The Covenant: A Novel

by James A. Michener

  Kharu, having discharged her obligations, now demanded that Gumsto fulfill his: ‘We must take even the boldest steps to secure water and meat. And you must allow Gao to do the killing, for he cannot lead this clan without a wife.’

  Gumsto nodded. He had used every stratagem to delay this moment, but now he was satisfied that his son must ready himself for command: ‘It’s difficult to think of him leading the hunters. Or Naoka gathering beetles.’

  Kharu smiled at him. ‘You’re an old man now. It’s time you gave up your foolish dreams.’ She moved close to him and took his hand. ‘We never suffered in this clan when you were leader. Now teach Gao to be like you.’

  He took his son aside and said grimly, ‘We are close to perishing unless we have the courage to take daring steps. Those hills to the west, I’m sure they hold eland and water. But they also hold lions. Are you ready?’ When Gao nodded, Gumsto led the file west, with everyone surviving precariously on sips of water from Kharu’s final egg.

  As they headed for the ridge of hills they were kept under observation: far in the blazing sky, wheeling endlessly to mark anything that moved across the desert, a flight of vultures watched the tiny band impassively. That these forlorn stragglers would accomplish their salvation seemed most improbable, and the vultures waited, patterning the sky with impatience. Hyenas stirred in various parts of the desert, for if the vultures remained aloft, some living thing must be about to perish, and the scavengers moved close, certain that some older person would soon fall behind.

  This time they were cheated by old Kharu, her wrinkles so deep that not even dust could penetrate. It was she who apportioned the last water from her final egg and who then strode ahead, determined to keep her people moving forward, and it was she, not her husband, who first saw the eland exactly where he had predicted.

  It was a frustrating hunt. Near death from thirst and hunger, the little band watched impotently as the eland moved majestically out of one trap after another; the combined skills of Gumsto and his son were neutralized by the cleverness of the animals. On the second night the fatigued men heard an ominous roaring, and for a long time no one spoke, but finally Gao, who understood animals, uttered the fateful words: ‘We must use the lions.’

  This strategy was usually avoided, for it entailed so much danger that none of the hunters wished to employ it, but old Kharu, who was watching her clan disintegrate, desperately wanted to encourage the men. She knew that in matters of hunting, decisions must always be left to them; nevertheless, when no one supported her son, she broke ancient tradition by thrusting herself into the midst of the hunters and saying firmly, ‘Gao is right. We shall die if we don’t use the lions.’

  Gumsto looked at his weather-beaten old woman with pride, knowing the courage required for her to intrude upon this meeting. ‘Tomorrow we will use the lions,’ he said.

  This tactic, used only in extremity, would require the united effort of all, even the children, and the probability was great that one or several would lose their lives, but when the continuance of the band was at stake, there was no alternative.

  ‘We go,’ Gumsto said quietly, and his little people spread themselves into a half-moon, creeping toward the eland. Gao left the group to ascertain exactly where the lions dozed, and when he signaled their position, Gumsto and another hunter started to move noisily, so that the eland would hear them and edge away. As planned, the big animals did see them, did become nervous, and did run off, directly into the claws of the tawny beasts. A female lion grasped the throat of the biggest eland, bit into its neck, and brought it down.

  Now came the time for audacity and precise execution. Gumsto and Gao kept their people in hiding, each person quietly grasping clubs and rocks for the heroic moment. They watched the lions feeding, and the lips of even the bravest grew dry; the hearts of the women beat faster in contemplation of what they must now do; and children who had never previously participated in a hunt knew that they must succeed or perish.

  ‘Now!’ Gumsto cried, and with a sudden rush, everyone surged forward, shouting madly, brandishing clubs and hurling rocks to drive the lions from their kill.

  It was a most perilous maneuver, for the lions could easily have slain any one or two or three of the San, but to have so many rushing at them and with so much confusion bewildered the beasts, and they started to mill about. It was at this point that Gumsto sprang directly at the principal lions, beating them about the face with his club.

  He had volunteered for this suicidal mission because the continuance of his band was more important than the continuance of his life, but at the moment when all hung in the balance—one man against the lions—he was saved by the sudden appearance of Gao at his side, roaring and thrashing, and forcing the snarling lions to withdraw.

  But when the eland was taken by the San, with a dozen hyenas chuckling in anticipation, it was neither Gumsto nor Gao who assumed charge, but Kharu, rummaging with bloody hands through the exposed entrails until she found the most precious portion of the carcass, the rumen, that preliminary stomach of all animals called ruminants. When she felt how heavy it was, her old face broke into smiles, for it was here that the dead eland had collected grass for later digestion, and with it a large amount of water to make the grass soft.

  Ripping open the rumen, Kharu squeezed the grassy accumulation, expelling enough liquid to fill her eggs, and in a peculiar way this liquid was better than water, for it was astringent, and bitter, and cleansing, and when she doled out a few drops to all, their thirst was assuaged. On this miraculous fluid the band would survive.

  At the end of their joyous feasting, the exhausted gluttons lay about the carcass in stupor, their bellies extended; when they revived, Kharu made her speech: ‘Since Gao found the eland, and since he drove away the lions, let us proclaim him a hunter and award him a wife. Naoka, step forward.’

  One man, a considerable hunter himself, protested justifiably that since Gao had not actually slain the eland, he did not qualify, and there was consternation. But Kharu nudged her husband forcefully, and Gumsto stepped forward. Taking his son by the hand, he stood before the clan and said proudly, ‘A lion is just as important as an eland. And this boy drove away four lions that were about to kill me. He is a hunter.’ And with emotions that almost tore him apart, he passed his son’s hand into that of Naoka.

  ‘Ah-wee!’ Kharu cried, leaping into the air. ‘We shall dance.’ And when the calabash sounded, and hands beat out the rhythm, the little people swirled in joy, celebrating their victory over the lions and the satisfying news that soon Naoka and Gao would have children to perpetuate the clan. Round and round they went, shouting old words and stomping to raise a sanctifying dust. All night they danced, dropping at times from exhaustion, but even from their fallen positions they continued to shout oracular words. Other antelope would be caught; other wells would be found for replenishing the eggs; children would grow to manhood; and their wandering would never cease. They were hunter-gatherers, the people with no home, no fixed responsibilities except the conservation of food and water against the day of peril, and when the allotted moons had come and gone, the dancers would go, too, and others would cross these barren wastes and dance their dances through the long nights.

  Gumsto, watching the celebrants, thought: Kharu was right, as usual. The young to the young. The old to the old. Everything has its rules. And when he saw his wife dancing vigorously with the women, he leaped up and joined the men. Kharu, watching him, noticed that he limped slightly, but she said nothing.

  The festivities had to be brief, for the clan must move on to safer areas, but in the moving, Kharu saw something else that disturbed her: Gumsto was beginning to lag, surrendering his accustomed position in the van to Gao, and when this had occurred several times, she spoke to him.

  ‘Are you grieving over Naoka? You know she merited a younger husband.’

  ‘It’s my leg.’

  ‘What?’ The simplicity of her question hid the terror she felt, for a
damaged leg was about the worst thing that could happen on a journey.

  ‘When we charged the lions …’

  ‘They clawed you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Oh, Gumsto!’ she wailed. ‘And I sent you on that mission.’

  ‘You came, too. The lions could have got you.’ He sat on a rock while Kharu explored the sore, and from the manner in which he winced when she touched certain nerves she knew that it was in sad condition. ‘In two days we’ll look again,’ she said, but when he walked with a sideways limp, dragging his left leg, she knew that neither two days nor twenty would heal his hurt. And she noticed that aloft three vultures followed him with the same relentless attention he had exercised when tracking a wounded antelope.

  Whenever the clan moved onward, she stayed close to him, and once when the pain surged with great force and he bit his lip to prevent tears from showing, she led him to a resting spot, and there they remembered the days when he had taken his eland to her father, that great hunter, and asked for Kharu in marriage.

  ‘You were seven,’ Gumsto said, ‘and already you knew all things.’

  ‘My mother mastered the desert.’

  ‘You were a good child.’

  ‘I was proud of you. Taller, stronger than the husbands of the other girls.’

  ‘Kharu, they were good days, in those lands around the lake.’

  ‘But the water grew stale. The water always grows stale.’

  ‘The rhinoceros, the herds of wildebeest, the zebras.’ He recounted his triumphs from the days when his band ate well.

  ‘You were as knowing as my father,’ she conceded. Then she helped him rejoin the band as it moved south, and when it became apparent that he could never again lead the hunt, she told Gao, ‘Now you must find the meat.’

  Gumsto’s accident produced an unforeseen result that both pleased and perplexed him. When the band halted eight days, both to replenish their ostrich eggs and give him time to recover, Gao quickly left the camp to find a large slab of smooth stone, on which he worked with furious energy during all daylight hours. From his resting place Gumsto could see his son, and guessed that he was creating a memorial to some important animal, but later, when Kharu helped him to the rock, he was unprepared for the wonder that was revealed.

  Across a broad expanse Gao had formed not one eland but thirty-three, each as well composed as any he had previously drawn, but done with such fury that they exploded across their stony savanna. They leaped and quivered and exulted and rushed at unseen targets, a medley of horn and hoof that would astonish the world when it was discovered.

  But there was a deficiency, and Gumsto noticed it immediately: ‘You haven’t colored them carefully.’

  He was right. Gao had worked so feverishly to record this epic before his band moved on, that in the end he had simply splashed colors here and there, attempting to finish some of the creatures, satisfied with merely indicating the hue of others. The result was a confusion of movement and color, though it did give the massive composition a curious balance and a sense of real eland chasing across the timeless rock.

  But why had the boy been so careless? Time was pressing, but he could have pleaded for two extra days. Pigments were also precious, and perhaps he realized he might not have enough to show each of the thirty-three properly, but he could have enlisted some hunter to help him find more.

  There were a dozen other reasonable explanations for the wild coloring, but none approached the truth: Gao had created the eland in this arbitrary manner because at the height of his powers, when his senses were ablaze, he had experienced a revelation which showed that it was not the faithful laying down of color within the confines of his composition that would best indicate the reality of an eland, but a wild splashing that would catch the spirit of the sacred animals. It was an accident, the kind of accident that inspired artists contrive, and Gao could not explain it to his father.

  Gumsto did not like the carelessness, not at all, for he deemed it an insolence to the eland, whose colors should be thus and so, as all men knew, but as he was about to complain he saw in the lower right-hand corner of the mural his son’s depiction of a San hunter, a man awed by the eland but facing them with his frail arrow, and he saw that this little fellow was himself. This was a summary of his life, the recollection of all the eland he had slain to assure his people survival and meaning, and he was silent.

  Three times he asked his son to carry him back so that he might study it, and live again with the animals that had meant so much, and whenever he saw himself so small at the lower corner he felt that Gao was right. This was the manner of life, that a man live forever with the major concerns, not with the grubs hiding under the bark of the thorn tree. To be on the savanna with a tiny arrow tip, and it the difference between death and life, and to throw oneself among the mightiest of the antelope, not the klipspringer and the duiker, and to fight them as they came, that was the nature of man—and it was his son who had shown him this truth.

  When the others realized that Gumsto’s days were almost finished, for he was now forty-five, a very old age for these people, they knew that the day was approaching when they could wait for him no longer, and one afternoon they watched indulgently as he crawled from his area into the one occupied by Gao and Naoka, where the young bride lolled in the sand. ‘I wanted you for my wife,’ he told her. She smiled. ‘We could have …’

  ‘It’s better this way,’ she said without moving. ‘Gao is young and you’re an old man now.’

  ‘No more hunting,’ he said.

  ‘How good that your son learned.’

  ‘Indeed,’ the old man agreed. He had an infinity of things he wished to say to this splendid girl with the unwrinkled face, but she seemed uninterested, yet when he started to crawl back to his own area she smiled at him in her ravishing way and said, ‘I would have liked you for my husband, Gumsto. You were a man.’ She sighed. ‘But my father was a man, too, and one day Gao will be as great a hunter as either of you.’ She sighed again. ‘It’s always for the best.’

  Everyone in the tribe knew that the decision had to be made. Gumsto lagged so constantly that he was becoming an impediment, and this could not be tolerated. For two more days old Kharu served as his crutch, allowing him to lean upon her while she leaned on her digging stick, two old people striving to keep up, and on the third day, when it seemed that he must be left behind, Kharu was surprised to find Naoka coming back to urge Gumsto along.

  ‘Let him lean on me,’ the girl said as she assumed the greater burden, and in the heat of the day, when Kharu herself began to falter, Naoka alone carried him along. At dusk, when the others were well ahead, Gumsto told his two women, ‘This is the last night.’ Naoka nodded and left the old couple by a thorn tree.

  In the morning Kharu overtook the others, asking for a filled ostrich egg and a bone with some meat on it. These were provided by Gao, but it was Naoka who carried them back to where Gumsto sat propped against the thorn. ‘We bring you farewell,’ the girl said, and it was from her smooth hands that he took his final supplies.

  ‘We must leave now,’ Kharu said, and if she was crying, Gumsto could not detect it, for her tears fell into such deep wrinkles that they quickly became invisible. Gumsto leaned back exhausted, able to show no interest in the meat or the water, and after a while Naoka knelt down, touched him on the forehead, and departed.

  ‘You must catch up,’ Gumsto warned the woman he had tended since the age of seven.

  Kharu rested upon her digging stick, reflected for a moment on the days they had spent together, then pushed the bone nearer to him and strode off.

  For just a moment Gumsto looked up at the gathering vultures, but then his eyes lowered to follow the disappearing file, and as he watched it move toward better land he felt content. Gao was a hunter. Naoka was learning where the beetles hid, and the luscious tubers. With Kharu to guide them for a while, they would do well. The clan was twenty-five again, the right number: he was gone, but Kusha
’s baby restored the balance. The clan had survived the bad days, and now as it disappeared he wished it well. His last thoughts, before the predators moved in, were of that zebra: He had insisted on moving away from his clan, and the lions had got him.

  Kharu, walking with determination, soon passed Naoka, then overtook the main portion of the file, and assumed at last her place in the lead. There, with her stick to aid her, she led her band not due west, as it had been heading recently, but more to the southwest, as if she knew by some immortal instinct that there lay the Cape—with its endless supply of good water and wandering animals and wild vines that produced succulent things that could be gathered.

  In the year 1453 after Christ, the effective history of South Africa began by actions occurring at a most unlikely spot. At Cape St. Vincent, on the extreme southwestern tip of Europe, a monkish prince of Portugal in his fifty-ninth year sat in his monastery on the bleak promontory of Sagres and contemplated the tragedy that had overtaken his world. He would be known to history as Prince Henry the Navigator, which was preposterous in that he had never mastered navigation nor sailed in one of his ships with an explorer who had.

  His genius was vision. At a time when his narrow world was circumscribed by fear and ignorance, those handmaidens of despair, he looked far beyond the confines of Europe, imagining worlds that awaited his discovery, and although he had studied carefully the reports of Marco Polo and knew that civilizations existed in the far Orient, he was convinced that until white men from Europe, baptized into Christianity, had stepped upon a piece of land, it remained for all reasonable purposes undiscovered, heathen and condemned.

  His target was Africa. Twice he had visited this dark and brooding continent which lay so close to Portugal, once in grand victory at Ceuta when he was twenty-one; once in shameful defeat at Tangier when he was forty-three, and it fascinated him. From much study he had deduced that his ships, each flying a flag blazoned with the red cross of Jesus Christ, could sail southward along the western coast of Africa, turn a corner at the southern tip and sail up the eastern coast to the riches of India, China and mysterious Japan. Obstinately he had pursued this goal for forty years and would continue until his death seven years hence, but he would fail.