Sarum (24 page)
Authors: Edward Rutherfurd
But now she found that his presence disturbed her.
Nooma, in search of something, had dived inside the hut, leaving her alone with him in the sunlight outside. As a good wife should, she offered him wheat cakes and drink and sat modestly on the ground while he ate, looking up at him only when he spoke to her the formal compliments that custom required. Even so, she felt herself blush.
Tark the riverman looked down at the mason’s young wife. She was little more than a girl. And he understood at once everything that was passing in her mind. He smiled pleasantly at her, noting once again the points about her that had first made him tell Nooma that she was the best of the girls he had seen. She was indeed, with her dark eyes and creamy skin.
Above all he felt sorry for her.
“I did this poor girl no favour when I told the mason about her,” he thought. Had she ever known passion with this squat fellow who was now bustling around in his hut looking for some stone he had picked up that he wanted to show him? He doubted it. He felt sorry for her; but there was nothing he could do now.
Just then, Nooma appeared triumphantly with his stone.
“Look,” he exclaimed as he handed Tark the little figure of the ancient hunter’s woman; “isn’t it fine workmanship?” As Tark turned the little figure over in his long fingers, and felt the firm, voluptuous curves of it, he had to agree that the mason was right.
“The carver loved his woman,” Nooma grinned, “as I love mine.” As Nooma put his arm round Katesh’s waist, Tark found that he was looking into her eyes.
Katesh looked down at once. She had not meant to look at him. And for the rest of the time that Tark was there, she kept her eyes downcast.
What was it about the tall figure that made her afraid she would blush if she looked at him again? Was it the memory of his rich voice and his far-away eyes when he had sung that night after Noo-ma-ti had been named? Was it something she had seen just then, as he paddled down the stream? Was it the fact that he was close to her now, that she knew he guessed the feelings that she had hardly even allowed herself to think?
She thought she was glad when he left.
“Isn’t he a fine fellow?” Nooma said enthusiastically, as Tark walked down to his boat.
“He is too tall,” she replied.
“Most women like him,” Nooma laughed.
“I prefer my husband,” she said, and pulled him to her.
Did she, after that day, go more often to the riverbank? She did not think she did.
It was almost a month later that Tark pulled in to the bank one afternoon to exchange a few words with her. His boat was laden with goods that he was taking up from the harbour to the henge and politely she enquired:
“Were you trading with merchants from over the sea?”
He nodded. “They brought things from many lands.”
Then he explained to her where each of the items in the boat came from: the rich cloths from the far south, the bronze knives from the north, the richly decorated belts from cunning artisans who lived in the east. She was impressed with this knowledge and the fact that he spoke of these distant places with such familiarity. Her shyness with him grew less.
“Have you been to these places?” she asked.
“Some, but not all,” he told her easily. Then, stepping out of the boat and sitting beside it on the riverbank, he gave her some account of the journeys he had made across the sea in the course of his trading, of the merchants he had met and the stories they had told him. No one had ever spoken to Katesh of such things before; she was entranced; and when he left her to continue on his way, she watched him thoughtfully until he disappeared around a bend in the river.
Often, from that day, he would pause to speak a few words to her as he passed; and as time went by, she could not help contrasting the sense of power and ease which exuded from every movement he made, and the roving life he led, with the short, jerky movements of her husband who only bustled, like a beetle, from the sarsen site to the henge and back again. As the summer days passed, she would sit by the river with Noo-ma-ti and watch the elegant swans: and when one of them stretched its great neck and, with a beating of its wings, took off so easily from the water to soar into the air, she thought of the river-trader who so calmly crossed the seas.
It was an early afternoon in mid-summer and Katesh and Noo-ma-ti were by the riverbank. Katesh had eaten some wheat cakes and fed the baby, and now he lay in her lap, his eyes closed. Katesh felt drowsy, and lifting the baby gently she placed him beside her on the ground, then stretched out herself, curling her arm round the child. The smell of the riverweed was good. The water made gentle, rippling sounds, as it flowed past below her feet. Lazily she turned her face towards the sun, which was directly above a clump of trees and closed her eyes.
She woke with a start. The sun was still high, but had moved some way from its previous position. And the baby was gone.
She looked to right and left but there was no sign of Noo-ma-ti. Quickly she inspected the riverbank. How far would the child have gone?
Beginning now to fear the worst she started to run along the bank downstream, her eyes anxiously scanning the water. But she found nothing, and with a pounding heart, and a terrible, ice-cold mind, she thought: the baby is drowned, and I shall not even find him.
Still scanning the water, she returned along the bank. Those long river weeds with their waving green tendrils could so easily drag a baby under the water and then conceal it. The pounding of her heart grew stronger as she approached the empty spot where she had been.
Then she saw him.
The baby was on the bank where he had crawled, only ten yards from the spot where she had fallen asleep. There was a small bush there and the child must have lain concealed behind it when she ran down river in her panic. But now, little Noo-ma-ti was sitting perilously on the edge of the bank, and as she watched, slowly, it seemed deliberately, he leaned forward and fell into the water. There was eddy in the current at that point, and at once, before Katesh could even move herself, it carried the baby which floated quietly, face downwards, out into the stream.
She screamed. But there was nobody there. Then she threw herself into the river.
As she frantically thrashed towards midstream, the river weeds caught her.
They were so soft, yet so insistent. They wrapped themselves around her legs, holding her back, and seemed to wish to embrace her arms. It was as though she was in one of those dreams in which, despite her will, her body was forced into slow motion. The baby was already nearly level with her, out of reach and about to glide past. She shouted frantically.
Tark’s canoe came round the bend of the river with a speed that was astonishing. He had heard the scream, and his long arms now made fast, powerful strokes with the paddle so that the light boat sped over the water. He saw everything at a glance; and as Katesh saw her baby drift past her, out of reach, the canoe rushed after it. As he came level with the child, Tark scooped it into his boat with a single gesture, and sent his canoe skimming to the bank. Moments later, having pressed the water out of the child and made sure that it was still breathing, he turned his attention to its mother, who was now struggling to get her legs disentangled from the weeds. He dived into the water and swam easily towards her with powerful strokes; in seconds, his strong arms were round her, and Katesh found herself supported and soon lifted out of the water on to the bank.
As his long, dark body came dripping out of the river, she had just time to notice the dark hairs on his arms, and the drops of water that fell from his beard as he smiled before she half ran, half clambered along the bank to her baby.
They went together up the path to the hut, and whilst she was inside wrapping the baby in a woollen shawl, Tark built up a fire in front of the hut and sat cheerfully in front of it to dry himself. He made her sit down opposite and eat. While she shivered from shock, he calmly sat watching her, the steam hissing from his leather jerkin, and when she tried to thank him, the riverman smiled down at her and laughed softly.
“The river is dangerous, Katesh, like a woman. You never know what she will do next. So be careful of her.”
He ran his hand through his long black hair and smoothed his beard. His black eyes, she saw, were watching her thoughtfully.
When he had dried himself, he rose to go. Katesh rose too. As she put out her hand to thank him, he took it gently and held it. She looked up into his face.
For the first time in her life she felt a rushing current of excitement pass through her whole body; it was more violent, more urgent than anything she had felt in her life before. She could not help herself; she trembled.
Tark said nothing, but he knew. He moved closer. She felt her lips part on her upturned face, saw his head about to swoop down upon it.
Then, to her surprise, his face looked instead to a point somewhere behind her, and, still holding her hand, he called in a friendly voice:
“Nooma, you come at a good time. Your son has been swimming!” as the little mason approached his hut from the path.
When, soon afterwards, Tark left them, Nooma turned to her and said:
“You may not like Tark, but he has saved our son’s life. He is a good man.”
Katesh herself was frightened by the effect that Tark now had upon her and she tried to put him out of her mind.
Most of the time she was successful. She stayed away from the riverbank where she might see him, and the trader though he often passed, made no efforts to seek her out.
The summer passed. Two months after the solstice, the priests ordered the harvesting to begin.
The harvesting was completed quickly in the northern valley that year, and in the final days, Katesh went to help the family of a neighbouring farmer to get the last of his corn in. Nooma was away.
The work was hard and she enjoyed it. She and the farmer’s wife took turns to sit in the shade with Noo-ma-ti and the children of the farmer who were too young to work with the adults in the field.
By early evening, the last of the fields was cleared, and all the women went to the farmhouse to prepare a meal to celebrate the completion of their work. It was just as the sun was setting and the men were coming towards the fire that a happy shout came from below the farm towards the river, and a few moments later the farmer appeared, his face wreathed in smiles.
“Look who I have found passing us on the river!” he cried. “He shall sing to us tonight.” And behind him came Tark.
Before she could stop herself, she looked at him. She had not spoken to him since the incident in the river, and now that she saw him once again, the trembling sensation that had come over her then – and which she had afterwards told herself was caused by nothing more than the shock of the occasion – now came to her again more violently than even before. Fortunately, in the shadows, and with all eyes on the riverman, no one noticed.
As the stars came out and the farmers sat round the fire, once again Tark led the singing. The men called for all kinds of songs: some bawdy, some recounting hunting feats. Once again, it was Tark who finally said softly:
“And now a lullaby.”
It was indeed a wonderful song that he loved to sing: lilting, mournful, yet soothing. And the words, Katesh thought, were so strange: for the song was more than a lullaby: it told the story of a forest long ago, full of great trees, and birds and animals; and how one day the gods tired of the noise of the forest and decided to send it to sleep: so they sent a great sea to cover it like a blanket. But although the forest slept under the sea, from time to time, the sounds of the animals living below the waters would be heard in the waves.
Sleep baby sleep:
The waters are over the forest
Sleep, pretty one sleep:
The birds are all under the sea.
What was it about that lilting melody that stirred her so deeply? Feelings, passions she had only half dreamed of, never known how to name, seemed to be spoken of in the haunting words.
“Aie,” she murmured, “it is beautiful.”
Sleep pretty one, sleep
Dreams of the forest will come to you;
Sleep pretty one, sleep
Hear the voice of the birds in the waves;
Let the birds sing you a lullaby
Sleep, baby, sleep on the waves.
His face was so strong, his body, she knew, so hard. But his faraway eyes and his voice were so gentle. Katesh rocked back and forth to the song and wondered what it meant, this strange and wonderful feeling that stirred her.
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