The Burning Shore c-8 Read online

  it was almost as though Hand had divined the exact limit of her endurance, for she and O'wa were waiting for her in the rock shelter, and she smiled and chittered with pleasure as Centaine dragged herself up the slope into the cave and fell exhausted on to the floor beside the fire.

  H'ani gave her a ration of water, and while she did so, there was another lively argument between the old people which Centaine watched with interest, noticing that every time H'ani pointed at her she used the word nam.

  The gestures that the old people made were so expressive that Centaine was sure she understood the old woman wanted to stay for her sake, while O'wa wanted to go on.

  Every time H'ani pointed at her mate, she made that kissing pop of her lips. Suddenly Centaine interrupted the discussion by also pointing at the little Bushman and saying, O'wa! They both stared at her in stupefied amazement, and then with delighted squeals of glee acknowledged her accomplishment.

  O'wa! H'ani prodded her husband in the ribs, and hooted.

  O'wa! The old man slapped his own chest, and bobbed up and down with gratification.

  For the moment the argument was forgotten, as Centaine had intended, and as soon as the first excitement had passed, she pointed at the old woman, who was quick to understand her query. H'ani? she enunciated clearly.

  On the third attempt, Centaine sounded the final click to Ham's satisfaction and high delight.

  Centaine. She touched her own chest, but this precipitated shrill denials and a fluttering of hands.

  Nam Child! H'ani slapped her gently on the shoulder, and Centaine resigned herself to another christening. Nam Child! she agreed.

  So, revered old grandfather, H'ani rounded on her husband, Nam Child may be ugly, but she learns fast and she is with child. We will rest here and go on tomorrow.

  The matter is at an end! And grumbling under his breath O'wa shuffled out of the shelter, but when he came back at dusk, he carried-the fresh carcass of a half-grown seal over one shoulder, and Centaine felt so rested that she joined in the ceremony of thanksgiving, clapping with H'ani and imitating her piping cries while O'wa danced around them and the seal meat grilled over the embers.

  The ointment which H'ani had used on her injuries brought rapid results. The raw burns and blisters on her face dried up, and her skin with its Celtic pigmentation darkened to the colour of teak as it became conditioned to the sun, though she used her fingers to brush out her thick dark hair to shade as much of her face as possible.

  Each day she grew stronger as her body responded to hard work and the protein-rich diet of seafood. Soon she could really reach out with her long legs and match the pace that O'wa set, and there was no more lagging behind, or argument about early halts. For Centaine it became a matter of pride to keep up with the old couple from dawn until dusk.

  I'll show you, you old devil, she muttered to herself, fully aware of the strange antagonism which O'wa felt towards her but believing that it was her weakness and helplessness and her drag on the party that was the cause.

  one day as they were about to begin, and despite the old woman's protests, she took half the water-filled ostrich eggs from H'ani's load and slung them in her canvas shawl. Once H'ani realized her intention, she acquiesced willingly and ribbed the old man mercilessly as they set out on the day's trek.

  Nam Child carries her share, just like a woman of the San, she said, and when she had exhausted her gibes she turned all her attention to Centaine and began her instruction in earnest, pointing with her digging stick and not satisfied until Centaine had the word right or showed that she understood the lesson.

  At first Centaine was merely humouring the old woman, but soon she was delighting in each fresh discovery and the day's journey seemed lighter and swifter as her body strengthened and her understanding grew.

  What she had at first believed was a barren wasteland was instead a world teeming with strange and wonderfully adapted life.

  The kelp beds and underwater reefs were treasure houses of crustaceans and shellfish and seaworms, and occasionally the low tide left a shoal of fish trapped in a shallow rock pool, They were deep, fullbodied fish with gunmetal gleaming scales and a slightly greenish tinge to the flesh, but when split and grilled on the coals, were better than turbot.

  Once they came across a nesting colony of jackass penguins. The penguins were on a rocky island, connected to the mainland by a reef across which they waded at low tide, although Centaine had shark horrors all the way over. The thousands of black and white jackass penguins nested on the bare ground, and hissed and brayed with outrage as the Bushmen harvested the big green eggs and filled the canvas carrying bag with them. Roasted in the sand under the fire they were delicious, with transparent, jelly-like whites and bright yellow yolks, but so rich that they could only be eaten one at a time and the supply lasted many days.

  Even the shifting dunes with precipitous slip-faces of loosely running sand were the homes of sand-burrowing lizards and the venomous side-winding adders that preyed upon them. They clubbed both lizards and adders and cooked them in their scaly skins, and after Centaine had mastered her initial aversion, she found that they tasted like chicken.

  As they trekked northwards, the dunes became intermittent, no longer presenting an unbroken rampart, and between them were valleys whose bottoms were of firm earth, albeit as bare and as blasted as the dunes or the beaches. H'ani led, Centaine over the rocky ground and showed her succulent plants which exactly resembled stones. They dug beneath the tiny inconspicuous leaves and found a bloated root the size of a football.

  Centaine watched while H'ani grated the pulp of the root with her stone scraper, then took a handful of the shavings, held them high with her thumb pointed downwards like a teat on a cow's udder and squeezed. Milky liquid ran down her thumb and dribbled into her open mouth, and when she had squeezed out the last drop, she used all the remaining damp pulp to scrub her face and arms, grinning all the while with pleasure.

  Quickly Centaine followed her example. The juice was quinnine-bitter, but after the first shock of the taste, Centaine found that it slaked her thirst more effectively that water alone, and when she had scrubbed her body with the pulp, the dryness caused by wind and sun and salt was alleviated and her skin felt and looked cleaner and smoother. The effect was to make her aware of herself for the first time since the shipwreck.

  That evening as they sat around the fire waiting for the kebabs of limpets threaded on a piece of driftwood to broil, Centaine whittled a stick and with the point cleansed between her teeth, and then used her forefinger dipped in evaporated crystals of seasalt that she had scraped from the rocks to scrub them again. H'ani watched her knowingly, and after they had eaten, she came and squatted behind Centaine and crooned softly to her as she used a twig to pick the knots and tangles out of her hair, and then dressed it into tight new braids.

  Centaine woke when it was still dark to the realization that a change had taken place while she slept. Although the fire had been built up, the light was weirdly diffused, and the excited voices of H'ani and O'wa were muted as though they came from a distance. The air was cold and heavy with moisture and it took Centaine a while to realize that they were enveloped in dense fog that had rolled in from the sea during the night, H'ani was hopping with excitement and impatience.

  Come, Nam Child, hurry. Centaine's vocabulary already contained a hundred or so of the most important words of San, and she scrambled up.

  Carry. Bring. H'ani pointed at the canvas container of ostrich eggs and then picking up her own leather bag scampered away into the fog. Centaine ran after her to keep her in sight, for the world had been obliterated by the pearly fog banks.

  in the valley between the dunes H'ani dropped to her knees.

  Look, Nam Child. She seized Centaine's wrists and drew her down beside her, and pointed to the desert plant that was spread out flat against the ground. The thick smooth skin that covered the stone-like leaves chameleoned to the exact colour of the surrounding earth. Wat
er, H'anfl Centaine exclaimed delightedly. Water, Nam Child. H'ani cackled with laughter.

  The fog had condensed on the smooth leaves and had run down the slanted surface to gather in the trough-like depressions of the point where the foreshortened stems disappeared into the earth. The plant was a marvellously designed gatherer of moisture, and Centaine understood now how that bloated subterranean root was replenished at each coming of the fog.

  Quick! H'ani ordered. Sun come soon. She stood one of the empty ostrich shells upright in the soft earth and unplugged it. With a ball of animal fur she mapped up the glistening pool of dew and then squeezed it carefully into the egg-bottle. With that demonstration, she handed Centaine a wad of fur.

  Work! she ordered.

  Centaine worked as quickly as the old woman, listening to her chattering happily and understanding only an occasional word as they hurried from plant to plant.

  This is a blessing indeed, the spirits are kind to send the water-smoke from the sea. Now the crossing to the Place of All Life will be less arduous. Without the watersmoke we might have perished. They have made the road smooth for us, Nam Child, perhaps your baby will be born at the Place of All Life. What a prodigious benevolence that would be. For then your child would have the special mark of the spirits upon him for all his life, he would be the greatest of hunters, the sweetest of singers, the nimblest of dancers and the most fortunate of all his clan. Centaine did not understand, but she laughed at the old woman, feeling lighthearted and happy, and the sound of her own laughter startled her, it had been so long and she replied to the old woman's chatter in French.

  I had begun truly to hate this harsh land of yours, H'ani. After all the anticipation I had to see it, after all the wonderful things that Michel told me and all the things I had read about it, how different it all was, how cruel and how malicious. Hearing the tone of her voice, H'ani paused with the wet wad of fur poised over the egg-bottle and looked at her quizzically.

  Just now was the first time I have laughed since I have been in Africa. Centaine laughed again, and H'ani giggled with relief and returned her attention to the bottle. This day Africa has shown me its first kindness. Centaine lifted the sodden fur to her lips and sucked the cold sweet dew from it. This is a special day, H'ani, this is a special day for me and my baby. When all the egg-bottles were brimming full and carefully replugged, they indulged themselves, drinking the dew until they were satiated, and only then did Centaine look around her and begin to appreciate what the fog meant to the plants and creatures of the desert.

  Bright red ants had come up from their deep nests to take advantage of it. The worker-ants scurried from plant to plant, sucking up the droplets so that their abdomens swelled and became translucent, on the point of bursting before they disappeared back into the burrows. At the entrance to each burrow a cluster of other ants were assembled, the wedding party to see off the breeding queens and their consorts as they lifted into the foggy air on paper-white wings, fluttering off, most of them to die in the desert, but a very few of them to survive and found new colonies.

  The sand lizards had come down from the dunes to feast an the flights of ants, and there were small rodents, gingery-red in colour, that hopped down the valley floor on overdeveloped hindlegs like miniature kangaroos.

  Look, H'ani, what is this? Centaine had discovered a strange insect the size of a locust which was standing on its head in an exposed position. The dew condensed in silver droplets on its shiny iridescent armour plating, then trickled slowly down the grooves in the carapace and were channelled into the creature's hooked beak.

  Good eat, H'ani told her and popped the insect into her mouth, crunched it up and swallowed it down with relish.

  Centaine laughed at her, You dear, funny old thing. Then she looked around at the small secret life of the desert. What an enchanted land Africa is! At last I can understand a little of what Michel tried to explain to me. With an African abruptness that no longer surprised Centaine, the mood changed. The curtains of fog peeled away, the sun struck through and within minutes the gem-like droplets of dew had vanished from the stoneplants. The ants disappeared into their burrows, sealing the entrances behind them, and the sand lizards scurried back into the slippery dunes, leaving the dismembered paper wings of the flying ants they had devoured to blow idly on the small offshore wind.

  At first the lizards, still chilled by the fog, basked on the sunny front of the dunes, but within minutes the heat was oppressive and they ran across the ridges of the slipface to shelter on the shady side, Later, when the noon sun dispelled all the shadows, they would dive below the surface and swim down through it to the cooler sands beneath.

  H'ani and Centaine shouldered their carrying bags and, bowed under the weight of the egg-bottles, went down to the beach. O'wa was already at the camp and he had a dozen fat lizards impaled on a stick of driftwood, and a goodly bag of the gingery desert rats laid out on the flat stone beside the fire.

  Oh, husband, what an intrepid provider you are. H'ani laid down her carrying bag the better to praise the old man's efforts. Surely there has never been a hunter of all the San to match your skills! O'wa preened quite unashamedly at the old woman's blatant flattery, and H'ani averted her face for a moment and her eyes flashed a message to Centaine in the secret language of womankind.

  They are little boys, her smile said clearly. From eight to eighty, they remain children. And Centaine laughed again and clapped her hands and joined in H'ani's little pantomime of approbation.

  O'wa good! O'wa clever! And the old man bobbed his head and looked solemn and important.

  The moon was only four or five days from full, so that after they had eaten, it was bright enough to throw purple dark shadows below the dunes. They were all still too excited by the fog visitation to sleep, and Centaine was trying to follow and even join in the chatter of the two old San.

  Centaine had by now learned the four click sounds of the San language, as well as that glottal choke which sounded as though the speaker was being strangulated.

  However, she was still struggling to understand the tonal variations. The different tones were almost undetectable to the Western ear, and it was only in the last few days that Centaine had even become aware of their existence.

  She had puzzled over the way H'ani seemed to repeat the same word and showed exasperation when Centaine had obviously not been able to detect any difference in the pronunciations. Then, quite suddenly, as though wax plugs had been removed from her ears, Centaine had heard five distinct inflexions, high, middle, low, rising and falling, that changed not only the sense of a word but the relationship of the word to the rest of the sentence.

  It was difficult and challenging and she was sitting close to H'ani so she could watch her lips, when suddenly she let out a surprised gasp and clutched her stomach with both hands.

  It moved! Centaine's voice was filled with wonder. He moved, the baby moved! H'ani understood immediately and she reached out swiftly and lifted Centaine's brief tattered skirt and clasped her stomach. Deep in her body there was another spasm of life, Ai! Ai! shrilled H'ani. Feel him! Feel him kick like a zebra stallion! Fat little tears of joy squeezed out of her slanted Chinese eyes and as they ran down the deep corrugated wrinkles on her cheeks, they sparkled in the light of the fire and the moon. So strong, so brave and strong!

  Feel him, old grandfather. O'wa could not refuse such an invitation, and Centaine, kneeling in the firelight with her skirts lifted high over her naked lower body, felt no embarrassment at the old man's touch.

  This, announced O'wa solemnly, is a most propitious thing. It is fitting that I should dance to celebrate it. And Uwa stood up and danced in the moonlight for Centaine's unborn infant.

  The moon dipped into the dark, slumbrous sea, but already the sky over the land was turning to the colour of ripe orange at the approach of day and Centaine lay for only a few seconds after she awoke. She was surprised that the two old people still lay beside the dead ash of last night's fire, but
she left the camp hurriedly, knowing that that day's trek would begin before sunrise.

  At a discreet distance from the camp she squatted to relieve herself, then stripped off her rags and ran into the sea, gasping at the cold invigorating water as she scrubbed her body with handfuls of sand. She pulled her clothing over her wet body and ran back to the camp. The old people were still wrapped in their leather cloaks and lying so still that Centaine felt a moment of panic, but then H'ani coughed throatily and stirred.

  They are still alive, anyway, Centaine smiled and assembled her few possessions, feeling virtuous for usually H'ani had to chivvy her, but now the old woman stirred again and mumbled sleepily.

  Centaine understood only the words Wait, rest, sleep. Then H'ani subsided and pulled her cloak over her head again.

  Centaine was puzzled. She fed a few sticks to the fire and blew up a flame, then sat to wait.

  Venus, the morning star, lay on the backs of the dunes, but paled and faded at the approach of the sun, and still the two San slept on, and Centaine began to feel irritated by the inactivity. She was so strong and healthy already that she had actually been looking forward to the day's journey.

  Only when the sun cleared the tops of the dunes did H'ani sit up and yawn and belch and scratch herselfGo? Centaine used the rising tone that changed the word into a question.

  No, no, H'ani made the negative waving sign. Wait night, moon, go there. And she pointed with a quick stabbing thumb at the dunes.

  Go land? Centaine asked, not sure that she understood.

  Go land, H'ani agreed, and Centaine felt a quick thrill.

  They were going to leave the seashore at last.

  Go now? Centaine demanded impatiently.

  Twice during the last few days when they had stopped to make camp, Centaine had climbed to the top of the nearest dune and stared inland. Once she had imagined the distant outline of blue mountains against the evening sky, and she had felt her spirit summoned away from this monotonous seascape towards that mysterious interior.