Mara and Dann (27 page)

And now Mara stood on the wide verandahs of this Mahondi house, which had once been the home of a rich Hadron, and looked across to that enormous, threatening central Tower, with the twenty-four smaller ones – small only in comparison: they were huge. Had she promised not to go there? Yes, she had, at least by implication. And how could she do anything to damage these people, her Kin, who had been so kind and who valued her? But suppose Dann was in those Towers, hiding? It must be as terrible for him as anything they had experienced together. No, more likely that he had gone North: if so, he would be back for her, she was sure of it.

Again Mara accompanied Juba to the water site. All the young men hated this duty, which was lonely and boring, and that was partly why Juba visited them. Six guards, who patrolled the rusty tangle of fencing, and their officer, who was the Mahondis' ally. These young Hadrons were not disgusting, like their elders. They were like the Rock People, and Juba said that the Hadrons had come from the south, and presumably some had decided to settle along the way. Poorly fed Rock People were still solid and big boned, but these, who fed well, were large, and smooth, and their yellowish skins shone. The glistening mass of pale hair, on soldiers, was shortened and looked like a silvery cap. They were proud of their military training and their weapons, which were mostly piles of sharpened sticks, and bows and arrows. Juba inspected them, solemnly. The officer had the weapon like a long stick, of metal, Mara had seen when she was taken to the Hadron house. Juba was careful to look at it, check it, hand it back with a stern nod, saying, ‘Very good.' This was a gun: it came from somewhere in the North, it was very old, and the traders who brought them said they would terrorise any possible
enemy. The trouble was, they had killed quite a few people, not enemies, by blowing up in the soldiers' faces.

Juba said to Mara, ‘Did you know that there were weapons once that could fire right around the world?'

‘No.' Mara was wrestling with the word, world. Her longing reached Juba, who patted her shoulder and said, ‘Don't worry, we will teach you everything we know. But as I am sure you are beginning to see, that isn't very much. And you must be prepared: it isn't easy, when you begin to learn just how little we know compared with those people – the ones who lived long ago. If they could see us they would think us savages.'

They were standing looking past the great rusty fence up to the cliff where Mara and Dann had come. The scrub right at the top made Mara think of her short brush of hair – though if she used water she could plaster it down now. She was unhappy, and it was because of Kira, her week of being with this man, and of her being pregnant. All the women were restless, and sad, like Mara. Kira sat among them, with a softness about her, a sweetness, that none of them had. Because of Mara's own unhappiness she could feel Juba's. This strong man, of whom Mara had often thought, I am sure he is like my father was – a man with a grown-up son of whom Mara had caught herself thinking, If I did agree to have a baby then it would be with Meryx – this man who seemed so calm, so self-sufficient, was staring up at the cliff top but not seeing it, because his eyes were full of tears.

He said, ‘When Dromas was pregnant I was with her all the time, and I was part of it all. And now I spend a week with a woman who is going to have my child, but I am not supposed to want more. If I had not lived the way I have, with Dromas, then I would be the kind of man who could say to Kira, Thanks, that was very nice, goodbye. But how could I be? – after living with Dromas for twenty years.'

Mara thought that ‘living with Dromas for twenty years' was like listening to a song, or a story, so far was it from her, or from anything she expected. She put her hand on his arm and said, ‘You know, Juba, there's a solution.'

‘What?' he said angrily. ‘There are things no one can change, nothing can make better – young people are like that, you think there must be a solution to everything, well there isn't. Dromas and I are – one person. And now I lie awake at night and I can't sleep because of that girl – and I don't even like her. I've never liked Kira. She's a sly, cold little piece.
Dromas has taken her bed into another room because she can't bear it. I feel as if I've been cut in two.'

For a while they stood silent, while in front of them the young men marched efficiently up and down, believing that Juba was watching them.

It was a hot day – but when was that not true? They were well into the dry season. Out on the plain the dust devils lazed by. Here, the stream that she and Dann had bathed in was lower and in places – Mara saw this with a feeling of foreboding – was not a stream, but had become a string of waterholes.

‘So what is your solution, Mara?'

‘You are fertile – you've proved it. If there were two, or three, or even more girls pregnant, then…'

‘Oh, so you see me as a sort of breeding stud?'

‘You asked.'

And now he gave her a glance so wary, so circumspect, that she cried out, ‘No, you're wrong. I know I'm ugly, I wasn't thinking…' She felt that he had hit her, this kindly man. And she had been secretly thinking, I'm really not so thin and bony now, my hair is growing…Her eyes were full of tears. And he was remorseful and this was even worse for her. ‘Mara, give yourself time. You look so much better than you did. And don't imagine you aren't attractive. I wish you weren't – I don't want the Hadrons to notice you…Very well, what do you think I should do?'

‘Some of the courtyard women are already saying they envy Kira. One or two have said they are going to ask you. Next time all the Kin are together, you should suggest it. And of course Ida is keen.' 

‘Oh, Ida…'

‘She wants me to get pregnant for her, when my flow begins.' And then at his enquiring look, ‘Oh no, no,
no
. I'm afraid. There's nothing more terrible, children dying, the babies…'

And she thought, surprised at herself, It is true, back in the Rock Village, the children and the babies dying; but it was so terrible I wouldn't let myself feel it, and so when that child died on the journey here I felt nothing. I don't want to feel, I don't want that again –
never.
And she felt now the anguish of seeing the dying babies in the Rock Village, babies being born, then dying, or surviving for a while, so that everyone watched, hoping, and then another bad dry season – and they died. The mothers' stony faces, the fathers' angry faces as they dug little graves in the hard earth, or put the corpses out for the scavengers.

Juba put his arm around Mara, and she leaned against him and most bitterly sobbed, to make up for all the tears she had held back then. And he stood, full of sorrow, and thought that this girl could never understand his grief over Dromas.

Now Kira sent a message: she demanded a full meeting of the Kin, and when they were assembled she rushed into the room propelled by furious emotion, and was checked by Candace who said, ‘Sit down, there are still some others to come.'

Kira was pouting and exclaiming, and did not sit.

‘We have problems,' said Candace, ‘serious ones.'

‘Oh, mine isn't serious, I see,' said Kira.

Then Meryx came in, with Mara: they had been inspecting the food warehouses. Ida arrived, and sat and sighed, fanning herself, and at once everyone had to look. That fan of hers, made of the feathers of a bird Mara thought must be extinct, or had gone North long ago, was like her sighs, her exclamations, her sorrow: the quick flutter near her face, the dramatic turn of the elegant, plump wrist, the click of the fan opening and shutting, the blur of colours as she fanned – she had not said a word, but everyone knew she felt betrayed because Kira was saying that she was going to keep the baby.

‘Sit down,' said Juba to Kira, who was still marching about, ironically watching Ida.

She did sit now, because it was he who had said so – she made this plain by her manner.

‘I demand,' she said, ‘to be allowed to marry Juba.' She saw the shocked and astonished faces around her and burst into tears.

Candace said, ‘Don't be so absurd. Of course Juba isn't going to marry you.'

Juba was sitting next to Dromas, who was looking strained, but she smiled.

Now Candace said to Kira, ‘You think only of yourself, Kira. Now listen.' And she outlined a plan for Juba to try to impregnate the four girls from the courtyard who had agreed to it – not merely agreed, they were now desperate to try.

Kira began to wail and shout and fling herself about. Orphne supported her up out of her chair and said, ‘Don't worry, I'll calm you down.' And Larissa joined the two, saying, ‘I think Kira should come and stay with me for a while. I'll look after you, Kira, you'll see.'

Ida said, ‘Why does Kira hate me so much?' And Candace said,
‘Obviously, because you aren't Juba. Be quiet, Ida. We have serious problems.' And almost as an afterthought added, ‘The women who want to try with Juba can arrange between themselves when and how.'

Candace's tone was such that Ida was quiet, and even her fan lay still across her knees. And Mara thought that she had never suspected that behind Candace's gentleness and kindness lay this iron will.

Meanwhile Meryx was outlining the new difficulties. When he had finished he got up to leave and beckoned Mara to go with him. Normally Mara would have just left, but now looked to Candace for permission. Candace nodded, and Mara felt the shrewd – cold? – gaze on her back.

Meryx said, ‘I'm going to ask you something – don't be angry. But please will you wear my clothes – well, any of the men's clothes when you are out? And this?' It was a little cap like those worn by the slaves. Mara turned away so he could not see her face – her hair was just beginning to be nice to look at, and she loved the pretty frocks, pink and white and green, that she wore. Meryx caught her arm and turned her around. ‘Mara,' he said, ‘I don't want…we don't want the Hadrons to notice you. Please. You are out and about all the time, everyone can see you…' She nodded, knowing he was right. He let his hand fall off her arm, took her hand and led her to his room. There he turned his back while she took off her pink dress and put on the brown top and loose trousers the men wore. Meryx turned, laughed and said, ‘Well, I would know you because – I know you.' There was no doubt he liked what he saw. ‘And the next thing will be, you'll be sending a message to my father.'

She wanted to say, Oh no, no, no, it would be you I'd ask…but the consciousness of her ugliness, which would not leave her, kept her silent. He said, with the little humorous smile that was characteristic, ‘How would you feel if you were me? It is my father who will be father to the new babies. Not me. No one expects anything of me.'

And now she did go to him, put her hands on his upper arms, daring herself to do it, and said, stumbling over it, ‘Meryx, I haven't begun my flow yet.'

‘Sweet Mara,' said Meryx. ‘Well, we'll see. Let's see how my father does.'

And with that they went out to deal with the new difficulties.

Every dry season dust blew across the plain and the dry, dead bushes bounced and whirled about the air with the dust devils; but this season was worse than anybody remembered. The milk beasts had always stayed
out during the dry months, led daily to water, and food was brought to them. But hardy as they were, used to eating unnourishing grass and thorny scrub, used to heat and dust, this year they stood together in their family groups with their backs to the blowing dust and bleated their protests. It had been decided to bring them into the big empty sheds until it rained. ‘There is one thing we aren't short of,' said Meryx, ‘ – empty buildings.' But these animals had never been confined before. They were herded into the sheds, and complained at finding a roof over them, but then saw that the great doors stood open and they could go in and out. Soon it was evident they were pleased about the shade they could escape into any time they wanted. It was lucky these beasts were used to drinking so little, with the water so low in the streams and reservoirs.

But the milk beasts' plight was a small problem compared to what had happened the week before when traders from the River Towns came as usual with their dried fish, dried meat, river fruits and vegetables, bales of cotton cloth, to exchange for ganja and poppy. While a casual glance around the great storehouses showed everything was normal, when the slaves came to pull out last year's crops, leaving this year's to mature, most of them were gone. Now these storehouses, housing the most precious commodity of Chelops, were heavily guarded, day and night, by Juba's most trusted militia. They were all Mahondis, because Juba had to keep control of what controlled the Hadrons.

Not to tell the Hadrons would be foolish, and besides by now their spies would have informed them. They had to trust Juba: everything depended on that. Yet to confess the extent of the loss must be to throw doubt on his competence. The ruling Hadrons were suspicious anyway, jumpy and ready to see plots everywhere. They knew of course about the discontent among the younger Hadrons and feared above everything they would lay their hands on the country's main source of wealth.

Juba had thought, and thought again, and consulted Dromas and Meryx, and then Mara. It was she who suggested that Juba should see the chief Hadron, and ask that the guards on the storehouses should be half Mahondi, half Hadron. This meant that any future thefts must be the responsibility of both. Juba agreed, for he had come to the same conclusion, though the plan meant the easily suborned Hadron slaves might steal the drugs.

Juba said that the chief Hadron, an old man called Lord Karam, was intelligent, even if half the time he was drug-sodden. Juba went to see
Karam, taking Meryx. Mara had hoped to go too, but the men said, You keep out of sight, Mara.