6.

Kanani and Faisi continually thanked God that the twins were never problem children. They had so far not received bad reports from school. In Sunday School too, the twins behaved well. In church, they sat between Kanani and Faisi who made sure that they did not run up and down the aisle like other children. The twins did not go to the toilet during the service, making grown-ups stand up, because Faisi sent them to the toilet before entering church. In fact, other parents said to their children, “Why can’t you be like the Kintu twins? They don’t disturb.”

At thirteen and fourteen Job was a bit confrontational but it was nothing that prayer wouldn’t eliminate. Hence, Kanani and Faisi did not see the Devil coming. He arrived early in 1968 and camped in the twins’ world. The twins were eleven years old at the time.

On Wednesdays, school closed at midday. Normally, the twins went back home and played outside the house until Faisi returned from sowing to open up. One Wednesday, however, the twins walked from school as they normally did but rather than turn to Naakulabye to go home, they crossed Bukesa Road and rolled down the hill until they came into the narrow valley called ewa Namalwa.

The valley was flooded. Frogs croaked among the yams. There were no houses. The twins walked past a well and stood on a dry patch near the muddy road. They looked up Makerere Hill. All they could see was bush. The track was undefined: rainwater from the university came down the track more often than people. On the left, ten minutes of walking would take them to Old Kampala, which was now considered the Indian capital. Apart from Fort Lugard, a forlorn and lonely monument for Kapere Lugard (named after Captain Fredrick Lugard—fabled for being the most stupid person the Ganda have ever met and who was responsible for children being called kapere if they were silly), there was nothing exciting in Old Kampala.

The twins turned to the right and walked toward Makerere Road. At the top of the road they stood at the junction wondering whether or not to cross it. On the other side, beyond the shrubbery, was Kiwuunya, the only place on earth that replicated hell. Every day between 8:00 a.m. and 1:00 p.m., the twins heard shrill squeals and grunts as pigs were butchered. Children at school said that pigs made a lot of noise because they did not have necks. In the evenings, the smell of death, thick and rotten, fell like a blanket over Naakulabye.

As the twins were about to go home, they saw, on their right, children from their school scurrying around a church, peering and giggling. Ruth explored first; Job was wary of churches. Ruth followed the other children to the church doors and stood still. Before her were grown men and women singing, clapping, and dancing, their piano raucous. Job joined her and he too gaped. The pianist now knocked, now tickled, now caressed the keys like a heathen playing drums. The piano grunted and squealed and whooped as if it were not European. The songs being sung were Christian, yet heathen. The twins knew all of them but in their holy versions. When a kindly woman came and led the twins inside the church, neither Ruth nor Job resisted. They sat on the pews and watched. There was no sermon. In their church, the sermon was the main course of a service. This congregation indulged mainly in singing, a side dish, sprinkled with short readings from the Scriptures. The twins expected God to empty a wrathful bowl of brimstone and fire on the church but they did not leave. It felt wrong and right at once, like stealing with your mother.

By the time the twins emerged from the church, it was the end of the school day. Faisi was already home when they arrived but she did not notice that it was Wednesday and that the twins should have been home earlier. The twins went back to Gguggudde’s Mungu ni Mwema’s Church the following Wednesday and many Wednesdays thereafter. Ruth was the first to let go. Until then, she had never realized that she owned dancing energies. Her eyes shone as she nodded, swung, and clapped. The familiarity of the songs in dance versions must have unlocked her inhibition. Job, on the other hand, was stiff. He clapped and swayed but only to egg Ruth on.

Then one Wednesday, the twins arrived at Gguggudde’s to find the congregation howling. The worshippers threw their hands in the air, pulled their hair, beating down on their thighs, wailing. Without hesitation, the twins launched themselves into crying. Even Job threw his arms in the air and had a hearty howl. Every bad deed, evil thought, and ill feeling was exorcised. It was so personal, this wailing, that the twins did not even share with each other the agonies they howled.

Finally, the piano whispered softly and the congregation calmed down. Then singing started, melodious and soothing at first, then it rose and rose until they were singing to fill the church up to the roof for the Lord. They clapped and danced with as much abandon as they had howled. Leaving Gguggudde’s that afternoon, the twins were lightheaded. For the following three years, until they went to secondary school, they sneaked into Gguggudde’s and joined in the abandonment of worshipful howling.

The Devil revealed his true intentions just after the twins sat their primary leaving exams. There was a man, Kalemanzira, a water-man who fetched water for the family. Initially, Kalemanzira annoyed the twins by claiming that the family had Tutsi roots.

“You’re too good-looking to be Ganda. Look at that slender nose,” he pointed at Ruth.

The family ignored him but Kalemanzira carried on asking, “Are you sure there is no Tutsi blood in your family? Look at Nnakato: look at that shape, those legs. Ganda women have such twisted legs that they make a ram’s horns jealous.”

“Her name is Ruth,” Faisi admonished.

“Don’t talk about her,” Job was so angry he choked.

Then one day, Kalemanzira was so tempted by Ruth’s voluptuous body he sneaked a finger to poke her bottom. Job was so incensed he picked up a stone and hurled it at Kalemanzira’s head. Kalemanzira passed out.

Kanani was paralyzed with fright.

It was Faisi who called an ambulance. After recovery, Kanani gave Kalemanzira so much money that the water-man went back to Rwanda.

Shortly after Kalemanzira’s departure, Ruth was taken to Namirembe Hospital with a fever. The rest of the family came along—Kanani to make sure that a doctor, who was a friend, saw Ruth quickly so he could go to work, Faisi to guarantee that whatever the problem she would still go sowing, and Job to be together with Ruth. Hence, all four were stunned silent when Ruth was pronounced pregnant.