SHE WAS AN OLD WOMAN of a family with a long genealogy. Leza Shikakunamo – “The Besetting One” – had stretched out his hand against her family. He slew her mother and her father while she was yet a child; and in the course of the years all connected with her perished. She said to herlsef, “Surely, I shall keep those who sit on my thighs” – but no, even they, the children of her children, were taken from her. She became withered with age, and it seemed to her that she herself was a last to be taken. But no, a change came over her: she grew younger. Then came into her heart a desperate resolution to find God and ask the meaning of it all. Somewhere up there in the sky must be His dwelling: if only she could reach it!

She began to cut down trees, immense, tall trees, joining them together, and so planning a structure that would reach to heaven. It grew and grew, but as it was getting to be as she wanted it, the lowest timbers rotted and it fell. She fell with it, but without being killed or breaking a bone. She set to work again and rebuilt the structure, but once again the foundations rotted and it fell. She gave it up in despair, but not her intention of finding Leza. Somewhere on earth there must be another way to heaven!

So she began to travel, going through country after country, nation after nation, always with the thought in her mind: “I shall come to where the earth ends, and there, where the earth and sky touch, I shall find a road to God, and I shall ask him, “What have I done to Thee that Thou affictest me in this manner?”

The old woman never found where the earth ends, but though disappointed, she did not give up her search. As she passed through the different countries the people asked her, “What have you come for, old woman?”

And her answer would be, “I am seeking Leza.”

“Seeking Leza! For what?”

“My brothers, you ask me! Here in the nations is there one who suffers as I have suffered?”

And they would ask again, “How have you suffered?” “In this way. I am alone. As you see me, a solitary old woman: that is how I am!”

And they answered again, “Yes, we see. That is how you are! Bereaved of friends and kindred? In what do you differ from others? Leza Shiakunamo sits on the back of every one of us, and we cannot shake him off!”

She never obtained her desire: she did died of a broken heart.

[ BAILA ]