I frowned at this, confused.

“She was very loud,” he explained, taking a piece of my bread. “She laughed a lot when she was happy and shouted a lot when she was irritated. You see?”

I nodded.

“For a while, we were happy,” he said. He paused.

I waited for him to continue. I knew this was the bad part. When he just stared at his piece of bread, I said, “Well? What happened next? Did she do you wrong?”

He chuckled and I was glad, though I had asked the question in seriousness. “No, no,” he said. “The day she raced the fastest race of her life, something terrible happened. You should have seen it, Onyesonwu. It was the finals of the Rain Fest Races. She’d won this race before, but this day she was about to break the record for fastest half mile ever.”

He paused. “I was at the finish line. We all were. The ground was still slick from the heavy rain the night before. They should have given the race another day. Her camel approached, running its knock-kneed gait. It was running faster than any camel ever has.” He closed his eyes. “It took a wrong step and… tumbled.” His voice broke. “In the end, Njeri’s strong legs were her downfall. They held on and when the camel fell, she was crushed under its weight.”

I gasped, clapping my hands over my mouth.

“Had she tumbled off, she’d have lived. We’d only been married for three months.” He sighed. “The camel she was riding refused to leave her side. It went wherever her body went. Days after she was cremated, the camel died of grief. Camels all over were spitting and groaning for weeks.” He put his gloves back on and went back to his anvil. The conversation was over.

Months passed. I continued visiting him every few days. I knew I was pushing my luck with my mother. But I believed it was a risk worth taking. One day, he asked me how my day was going. “Okay,” I replied. “A lady was talking about you yesterday. She said that you were the greatest blacksmith ever and that someone named Osugbo pays you well. Does he own the House of Osugbo? I’ve always wanted to go in there.”