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delighted at my interest in the whole process, an interest that did not extend beyond a fascination for the potions, salves and elixirs she mixed and brewed as part of her profession. Of course I felt proud when she ushered me into the tiny room my father had built onto our house where she measured out her herbs and prepared her concoctions, but the pride was a part of my whole urgent need to learn, to acquire knowledge, for knowledge, as Pa-ari had said, was power. That little room was always redolent with the aroma of fragrant oils, of honey and incense and the bitter tang of crushed plants.
    My mother could neither read nor write. She worked by eye and hand, a pinch of this, a spoonful of that, as she had learned from her mother. I would sit on a stool and watch and listen, filing everything away. I continued to attend village births with her, carrying her bag and soon passing her the medicines required before she even asked for them, but my distaste for the process of parturition never left me, and, unlike her, I remained unmoved at a child’s first cry. I have often wondered if there was some serious lack in my make-up, some gentle component of femininity that did not take root when I was myself in the womb. I struggled with my guilt and tried very hard to please my mother because of it.
    I soon became aware that my mother’s work entailed more than just the task of midwife. Women slipped into our home for other reasons, some of them whispered furtively into my mother’s understanding ears. She did not discuss specific secrets with me but spoke about them in general ways.
    “An abortion may be procured by a crushed mixture of dates, onions and acanthus fruit steeped in honey and applied to the vulva,” she told me, “but I think that this treatment must be supported by a potion of harsh beer, castor oil and salt drunk at the same time as the outward salve is used. Be very careful if you are asked to prescribe for this, Thu. Many wives come to me for such a purpose without the knowledge and consent of their husbands. As my first duty is to the wives I do my best to satisfy them, but you must always be able to keep their requests to yourself. It is better to prevent conception than deal with it after the damage is done.”
    My ears pricked up at this. “How can you prevent such a happening?” I asked her, trying not to sound too eager.
    “Not easily,” she retorted, unaware of the importance of my question. “I usually suggest a thick syrup of honey and auyt gum in which acacia tips have been soaked. Crush the acacia first, and after three days, throw them away and insert the syrup into the vagina.” She gave me an oblique glance. “This can wait,” she said abruptly. “You must learn to assist the beginnings of life before you study how to prevent it. Give me the pestle resting in that dish, then go and see if your father has come in from the field and wants to wash.”
    I think that my father must have compelled her to take her own advice, for not long after this conversation with my mother I heard her and my father arguing one night when I could not sleep for the heat of Shemu. Their voices had begun as a low murmur and then risen in anger and I listened while Pa-ari snored.
    “We have a son and a daughter,” my father said sharply. “It is enough.”
    “But Pa-ari wants to be a scribe not a farmer. Who then will till the soil when you are too feeble? And as for Thu, she will marry and take the skills I am teaching her into her husband’s household.” I could hear the fear rise in her, being expressed as anger, and her tone grew shrill. “There will be no one to care for us in our old age and I would be ashamed to trust to the kindness of our friends! I obey you, my husband. I do not become pregnant. Yet I grieve for the emptiness of my womb!”
    “Hush, woman,” my father commanded in the way that prompted immediate obedience from us all. “I do not plant enough crops on my three arouras to