A Grain of Wheat: Chapter 12 Summary & Analysis

Gikonyo comes home in a foul mood. Mumbi notes that he has changed recently; where once he was merely distant, now he is hostile. When Gikonyo pushes Mumbi’s son to the ground, a fight erupts between them. Gikonyo calls Mumbi a “whore” and hits her hard in the face, twice. Wangari arrives and stands between them, furious at her son, and castigates him until he leaves in a fury. However, Gikonyo’s anger is not truly towards Mumbi; she only happened to be the closest and easiest person to take it out on. The MP whom he had met with to receive a loan and buy land had swindled him, stealing the land out from underneath him and purchasing it for himself.

To distract himself, Gikonyo goes to speak with Warui about the Uhuru celebrations. To Gikonyo, Warui seems happy and contented, even though he is a widower, and Gikonyo wonders if this is because he has lived a full and purposeful life. Privately, though, Warui is plagued by his own pains, most notably that his two sons have both sided with the British because of their power and wealth. In spite of this, Warui puts his hope in “the spirit of the black people” and believes that figures such as Harry Thuku or Jomo Kenyatta are imbued with “mystical power,” and that Mugo must be such a man as well. However, Gikonyo then announces Mugo’s refusal to lead, so they both elect to go meet with him once again.

Mugo has just fled his meeting with General R., Mumbi and Koina, gripped by an “irrational terror.” Somehow, Mumbi’s story hx broken through his cold, dispassionate shell and made him start to feel things again. As he walks through the village, rather than seeing mere objects that don’t concern him, each hut and person seems meaningful. What happened to Wambuku feels meaningful and tragic. Mugo revisits the part of the trench where he once worked, remembering how, as others cowered while Wambuku was being beaten to death, he found himself oddly compelled to reach out and stop the hand striking her. He was quickly arrested and accused of taking the oath, and sent to various detention camps soon after. All these feelings and reflections unnerve Mugo and he decides to return to his hut, to the safety of the “limbo” he formerly lived in.

As he walks, Mugo meets Warui in the street, who has just left a small gathering of people around the old woman’s hut. Mugo secretly dislikes Warui, though he cannot understand why. Warui tells him that the old woman has twice seen her son, Gitogo, back from the dead and entering her hut, so now she keeps her door always open so he may return. Although it sounds absurd, Warui claims he once saw a man come back from the dead himself when he was young. Mugo is disturbed by the thought of meeting the dead again and walks on. Though he tries to drive such thoughts and his guilt over Kihika from his mind, it keeps returning. Mugo wonders why, when Christ was crucified—like Kihika was “crucified”—everyone blamed Judas, who was only “a stone from the hands of a power more than man.” In his hut, Mugo has a brief vision of blood dripping down the walls, and he wonders if he is going insane.

In the evening, Mugo tells Gikonyo and Warui that his mind is “not well” and he cannot speak. The two tell him to reconsider and then leave him in peace. Warui tells Wambui about Mugo’s refusal, and together they spread the word through the village. “The man who had suffered so much had further revealed his greatness in modesty. By refusing to lead, Mugo had become a legendary hero.”

At the same time, Gikonyo walks home, his rage at the world beginning to return, intending to beat Mumbi to vent his anger. When he arrives, Mumbi is gone, but Wangari is waiting for him. She tells him that Mumbi has gone back to her parents’ house and that Gikonyo is a “foolish child” who never bothered to discover what truly happened to Mumbi, and will never “what woman Mumbi really is.”