The Rising Tide

by Helen Brain

  “Ebba and the rest of the council have decided to release more workers from the colony,” Leonid spits. “They’re going to Boat City to run the transport. It’s a new law. The army is running all the transport to the mainland as of right now.”

  Alexia goes pale. “Everyone’s going to lose their jobs?”

  “And their longboats,” Micah says. “The army’s confiscated them all.”

  She sinks down into the office armchair. “That’s awful. But it’s not Ebba’s fault – she wouldn’t have voted for that.”

  “I didn’t,” I say, trying not to whine. “There wasn’t even a vote. The general just announced it. I told him it was wrong and I couldn’t support him, and he said it was my fault because I wanted the workers released from the colony, so I had to shut up.”

  Micah nods. “That’s the general’s way of punishing you for appointing the Syndicate instead of the army to transport the vegetables.”

  “How does that punish Ebba?” Alexia asks.

  But I know. He’s deliberately turning everyone against me. The more people hate me, the more the pressure builds up inside me. He’s tightening the screws and waiting for me to crack.

  THE NEXT DAY I have an even bigger problem.

  It’s early evening, and the colony girls have gone back to the army barracks, marching down the driveway five abreast, feet sending up a cloud of dust. I’m in the forest collecting kindling for the fireplace when the wagon comes down the driveway and stops outside the barn. Leonid is back from market.

  I pick up my basket, and am about to run over and help him unload the crates when she crawls out from under the tarpaulin. She shakes out her long curly hair, brushes some straw off her clothes and stands there on the edge of the wagon with her big boobs and her tiny waist, her chin lifted up so she’s looking down her nose at everyone.

  Samantha-Lee.

  My heart slides down to my feet. Next to me, Isi growls.

  I want to march over there and demand to know what she’s doing on my property. I’m summoning up my courage when Micah comes round the corner. He looks around quickly but doesn’t see me among the trees. Then he’s laughing and waving and he holds out his arms and lifts her down.

  Is she kissing him?

  On the lips?

  I grab the basket of kindling and storm over to them. How dare she come to my farm and make out with my boyfriend? She barely glances my way when I drop the basket next to them and stick my hands on my hips.

  “Micah, why is she here?”

  Micah lets her go and turns to face me. “Ebba! What’s going on with you?”

  What’s going on with me? It’s them, acting like kissing on the lips is perfectly okay even if you’re in a relationship with someone else. But maybe it is? I stop, confused. Maybe the rules are different in Boat Bay. I take a step back.

  “I’m just … Why is she on my farm?”

  “Babe,” he snaps, “come on. Samantha-Lee’s one of my oldest friends. I asked her to come.”

  Samantha-Lee holds out her hand. “Pleasure to meet you at last,” she says, flashing her perfect smile. She has a dimple in her chin, and her cheek bones are even more beautiful up close. I’m painfully aware of my dirty work robe and my hair that needs a wash.

  I blush as I shake her hand. Have I been an idiot again? What must she think of me? Maybe it was just an innocent kiss.

  I know that I’m totally out of my depth. They’re both much older than me, and they’ve seen the real world. I’ve only ever known the bunker and life on Greenhaven. I’m making such a fool of myself.

  Then Micah puts his arm around me. Thank the Goddess. His arm is around me.

  “Sorry about …” I try to steady my voice. I take a deep breath. “Welcome to Greenhaven.”

  “Samantha-Lee’s come to help me with something,” Micah says. “Just for a few nights. She’ll sleep in the hayloft.”

  “I’ll be gone by the end of the week,” she says brightly. “Thanks a mill.” She saunters off after the wagon.

  “Just keep it quiet,” Micah says to me over his shoulder as he follows her. “The guards will arrest her if they find out.”

  Suddenly Isi darts down the path after them, as silent as a bullet, and nips Samantha Lee on the back of the calf. She screams.

  “Isi, no!” I screech. “Come here.” Isi slinks back, looking so remorseful I want to laugh.

  Micah is checking Samantha-Lee’s leg. “She hasn’t broken the skin,” he says. “But it’s going to be a big bruise.”

  “You should keep that dog under control,” Samantha-Lee snarls.

  “Sorry,” I call. “She’s never done that before.”

  Just put one foot wrong, I think as she disappears into the barn. Just make one move on my boyfriend and it will be far worse than a dog nipping your leg. I’ll have the guards thrash you till you bleed and then throw you into prison where you’ll rot until you’re a hideous old lady with no teeth … It’s a satisfying fantasy, but I know I could never report her. Micah would never forgive me.

  So now I’m stuck with her staying on my farm. In my hayloft.

  Far too close to my boyfriend.

  CHAPTER 15

  T empus fugit.

  Dr Iris won’t leave me alone. I go into the farm office the next morning and she’s there with a burning cigarette in her hand, her court shoe tap-tap-tapping on the floor. What does she want? What is this thing she keeps saying: Tempus fugit?

  I sit down opposite Shorty and try to ignore her standing next to the clock, glaring at me like I’m a lazy kid who isn’t running fast enough on the treadmill.

  Shorty is adding up columns in the ledger. He pushes it over to me.

  “See here, Miss Ebba? This is our income from the market yesterday. And here’s the average for the last six months. See how much our income has dropped?”

  I pull the book towards me, trying to make sense of the column he is pointing to with his stubby finger.

  “It’s because we’re feeding an extra fifty people,” he says. “They’re eating what we used to sell.”

  I bite my pencil. I saw the wagon going off to market with hardly any eggs. The milk and cream are all being used up here at Greenhaven, and we’re spending a small fortune on mealies and wheat to make bread.

  “Could you feed them cheaper food?” he asks.

  I shake my head. “I feel bad if we eat different food from them. They have to eat the same quality as we do.”

  “How long until the new lands can be harvested?” he asks. “Once the income increases from the vegetables, we should be able to cover these costs.”

  I sigh. “It’ll be at least a month. Things grow slowly in winter.”

  He turns back to his ledger, and I stare out of the window. Out of the corner of my eye I see Dr Iris shaking her head and tapping her wristwatch. The last thing I need now is some deranged ancestor nagging me in Latin.

  She goes over to the desk, opens the drawer, feels underneath it and pulls out the envelope with the key.

  My hand goes to the key hanging around my neck. It’s definitely there. But it’s also taped under the drawer? This is so crazy. But yes, she’s also got it clutched firmly in her hand. She crosses to the corner where the clock is standing behind a pile of boxes, and shoves them aside.

  Shorty doesn’t notice a thing. Can’t he see the boxes have moved? Or is this all happening in some alternative world in my head – one where an object can be in two places at once?

  She reaches up to the clock face, takes each side of the wood-and-glass top, and pulls it forward. The cover comes off, and she puts it carefully on the floor. Then she opens the glass window that covers the dial. There are two holes in the centre of the dial, and she’s turning the key in one, with a loud rasping noise. I count thirteen twists. She takes it out and inserts it into the second hole and the rasping begins again. She finishes winding and puts the cover back on the top.

  Shorty looks up. “What’s that noise?”

&nbs
p; All I can hear is Iris’s footsteps as she strides across the office and drops the key back into the drawer. “What?”

  “That ticking noise,” Shorty says, turning his head.

  Then I hear it too. A regular, soft tick-tick-tick coming from the clock.

  Shorty jumps up. “It’s the clock. How can it just start again out of the blue?”

  He pushes the boxes out of the way, fetches the chair and pulls it over to the clock. He clambers up and stands there staring at the face.

  “I’ve never noticed this before. Look, Miss Ebba – there’s a ship painted here, on the sea, and every time the clock ticks, the sails move.”

  I go over and peer at the dial.

  “See, these are Roman numerals one to twelve,” he says, running his finger in a circle around the letters. “The short hand shows the hours and the long one shows the minutes. How did it suddenly start working again after all these years? Oh, I must show Letti. She’s going to love this.”

  I’m staring at the painting above the numbers. There is a ship on the sea, with a mountain in the background. It’s Table Mountain, with Devil’s Peak on one side, and the Lion’s Head on the other.

  “Look at the date,” Shorty says. “London, 1722. And there’s something written here in Latin. Er …” He rubs his chin. “Temp …Tempus fugit. Now, let me see if I remember … what does that mean again?”

  It can’t be. It just can’t be. I rub my hands over my face to clear my eyes and look again at where Shorty is pointing.

  “Tempus is time. Time is … fugit – running. Time is running out.” He beams at me. “I knew I’d get it. My granddad used to teach me Latin when I was a kid. I must go and call Letti. It might stop working again but she has to see this. She’s going to love it.” Then he runs off towards the house calling, “Letti, Letti, my love, come here!”

  I stand back, wondering what’s going on. If Dr Iris is trying to show me there’s an amulet there, why can’t she just tell me directly instead of playing games with keys? I climb up onto the chair and run my hands over the dusty top of the clock. Nothing. Carefully, I lift off the wood-and-glass case and put it on the pile of boxes. Then I undo my necklace and take off the key.

  Shorty comes back, his cheeks pink with excitement. “Letti’s coming. What have you got there, Miss Ebba?”

  “It’s the key.” I show it to him, then carefully insert it into the first hole in the dial and turn. The same rasping noise creaks out. I do the same in the second.

  “There’s another keyhole here, Miss Ebba,” Shorty exclaims, running his hands down the side. “Why don’t you unlock it so we can see inside the door?”

  Inside are two heavy brass weights on wire pulleys, and a shining brass thing like a plate.

  “Will you take a look at that? That’s the pendulum,” Shorty says, rubbing his hands.

  Just then Letti comes running in, and Shorty grabs her hand. “Take a look at this, my love,” he says pushing her forward. “Miss Ebba found the key for this old clock.”

  Letti beams and jumps on the chair, peering at the clock face with her nose pressed right up against the glass. They’re so happy. Even the smallest things make them joyful.

  I kneel down and reach inside the clock case. There must be something at the bottom, but I can’t feel anything. I check and recheck. I run my hand down the heavy cylindrical weights and look up to see if something’s hidden where the pendulum hooks onto the frame. But there’s nothing inside.

  I ask Shorty to help me push the clock away from the wall and I check the back. Nothing there either.

  Meanwhile, Dr Iris has lit another cigarette and is staring at me. Are you such an imbecile? she says in my head.

  I’m stumped. I haven’t got the faintest idea. I don’t even know what an imbecile is, but I don’t think it’s a compliment.

  For the next few days, I’m haunted by the smell of cigarette smoke wherever I go. It’s Dr Iris trying to get me back to the office so she can torment me with her tempus fugit garbage. But I do everything to stay away. If she knows where the amulet is, she should just show it to me instead of telling me that I’m an imbecile.

  Fez has told me what the word means. She’s a rude old lady.

  A FEW DAYS LATER, I go to find kindling in the forest. Even though the holy well is not completely repaired, I still like going there. I like to imagine it’s complete, and that when I lean over the edge I can see the sky and clouds reflected against the indigo-blue base, and that the algae at the bottom still makes a map of the world. The last time I was there, its walls were partly rebuilt but the tree was still lying across it, too heavy to move.

  But when I arrive, I find that most of the tree is gone. Instead, there’s a neat pile of firewood next to the milkwood stump.

  I sit on the wall, watching the water trickling up through the bottom of the well.

  Then I smell it: cigarette smoke. Damnit. Can’t she leave me alone? I look around, but it’s Lucas who comes through the trees, carrying an axe. He’s pale, his eyes sunken, and he’s thinner than ever. Dr Iris is with him. Not clearly – I can’t even see all of her. But there’s an outline of her white doctor’s coat, and I can see glimpses of her skirt against the cream of Lucas’s robe, and a trail of cigarette smoke wisping up next to his face. What is she doing here?

  He sees me, and his face goes pale. He opens his mouth then shuts it again, turns and scuttles off into the trees.

  “Lucas!” I call. “Please don’t go. Please talk to me.”

  Small hope.

  “Leave him,” Aunty Figgy told me last time I asked her about him. “He needs time to heal. He’s lost everything – his job, his family, his home. He’s crushed. Time is a great healer.”

  But I feel useless. He’s suffering, and I can’t do anything to help him.

  When I go back to the house, Dr Iris comes with me. I can smell her cigarette smoke just over my shoulder when I reach the kitchen garden, still brooding over Lucas. Why won’t he just come inside the house, where he’ll be comfortable and warm? We’ll give him hot meals and he’ll have company. It’s not good to be alone all the time, especially when you’re heartbroken. Soon it will be winter, and he can’t stay out there through the storms and rain. It’s not safe.

  Frieda is ringing the old slave bell to call everyone to lunch. The colony girls are starting to sit down in their rows on the lawn next to the barn, and Hawa is bringing out the pile of army-issue plates. It’s embarrassing that they have to sit outside like this, but there isn’t room for everyone in the house. I wonder if it would be fairer if we all came to eat out here with them?

  I’m kicking the dirt off my shoes at the pump when I smell cigarette smoke, and I lose my temper. I hate that smell.

  “Just go away!” I snap. “Take that filthy cigarette away and leave me alone.”

  Alexia’s head pops up from behind the trellis, where she’s harvesting butternut. “What cigarette? Who are you talking to?”

  “Nobody.”

  She comes over, rubbing her hands on her tunic. “You were talking to someone. You’re really cross. Tell me.”

  “I told you. It’s nobody.”

  She’s not going to give up. “Was it an ancestor?”

  I sigh.

  “I’m right, aren’t I? It’s one of your ancestors. Have you found another amulet?”

  I tell her about the cigarettes, and Dr Iris and the clock.

  She taps the knife handle against her teeth. “But this doctor lady, Iris, she’s always there when you’re in the office?”

  “Always.”

  “And she disappears when you leave?”

  “Yes, sort of. Except for her cigarette. I smell it everywhere. And I kind of saw her in the forest, but very vaguely.”

  “So there must be an amulet in the office. Come on, Ebba – time is running out.”

  I roll my eyes at her. “Not you too.”

  “The only way to get her off your back is to give her what she wants.” She
grabs my hand and pulls me back to the office.

  The instant I go inside, Dr Iris is there, smiling her tight-lipped smile at me. Alexia goes straight for the clock. The key is still in the keyhole and she unlocks it to swing open the door.

  “Light the lamp,” she says, pointing to the oil lamp on the mantelpiece.

  I hand it to her and she holds it inside the clock case, peering at the workings of the mechanism.

  “The weights are hanging on a sort of pulley contraption.” From inside the clock, her voice sounds hollow. “There’s space to hide something small up there. Damnit, I can’t reach it. I reckon we need to take it apart and search it properly.”

  “But it might break!” I exclaim.

  “Ebba, it’s broken anyway. It’s not ticking now.”

  “That’s because you bumped the whatchamacallit,” I tell her. “The pendulum.”

  “We’ll use Jaline,” she says, blowing out the lamp. “You said she’s a brilliant engineer. She’ll be able to dismantle it and put it together again.”

  Alexia scampers off, very pleased with herself, and returns quickly with Jaline, who’s wiping her hands on her tunic. She looks around the office with her usual sneer, and I know what she’s thinking: All this belongs to you, you spoilt bitch, and now you think you’re better than us. I want to grab her and shout, “Of course I’m not better than you! I didn’t do anything to earn it.” But I’m a bit scared of her, so I don’t say anything.

  Alexia explains that we need to take the clock apart.

  “Why?” Jaline says from under her black fringe. Her eyebrows meet in the middle, making her look even fiercer.

  “We just do,” Alexia says firmly.

  Jaline must think we’re deliberately hiding something from her, which goes against everything we were taught in the colony. It’s bad enough that she and the other girls have to be marched in every morning by the army – the least I can do is treat her with some respect.

  “I think there’s a family heirloom inside,” I say gently.

  Alexia digs me in the ribs. “It’s just a letter. Not worth anything. Just sentimental, you know.”