A banging on the door woke him up. It was Candida.
‘So I was sleeping,’ he said, stretching himself. Sorry for wasting your time.'
‘No problem,’ she replied. Now as they were going, he said; ‘Today you are going to tell me one of those your stories’. ‘I find them very interesting you know’.
‘What’s there to tell. I have told you the most interesting ones, and besides I have already forgotten most of them. There is only one now I can clearly remember, but it’s too long and boring.
‘You’ll tell me that one; he insisted.
She shrugged.
When they were approaching the river, he pulled off his sweaters and ran ahead into the water. Candida followed him. They swam and played together, splashing water on each other like children. When they had had their fill of the water, they came to the sandy beach and sat opposite each other. The sun was fast setting behind the mangrove trees on the other side of the river. Dawson reminded her of the story.
'It’s not much of a story'; she lamented.
‘But I want to hear it, ‘he said.
‘Okay’, she gave in. 'It’s about the ‘Gold Tree and the Eagle’. Are you sure you want to hear it?'
‘But why, I’d like to hear it more than anything else. The title sounds fantastic.’
‘Ok.’ ‘Once upon a time’, started Candida, 'in a town, there lived a man called Atete. This man has six sons and a very large tree that produces gold as its fruits. He thus earn his living from selling the gold from the tree.
Now far away in another village was a king well known for his good rulership. This king has a very big eagle kept in its own cage which acts as nest. The bird was so big that it was only allowed to fly out at night. Now the bird feeds on gold. Every night the Eagle would fly to Atete’s village to feed on the gold from his tree unknown to him. But before long, he discovered that the number of fruits or gold were decreasing and wondered what it was that was stealing his precious gold. Without wasting time, he set his six sons to be watching the tree at night.
On the first night, the eldest son was assigned to watch the tree. He armed himself with a cutlass and a gun. But it wasn’t until the wee hours of the morning that the bird came with a very strong breeze created by the feathers. Already weary from lack of sleep during night and the morning cold, he fell asleep. When he was finally awake in the morning, he couldn’t tell whether anything has happened, but some of the gold had disappeared. The father was annoyed that he did not even make any effort to see what it was that had removed his precious gold.
The boy preceding the eldest son watched the tree for the following day, also without seeing anything as he too was fast asleep when the bird came. Two other sons were allowed to watch the tree in turns but they were no better than the first son and all their efforts to see and stop the intruder and thief failed. The second to the last son followed suit. He took all precautions to stop the activities of this unknown enemy. The Eagle came as usual with its strong wind, bringing a cold that nearly knocked out the boy. He struggled to stay awake but was so weak and incapacitated that he could not do anything. However he was able to see that it was a bird that was removing the fruits.
‘So it is a bird’, he said to himself after the Eagle had flown away. It finally came to the turn of the last son. Having known that it was a bird and that it usually come at the early hours of the morning with a strong wind, he settled down to prepare himself.
He obtained ground pepper mixed with water, a dagger, a loaded hand gun and a horse, for he promised his father that he must kill this bird and that if he failed to kill it, he must trace it to its owner and bring it to him. When people were already preparing for bed that night, he went and sat at the corner of their hut where he had good view of the tree. He also took along with him a handful of kolanuts and a bottle of ‘Ogogoro’, a locally brewed gin that would last him through the night blizzards.
As usual the bird came with its heavy breeze swaying the branches of the trees around as if a storm was about to burst forth. It nearly took him unaware but he immediately came to his senses and before dizziness could overtake him, he grabbed the pepper and water mixture and rubbed it on his face and soon he was jumping about fully alert. He saw the bird in time and aimed a good shot at it. Unfortunately he missed his target, and before he could shoot again the bird was gone.
Reacting like a man whose wife has been kidnapped with a nine months pregnancy, he sprang to his feet, untie the horse, jumped on it and went in the direction of the bird. Of course he could not follow it, but he did try. But it wasn’t a long time before he lost sight of the bird. He felt utterly defeated, but he told himself he must search for the bird. Later in the morning, following his own reasoning of the likely places the bird had flown, he went from one village to another asking people as he went along whether they have heard of or seen a large Eagle bird. Nobody gave him any satisfying answer. After asking, he would ride from that village to the next. He continued in this way for three days not knowing where he was going but he continued to move on. Eventually, he came to a village that was celebrating her festival. So many people had come to the festival from neigbouring villages including people from the village of the king who owned the eagle. Mosusu (for that’s the name of the boy) found himself in the midst of people enjoying themselves in a palm wine shed. After also enjoying himself in the company of these people, he approached some of the men who were already feeling high from the palm wine. By chance, he asked some of the people who had come from the village of the king. They told him the name of the village. After spending a few more minutes with them, he took out himself and loosing the horse from the tree to which he had tied it, rode straight to the village. On getting there he was led by a man to the king’s palace.
The king’s palace turn out to be a large compound surrounded by a thick wall some three meters high with a very large gate. To your left and right on entering the gate are houses of the same shape and size. Far ahead of you at the end of the compound is the biggest house facing the gate, where the king resides. This house has in its front an open conference hall where the chiefs meet. At the far end of the hall normally sat the king from where he could see any person entering the palace even before the person sees him.
As a king is normally known to be generous and hospitable, Mosusu introduced himself as a traveler going across the village and who decided to pay the king homage and also rest a while before he continue his journey.
At this stage, Candida threw a look at Dawson and said; But you know the reason why Mosusu went to the village, don’t you?
‘Sure’, he replied. ‘Do go on, am listening’.
‘Okay . So Mosusu was received into the king’s palace as a guest. He was given a room among the many rooms in the palace meant for strangers and was well taken care of. On the following day, as was the custom of the king, Mosusu was conducted round the king’s palace to see his collections. The Eagle was shown to him as one of the king’s treasures and as soon as Mosusu saw it, he immediately recognized it as the one that has continually gone to take gold from his father’s gold tree. Even some of the recent gold could be seen on the floor. Having seen what he wanted, he settled down to think how he can kidnap the bird. He found out this was not going to be easy.
Now the king had a daughter, a very beautiful girl. She was cared for by a maid. The daughter and her maid are usually the only ones allowed to feed the bird besides the king himself. This means that if he is to get to the bird, it will have to be through the girl or her maid. Going through his plan in his mind, Mosusu decided he had to get friendly with the maid. Soon he made progress and was allowed to see the king’s daughter. While he made plans to kidnap the Eagle, they met continually. Mosusu had not expected the king’s daughter to be so beautiful and the frequent contact with her soon led to his falling in love with her. Although the maid was aware of the relationship she did not show any sign of it. neither did she tell anybody about it. Every day, Mosusu would go together with the girl to feed the Eagle.
As Mosusu continue to enjoy the king’s hospitality while making his plan, little did he realize what was in store for him. Something happened that stamped dead to his plans.The king's daughter suddenly fell sick and died.