He turned back to Fa. She was still kneeling, looking out into the clearing at the red-hot heap of wood and the sweat on her skin glistened faintly. He had a sudden and brilliant picture of himself and Fa taking the children and racing away through the clearing. He became alert. He put his head by her mouth and whispered.
“Shall we take the children now?"
She leaned away from him so that she was far enough off to see him clearly in the now dim light. She shuddered suddenly as though the moonlight that fell on the tree were wintry.
“Wait!"
The two people beneath the tree were making noises fiercely as though they were quarrelling. In particular the fat woman had begun to hoot like an owl and Lok could hear Tuami gasping like a man who fights with an animal and does not think he will win. He looked down at them and saw that Tuami was not only lying with the fat woman but eating her as well for there was black blood running from the lobe of her ear.
Lok was excited. He reached out and laid a hand on Fa but she had only to turn her eyes of stone upon him and she was immediately surrounded by that same in- comprehensible feeling, that worse than Oa feeling which he recognized but could not understand. He took his hand hurriedly from her body and began to stir with it in the leaves until he had a spy-hole that looked at the fire and the clearing. Most of the people had gone into the caves. The old man's feet were the only part of him that was to be seen resting on the sides of the hollow logs. The man who had crawled round the fire was lying on his face among the round stones that held the bee-water, and the hunter who had been on guard was still standing by the thorn fence, leaning on a stick. As Lok watched, this man began to slip down the stick until he collapsed near the thorns and lay still with the moonlight gleaming dully on his bare skin. Tanakil had gone and the crumpled women with her so that the clearing was little but a space round a dull red heap of wood.
He turned round and looked down at Tuami and the fat woman who had risen to a rowdy climax and now lay still, glistening with sweat and smelling of flesh and the honey from the stones. He glanced at Fa who was still silent and terrible and who looked at a picture that was not there in the darkness of the ivy. He dropped his eyes and automatically began to feel over the rotten wood for something to eat. But suddenly as he did so he discovered his thirst and once discovered it would not be ignored. Restlessly he peered down at Tuami and the fat woman for of all the astonishing and inexplicable events that had taken place in the clearing they were at once the most understandable and at the same time the most interesting.
Their fierce and wolf-like battle was ended. They had fought it seemed against each other, consumed each other rather than lain together so that there was blood on the woman's face and the man's shoulder. Now, the fighting done and peace restored between them, or what- ever state it was that was restored, they played together. Their play was complicated and engrossing. There was no animal on the mountain or the plain, no lithe and able creature of the bushes or forest that had the subtlety and imagination to invent games like these, nor the leisure and incessant wakefulness to play them. They hunted down pleasure as the wolves will follow and run down horses; they seemed to follow the tracks of the invisible prey, to listen, head tilted, faces concentrated and withdrawn in the pale light for the first steps of its secret approach. They sported with their pleasure when they had it fast, as a fox will play with the fat bird she has caught, postponing the death because she has the will to put off and enjoy twice over the pleasure of eating. They were silent now except for little grunts and gasps and an occasional gurgle of secret laughter from the fat woman.
A white owl swept over the tree and a moment later Lok heard his note that always sounded farther away than it was. The sight of Tuami and the fat woman was not as rousing as it had been when they fought together and they were powerless to put down the presence of his thirst. He dared not speak to Fa not only because of her strange remoteness but also because Tuami and the fat woman made so little noise now that speech was dangerous again. He became restless to take the children and run.
The fire was a very dull red and its light hardly reached to the wall of branches buds and twigs round the clearing so that they had begun to be a pattern of dark- ness against the brighter sky behind them. The ground of the clearing was so sunken in gloom that Lok had to use his night sight to see it. The fire was isolated and seemed to float. Tuami and the fat woman came from beneath the tree unsteadily and they did not walk together but made their way waist deep in shadows to separate eaves. Now the fall roared and the voices of the forest, crepitations and scuttering of unseen feet were audible. Another white owl drifted through the clearing and away across the river. Lok turned to Fa and whispered.
“Now?"
She came close. There was in her voice the same urgency and command as when she had bidden him obey her on the terrace.
“I shall take the new one and jump the thorns. When I have gone, follow." Lok thought but no picture would come.
“Likuó" Her hands tightened on his body.
“Fa says 'Do this!'" He moved quickly so that the ivy leaves brushed each other harshly.
“But Likuó"
“I have many pictures in my head."
Her hands left him. He lay in the treetop and all the pictures of the day began to spin once more. He heard her breathing pass by him and sink into the ivy that rustled again so that he looked quickly into the clearing, but no one stirred. He could just make out the old man's feet sticking out of the hollow log and the holes of deep black where the branch caves were. The fire floated, dull red for the most part, but with a brighter heart where blue flames wandered over the wood. Tuami came out of the cave, stood by the fire, looking down at it. Fa was already half out of the ivy and clinging to the thick branches in the river side of the tree. Tuami took a branch and began to rake the hot ashes together so that they sparkled and sent up a puff of smoke and winking points. The crumpled woman crept out and took the branch from him and for a moment or two they stood swaying and talking. Tuami went away into a cave and the moment after Lok heard a crash as he fell among dry leaves. He waited for the woman to go; but first she dug earth round the fire until there was nothing but a black hummock with a glowing mouth at the top. She carried a sod to the fire and dumped it on the mouth so that the grass flared and crackled while a wave of light shook out over the clearing. She stood, quivering at the end of her long shadow, the light faltered and went out. He half heard, half sensed her as she went feeling towards the cave, fell on hands and knees and crawled inside.
His night-sight came back to him. The clearing was very still again and he heard the noise of Fa's skin scraping against the old bark, of the tree as she let herself down. An immediacy of danger came to him; the knowledge that they were about to cheat these strange people and all their inscrutable works, the awful knowledge of Fa creeping towards them caught him by the throat so that he could not breathe and his heart began to shake him. He gripped the rotten wood and cowered behind the ivy with his eyes shut, seeking without knowing for those hours when the dead tree was relatively safe. The scent of Fa rose up to him from the fireward side of the tree and he shared a picture with her of a cave with a great bear standing at the mouth of it. The scent ceased to rise, the picture disappeared and he knew that she had become eyes and ears and nose crawling noiselessly towards the cave by the fire.
His heart slowed a little and his breathing so that he could look again at the clearing. The moon soared from the edge of a thick cloud and poured a grey blue light over the forest. He could see Fa, flattened by the light, clutched down to the ground and not more than twice her length from the dark mound of the fire. The cloud was succeeded by another and the clearing was full of darkness. Over by the thorns that blocked the entry to the trail he heard the guard choke and struggle to his feet. There came the sound of vomiting and then a long moan. Feelings mixed themselves in Lok. He had a half-thought that the new people might choose suddenly to be as they were; to stand up, ta
lk and be wary or infinitely knowing and secure in their strength. With this was mixed a picture of Fa not daring to run first across the log by the terrace; and this feeling of warmth and urgent desire to be with her was part of it. He moved in the ivy cup, parted the leaves towards the river and felt for the branches on the trunk. He let himself down quickly be- fore the feelings had time to change and make an obedient Lok of him; he stood in the long grass at the foot of the dead tree. Now the thought of Liku possessed him and he crept past the tree and tried to see which cave contained her. Fa was moving towards the cave on the right of the fire. Lok moved to the left, he sank on all fours and crept towards the cave that had grown beyond the logs and the pile of unsorted bundles. The hollow logs were lying where the people had left them as though they too had drunk of the honey drink and the old man's feet still stuck out of the nearer one. Lok cowered under the height of the log and sniffed cautiously at the foot above him. It had no toes or rather, now he was able to get so close to it, it was covered in hide like the peoples' waists and it smelt strongly of cow and sweat. Lok lifted his eyes above his nose and looked over the edge of the log. The old man was lying full length in it, his mouth open, and he was snoring through his thin, pointed nose. The hair prickled on Lok's body and he ducked down as though the old man's eyes had been open. He cowered in the torn earth and grass by the log, and now that his nose was adjusted to the old man, it discounted him, for there were many other bits of information coming to it. The logs, for example, were connected with the sea. The white on their sides was sea-white, bitter and evocative of beaches and the ceaseless progression of the waves. There was the smell of pine-tree gum, of a peculiarly thick and fiery sort of mud that his nose could identify as different but not name. There were the smells of many men and women and children and, finally, most obscurely but none the less powerfully, there was the smell compounded of many that had sunk beneath the threshold of separate identification into the one smell of extreme age.
Lok stilled his flesh and the pricking of his hair and crawled along by the log until he came to where the round stones had been left a little way from the hot but lightless fire. They maintained their own atmosphere, a smell so powerful that his mind could see it like a glow or a cloud round the holes in the top. The smell was like the new people, it repelled and attracted, it daunted and enticed, it was like the fat woman and at the same time like the terror of the stag and the old man. Lok was reminded of the stag so strongly that he cowered again; but he could not remember where the stag had gone nor where it came from except that it approached the clearing from behind the dead tree. He turned then, looked up and saw the dead tree with its ivy, vast, shock- headed and impending from the clouds like a cave-bear. He crawled quickly to the hut on the left. The guard over by the thorns groaned again.
Lok smelt his way along the leaning branches at the back of the cave and found a man and a man and another man. There was no smell of Liku unless a sort of generalized smell in his nostrils so faint as to be nothing but an awareness might be connected with her. Wherever he cast over the ground the awareness persisted and would not be tracked down to a source. He grew bold. He gave up his random and fruitless casting and made for the open side of the cave. First the people had set up two sticks and laid one other long stick across the top. Then they had leaned innumerable branches against the long stick so that they formed a leafy overhang in the clearing. There were three of these, one to the left, one to the right, and one between the fire and the thorns where the guard was. The cut ends of the branches had been forced into the earth in a curving line. Lok crawled to the end of the line and put his head round it cautiously. The noise of breathing and snoring that came from the shapes in- side was irregular and loud. Someone was asleep not an arm's length from his face. The someone grunted, belched, turned and an arm fell over so that the open palm of the hand brushed Lok's face. He jerked back, quivering, then leant forward and smelt the hand. It was pale, glistening slightly, helpless and innocent as Mai's hand. But it was narrower and longer and of a different colour in its fungoid whiteness.
There was a narrow space between the arm and the place where the ends of the branches slanted into the earth. The picture of Liku so maddeningly present and so hidden drove him forward. He did not know what this feeling required him to do but knew that he must do something. He began to draw his body forward slowly into the narrow space like a snake sliding into a hole. He felt breath on his face and froze. There was a face not a hand's length from his own. He could feel the tickle of the fantastic hair, could see the long, useless cliff of bony skull that prolonged the head above the eyebrows. He could see the dull gleam of an eye beneath a lid that was not tightly shut, see the irregular wolf's teeth, feel now the honey-sour breath on his cheek. Inside-Lok shared a picture of terror with Fa but outside-Lok was coldly brave and still as ice.
Lok passed his arm over the sleeping man and felt space, then leaves and earth on the other side. He put the palm of his hand firmly in the space and prepared to pass his body over on hand and foot, arching away from the sleeper. As he did so the man spoke. The words were deep in his throat as though he had no tongue and they interfered with his breathing. His chest began to rise and fall quickly. Lok whipped his arm back and crouched again. The man threshed about in the leaves; his clenched fist smacked a shower of lights out of Lok's eye. Lok shrank back and the man arched so that his belly was higher than his head. All the time the tongueless words were struggling and the arms beat about among the sloping branches. The man's head turned to Lok and he could see that his eyes were staring wide open, staring at nothing, turning with the head like the eyes of the old woman in the water. They looked through him and the fear contracted on his skin. The man was jerking his body higher and higher, the words had become a series of croaks that grew louder and louder. There was a noise coming from one of the other huts, the shrill chatter of women and then a terrified screech. The man by Lok fell over on his side, staggered up and struck away the branches so that they fell in a pile. The man staggered forward and his croaks became a shout that someone answered. Other men were struggling in the cave, knocking down the boughs and shouting. By the thorns the guard was stumbling round and fighting with shadows. A figure stood up out of the wreckage by Lok, saw the first man dimly and swung a great stick at him. All at once the darkness of the clearing was full of people who fought and screamed. Someone was kicking the sods of earth away from the fire so that a dim glow and then a burst of flame lit up the crowded ground and ring of trees. The old man was standing there, his grey hair swirling round his head and face. Fa was there, running and empty-handed. She saw the old man and swerved. A figure by Lok swung a huge stick with so much purpose that Lok grabbed it. Then he was rolling with a tangle of limbs and teeth and claws. He pulled away and the tangle went on fighting and snarling. He saw Fa rise and dive at the top of the thorns and vanish over them, saw the old man, a demented picture of hair and gleaming eyes, swing a stick with a lump on the end into the heap of struggling men. As Lok flung himself over the thorns he saw the guard fighting to get through them. He landed on his hands and ran till bushes clutched at him. He saw the guard fly past, with bent stick and twig ready, duck under the curved bough of a beech tree and disappear into the forest.
There was a fire burning brightly now in the clearing. The old man was standing by it and the other men were picking themselves up. The old man shouted and pointed until one of the men staggered to the thorns and ran after the guard. The women were crowding round the old man and the child Tanakil was among them with the backs of her hands to her eyes. The two men came running back, shouted at the old man and fought their way through the thorns into the clearing. Now Lok could see that the women were throwing branches on the fire, the branches that had made them a cave. The fat woman was there, twisting one hand over the other and wailing with the new one on her shoulder. Tuami was talking urgently to the old man, pointing to the forest and then down at the ground where the stag's head was. The fire
grew; whole sprays of leaves burst into light with an explosive crackle so that the trees of the clearing were to be seen as clearly as by day. The people crowded round the fire, keeping their backs to it, and facing outward at the darkness of the forest. They went quickly to the caves and hurried back with branches and the fire pulsed out light with each addition. They began to bring whole skins of animals and wrap them round their bodies. The fat woman had ceased to wail for she was feeding the new one. Lok could see how the women stroked him fearfully, talked to him, offered him the shells from their necks and always looked outward to the dark ring of trees that trapped the firelight. Tuami and the old man were still talking urgently to each other with much nodding. Lok felt himself secure in the darkness but under stood the impervious power of the people in the light. He called out:
The Inheritors Page 15
