The tent was too small for so many people. Legs were stretched out to me, which I oiled without knowing to whom they belonged. The fellows enjoyed their turns. They made all the jokes that Rrattika usually come up with when a young woman oils a man. The more they drank, the louder they sang. My father filled his beaker many times. To my surprise, he knew not only every foreman, but every warrior by name. He was proud of the construction, he allowed the others to slap his shoulders and congratulate him. He insisted that I drink too. “Relax, Re Jana,” he whispered to me. “The rain is just a shower. It will take weeks for this land to flood.”
It was not until long after midnight that I could pack up my equipment. I had done everything they had asked. The wine had not made me cheerful, only dizzy. Ham noticed. He took no part in the feast. He had pulled up his tent’s curtain and watched feverishly from his quarters. I had offered him wine to relieve the pain, but his stomach would not let him consume anything except the water I fetched for him. When I got ready to go, he said, “What are you dragging your mother around for? Leave her here, we’ll look after her. She won’t suffer thirst or cold.” My mother eagerly blinked her eye when she heard his proposal, and so I left her behind with Ham.
Deep in the night, I woke up with an uneasy feeling. How could I have done this, left this beautiful woman behind in a tent where there was a feast going on? My father snored noisily next to me, his sleep a stupor I had not seen him in for a long time. I got up and went to the red tent. I stood close to the tent, about where I knew she had been. Her breathing was clearly audible. She was asleep. Around her, all was quiet. I felt reassured.
When I returned the next morning to fetch her, she had been combed and washed. There were not many people left in the tent, only Shem, slumped full length in a chair; even feverish Ham had finally left his mat.
“Who has groomed her?” I asked with the same uneasy feeling I had had during the night.
“Not me,” said Shem.
“So who did?” I asked the girls near the partition behind the women’s tent.
“None of us,” they said. In the forecourt, the warriors lay among the puddles. I prodded them until they opened their eyes and asked them who had washed my mother.
“That gorgeous thing in the corner? That willing little woman who blows without scratching? We did not really wash her, no.” They roared with laughter.
I stood over my mother. She smelled of the oil I had left with Ham. When I asked what had happened to her, she answered by turning her eye away, like a bird that spins from being hit by an arrow in the back rather than the heart.
41
My Mother’s Will
My father could not comfort her. Nor could he calm her anger. She thought the dwarf had chosen the right way. We uttered our suspicion only in whispers, we did not want her to hear. We said it while around us the almond powder blew about, scooped from my mortar by the wind. We pretended we were talking about nothing in particular, just the nuisance of the wind, but we said, “She wants to prove she still has a will: the will to die.”
My father and mother talked together for days. In their turn, they kept what they said a secret from me, me who had so often been their mouthpiece, who had always done my best to keep them close. When, on sultry afternoons, my father’s restlessness became too great and he leaned against her in despair, I had lain on her other side, stretching my arms out to him across her. With his eyes closed, he had the illusion that my fingers and hands were hers. Then he would groan at the touch until the groans turned to sobs.
She asked my father to build a papyrus boat, a long, narrow one with high bow and stern, like a gondola, the kind on which we burn the dead. He took me with him to the stores where he made his choice from the stocks of reeds. There were bundles of flexible ones for covering pens and dividing spaces, thin stems suitable for birds’ perches, but also bamboo thick as an arm, for making cages for large, dangerous species. My father built a boat from papyrus as he had done a few times already in his life: one for his mother, one for his two brothers who perished together, and one for my little brother who died at the edge of the water. He only took cover when it rained and went back to work as soon as the sun broke through.
People surrounded his structure. They did not know about the carrying power of reeds and laughed at what he was doing. Some thought it was an act of rebellion and that he was ridiculing the Builder and his warriors. But when the papyrus boat was finished, they looked at it full of admiration. None of them, seeing the gondola, thought of death.
My father asked Put and me to help him carry the boat far into the hills, near where the thick-fingered bushes grew. He had chosen the spot and prepared it. He had gathered bundles of branches and hidden a large jug of oil in the shrubs.
For the first time in his life, Put, that poor little boy who had no idea what was going on, killed a duck in flight with his slingshot. Away from people, we cooked it, keeping the lid tight on the pot so the scent would not escape. We ground the meat into a mush, adding salt and herbs.
My father held my mother close and fed her one mouthful after another. “Do you remember,” he asked, “how your ducklings took to the water?” She blinked. I had experienced it. When the ducklings she had bred were ready for the water, she got into her boat and made them come after her. The ducklings followed her into the water. My father always thought it a lovely moment, and he invariably clapped his hands. But we children had our hearts in our mouths. We knew some of the ducklings could not swim at all. Sometimes one of them would tip over. Then the awkward little thing would float upside down in the water. The eldest amongst us could handle a raft, and even if it was late and cold already, we would clamor to be allowed to go to the rescue. But my mother forbade it. She needed to know the strength of the young birds. Sometimes one of them would manage to turn itself right side up. To our great relief, its head would reappear above the water, and it would swim a little faster to catch up with its siblings. But frequently, we had to watch its efforts slow down, see the movements of its wings and legs become stiff and change into useless splashing as if something inside it had broken. Then the duckling became still, and the fish came to claim it.
Put cried when my father spoke about the past, and so did I. We plucked at our girdles, pulled our legs up high, and rested our chins on our knees. My mother settled a few more matters. She made it clear to my father that I was to have her divining rod, which was the most precious thing she owned. I dug my hands into the earth. I knew that I was waiting for a pain that went deeper than I could fathom and felt my fear rising. While waiting like that, it was hard not to repeat the old arguments: We still had my father’s truss-boat; we could manage to live in close proximity; the water might not even come.
But whenever we mentioned the water or the truss-boat in the field, even in a whisper so she would not hear, my mother’s eye would fill with fear. The rising springs, the overflowing ponds, the stones that became more and more slippery, and the hills that were so much greener than before caused her to look around anxiously. She had come here so she would never again have to be at the waterline. She had suffered the journey so she would never again be carried onto a vessel. If the whole world flooded, how could she escape? Making her wait for the waters to rise would be too cruel, and so was carrying her onto a boat or an ark.
That was why, after a long afternoon of eating and talking and silence, my father took her to the spot in the hills where he had prepared the papyrus boat. I stayed behind with Put, who stuck close to me, speechless. It was an endless wait before we saw the column of smoke rise. Wild ducks and all sorts of water birds passed, flying around the smoke in a wide arc. And the next morning, after an exhausting sleep under a ramshackle shelter, with nothing but dreams of my mother, we saw long, glistening threads hanging all over the encampment. They linked boards to rocks and palisades to trowels. They were the threads of the silkworms that my father had thrown to the wind.
“It is perfectly built,” my father sai
d later on. “It is the most beautiful papyrus boat my hands have ever produced.” Yet my mother had not wanted to be carried on it. Never again on a boat, she had made clear, not in life and not in death. He had had to lay her directly onto the pyre.
Here I did not know any places for grieving. At home in the marshes, I had places; I knew where I wanted to sit down when I learned that my grandmother was dead, and my uncles, who had died just one day apart from the injuries inflicted on them by wild boars. We each had our own spot, and we spread out knowing we would not get in each other’s way. In the Builder’s shipyard, I did not know where to go, it was so busy everywhere, and in the hills there were wild animals, and so I went to sit underneath the silkworms’ cage.
Neelata came to me almost immediately. The shrubs were low, they did not provide cover for someone tall, and so I knew she was approaching long before she found me. She carried a cushion on which she was embroidering a design of roses. She asked me if I liked it. It would be for me, she said, later, once it was finished.
She continued embroidering while I spoke about my mother. I leaned against her stretcher, which I dragged behind me out of habit. You could still see her shape, worn into it after so many years. Neelata did not look up from her task as I spoke to her. That was good: Her not looking made talking easier. I spoke about my mother’s life and what had happened to her. I said, “She blamed it all on her lack of will. She thought that, if only she had had the will, she could have stepped out of that boat to get my little brother.” Neelata let the threads slide through her fingers. I bent over, gently biting the skin on the back of my hand, and talked to my mother. I cried for her to come back.
Neelata had only just disappeared behind the shrubs when I saw Ham approach. He brought me a blanket, a comforting piece of woolen cloth, which he wrapped around me. The wool chafed my cheeks, which were wet and taut.
“Do not cry,” he said. “She has protected you from a much greater loss.”
“What loss could be greater than this?”
“A death against her will. A death that comes slowly like rising water.” The fever had left a red edge around his lips. He looked away from me as I told him about her. I knew it had been he who had washed her after that long night in the tent. He had done his best to remove the traces the warriors had left on her. He bore no guilt; the warriors had taken her away from him while he slept.
We made a memorial. Ham searched the area for a suitable stone, lifted it, and carried it to the spot I showed him. He carved a tern onto it, my mother’s lucky bird.
He took me with him into the hills. He wanted to get away from the silkworm cage, he insisted, as far as possible. Far from all our familiar spots, he erected a column of stones; there were no feathered warriors to help him. He said, “I have taken Neelata as my wife because she belongs with me. She comes from a lineage that has made our people great.” He stood behind me and wrapped his arms around me, his elbow on my breast and his hand on my neck. “But are you not my rightful wife? Have I not lain down with you long before Neelata?” He pointed at the column. “It is for you I am erecting this.” His shoulder was touching my back, but I moved away from him.
I wandered in the hills and found nothing but shy animals who looked at me indifferently. Near the thick-fingered bushes, the papyrus boat still stood, decked out, ready for the journey to the underworld, but not burned because of my mother’s will. Nowhere in the wide-reaching hills did I find a good place for grieving.
42
Contrition
After my mother’s death, my father changed into a man I no longer recognized. He mingled with the Rrattika. Warriors came to see him, men I knew had been there that night with my mother, but my father did not reach for his dagger to take revenge; by the glow of the fire under his teapot he exchanged quiet words with them. His behavior disturbed me. I thought he had lost his mind. To my alarm, he began to like the things they ate.
He became an adviser unlike any the Rrattika had ever known. He encouraged them to hatch a plan. “It is important that most people go on thinking there will be enough room for everybody,” he said. “It will need muscle power and skill to conquer a place. That is what you must prepare for.”
Only much later did I comprehend what he was up to. He had not gone mad. He deliberately allowed them to cultivate him. He did what he had not done before: He penetrated these people’s world, not because he sought company, but because he was working on a solution. He was trying to save our lives. And he was plotting revenge.
The water in the pond rose, more tents had to be moved, travelers arrived with news of flooding in faraway regions. The hills filled with water; they resembled huge sponges from which you could press fluid by simply putting your foot on them. Around us, people started hoarding anything that would float. They made rafts. They trekked long distances to gather branches, bind them together, and fit canvas around them. Others started to arm themselves excessively. They formed small militias and trained in the fields. They were the most dynamic amongst the Rrattika, people of enterprise with the courage to buck the established order. They knew that they had all undoubtedly done something that made it far from certain they would get a place on the ship.
But my father also mixed with those who did not bear arms or wear battle dress. To them he gave advice of a very different kind. He became a member of secret societies. They held meetings late at night. Together with men and women of varying backgrounds, he waxed indignant about the people who slept and slept and slept so they would not have to see the rain. We are so tired, they said, we have been working so hard. He was conspicuous with his dark skin; before long he could not cross the shipyard without being accosted ten, fifteen times. He encouraged people to sleep only during the hours of darkness. He called them to action. “Save yourselves. Do not blindly accept this fate. Be too smart for the Unnameable and force a second chance from him. Build a boat and lay in supplies.”
Even now that the ark was completed, very few understood how to do this. They still started by building a hull out of many small pieces and adding ribs and thwarts later. My father showed them it was necessary to first build the strengthening keel and that the superstructure should be fixed onto that. For the first time in his life he enjoyed the luxury of building boats from the hardest and most expensive varieties of timber, varieties he had never handled before, brought here by caravans at the orders of prominent warriors in exchange for much money and silver. He got help, lots of help, from woodworkers who, now that the ark was finished, had nothing to do. When a boat was finished, it was carried under cover of darkness to a secret place in the hills. The buyers acted discreetly. They were afraid of what the mob would do once the water came.
And my father set the example in showing contrition. He was amongst the first to don sackcloth and get rid of his last belongings. He only kept the things he had plans for: a hook, his large fyke-net, ropes, four jugs, my mother’s seamless cloak, and a funnel. But his yoke, the chest, the spears, even the pouch with the big cats’ talons, he got rid of. Some of the people in the shipyard listened to his advice and followed his example. What else could they do? Their own wise men were not much use to them. The wise men of the Rrattika, those know-it-alls, who had previously accepted valuable items in exchange for their counsel, no longer ventured out. They hid like mice creeping into their hollows and did not move. The Rrattika found support from my father because he was the only one who still spoke. They shaved their heads and put their hair into a large pile, the plaits, the frizzy hair, and the lank tresses all mixed together. Onto another pile went all their clothes, onto yet another one their footwear. The way they stood there, their thin legs sticking out from under the hair blankets, all with the same shaven skulls, they looked almost appealing, and you could not imagine that they had called a calamity down upon themselves.
The Builder witnessed the display of penance and said, “What you are doing does not show genuine contrition. You are sacrificing, you are doing what you have alway
s done for your old gods. If you were really contrite, you would not only cut off your hair, but also change your hearts. But you only cut off your hair.”
There was sadness in the singing of the workers early in the morning. They caught each other’s tones and complemented them. It was as if the hills themselves were singing plaintively. It was so beautiful I felt jealousy toward this people who, because of their common language and customs, their sense of unity and their adaptability, could survive anywhere in the world: They would always find themselves amongst their own sort and would always be at home. But their brotherliness had not done them much good. They gained no respite from the god they had chosen.
My father said, “I have worked with the Builder, but his god I am working against. I build boats for the warriors so they will survive, completely against his will. The boats are not big, but the important thing is they float. The calamity will not achieve its purpose, Re Jana, and that will be my doing.”
Ham too did penance. He renounced his place in the red tent. He no longer went to eat or sleep there, but lived like us, without a house, with only a fence to shelter against the rain and a stone to rest his head on. “I’ve come to finish the truss-boat,” he said to my father when he arrived with his pack. He provided us with as much timber as we needed.
43
The Discovery of the Truss-Boat
Shem and Japheth got wind of the fact that all over the hills boats were being built secretly. How could it be otherwise, it was practically impossible not to hear the banging of the hammers. The first to be suspected was, of course, my father. We were not surprised when, one morning, the two brothers were standing next to the truss-boat. They walked around it, examining every detail. Four cages had been constructed, two on each side. The face of the person sleeping inside and the top of the cage were less than an arm’s length apart.
In the Shadow of the Ark Page 19
