THE CHOPPED OFF HEAD

This story comes from West Africa, though other versions are told around the African continent.


 A man was nearing a town in the middle of a forest, when he stumbled across something that made his blood run cold.  A man’s head, chopped off at the neck, was sitting on a tree stump up ahead.


 The traveller stopped to have a proper look.  The head had obviously been there for some time. The flesh was starting to rot, the lips were bloating, the blood around the neck had seeped into the wood, attracting a swarm of flies.


 Suddenly, the swollen lips moved.   ‘The chief did this to me,’ said the chopped-off head, ‘but I’m warning you….don’t tell anyone about me, or you’ll be in trouble.’


 The hairs on the back of the traveller’s neck stood on end.  He took a step back from the tree stump.  And then he turned and bolted!  He didn’t stop running till he came to the town.  There he stopped to catch his breath, and to cool his face at a water hole.


 ‘Are you alright?’  A woman who’d come to fill her gourd was looking at him with concern.


 ‘No,’ said the man, forgetting all about the head’s warning, ‘Someone’s been killed in the forest.  His head’s been left on a tree stump.  It’s horrible.  Someone should rescue it and give it a proper burial.’


 It was a small town!  Word about the traveller soon got to the chief, who didn’t like what he was hearing.  Imagine if the people found out he’d had one of them beheaded.  They might turn on him. He ordered his guards to fetch the traveller to his palace.


 ‘You saw a chopped-off head,’ said the chief.


 The traveller nodded.


 ‘Are you sure you were not imagining things?  Perhaps you had too much palm wine last night?’


 ‘I am sure of what I saw, your honour,’ insisted the traveller.  ‘Why, the head even spoke to me.’


 A titter went round the chief’s hut.


 ‘It spoke to you, did it?’ said the chief.  ‘And what did it say?’


 ‘I can’t remember,’ said the traveller, who was too scared and confused to think properly, ‘but I saw the lips move.  I’m sure I did.’


 ‘Whoever heard of a chopped-off head that talks,’ said the chief nervously. ‘I say you are wasting my time with lies and fairytales.’


 “I am not a liar,’ replied the traveller.  ‘I am sure the head talked.  I bet my life on it.’


 That was exactly the reaction the chief was hoping to get from the traveller.  ‘’You are willing to bet your life on it, are you?’ he said, ‘in that case, I am sending you back to the forest with my guards.  If there is a head out there, and it speaks, I’ll give you a bag of gold as a reward.  But if you’ve been making a fool of me, it will be your head that gets chopped off.’


 The traveller was escorted back to the forest by four guards, all carrying a sword and a spear.  He wasn’t at all worried about losing his head.  After all, he knew there was a head there, and he had definitely heard it talk, although he still couldn’t remember what it had said.


 It was getting dark by the time they found the head on the tree stump.


 ‘Don’t keep us here all night,’ said one of the guards to the traveller.   ‘Make it talk.’


 The traveller reached out and touched the head.   ‘Hello, there.  Good to see you again.  I brought some friends to meet you.’


 If the head was at all pleased to see the guards, it did not show it.  Its eyes and mouth remained firmly shut.


 ‘Say good evening to my friends,’ said the traveller.


 A hint of a smile seemed to spread across the bloated lips but no words came out of the mouth.  The traveller knelt on the grass.  ‘Please, head, I need you to say something.  Just one word would be enough.’


 It got properly dark.  Hyenas howled in the distance, owls hooted, but the head refused to make a sound.   It was obvious to the guards that the traveller had been fooling them all.   The head couldn’t talk.  It was dead.


 One of the men raised his sword, and the traveller’s head rolled on the floor.    The guards left, eager to the get back to the warmth of their huts.  A full moon came out, shining down on the tree forest path.


 The head on the tree stump opened its eyes.  ‘I warned you not to tell anyone  about me,’ it sniggered at the traveller’s head on the grass.   ‘But I must say I am glad you’re here.  I was getting lonely on my own.   And if anyone else happens to come this way, there might yet be a whole group of us!  Good night