The Lenje live in Zambia.

A man had taken a wife, and now she had the joy of being with child. But there was an acute famine.
One day, when hunger was particularly severe and the man, accompanied by his wife, was dragging himself along in the direction of her mother's home in the hope of getting a little food there, they happened to find on the road a tree with abundant wild fruit on the top.
"Wife," he said, "get up there and get some fruit!"
She refused, saying, "I am with child! How can I climb a tree?"
He said, "Well then, don't climb!"
And he himself climbed the tree. He shook the branches, and his wife picked up had fallen down.
But he said, "Don't pick up my fruit! You just refused to climb!"
She said, "But I was only picking them up."
Thinking about his fruit, the man hurried down from the top of the tree, and said, "You have eaten some of it!"
She said, "Why, I have not!"
And he came at her with his spear, and he stabbed his wife. And there, on that spot, she died.
Then the man gathered his fruit with both hands. There he is, eating the fruit, remaining there where his wife was stretched out dead.
Then, all of a sudden, he started to run! Run! Run! Run! Without stopping once, until he reached a rise.
There he slept, out of sight of the place where he had left the woman.
Meanwhile, the child that was in the womb rushed out of it, dragging its umbilical cord. First, it looked around for the direction that its father had taken, then it started singing a song:

"Father, wait for me!
Father, wait for me,
The little wombless.
Who is it who has eaten my mother?
The little wombless!
How swollen are those eyes!
Wait till the little wombless comes."

That gave him a fright.
"There," he said, "there comes a thing that is speaking." He listened, he stared in that direction. "This is the child coming to follow me after all that, after I have killed its mother. It was left in the womb." Then rage took his wit away, and he killed the little child!
And there the man is, starting anew, moving on.
And here, where the little bone of the child had been left: "Little bone, gather yourself up! Little bone, gather yourself up!"
Soon it was up again, and then came the song:

"Father, wait for me!
Father, wait for me,
The little wombless.
Who is it who has eaten my mother?
The little wombless!
How swollen are those eyes!
Wait till the little wombless comes."

The father stopped. "Again, the child that I have killed! It has risen and is coming, I'll wait for him."
So he hid and waited for the child, and he had a spear in his hand. The child came, he could be seen a short distance away. And as soon as the child came-quick with the spear! Stab it! Then the man looked for a hole, he shoveled the little body into it and heaped branches up at the entrance.
Then he ran with all speed! With all speed!
At last he reached the kraal where lived the mother of his dead wife, the grandmother of the child.
When he arrived, he sat down.
Then his brothers and sisters-in-law came with smiling faces.
"Well! Well! You have come to see us!"
"We have," he said, "come to see you."
And a house was prepared for him and his wife-she was expected.
Then his mother-in-law was heard asking from afar, "Well! And my daughter, where has she been detained?"
He said, "I have left her at home. I came alone to beg for a little food. Hunger is roaring!"
"Sit down inside there, Father."
Food was brought to him. And he began to eat. And when he had finished eating, he even went to sleep.
Meanwhile, the child had squeezed itself out of the hole it had been put into, and again, with its umbilical cord trailing behind:

"Father, wait for me!
Father, wait for me,
The little wombless!
Who is it who has eaten my mother?
The little wombless!
How swollen are those eyes!
Wait till the little wombless comes!"

The people listened to the song coming from the direction of the path.

"That thing coming along there, speaking indistinctly-what is it?"
"It seems to be a person."
"What is it?"
"It looks, man, like a child killed by you on the road!"
"And now, as we look at the way you're sitting-you seem to be only half-seated!"
"We cannot see him very well."
"It cannot be the child, Mother. It remained at home."

The man got up to shake himself a little.
And his little child, too, was coming with all speed! It was quite near now, with its mouth wide open:

"Father, wait for me!
Father, wait for me,
The little wombless!
Who is it who has killed my mother?
The little wombless!
How swollen are those eyes!
Wait till the little wombless comes!"

Everyone was staring. They said, "There comes a little red thing. It still has the umbilical cord hanging on."
Inside the house there, where the man was, there was complete silence.
Meanwhile, the child was coming on feet and buttocks, with its mouth wide open-but still at a distance from its grandmother's house.
"Just over there!" everyone said.
The grandmother looked towards the road, and noticed that the little thing was perspiring, and what speed!
Then the song:

"Father, wait for me!
Father, wait for me,
The little wombless.
Who is it who has eaten my mother?
The little wombless!
How swollen are those eyes!
Wait till the little wombless comes!"

Great Lord! It scarcely reached its grandmother's house when it jumped into it. And on the bed:

"Father, wait for me!
Father, have you come?
Yes, you have killed my mother.
How swollen are those eyes!
Wait till the little wombless comes."

Then the grandmother put this question to the man: "Now what sort of song is this child singing? Have you not killed our daughter?"
She had scarcely added, "Surround him," and he was already in their hands. His very brothers-in-law tied him. And then, all the spears were poised together in direction, everyone saying, "You are the man who killed our sister...."
Then they just threw the body away there to the west.
And the grandmother picked up her little grandchild.

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