate substantial levels of courage, natural intelligence, self-determination and responsibility to the delight of my parents, it was one of the instructions they had left for the chores of that day, I Okagbeng needed to do before joining the other neighbourhood children in time to attend second Mass. After that, it was also prearranged - that we would all join them, who by then would have finished any of the many boring meetings parents always attended after first mass, and together we would go back home.

It must have been sometime in mid-July, in the early-seventies during the typically notorious tropical rainy season. There was then only one main road linking the Ikom-Calabar express road with the residential camp for senior and junior workers of a rubber plantation located within the Tropical Evergreen Forest region of West Africa, in Akamkpa, Odukpani and Uyanga towns, of Cross Rivers State of The Federal Republic of Nigeria.

The senior staff of the Rubber Plantation consisted mainly of European expatriates whose roles included among other more technical detail; supervision and training of the local labour in cultivating and harvesting rubber products, then one of the notable national cash crops among others like cocoa, groundnut and palm kernel, mostly for export. They were also priests, nuns, doctors, nurses, other medical support personnel and teachers. The rubber is tapped out of mature rubber trees, by carving ridges along their trunks with short scythes specially fabricated for this. The rubber itself usually runs out in frothy, milky-white liquid form unto a ten litre pail tied on the tree just under the last of the ridges and left to fill, after which the tapper responsible for that particular row would remove the bucket and pour its contents into a bigger drum strategically positioned nearby. The empty bucket would be re-fixed to collect more. Eventually, a truck would come by and carry the filled drums off to a depot where the liquid is smoked into sheets.

The camp, which was built up of neatly arranged rows of tenements consisting of two rooms and a kitchen apiece for the junior staff and three to four or more bedroom flats for senior and expatriate staff according to rank, also had two primary schools – one a Mission School, the other Government. One infirmary and three or four churches all clustered around a few square kilometres of the forest clearing.

According to data obtained by word of mouth from government people, some of who were very insolent, who came with their painful vaccination apparatus to prick us children on the arms, there were then about seventy-nine buildings in all, housing approximately seventy families and about one thousand human beings all from different cultures, tribes and backgrounds. Said one of the vaccinators with an air of bloated importance; I beg don waste my time, I still get up to seventy house dem to visit and you are only number nine! I don’t know the problem with all these thousand bush people self! she would say shaking her head and flashing her eyes at my Mother. Don mind them, said mother to me when she saw the bewilderment on my face at such impertinence. Dem be government people and they think say them important pass everybody. Later that day, I would try to add up the numbers seventy and nine houses. Also, living in a mixture of thatched roof houses structured with burnt clay, and a few modern bungalows owned by the rich among them beside and scattered around the camp, were local indigenes of the Orkomita community.

There were farmers, fishermen, traders, hunters, craftsmen and a few government workers all living together in the area. Efik, Ibibio, Ibo, Yakurr, English/pidgin, and the local languages were the commonly spoken. A few people had started little shops retailing household and everyday items bought from the big market at the centre of town, which had a Police Station and the branch office of the Cross River Estate Limited, the parent company of the rubber plantation mentioned above, a Postal Agency and General Hospital.

Every now and again, especially on Fridays and Saturdays, either the football field or one of the main halls of the local primary school was used by the Ministry of Information as the local cinema theatre. On its walls or on a make-shift chalky-white cloth screen, films such as the adventures of John Wayne, Robin Hood and Count Dracula were screened, interspersed with short documentary films, advertorials and commercials notably that of a certain tooth-paste, via a mounted projector casting a long beam of luminescence, sometimes for free, and other times for entertainment, with a view to public enlightenment and education of those who could afford to pay the gate fee of five pennies per person and this, always at night, from the hours of six to ten o’clock.

On each of these weekend days, five or six hours prior, there was a public awareness campaign through the streets, where the Ministry, by means of a Land-Rover truck or bus issued a limited number of free tickets. It was exciting to run after the vehicle trying to catch a ticket when they came flying out of its windows. A booming voice would be announcing which film is on show that night at a particular school. Loud martial music would blare from public address systems mounted on the roof of the said vehicle.

I often tripped and fell flat on my face or, to my tearful irritation and disappointment, would be trodden on by adults in their equally zestful scuttle after free tickets, sometimes just at the very moment when I was reaching up into space to grab one.

‘Why are adults faster and stronger, and why are some so mean?’ I often wondered, annoyed while dusting earth off my buttocks and watching helplessly the rather elusive tickets floating away into their hands. ‘Why could they not pay the gate fee at the cinemas, instead of making a fool of themselves scrambling for free tickets with kids?’ I would ask myself in frustration.

In order to dispatch my chore for that morning in time to have a few moments for play to myself before joining others for second mass, I would decide to take one of several improvised short cuts off the main road through the ever-green rubber forest commonly used for various purposes by rubber plantation workers, farmers, fishermen, hunters and for play by students like me and my friends. This was in spite of the fact that Mother had said;

Son, make sure you follow the highway and do not branch off to anywhere so as not to waste time; your auntie’s soup must not get cold otherwise its purpose will be defeated and its contents must not be spilled. You must show me that you are capable of responsibility as my first son. Now go and return as soon as possible. See, I have spit on the ground and you do not want your right hand to wither if you do not return before my spit dries. So, run along now and be careful. Okay?

Fully familiar with this spitting on the ground by adults to make kids carry out errands with dispatch or stand the risk of withered extremities. Nevertheless, and in spite of the fact that I had, resolute not to disappoint, answered; Yes Ma to my Mom’s admonishments, I knew from experience that the spitting-omen was inefficacious and so I disregarded it in the choices I made as soon as I was beyond any further adult supervision.

This shortcut incidentally also led straight to the local maternity about half a kilometre away to which I was heading and the Government primary school one and a-half kilometres away and, as I reckoned, taking it would afford me some extra time - for play!

The tropical sky was aglow with bright sunshine. Its colour so intense that even the perpetual puddles which were usually muddy- brown on the trodden path, had become tinted by the deep blue sky. The rays of the morning sun like heavenly swords knifed through the sparse spots in the canopy formed by the thousands of rubber trees. Several kinds of butterflies erratically but gracefully flapped their multi-coloured wings and perched all about in hundreds. My skin crawled and I shrank back reflexively in feverish revulsion as one grasshopper leaped on my bare neck with its prickly legs. There will be hopefully no torrential rainstorms today as happens regularly with our tropical climate and therefore, thankfully too no fallen, snake infested trees blocking the path, for we children were in much foreboding of snakes and refrained from mentioning its real name when in the forest due to the belief that it might emerge and attack when its name is mentioned. Alternatively, we referred to it as ‘rope of the forest!’

Nevertheless, I set off with a sprint in my walk and a song in my breath, holding the food flask, which was actually sky-blue three in one ceramic plates, arranged one on top of the other and held together by a tough contraption of white filmy rubber straps, which all culminated in a handle on top of everything. I was basking in this early morning tropical sunshine, refreshed by the music and chirpings of a million species of birds and insects, flourishing in the thick foliage and branches of the sequentially planted rows and rows of rubber trees.

Animals there were – a thousand species or more but they were usually a little far off from the area of the forest nearer to the camp, some of them, probably due to nature and not braveness, only stealing in during the quiet of night to chase house rodents, lizards and chickens often leaving some tell-tale marks in their wake which were discovered during the morning. And the wilder ones – rare sightings of giant lions, gorillas and other apes and nameless beasts, these most likely exaggerated, had been made by locals. Those, and other more common ones like the drill monkeys, chimpanzees and leopards were even farther off inside the far reaches of the forest, and only one or two tales were rife about a crazed monkey poking fun at a woman on her way to the farm, two stray monkeys mimicking and making faces at passers-by and a large python caught in a trap.

I remember one story by one of the camp kids. The story has it that a long time before the civil war, a certain farmer had on a morning of weeding of her farm found a newly born baby chimp caught in a cluster of thorny bushes and whimpering faintly. She had rescued the little chimp, cleaned it up, fed it her ration of soup and water and wrapped it up protectively with banana leaves laying it carefully on the grass while she continued her weeding. It was said that on her return to check on the animal she was perplexed to find it gone! Days later she had visited her farm again to find a freshly killed duiker wrapped up carefully with banana leaves and left on the same spot where she had lain the baby chimp obviously left for her to find. Such apparent act of gratitude by the parents of the baby chimp continued till the system of shifting cultivation took her away from that piece of farmland.

On one or two occasions during the holidays as Mom usually went to the market to sell her wares and Father to work in the rubber plantation, I myself had ventured as far into the forest as I could possibly get on my own, and what I experienced left me with no other need of warning to steer clear of that part of the forest when not accompanied by friends or an adult. On one such, while crossing the shallowest part of the forest stream, I had been terror struck and stood rooted to the middle of the stream when a snake swam right over my feet. It had swum past and gone on its way without harming me but I had taken this as a warning and had retraced my steps only to be stopped on my return tracks by a great multitude of crawling things much like diminutive snakes or giant worms or millipedes or centipedes - I cannot now define which. These were crossing the path from one end to the other for a horrifying forty-five minutes and my plaintive cries for help only ricocheted back and forth off the sturdy barks of the rubber trees, wasting into oblivion!

Not to talk of the day I got tricked into that part of the forest by one very mischievous Sunday - a neighbourhood kid nicknamed Babbah! He was pretending to teach me how to gather snails, and being a native and consequently very familiar with it, had asked me to wait for him under a tree as he went to relieve himself in the bush, only for him to abandon me there waiting in vain for close to an hour until a hunter friend of my father’s who had been returning home from the bushes with his catch for the day – a huge snake apparently caught in one of his many traps found me wandering about crying. But he did a lot to convince me first that the snake was dead, before I agreed to take a step home after him, and even then, I maintained a reasonable distance behind him.

Afterwards I never ventured alone farther than the fringes of the forest. I utilized this short cut now only because it was close to the main road and the camp buildings. I reckoned that someone could hear me from their house if I shouted at the top of my voice for whatever reason.

Nonetheless, as I now trudged on, I kept taking furtive glances all around just in case. I was at that time totally oblivious of the calamity that was soon to befall me. It would prove a cataclysm that would set the stage for a series of other equally catastrophic events! A cataclysm which mesmerized my relatives and friends! These events happened to me at various times as I grew up. In fact they changed my entire life and the lives of all those who were related to me, whether by blood or friendship. This one indeed charmed me beyond comprehension.

Oh! How Bizarre!

CHAPTER 2

The Mermaid Beside the Stream

Now there existed in this forest a brook. It was ancient. And, as far as the ordinary eye could see, was very shallow and narrow. Since it was running, it was drinkable by man and beast. Its deepest parts as we knew then (it was later known to be quite expansive and deep in some parts,) only reached to the hips of any average man or woman. At such places, flat pieces of felled tree trunks were laid, such that anyone who had to cross from one side to the other would take care not to wet their trousers or skirts. Fable, however, has it that: of this simple stream, which winds its way round the parts of the towns spanning Western and Central Cross River State, mainly, Akamkpa, Uyanga, Akpet, Agwagwune and Yakurr, no one had ever traced its source save for a trickling from a huge black boulder of rock. This rock is said to be endowed with a mysterious power that incapacitated any radio equipment brought within range of it. And the stream issuing from its puzzling fissures lacked any point of draining into any bigger river or sea.

– I think it must have meandered its way endlessly all over those towns and finally curled around and backwards emptying directly unto its own self at some point. All explorers, both local and foreign, who had made attempts in the past, were said to have vanished! Disappeared into thin air forever without leaving a clue as to their whereabouts! And scientists are still at a loss over its mysterious, radio-signal diminishing power. One such explorer, an expatriate European, boasting that he had swum bigger and much deeper waters in his hometown, had dived into the stream in-spite of severe warnings from locals about the deceptive crystal-clearness of the waters. So clear, that one could see the sandy floor of the stream even at night. That dive was to be his last, as he was never seen again to this day.

The stream and its surrounding marshes are inhabited by several species of aquatic and other life - reptiles including crocodiles, iguanas, snakes and a plethora of different breeds of fish, eels, crabs, periwinkles, and crayfish. The stream also mysteriously changes colour; turning black in the daytime, but becoming clear crystal at night. It also like a spa simmers hot in some parts, at different times.

My older cousins said that their older cousins had told them that this stream was the issue of blood from a prehistoric Giant female Gorilla who had had a miscarriage - probably after being pinned to some pre-historic tree and poked at by several rogue gorillas. That was several ages before the great, great grandparents of our great, great grandparents were born. These waters were also rumoured to be a potent cure of leprosy and epilepsy if sufferers succeeded in finding, and employing the services of the genuine but elusive Priestess of Lokpoi Loganga as the Brook is called.

It is also strongly and widely accepted and believed that many of the tribes located in the central; (including our own Umor-Otutu,) western and one or two in the northern parts of Cross River State trace their descent from the surrounding fertile lands, and their protective deities, from a broomstick wielding, pot carrying water goddess who was said to abide in the depths of this same stream.

It was by the side of this same small stream narrow and shallow, but running and drinkable by man and beast that I, Okagbeng Odem-Eteti of Umor-Otutu saw, and experienced on that fateful early Sunday morning, on my way to give victuals to my Aunt Eniwen, what I had hitherto, only heard of in stories and fables.

As always, I had approached this particular part of the short cut nearest to the stream with a cautious rumbling as if the butterflies were fluttering in my stomach, which was accentuated that day, more so, because I was alone! No noisy school companions chattering about how much the teacher’s whip stung, how Arikpo had been beaten-up in a school fight by a girl, or whose mother had served soured mgbolo i.e. watery soup to her European guests last Christmas! No palm wine tapper whistling by on his bicycle with his huge hernia swinging left right, left right as he pedalled along! No! No one but me, only me and the stirring music of chirping insects and singing birds and the vague notion of a chimpanzee raping a woman far, far away. Yes, my stomach always seemed to contain loose water anytime I find myself in certain lonely circumstances…!

Like one school day morning, standing around the outdoor cooking spot behind our house with my two younger siblings, I had accidentally pushed Oblantamna unto that accursed kettle of boiling water set on a three-legged iron stand, and there had been screams and shouting. Mother had lugged Oblantamna on her back crying for her child and asking God to have mercy.

Ewo nwam-oo! Chineke merem ebere-ooh!

She had cried, as she dragged Etengwen by the hand and hurried off to the hospital because the boiling water had scalded the little one all over one side of her face and neck, the scars of which she still bears