Mara and Dann

by Doris Lessing

  Moving about the streets on her cleaning duties, Mara recognised a good deal of what she saw. The trees, first. They were limp, some had dying branches, white stick-like limbs among the green, and there were many dead trees. The city had fountains, but there was no water in them, only rubbish, which Mara, with fellow slaves, was kept cleaning out.

  The slaves were not all Mahondis, but all were fugitives from the famine and the drought. Some had already been here for years. Mara had believed that the Mahondis of Rustam had been all there were, but other Mahondi people had come from all over southern Ifrik, and some spoke of past comforts and pleasures – even high positions and riches.

  Mara was tense, anxious, fearful, which climaxed every day when the tubs of water were brought in from where water was kept under guard and, when enough had been set aside for drinking, the slaves were expected to stand in groups around the tubs and wash themselves. Most stood naked, shedding the ubiquitous slaves’ robes to wash, but not all stripped, and Mara washed her legs and body up to her hips, bunching up the robe, and then sliding it down a little, but never showing her chest. Her worry was the cord of coins, but her breasts were already a bit bigger. The Hadrons who guarded them were looking at her and wondering. Something told them she was not male, though she thought she still looked like a boy. Then what she dreaded happened. While she was washing, manipulating the folds of robe to keep herself covered, a guard lifted them with his stick and kept his stick there, so she was exposed to everyone – fellow slaves who first were surprised, but laughed, and the other guards, who laughed, and came to have a good look.

  Within an hour she had been told to fetch her sack, and without being able to warn Dann, who was out portering a chair for some bigwig, she was led across the town to a large house, where she was taken in at once to see its mistress. She had expected to see a Hadron, but the guards had told her no, she was a Mahondi in charge of the female slaves. At first Mara thought, How can she be a Mahondi? We are tall, slim people, while this woman is fat, and sits in her chair with her little, plump feet on a stool. It occurred to Mara for the first time that she had believed her people to be thin by nature, because she had never known a time when food was not short, even when she was little. So Mahondis could be as fleshy and as large as Hadrons. Mara was not sure she liked this.

  She was standing quietly before this woman, who was examining her, her head propped on a little hand with many rings on it. She wore a big, white, clean robe of fresh cotton, with black stripes around the sleeves, and ropes of coloured beads around her neck. Her long, black hair had a red flower in it. She smelled of a heavy, sleepy scent.

  Her name was Ida, and on her depended Mara’s fate.

  Mara did not know what to think of her, but that pretty freshness, the clean white, the glossy hair, the sweet scent, was making her want to cry. She wanted so much to be like that, to be that, instead of…She did not know she was going to say what she did: ‘Are you cruel?’ she whispered, and saw Ida’s eyes widen, then narrow, while her plump lips mocked her in a slow smile. All this was artificial, Mara knew, meant for her to see it and feel foolish. ‘That depends on…’ said Ida, laughing; but at once her face became serious, and she sighed, for Mara only stared.

  Meanwhile what Ida was seeing was a tall, lanky youth with a brush of hair, a bony face and enormous, hungry eyes, a body all bone and hard muscle.

  ‘Tell me about yourself,’ said Ida, flicking some dust or something off her skirt. There was a little dust in the room, but nothing like what Mara was used to.

  Mara was dismayed. She wanted to sit down, because of the length of what she had to tell, but Ida only waited. Mara began from that moment when she and Dann were taken to be cross-examined by the man she still could not help thinking of as ‘the bad one.’ Almost at once Ida was alert and listening, her indolence gone. Mara told it all, leaving out nothing, went on to the flight, the stone room and Lord Gorda, went on to the rushing through the night, the two rescuers, the flood, and then to Daima, where Ida stopped her.

  ‘What is your name? Maro?’

  ‘No, Mara.’

  Ida looked hard at her, meaning her to see it. ‘You are going to have to tell us everything. We want to know everything that happened. We are related to the family at Rustam. You are probably some kind of cousin – we’ll work it out. Meanwhile, I want you to do as I say. We have something called the sleep cure. I’m going to give you something to drink, and you are going to sleep. Every time you wake you’ll have something to eat. Until we get some flesh on to you we aren’t going to get anywhere.’

  Mara had thought she was doing well, with getting her bones covered, but she looked down and saw her long, spiky fingers and her long feet where all the bones showed. The thought of sleeping – oh it was wonderful. She had slept so little, in the barracks with the young male slaves. Apart from her fear of discovery – but being found out had turned out to be a good thing – it was Dann: she was worried sick about Dann. She knew he was going to do something foolish: run away again, start a fight, or a riot. She was sure he hadn’t smiled or laughed since they had come down the hillside into Chelops. He was so angry she was even afraid of him herself.

  ‘My brother,’ said Mara. ‘My brother, Dann…’ but Ida broke in, ‘Don’t worry about anything. I’ll make enquiries about your brother. And when you wake up, believe me, we are all going to want to hear your story.’

  She clapped her hands; a young woman appeared, and stood waiting. ‘Kira, take Mara to the Health House, and tell Orphne to give her the sleep treatment, and feed her, and go on until it’s enough. I’d say probably five days.’

  Kira led Mara through a courtyard where young women were sitting about, talking, laughing, with piles of flowers and plants in front of them, which they were picking over. There was a strong herbal smell. They all looked curiously at Mara, and Kira said, ‘Later. She’s going to sleep now.’

  Kira walked with Mara fast through hot dusty lanes, where plants and trees stood drooping, to a big house, like Ida’s, where she called to another young woman, Orphne, gave her the instructions, and went off.

  Orphne was another large woman, full of health, pretty, with flowers in her hair, and she said to Mara, ‘Have you really come from down there? Is it as bad as they say? – well, I can see by looking at you that it is.’ She walked around Mara, examining her, touched her brush of hair, felt her arms and legs, and said, ‘Before anything else I’m going to clean you up a bit.’

  Mara had thought she was clean, but now she sat down, while Orphne cut her long claw nails and the hooks of nails on her toes, rubbed pads of callused skin from her soles with a rough stone, dug clogs of wax from her ears, lifted her lids to examine her eyes, and put in drops, shook her head over the loose teeth, and rubbed oil all over her arms and legs. Then she made Mara drink a long, warm, herb-smelling draught, and put her to bed in a room that had another bed in it, and said, ‘When you wake up you’ll be all right again, you’ll see.’

  Mara slept, sometimes deeply, sometimes shallowly, and whenever she woke there were heavily sugared cakes beside her, and fruit, and more of the herb drink. Once Kira was sitting by her head, watching. She said, ‘I’m going to give you a massage and then you can sleep again.’

  ‘I don’t want a massage,’ said Mara, thinking of the coins under her chest.

  ‘All right then. But I’m here to keep an eye on you. You’re a restless one, aren’t you?’

  ‘I don’t remember anything.’

  ‘You were crying out, “Help me, help me” – and then calling for Dann. Who’s he?’

  ‘He’s my little brother,’ said Mara, and began to cry, as if she had been waiting all her life to cry as she was now.

  Kira waited a little, then called Orphne. Mara saw the two young women, with their young, fresh faces, their concerned smiles, their plump young bodies, and thought, And I’m so ugly, so ugly – and I’ve always been ugly. She went on crying, until Orphne lifted her and Kira held the herb drink t
o her lips, and she sank back into sleep again.

  Another time when she woke it was night, a low flame burned in a dish of oil, and Orphne was asleep in the other bed.

  And then she woke to find both Kira and Orphne there, and Orphne said, ‘Now that’s enough of sleep. We don’t want to make you ill. And soon Mother Ida will decide what to do with you.’

  Mara said, ‘If we are slaves, all the Mahondis, then why is everything so nice, how can you be so kind?’

  At this Orphne embraced Mara as if she were a small girl and said, ‘Everything was much nicer, believe me. These are hard times.’ And Kira said, in the way she had, laughing, but with a little edge of petulance, ‘We are nice. We’re lovely – aren’t we, Orphne?’ And Orphne patted and stroked Mara and said that now she must have a bath. ‘We’re going to give you a bath,’ she said. At first Mara did not hear the ‘we,’ but then did, and was full of panic again. Orphne and Kira must not know about those coins hidden there. Then Mara thought, I’ll confide in them, I’ll ask them to keep it a secret – but knew this was nonsense. No, no, already Dann and I have been saved by the gold coins and they’ll save us again – get us out of Chelops to the North, buy us our escape.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ asked Orphne.

  ‘I want to bath by myself.’

  ‘Goodness, what a shy little thing you are. Very well then.’

  In a room that had a stone floor stood a tub of water, not hot but warm, because the water had been in a tank in the sunlight. Orphne put clothes on a stool and went out. The door did not lock. Mara took off her slave’s dress, so dirty and smelly, untied the lumpy rope from her chest, put it under her new clothes, and got into the water, which was up to her chin. In came Orphne again, with soap. ‘I’m just in and out,’ she said, humouring Mara; but what she wanted was really to take a good look at Mara’s shoulders, which was all she could see of her.

  ‘You’re fattening up nicely,’ she said, and went out.

  When the water was cold Mara put back the cord of coins and over it a loose, light, white dress, like Kira’s and Orphne’s. She went back into the other room and Orphne hugged and kissed her, saying she was pleased, and now Mara must go back to Mother Ida who was waiting for her.

  Again Kira led Mara through dusty little lanes, and into Ida’s house; and there was Ida, as before, sitting with her feet on a stool, and she was fanning herself slowly, using many turns of the wrist, with a fan made of feathers. This made Mara remember birds, and their variety and their songs and their beauty, and wonder if perhaps there were still some left in Chelops. She had not seen any birds.

  Ida was looking closely at her with those clever eyes of hers, while she fanned and fanned, and then she said, ‘Good. I wouldn’t have recognised you. You’ve got a face now.’ Then she lifted down her pretty feet and said, ‘I’m going to take you now and show you to the Hadrons. No, don’t worry. You aren’t pretty enough yet for it to be dangerous. But that’s the point you see. They have to see you – it’s the rule. And then they’ll forget about you. At least I hope they will.’ She draped a white scarf over Mara’s brush of hair, and took her hand. She asked, ‘Are you feeling yourself again? Can you manage a little walk? It really is better if we do it now.’

  At this Mara had to remember for how long she had not felt herself, how she had forgotten what feeling yourself meant; and she stood smiling at Ida in gratitude, wanting to tell her everything, and she had begun, ‘You see, in the Rock Village, for all those years I don’t think I was anywhere near what I really am – ’ when Ida laughed, gave her a little push to the door and said, ‘Save it for when we can all hear.’

  At the door stood one of the carrying chairs that so recently Mara had been portering, the shafts on her shoulders, and Ida got in, and pulled in Mara, who stood hesitating, knowing how her weight and Ida’s would drag at the thin shoulders of the two slaves at the back and the front. One recognised her, and gave her a sullen look.

  They were jogging through small lanes, then on a road, which had on either side of it red flowering shrubs; but the flowers seemed to Mara to be emitting a high, almost audible scream for help, because she was remembering, and identifying so strongly with a longing for rain. Then they turned into a big garden where there were shrubs and flowers that were watered and fresh. Beyond the big house they were approaching was a field full of very tall odoriferous plants, and their smell was unpleasant, rank and head-haunting.

  ‘We used some of that for your sleep,’ said Ida, ‘but don’t take it on your own, I’m warning you: we don’t want you to become one of those – ’ and she pointed to a couple of slaves who lifted their faces as the carrying chair passed to show blank, drugged eyes.

  Around this house were big, deep verandahs, and on them lounged half a dozen men with long stick-like weapons, which they pointed at the two women.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said Ida, ‘they are as useful as the sky skimmers – they don’t work. Or when they do, they give the poor fools such a fright they throw them down and run.’

  They stepped out of the chair. The two porters took it to the side of the garden, sat down by it and at once went to sleep.

  They went past the guards, and into a big room that was half dark because the windows were shaded, with the glare showing through the blinds like a hot stare. In the room, on cushions all around the walls, sat very large men, very fat, with billows and pillows of yellow flesh, wearing robes of all colours that were loose to hide all that fat. Never had Mara even imagined such ugliness, such disgustingness, such beasts of men. The bulging flesh reminded her of the big lizards and dragons.

  These were Hadrons. But Mara was thinking, I’ve seen them before – surely I have? And then she understood: the Rock People were very similar in build and shape, and their hair was the same, a mass of pale, frizzy stuff. Each of these beast-men leaned his elbows on a cushion, and they all stared and dreamed, and the air was sickly sweet. There were all kinds of pipes and tubes set out, and some Hadrons used these, but others were chewing black lumps, slowly, the way Mishka and Mishkita had chewed their food – when there was any.

  Ida walked to the middle of the floor, leading Mara by the hand. No one seemed to notice them. Ida made a very deep curtsy, clapped her hands gently at chest level, and then curtsied again. Some of the befogged faces turned to look.

  ‘Your lordships,’ said Ida, ‘I’ve brought the new girl.’

  At this all the eyes turned towards Mara. It was the words ‘the new girl.’ But, clearly, what they saw did not attract them, and besides, it was at that moment, when questions might have been asked, that four slaves carried in two great trays of food, piled high, and the smells of spices and fat were added to the cloying smells of the drugs.

  All faces turned to the food, and Ida and Mara were forgotten. Ida curtsied again, but the Hadrons were reaching out with fat hands, covered with jewels, to the food, and the two women went out, unnoticed.

  ‘We have to do that,’ said Ida. ‘It’s the rule. They must have a good look at every new arrival in the Women’s Houses. And now we’ll not have to do it again, when your hair is grown and you look nice.’

  Back they went in the carrying chair to Ida’s house. There she told Mara to rest for a while, since she shouldn’t overdo things after her sleep treatment, and showed her a room that had only one bed in it, and left her.

  When Mara got up, she found Ida in her usual place, fanning herself, apparently contemplating her pretty feet. She looked so unhappy, Mara thought, in that moment before Ida saw her and smiled.

  ‘Sit down,’ said Ida, and Mara sat.

  ‘And now,’ said Ida, ‘what did you see?’

  Mara smiled at Ida through tears: to hear these words again, after such a long time, it was like hearing Daima’s voice, or her parents’ voices.

  ‘The Mahondis here are slaves of the Hadrons, but they decide everything and the Hadrons do not know it because they are lazy and stupid and take too much poppy.’

  ‘Ve
ry good,’ said Ida. ‘Well done. But don’t you ever say it where they can hear you. But we don’t decide everything. We can’t stop them taking Mahondi girls as concubines. Or the boys, either.’ Then, because of Mara’s surprised face, ‘You’ve never heard of what I’m saying?’

  Mara shook her head. ‘Not men and men?’ In her mind a warning was flaring: Dann, Dann, Dann. She thought, That’s a danger for Dann, I am sure of it.

  ‘Go on, Mara, what have you seen?’

  ‘Chelops is emptying,’ she said. ‘And that is why you need so many slaves – there’s no free labour to hire.’ And then, after a silence, while an old sadness dragged at her heart, ‘Chelops is coming to an end.’

  ‘The Hadrons say that Hadron will last for a thousand years,’ said Ida.

  ‘That’s silly.’

  ‘We have food growing out there. Our storehouses are full. We still have milk beasts. And we are still trading with the North: we sell them poppy and the ganja, they sell us food. It’ll last our time.’

  Mara did not allow herself to say anything, and Ida went on, ‘So what have you seen?’

  ‘There are hardly any children. I haven’t seen any babies.’

  ‘The slaves in the Women’s Houses are supposed to get pregnant, but for some reason it is hard for us to get pregnant.’

  ‘And the Hadrons?’

  ‘There are very few Hadron children.’

  ‘Perhaps their stuff isn’t any good?’

  ‘And our stuff doesn’t seem much good either.’

  Mara said, because it floated up into her mind from long ago, ‘Every woman has in her all the eggs she will ever have: she is born with them. And every man has in his stuff enough eggs to fertilise all of Chelops.’