The Burning Shore - Smith Wilbur - Страница 89

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in the river bed they quickly erected two rudimentary shelters, sticking the saplings into the sand in a circle, bending them over to meet on top and roofing one of them with branches and the other with the stiff, stinking gemsbok skin. They were the most primitive shelters, without sides and floored with river sand, but Centaine flopped gratefully into the shade and watched O'wa.

Firstly he removed the poisoned heads from his arrows, handling them with elaborate care, for a single scratch would be fatal. He wrapped each arrowhead in a scrap of raw hide and packed them into one of the pouches on his belt.

Then he began to fit the reed arrows together, sealing the joints with a ball of acacia gum, until he had a single length of hollow reeds longer than he was tall.

Help me, little flower of my life, he sweetened H'ani blatantly, and with their hands they began to dig together in the sand. To prevent the sand running back into the hole, they made it funnel-shaped, wide at the top and gradually narrowing until O'wa's head and shoulders disappeared into it, and at last he started throwing up handfuls of darker, damp sand.

Deeper still he dug, until H'ani had to hold him by the ankles while his entire body was jammed in the hole. At last, in response to muffled cries from the depths, she passed the long hollow reed down to him.

Upside down in the well, O'wa placed the open end of the reed carefully and then fitted a filter of twigs and leaves around the open end of it to prevent it becoming clogged. With both the women hauling on his ankles, they drew him out of the narrow well, and he emerged coated with orange sand. H'ani had to clean out his ears and brush it from the corms of his grey hair, and from his eyelashes.

Carefully, a handful at a time, O'wa refilled the well, leaving the filter and reed undisturbed, and when he was finished, he patted the sand down firmly, leaving a short length of the end of the reed pipe sticking out above the surface.

While O'wa put the finishing touches to his well, H'ani chose a green twig, stripped off the thorns and peeled it.

Then she helped Centaine unplug the egg-bottles and set them out in a neat row beside the well.

O'wa stretched himself out, belly down on the sand, and placed his lips over the end of the reed tube. H'ani squatted beside him attentively, the row of egg-bottles within reach and the peeled green twig in her hand.

I am ready, hunter of my heart! she told him, and O'wa began to suck.

From under her shelter Centaine watched as O'wa turned himself into a human bellows; his chest swelled and subsided, seeming to double in size with each hissing intake of air, and then Centaine could sense the impediment of a heavy load in the tube. O'wa's eyes closed tightly, disappearing behind a network of baggy wrinkles, and his face darkened with effort to the colour of toffee.

His body pumped and pulsated, he swelled like a bull frog and shrank and swelled again, straining to draw a heavy weight up the long thin reed tube.

Suddenly he made a mewing sound in his throat without breaking the rhythm of his powerful suctions, and H'ani leaned forward and gently fitted the peeled twig into the corner of his mouth. A diamond-bright drop of water bubbled out between O'wa's lips and slid down the twig; it quivered on the tip for an instant and then dropped into the egg-bottles that H'ani held below it.

Good water, singer of my soul, H'ani encouraged him. Good sweet water!

And the flow from the old man's mouth became a steady silver dribble, as he sucked it in and let it run on the exhale.

The effort required was enormous, for O'wa was lifting the water over six feet, and Centaine watched in awe as he filled one egg-bottle, then another, and still a third without pause.

H'ani squatted over him, tending him, encouraging him, adjusting the twig and the bottles, cooing to him softly, and suddenly Centaine was struck with a strange feeling of empathy for this pair of little old people. She realized how they had been forged by joy and tragedy and unremitting hardship into a union so fast and strong that they were almost a single entity. She saw how the hard years had gifted them with humour and sensitivity and simple wisdom and fortitude, but most of all with love, and she envied them without rancour.

If only, she thought, if only I could be bound to another human being as these two are bound to each other! And in that moment she realized that she had come to love them.

At last O'wa rolled away from the tube and lay gasping and panting and shaking like a marathon runner when the race is run, and H'ani brought one of the egg-bottles to Centaine. Drink, Nam Child, she offered it to Centaine.

Almost reluctantly, achingly aware of the effort that had gone into reaping each priceless drop, Centaine drank.

She drank sparingly, piously, and then handed the bottle back.

Good water, H'ani, she said. Though it was brackish and mingled with the old man's saliva, Centame now understood completely that the San definition of good water was any fluid which would sustain life in the desert.

She rose and went to where O'wa lay in the sand.

Good water, O'wa. She knelt beside him, and she saw how the effort had drained him, but he grinned up at her and bobbed his head, still too tired to rise.

Good water, Nam Child, he agreed.

Centaine unfastened the lanyard from around her waist and held the knife in both hands. it had saved her life already. It might do so again in the hard days ahead, if she kept it.

Take, O'wa, she offered it to him. Knife for O'wa. He stared at the knife, and the dark, blood-suffused tones of his wrinkled face paled, and a great devastation seemed to empty all expression from his eyes.

Take, O'wa, Centaine urged him.

It is too much, he whispered, staring at the knife with stricken eyes. It was a gift without price.

Centaine reached out, took his wrist and turned his hand upwards. She placed the knife in his hand and folded his fingers over it. Sitting in the harsh sunlight with the knife in his hand, O'wa's chest heaved as powerfully as it had as he drew water from the sip-well, and a tear welled out of the corner of one eye and ran down the deep groove alongside his nose.

Why are you weeping, you silly old man? H'ani demanded.

I weep for joy of this gift. O'wa tried to maintain dignity, but his voice choked, That is a stupid reason to weep, H'ani told him, and twinkled mischievously as she covered her laughter with one slim, graceful old band.

They followed the dry river bed into the east, but now the urgency that had accompanied their night marches through the dune country was left behind them, for there was good water under the sand.

They travelled from before sunrise until the heat drove them into shelter, and then from late afternoon until after dark; the pace was leisurely for they foraged and hunted on the march.

H'ani cut a special digging stick for Centaine, peeled it and hardened the point in the fire, and showed her how to use it. Within a few short days Centaine was recognizing the surface indications of many of the edible and useful tubers and plants. It soon became evident that though O'wa was so adept in the bushcraft and lore of the desert and that although his hunting and tracking skills were almost supernatural, it was the foraging and gathering of the women that provided their little clan with the staples of life. In the days and weeks when game was scarce or simply non-existent, they lived on the plants which the two of them brought into camp.

Although Centaine learned swiftly and her young eyes were hawk-sharp, she knew that she would never be able to match the innate knowledge and gifts of perception of the old woman. H'ani could find the plants and insects that gave no sign on the surface of their hiding-place deep down in the earth, and when she dug the hard dirt flew in all directions.

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