by Jeff Kamen
He looked jadedly around the empty kitchen, pulling at his face, scratching at the table. He got up, then sat again, then hesitated. Then went to the door to listen. Once there, he heard the man providing Cora with a graphic, if second-hand, account of the fighting. He frowned as he listened, surprised to find her displaying a keen interest in such events, her first question being to check that all of the enemy had been killed, to which the man replied that they had. He bit his lip, intrigued and a little disturbed to hear the man asking her to accompany him to a village west of the river, where a high number of casualties needed treatment; needed her help. As they continued talking, he crept back to his seat and sat pensively.
Not long afterwards, Cora returned indoors. The man was still in the garden, looking on. He nodded courteously in Moth’s direction, and then as though sensing tension in the house, he went back up the path and stood outside the gate, looking away.
Moth observed her with an empty stare. ‘You’re going with him,’ he said.
‘I think ... I think you go, too,’ she said, trying to hold his gaze. Then she faltered, lowering her eyes. ‘It is time, no?’
In the silence that followed, he started to cough, searching wretchedly for something he could say to appease her. He felt as though his life was slipping away from him and that there was nothing he could do. He was neither one thing nor another, was helpless, a creature left dangling between circumstances. ‘But I need to stay,’ he wheezed, ‘my chest ...’ He rubbed it feebly. ‘It-it still hurts. I meant to say something yesterday, but I, ah ... anyway, I don’t think I can risk it out there. I-I could easily die.’
She shook her head sadly.
‘The thing is, I haven’t been sleeping. I’ve been working hard, but I’m dizzy all the time, I’m ... please, I think I still need the gljiva. I’m sick, Cora, can’t you see? I’m still sick.’
‘Motte, why you make this hard?’
‘Just a little more time,’ he croaked. ‘Just a few more days.’
She regarded him doubtfully. ‘You still need gljiva? This true?’
‘Yes. Yes it’s true.’ He nodded at her, willing her to give in. ‘If I don’t ... if I don’t use it, then I’ll probably —’
‘Listen. Enough. You do it youself.’
‘Well, ah ... you’d need to show me.’
‘I get it now,’ she said impatiently, then went to the door and called to the visitor, warning that she was going to be a few minutes.
On returning from the storeroom, she handed him a paper wrap and listed the ingredients she added to the fungus after she’d boiled the water. To save him time, she suggested he make himself a double dose and reheat it the following day.
He nodded mechanically, scarcely taking in a word. ‘But, ah, when are you coming back?’ he said.
‘I think two or three night. I don’t know. I will ask Eva to help. Send someone for the pig.’
‘No, it ... it’s okay. I’ll do it.’
She studied his face. ‘You still count these day?’
He looked up. A new silence was growing over him, but not cold this time, not filled with brooding; a different silence. A silence like a plant casting forth its shade. ‘No,’ he said. ‘No, I don’t.’
She touched his arm lightly. ‘Good,’ she said, then left him to get on with his chores while she packed her bags.
~O~
When she returned a few days later, it was to a house swept meticulously clean, its contents well arranged, its odds and ends tidied away.
The pigs were well-fed and contented. He’d made good progress with the fence and had a meal waiting upon her arrival. ‘You, ah, had a couple of callers,’ he said, going to where he’d taken notes, and explained who the callers were and what they wanted, mentioning that in both cases it was her support, her skills as a healer. She left again in the morning and was not back for another three days, shaken and exhausted by what she’d experienced. He greeted her as before, this time with more written notes, more requests for help. She accepted them with tired grace and was soon away again.
As the days passed and the fallout of the battle reverberated through the outlying lands, she became ever more in demand, until it seemed to him that people were calling on an hourly basis. Each visitor brought their own ghastly stories of the conditions the prisoners had been forced to suffer, stories of horror and mayhem that were only bearable to hear alongside details of the heroism of those who’d fought back. Relieved to be of use, he continued to look after the house and animals in her absence, more often than not having to console her on her return. Increasingly, she came back in tears. She spoke of people dying in her arms. Tales of children butchered in the yards they’d grown up in. Of infections unresolved; the cold black cry of amputations.
At first he had no idea what to do when she wept, but as time went on he learned when to distract her with drink and food, and when to listen; when to talk with her and when to hold her in his arms.
He felt something growing inside him that he’d not known before, and as it grew, so it seemed to eclipse his ability to recall his earlier existence. The man from the underworld was now a fuzzy shadow. Faces and names he’d known for years were becoming blurred, detached from him; felt irrelevant. As if Nassgrube had retreated into myth and mist, replaced by the stronger reality of the overland. And behind these amorphous shadows, behind everything, he sensed his father wandering away from him like a stranger turned from a door; an empty-handed castaway adrift in the wilderness. A thought so uncomfortable that he shut it out altogether, focussing only on matters close at hand.
Finally, after a spate of funerals, it seemed that Cora would have a day to herself in which to recover. She was resting upstairs when a girl in a faded blue headscarf came calling, Cora known to her family from many years before, the girl explained. He called her downstairs and left them to talk, gathering as he listened that the girl lived quite some distance east of there, the request for help coming from some caves on the way to a place called Háv. The visitor was tense as she spoke and kept playing with her hands. She told Cora repeatedly that it was urgent, that they’d tried everything else, had called in doctors with no success. She said it was for a woman who’d led the attack on the bridge, a woman who was badly wounded, who needed metal fragments removing, needed the bleeding to stop. She put her case to Cora as forcefully as her gentle manner would allow, making it clear that without her assistance the woman would soon be dead.
‘Please,’ she said, when Cora asked for a moment to think about it. ‘Please. I know you’re exhausted, I can see that, but no one knows what to do.’
Moth was studying all this from the recess, having retired there to mix the pigfeed. He observed them carefully.
Cora glanced at him, then looked past the girl into the garden, muttering.
‘My mother, Elke,’ the girl said. ‘She said you’re the only one who could do it.’
‘Elke? Your mother?’
‘Yes.’
Cora looked down, then nodded. ‘I will help,’ she said, and with a gasp of thanks the girl ran out to speak to whoever had accompanied her.
By the time Cora was ready to go, clad in a long coat and boots and eyeing the weather from the front garden, Moth was busy in the orchard, debating whether to continue with making a ladder or start on waterproofing the fence. The gate was open, and he could see the girl sitting in the cart she’d travelled in, the driver at her side a wild-looking figure with braided blond hair and a forked beard, who draped an arm around her as they spoke.
When he heard Cora call for him, he could tell that something was wrong by her tone, and when he went through to the front and saw her expression, a dread coldness sat in his gut. Just when he thought they were close to some kind of understanding, it seemed he was mistaken: all she’d done was wait for the right moment to let him go.
‘What ... what is it?’ he said, struggling to smile. ‘What’s wrong?’
She set her bags on the ground; he noticed it was more than she usual
ly carried. Her eyes seemed clouded, troubled.
They exchanged a look. Both still bruised, the skin discoloured around their eyes. His dark yellow and mauve, hers slightly greener-looking on her olive skin. They looked like lovers with words to say after a terrible fight.
‘I go now,’ she said. ‘Maybe a long time, I don’t know.’
‘I, ah, I did wonder. After what she said. I expect you were —’
‘Listen,’ she said, and closed her eyes a moment. ‘I ... I have these pig here. Many thing, many job to do. You know this. You work here, yes, I see that, but I hear my daughter is gone away. Maybe she doesn’t know what happen.’ She hesitated. ‘Maybe ... maybe I ask to send a message to her. Someone else to stay when I am gone. Someone to help me, all the work. Maybe I speak to my neighbour.’
As she spoke, he felt something working in his chest. A horrid tightening sensation. ‘But ... but what about me?’ he whispered. ‘I can do all this. I-I can look after everything. I can get a message to her. Just tell me the details. Just tell me what to do.’
‘You?’
‘Yes, me. I don’t mind.’
She lifted a shoulder. ‘You don’t mind.’
‘No. No, it’s not like that. I-I want to. I want to stay. I want to be here. Here.’ He brought cupped hands to his chest. ‘Cora, that’s what I want. I don’t want to leave you. Not … not yet.’
‘Not yet.’
‘No, I … look, please let me stay. Let me think about it. Ah, just let me think about … things.’
She looked briefly towards the house, the open kitchen door. ‘Then you stay,’ she said, and then before he could answer, added, ‘but you listen me, Motte. You say you will think, yes? Then do it. Think well. You work, you do these job, but you must think hard. And then we see, when I come back.’
He nodded, brightening with hope, yet in many ways also floundering. ‘Yes, I’ll think,’ he said, ‘of course I will. Whatever you want. And I-I’ll be here, waiting. You have my word.’
She stood regarding him in thought. And as she did, and without meaning to, he kissed the unwounded side of her mouth, leaving his lips pressed there for long scalding seconds until her own lips weakly responded.
They kissed again, delicately, briefly, then broke apart.
He stared into her eyes. The unfathomable seeming for a moment somehow less so. ‘Cora,’ he whispered, ‘listen, I ...’ but she placed a finger on his lips.
‘Don’t speak,’ she said, ‘just think,’ and when she’d given him the information he needed to send word to Clareka, she walked off to the cart.
~O~
‘Who the ... what’s going on here?’ said a female voice. He stopped eating, turning to see a young fair-haired woman coming up the path.
She squinted at him myopically, then called again. By the time he’d reached the door to explain the situation, she was shoving past him and entering the kitchen. ‘What are you doing here?’ she said. ‘Where is she? Where’s Mother?’
Before he could get a word in, she started yelling into the hallway. Then she went to the passage and yelled up the stairs. He followed her, still trying to explain, only to back away again as she stormed past him and went through into the garden and checked around the side of the house.
‘Mother? Mama?’
‘Listen, please. I-I sent a message to you. To get in touch.’
‘You? Why? What’s going on?’
‘Your mother wanted me to. Ah, to know you were safe, and to tell you she was okay. Please stop, I can explain.’
‘MAMA? Where are you?’
When he caught up with her, she was staring at the washing line. Wheezing, he looked at the clothes belonging to Cora’s husband as they hung dripping, seeing them as she saw them. She turned around.
‘Look, ah …’ he protested, backing away from her as she approached, her face set in a ferocious expression he knew all too well. ‘No,’ he gasped, ‘wait, wait a minute.’
As she bore down on him, he raised his arm in self-defence, imploring her to believe him, showering her with examples of things he was doing on Cora’s behalf, even to the point of showing her the weeds he’d dug up. She stalled at this, uncertain, then followed him around the premises as he demonstrated examples of his handiwork. This seemed to calm her considerably, and after backing it up by describing his memory of her previous visit, he showed her his little room, proving to her beyond all doubt that he hadn’t taken over. As they returned to the kitchen he was relieved to notice she was observing him differently, still squinting, but now out of apparent curiosity.
Over tea, he explained how Cora had been called away ceaselessly since the terror had ended. He assured her that he was looking after the house as capably as he could manage — as well as anyone — and went on to explain that he’d sent the message she’d received via a neighbour up the valley. He suggested she call on the neighbour herself to verify his story. Then, not knowing what else to say, still detecting scepticism, he added that he and Cora were good friends.
He immediately wished he hadn’t. Her gaze became distant, mistrustful. ‘Friends?’ she said. ‘Really? She told me you were a patient.’
‘Well, ah ... you see it —’
‘She said you were ill.’ She glanced around the kitchen, as though looking more closely for signs of change, then said, ‘Just what kind of friend are you?’
He flushed darkly.
‘Well?’
He faltered, folding his arms and leaning on the table. ‘I-I, ah …’ he managed, ‘just a friend. We, ah ... we talk a lot, and ah, well, we’re quite close.’
‘Close? How old are you?’
He swallowed. ‘Well. Ah, well, I ... I’m mid—’
‘She’s thirty five. I’m nineteen. I’m her daughter.’
He shrugged miserably, hating her withering tone. ‘So?’ he said. ‘So what? Why can’t we be close?’
She sat back with both hands on her belly, studying him. After a while, she looked around the kitchen again, but this time more briefly, appearing to find nothing out of place.
‘More tea?’ he said.
‘No,’ she said. ‘Thank you, though. I’m going.’
He followed her out to where her cart was waiting. A young pony stood in the harness, grazing idly. She asked him to tell her mother to visit as soon as she could, adding that she’d be resting at home until the baby came.
‘Of course,’ he said, and helped her up to the seat, from where she looked down at him with friendly candour.
‘Sounds like you’ve been a good help to her,’ she said. ‘I’m pleased. Just make sure you keep it like that.’
‘Yes, I ... of course.’
‘Because if you hurt her, I’ll know about it. Understand?’
He nodded, chastened. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Yes. I understand.’
‘Anyway,’ she said. ‘Maybe I’ll see you again soon.’ With that she gave him a measured nod, and was soon heading away, the cart swaying in the direction of the upper valley.
~O~
All week long, the gate opened and closed and the door resounded with knocks as the stream of visitors continued.
There were neighbours and ex-patients and well-wishers of every age, and more than ever he understood the important role that Cora played in their lives. He saw it wasn’t just that she helped people: she was popular in other ways, as a friend and confidante, someone people liked to spend time with; someone they could trust and depend upon. He discovered this during conversations which at times made him feel hugely proud of her, and at others made him fear there’d be no room for him when she returned, not now that life was returning to its normal patterns.
Think, she’d said, and think he’d promised to do. Now he couldn’t stop himself. He considered her in every silence, in every moment of hope and doubt. At night, when he remembered the fleeting touch of her lips, he wanted to pull her memory around him like a blanket and remain inside it, remain in touch with her. Returning to the City began
to seem impossible; Cora was possible. Desirable. Something, he conceded, he was beginning to want more than anything.
But all the while something was nagging him. Coming to the surface. An irritant which wouldn’t go away. Just when he was preparing for her return, a whispering fear spoke that she’d decided to get rid of him after all. The voice was persistent and credible, a laughing and mischievous force. During the day, he chased it away with hard labour, and by night with wine; but unable to prevent it from entering his sleep, it came whispering repeatedly:
You men do bad, you kill. You kill the people. Our people. You stay here two week, no more. Why? I don’t know ...
He lay sweating, muttering.
You work, you eat, you sleep. Then you go ...
With a gasp he rose in his covers, thinking of her heavy bags and wondering how it was she’d known she would be away for so long. How, without having seen the patient?
He paced up and down the hall, paced around the cold floor of the kitchen. He thought of their kiss again, how unwillingly she’d responded, and began to wonder whether she’d simply taken pity on him. Was it that she was unable to face the awkwardness, the hurtful embarrassment of kicking him out? Was that it?
You a stupid boy, so I don’t kill you, I think ...
He thought of the handsome white-haired man who’d called, recalling that the first thing she’d asked him was if the enemy had been destroyed. Recalling the way she’d asked the question, too. The way a woman would about something she hated.
Think, she’d said, sighing, and in horror he realised what she’d wanted him to understand.
He tried to work as usual that day, but did not have the heart to. Instead he sat dwelling on her words, trying to draw from them anything that might back his case or argue against it, stung to think at that very moment she might be discussing the evils of his kind.
~O~
Roves and he roves and he strays about the garden aimlessly, front and back, supporting himself against the wall as he stumbles, as he begins his chores and leaves them to waste; as he stops what he cannot remember starting, walking backwards at times in periods of unprompted locomotion. Going back into the house, he finds himself gazing up the stairs, the smouldering forbidden stairs that lead up to her room, that lead to the bed pressing down through the floor upon his own. Lying there at night, he reaches up with grasping, helpless fingers. The smallest hope that she might care for him makes him shudder. She is gone and she is there and she is gone ...
