Free Memoirs of a Porcupine by Alain Mabanckou

that, and answered calmly, ‘Papa Mationgo, the porcupine you saw wasn’t from Séképembé, believe
me’, and the old man faltered and gave him a long look, then said in a resigned voice, ‘I see, I see, Kibandi, my son, I see, I suspected as much, I must say, but I won’t say a word, in any case, I’m just an old wreck myself, a bit of old scrap, I don’t want any trouble with people before I leave this world, because I’m going to die any day now’

a few years later, before taking his final leave of this life, ‘Papa’ Mationgo handed over his work tools to my master, Kibandi felt as though his own father had just died all over again, at that time he was seventeen years old, and in spite of his youth, he had learned everything there was to know about roofing, he had more work than any other artisan in the neighbourhood, most of the new huts in Séképembé had roof frames made by him, and when necessary, he would go to the cemetery and stand in silence before the tomb of ‘Papa’ Mationgo, I would see him sobbing as though at the graveside of his own parent, I was only a few hundred metres away from the cemetery, I knew too, that the noise behind me was coming from my master’s other self, I didn’t turn round for fearing of meeting the eye of the creature with no mouth, the other self was getting more and more agitated, he slept in the workshop, wandered dewy-eyed along the river bank, climbed trees, I sometimes wondered how he managed to eat, since he had no mouth, and, since I had never seen him snacking, I had to conclude that either it was my master who ate for him, or that the other self must eat by means of a different orifice, I’ll leave you to guess which, my dear Baobab

for twelve years, poor Mama Kibandi had woven mats which she sold to the locals, she did quite good business, and whenever it was market day in one of the neighbouring villages, Louboulou, Kimandou, Kinkosso or Batalébé, mother and son would go with their wares, Kibandi would spend his holidays in these remote little places, with Mama Kibandi’s friends, who were traders like her, leaving me alone with his other self, I didn’t much like it when he went away, I felt it upset the harmony between us, I didn’t come out of my hiding place, I ate only the supplies my master’s other self brought me, thus nights passed, and days passed, my thoughts turned to Kibandi, not that there was any cause for worry, I knew exactly what he was doing during these absences, which lasted only a few weeks, the other self kept nothing from me, I knew, for example, that my master had had his first sexual experience in Kinkosso, with the famous Biscouri, a woman twice his age, a most curvaceous widow, with a cumbersome behind and a rather excessive appetite for virgin boys, the moment she set eyes on one, she’d bound up to him, and pester him, she was well known for it in Kinkosso, she’d hang around after him, talk sweetly to him, prepare food for him, some parents even encouraged her, but widow Biscouri didn’t
like actually to be offered a virgin boy, she liked to be able to choose her stallion herself, even if he was skinny as a rake, like my master, she had her own technique for snaring innocents, first of all she’d set up a conversation, along the lines of ‘I know your mother, boy, she’s a fine woman’, and then she’d wrap her arms around him and suddenly thrust her hand between his legs, grabbing his intimate parts and then cry ‘my god, you’ve got something there, boy, you’re set up for life with that thing’ and she’d laugh, and hastily explain ‘it’s ok, I was only joking, my boy, come on, follow me, I’ll make you our finest local dish, the ngul’mu mako ’, but people still felt that Biscouri was the least catastrophic solution to the problem of introducing a boy to sex, now my