It was midnight.The little village of Susa slept in darkness in the heart of the forest farms,among the top trees.The mahoganies and sapeles stood tall in the dark sky,providing canopy over the village and deepening the density of this pitch-black night.The dying moon has done her job by providing faint light to the children who played in her glow and letter listening to stories from their grandmothers. Far behind the mammonth mountain.The children of Susa snored in their mothers bosoms.
Adu turn in his bed, coughed slightly, threw his hand about.He was a child of Susa - the village -and he too has been snoring. When he turn,his right hand fell heavily on his little sister`s face. Yaa woe up,frightened. who had hither? It was her big brother again. This was one thing she hated about him. Adu didn`t now how to sleep. At ten years she felt she was old enough to have her own bed but Birago, their mother, woundn`t hear of it.She had not only put them in one bed, but had even put the bed in her room. 'You children need watching over', she told them.
Yaa took the heavy hand from her face and flung it back to its owner. The sudden gesture woke twelve-year-old boy Adu. He grumbled an insult and stretched full length on his side of the wooden bed which creaked noisily in the silence. As he began to doze again in the little village of Susa slept on.From a distance cluster of neighboring villages, Adu heard a dog bark.Another dog howled. He ignored them. in the village, midnight was a dangerous time. It was better not to be awake or to hear noises.
It seems to Adu that he was moving away from the noises of the night, from the barking dogs,the hooting owls,and the insects.Or were the sound of the night was moving from him? He could not tell. One thing he knew : the night was bad in these parts. Nobody wanted to remember the bad frightening stories told about Susa. It was better not to know. Yet Adu was a boy who poked his nose into questions that only brave men asked.He knew more about woman Susa, the landlord`s wife who died;about her ghost who visited the village most night;about the cheetahs and lions and leopards that roamed only at night,never during the day.
To be continued.
Disclaimer,I am not the original author of this novel.
Great article and novel