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Authors: Ngugi wa'Thiong'o
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misleading so many angels to join him in his coup attempt because Jesus Christ was then not born.
What happened next, however, only went to confirm their fearsabout the devilish wiles of the figure before them. Even today the Soldiers of Christ swear that they never once took their eyes off him, but still they cannot explain how the figure disappeared right in front of their watchful eyes. All they know is that when they reached the street they, too, had seen the figure enter, they met so many people with similar bags that they could not tell who was whom among the hundreds pushing and shoving one another for the right of way. The Devil had vanished.
And then they remembered the tribulations of Maritha and Mariko and the same thought chilled their hearts: what if Satan had played his devilish tricks on them to pin them down in the central streets of the city while he went to Santalucia to snare Maritha and Mariko and pluck out their souls, leaving their bodies empty shells on the roadside or by some dumpsiter
They decided to go back to Santalucia. But before they had gone too far, they heard steps behind them. It was one of the garbage collectors.
“I have decided to leave the earthly brooms behind to become a cleaner of the hearts of men. I too want to become a Soldier of Christ,” he told them.
The Soldiers of Christ were amazed at what had just unfolded before them. God works in mysterious ways his wonders to perform. After days of trying without success, now, when they least expected it, in the most unlikely of places, they had just gotten their first convert. They accepted him as their new brother in Christ and they baptized him Sweeper-of-Souls.
And suddenly they saw the light of their next act and within seconds, accompanied by their new convert, they were on their way back to Santalucia, where they set up what would become a nightly candlelight vigil for the Satan who had appeared before the garbage collectors in the wilderness and later disappeared in the central business zone of Eldares. With Sweeper-of-Souls now among them, they would no longer have difficulties in identifying and then catching the Devil.
BOOK TWO
Queuing Daemons
SECTION I
1
A little dazed, his belly aching with hunger, Kamltl stood on a sidewalk to collect himself. He did not want to lie down because he feared a recurrence of what had happened to him earlier at the dumpsite. This was not the first time that he had felt himself ease out of his own body; he had had this sensation at night in the wilderness. There, in the open, lying on his back, looking at the stars and the moon, he would see himself abandoning his body for the sky as if pulled by a force intent on impressing him on the grandeur and mystery of a universe with no beginning or end. He would think of the prophets of old, Confucius, Gautama Buddha, Moses, John the Baptist, Mügo wa Kibirü, who had all retreated into the wilderness to commune, in total silence, with the law that held the universe together. Were their lives not enhanced by what they had picked up during their pilgrimage? He would roam free in the universe the whole night, endlessly fascinated by the being of things, and when he returned to his body in the morning he would feel his spirit imbued with fresh energy, ready to face another day of walking about the streets of Eldares, knocking at every door, hoping for something that would improve his life. Thus he retained hope and even looked forward to his free flights into the universe as relief from the wounds of fruitless quests. But he had never experienced in the sunlight, at a dumpsite or anywhere else for that matter, what he just underwent in the noon of day; he took it as a warning to keep away from dumpsites and take a different path. Surely the Universal Sharer, who looks after creatures that fly and those that crawl, can’t do any less for the ones made in his own image?
He saw a piece of chapati carried in the air by the breeze and followed it with
What happened next, however, only went to confirm their fearsabout the devilish wiles of the figure before them. Even today the Soldiers of Christ swear that they never once took their eyes off him, but still they cannot explain how the figure disappeared right in front of their watchful eyes. All they know is that when they reached the street they, too, had seen the figure enter, they met so many people with similar bags that they could not tell who was whom among the hundreds pushing and shoving one another for the right of way. The Devil had vanished.
And then they remembered the tribulations of Maritha and Mariko and the same thought chilled their hearts: what if Satan had played his devilish tricks on them to pin them down in the central streets of the city while he went to Santalucia to snare Maritha and Mariko and pluck out their souls, leaving their bodies empty shells on the roadside or by some dumpsiter
They decided to go back to Santalucia. But before they had gone too far, they heard steps behind them. It was one of the garbage collectors.
“I have decided to leave the earthly brooms behind to become a cleaner of the hearts of men. I too want to become a Soldier of Christ,” he told them.
The Soldiers of Christ were amazed at what had just unfolded before them. God works in mysterious ways his wonders to perform. After days of trying without success, now, when they least expected it, in the most unlikely of places, they had just gotten their first convert. They accepted him as their new brother in Christ and they baptized him Sweeper-of-Souls.
And suddenly they saw the light of their next act and within seconds, accompanied by their new convert, they were on their way back to Santalucia, where they set up what would become a nightly candlelight vigil for the Satan who had appeared before the garbage collectors in the wilderness and later disappeared in the central business zone of Eldares. With Sweeper-of-Souls now among them, they would no longer have difficulties in identifying and then catching the Devil.
BOOK TWO
Queuing Daemons
SECTION I
1
A little dazed, his belly aching with hunger, Kamltl stood on a sidewalk to collect himself. He did not want to lie down because he feared a recurrence of what had happened to him earlier at the dumpsite. This was not the first time that he had felt himself ease out of his own body; he had had this sensation at night in the wilderness. There, in the open, lying on his back, looking at the stars and the moon, he would see himself abandoning his body for the sky as if pulled by a force intent on impressing him on the grandeur and mystery of a universe with no beginning or end. He would think of the prophets of old, Confucius, Gautama Buddha, Moses, John the Baptist, Mügo wa Kibirü, who had all retreated into the wilderness to commune, in total silence, with the law that held the universe together. Were their lives not enhanced by what they had picked up during their pilgrimage? He would roam free in the universe the whole night, endlessly fascinated by the being of things, and when he returned to his body in the morning he would feel his spirit imbued with fresh energy, ready to face another day of walking about the streets of Eldares, knocking at every door, hoping for something that would improve his life. Thus he retained hope and even looked forward to his free flights into the universe as relief from the wounds of fruitless quests. But he had never experienced in the sunlight, at a dumpsite or anywhere else for that matter, what he just underwent in the noon of day; he took it as a warning to keep away from dumpsites and take a different path. Surely the Universal Sharer, who looks after creatures that fly and those that crawl, can’t do any less for the ones made in his own image?
He saw a piece of chapati carried in the air by the breeze and followed it with
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