Morvenna walked quietly to the doorway of the but and gazed out at the Indian encampment, where the river mist twined among the trees, and lean hunting dogs were curled asleep near the embers of the fires. In a while the women would awake and come from the thatched houses to relight the fires. Coffee would be set to brew, and farina pancakes rolled out ready for breakfast. Children and dogs would race to the river, and the men would roll out of their hammocks and yawn at their women that they wanted food and drink before they went hunting for the day, or fishing.
But for now, for about half an hour more, the camp was wrapped in mist and sleep, and Morvenna decided
to go down to the river for a wash. She had noticed a bar of soap among Nuno's things, and a hand-towel.
She found them, and with eager stealth made her way down to the riverbank. Everything was dewed; faintly pink from the flickers of dawn sunlight, and so fresh and loamy that it was like a cup of wine to stand and take deep gulps of the air. It was then that Morvenna noticed the slab of rock that jutted out over the river, a natural diving-board for the Indians, and irresistible to someone who was sweaty, grubby, and almost desperate to feel cool, clean water all over her.
There was absolutely no one about. She was alone on the shore, and within seconds she had stripped off her shirt and trews and had climbed to the top of the rock. From there she dived into the cool, tea-coloured water, and after swimming around for a few minutes she scrubbed herself briskly with Nuno's bar of soap.
How good it felt to be clean again ! Treading water, she rubbed the soap through her hair, then swam again until the soap was rinsed off and floating away on the water, iridescent bubbles in the pink and gold sunlight that was spreading across the river.
The birds were setting up their morning chorus and arrowing brightly from one green bank to the other. Morvenna swam in lazy circles, and felt her heart respond to the pagan loveliness of the jungle morning. No wonder her father had loved these faraway places. No wonder Roque de Braz Ferro called the island his world. She thought of him asleep, curiously vulnerable, his lashes curtaining those vital blue eyes, his black hair rumpled, giving him a boyish air until you looked at his dark-stubbled chin.
She smiled a little to herself, for she couldn't imagine
him in a city. He would look as out of place and uncivilized as a jaguar walking the city streets.
She came out of the water, wishing she had fresh clothing to put on . . . and there on the sands, as if put there by magic, was a length of gaily-patterned material such as Raya sometimes wore as a wrap-around, the end being fixed just above the bosom. Morvenna snatched up the towel and held it against her as she took a swift look at the surrounding bushes and trees. She couldn't see anyone, but upon seeing the wraparound her thoughts had leapt at once to the senhor. He was curiously perceptive where she was concerned. If he had woken and not found her, he would have guessed at once that the water had drawn her like a magnet. If he had brought the wrap-around to the river, he would have seen her in the water, arms raised as she washed her hair, naked as a naiad.
Her cheeks crimsoned as she hastily rubbed herself down. The Indians bathed in the jungle rivers without inhibitions, so perhaps he had not noticed her nudity. Consoling herself with that thought, she picked up the length of material and wound herself into it, not without a certain natural grace that was part of her Celtic heritage. Already the sun was climbing up through the trees, and its warmth touched her damp tousled hair and bare white shoulders. Soon her hair would dry, and she laid the towel across the drooping limb of a tree to catch the sun.
In her itipi, as the Indians called the wrap-around, she rested against a palm tree, which inclined gently and bore great fans of green leaves and clusters of fibred nuts. She would return to the but in a few more minutes, but it was peaceful here, and she wanted to
savour the feeling of freshness imparted by her bathe and her pagan mode of dress.
It came to her, like a touch that thrilled her every nerve, that she had grown to love all this, the sense of freedom, the unutterable beauty, the scents and sounds. They had penetrated her pores, and she knew that a part of herself would be left behind when she left the island of Janaleza.
She wasn't proof against the sudden feeling of desolation that swept through her, and she reached out blindly to a near-by bush of pointed, fragrant-scented leaves. She plucked a handful in her rush of pain, and crushed them in her fingers.
"Heart's desire," said a voice.
She glanced round wildly, and there was the senhor, standing tall and looking at her. He had used Nuno's razor and was clean-shaven again; his hair was combed back and agleam with moisture. He had been in the river, farther along, where it curved like an arm, where he must have gone after leaving her the itipi. He wore no shirt. He must have washed it out and left it to dry. He looked brown and hard, hewn out of jungle teak, and right through her being Morvenna was aware of the refreshed and wonderful look of him.
"The leaves of that bush are called heart's desire," he said again.
"It's a wonderful scent." She bent her head and breathed the scent of the crushed leaves, feeling almost strangled by emotion as he drew nearer to her, and she felt his gaze flick her bare white shoulders. It was this pagan place that aroused this awareness of him. She had noticed before that he was more vital than other
men, that he had raven glints in his hair, and a lean grace of body. Why then this sudden breathlessness, this acute shyness, this female urge to know whether she looked attractive or absurd in the flamboyant native garment ?
She felt his eyes upon her like a touch, and didn't dare to look at him. He must be comparing her to Raya, who looked as exotic as a jungle flower in one of these garments, and Morvenna turned from him to look at the river, glowing bright as agate as the sun chased away the mist.
"I couldn't resist taking a dip," she said. "Did you leave me the wrap-around ?"
"Yes. The old woman who cooked for us last night left it for you in the other hut."
He didn't say "our hut" this morning, with a wicked glint in his eye.
"She is sitting with Nuno," he added. "He will now get well, thanks to you."
"No," she faced him, protest in her eyes. "I did no more than you, senhor. We broke his fever together."
"He sensed that you were by his side, for when you left the hut this morning he became restless and spoke your name aloud—"
"I . I left you both asleep," she broke in.
"I awoke as you slipped from the but with Nuno's towel over your shoulder." A smile touched his lips. "It was all right to let you come to the river to bathe. The water runs fast and is always fresh."
And free of piranha, she added to herself.
"I enjoyed my dip very much, with everything looking so green, and Nuno out of danger." She ran a shy hand down the folds of the gaily patterned wrap-
around. "Thank you for bringing me this to wear. I was longing for something nice and fresh to put on . . . I didn't hear you bring it to the riverbank."
"You were singing," he quirked a black eyebrow, "as you washed your hair. I left the itipi and stole quietly away to take a dip of my own."
So he had seen her in the water ! She blushed. In fact it felt like a flame licking over her, and she couldn't control her instinctive retreat from his tall, dark maleness. She picked up her shirt and trews. "I'll give these a rub through."
She knelt by the water and as she proceeded to wash out her things, she felt a curious constriction in her throat, and a stinging at the back of her eyes. Whatever was the matter with her? A little while ago she had felt so happy, now all at once she felt like crying. She kneaded the soapy trews between her hands, and was aware of the barking dogs and sound of voices from the encampment. Woodsmoke drifted tangily through the trees.
The soap bubbles floated away as she rinsed her things. She gave them a shake, then walked to a nearby tree where she intended to hang them to dry.
"No," the sands crunched behind her and as
she reached the tree, a pair of hands took hold of her, rather roughly, "not the Palo Santo tree !"
"Let me go !" The warm, hard touch on her bare shoulders sent panic winging through her, and she instinctively fought with him. "Y-You're hurting me .. . and I'm fed up with your bossy ways !"
"That is too bad." He spoke crisply above her head. "But I am afraid you are going to have to put up with my bossy ways for a while longer. You child," he gave
her a shake. "Whatever I do is for your own good, and you should know that by now !"
"Such as bruising my shoulders ?" she flashed. "Y-you're a jungle savage !"
"Of course." He laughed low down in his throat. "The jungle is bound to bring out the primitive in a man, and I have naturally taken hold of you in order to pacify all that you arouse in a flimsy wrap-around that shows off your white skin. Such fine skin, soft as a baby's, and hair of silver that curls in tiny tendrils at the nape of your neck.
"Yes," his fingers deliberately caressed her shoulders, "you are very beguiling in the garment, and I shall be quite sorry to see you again in a shirt and a pair of trousers."
"Please take your hands off me !" A moment more of this and she would drop the dripping trews and shirt and turn without restraint to the touch that only taunted. It was unbearable, and her heart knew why !
"I shall be happy to oblige," his tone was suddenly cruel, "for as it happens I am not holding you because I find you irresistible — but the fire ants will, if you go too close to that Palo Santo tree. They make their nests in such trees, and their bite is vicious !"
His teeth snapped whitely on that final word, and Morvenna went meekly to the dwarf palm at which he gestured and hung her things on its branches to dry in the sun. It was firing the tops of the jungle trees, the tropical sun that gave birth to the ardent foliage, and to emotions such as Morvenna had never felt in her life before.
The senhor strolled up the beach to the encampment, and she followed him. When she caught the glances and
smiles of the Indian women, she knew that they were thinking of her as the woman of Tushaua Braz.
Morvenna' s eyes dwelt on the broad, coppery back that she followed; she took note of the dark peak of hair that stabbed the nape of his neck; the pagan freedom and assurance with which he held himself.
His woman would be totally his. His love would be a commanding one, but there would also be a world of comfort and humour and security in it. Morvenna watched him mount the ladder into Nuno's hut, and she paused among the trees and leaned a moment against one of them. She was shaking and weak. She told herself she was tired after her sleepless night at Nuno's bedside, but she knew that it was not quite true. She knew that she was building a defence against the invasion of her heart by a man whose plans for the future did not include her.
They would leave this place tomorrow. They would return to the fazenda, and on Friday the steamer would arrive and she would say good-bye to Roque de Braz Ferro, feudal chief of Janaleza, master of her fate for a few short weeks out of a lifetime.
She pulled herself together, and a minute later had joined the senhor and their patient.
Nuno's frightening rigors and mind-wandering had given place to quiet sleep, and the senhor said with a quiet smile that he would awake without fever in a few hours and would be ready for a bowl of soup.
"Why did he take the map, I wonder ?" Morvenna watched the boyish, sleeping face, with its long lashes and slender nose that reminded her of Raya. Like this, fragile after his fever, Nuno was very much like his twin to look at.
She glanced across at the senhor, and saw him studying Nuno with eyes which were suddenly fiercely blue. "Hidden treasure is like love," he said quietly. "A man has to find one or the other, and Nuno may have thought that if he found treasure he would be able to take you wherever you wished to go."
A quick little flame of denial licked through Morvenna. She was fond of Nuno, but love was something else. Love was being aware of a man with every vein and nerve, as she had become aware of Roque. Love was knowing she would die a little when the steamer drew away from Janaleza, and the tall figure on the shore waved once more before striding off into the shadow of the jungle trees.
She forced a smile, which etched tautly her cheekbones and her lips. "I am glad we burned the map. It can't hurt anyone else, or lead them astray."
"Has Nuno been led astray?" The blue eyes looked directly across at her; there was no evading them.
"Not deliberately," she said. "I've never learned how to pretend anything I never really felt. I like Nuno, but I've never led him to think that when the time came for me to leave Janaleza, I would want him to go with me. He belongs on the island, as you do, senhor. As Raya does — as I, or Leird or Poppy, could never belong."
She turned then and went from the hut. The old Indian cook had built a fire and was cooking a breakfast of fish and coffee. Morvenna ate hers sitting on a tree stump. The dark smoky coffee tasted good, and from here she could watch the activity of the Indian camp. The men had eaten their fill of farina and fish, and were setting off with their brazil-wood bows and quivers of arrows for a day's hunting in the forest.
There was a look of ageless vigour about these people, and in daylight Morvenna noticed the latticed designs on their upper bodies and limbs. Gourds of water were slung over their brown shoulders, and when they had disappeared like shadows into the bush, their women got down to their various tasks of grinding corn, and spinning wild cotton on hand-looms.
The younger children were free as the monkeys and birds to enjoy this strange Eden, but the older girls were given household tasks to perform, while the boys carved bows, or worked around the canoes.
The lively infants hid in the bush and peeped at Morvenna, but when she smiled and spoke to them they scampered off in wild shyness. Their bare skins were as glossy as silk, and the wild sugar-cane they sucked accounted for their polished teeth. She snapped off a piece herself and chewed it to clean her own teeth, as the senhor had advised her.
All at once she noticed that he was in conversation with a rather haughty-looking Incala, and her heartbeats quickened as he turned and came striding over to where she sat. The Incala watched, and Morvenna remembered seeing him last night, with the chief. In the dusk she had not noticed any specific details about him, but now she saw the scar running down his left cheek, a deep slash, long healed, slightly twisting the edge of his mouth.
She listened, all on edge, as the senhor told her that he had been asked to attend a palaver in the chiefs hut.
"That Indian over there," she caught at his arm and felt at once the tensing of his muscles. "Is he the one — you know ?" Her eyes met and were held by eyes so vividly blue they melted her bones and made her want
to put her arms tightly around the bare, coppery shoulders. She wanted to jump up, to stand and shield him, to hold and never let go.
She died inside in case he guessed her feelings, for his glance had shifted to her fingers holding his arm, slim and white against his tanned skin.
"Cuchillo and I buried the lance long ago," he reassured her. "We are friends now."
"H-he doesn't look all that friendly—"
"I assure you he is." Warm fingers pressed hers. "You are tired, pequina. Nervy and on edge from lack of sleep. The palaver will be a lengthy one, so why don't you go to the choza and rest in your hammock ? Nuno
will be all right. The old woman is keeping an eye on him."
"I - I don't think I could sleep," she protested.
"Have a try." He drew her to her feet, and she was exquisitely aware of his arm across her shoulders as he walked with her to the bamboo ladder of the but they had been given to share. "Go along." He watched her climb the ladder to the doorway, then he swung round and walked away with the Incala he had scarred in the machete duel over Raya.
Morvenna kicked off her grass sandals and climbed into her hammock. She pillowed her head on her arms and rocked the hammock to try and ease the aching tension that gripped her. So
this at last was love? This loss of self, this longing to be close, and closer still to just one man.
The rocking motion lulled her nerves and in a while she drifted off to sleep.
A rain squall awoke her. The hut was almost dark,
and the rain was pounding against the roof and big drops were bouncing through rents in the thatch. Something larger than a raindrop plopped on to Morvenna's hammock, and she sat up with a drowsy cry of alarm. It scampered and leapt away into the shadows, a black lizard, almost the size of a frog.
Unnerved by the lizard, the fury of the rain, and the dimness that told her she had been asleep for a long time, Morvenna scrambled out of her hammock and made for the doorway of the hut. It was barred by rods of rain. It drove down out of the sky, steel-cold, lashing the trees and turning the ground to mud.
All the same, Morvenna didn't feel like staying here alone. She sought her sandals and put them on. It wouldn't take her a minute to run through the rain to Nuno's but . . . anything to escape being alone just now.
Tightening her itipi around her, she caught at the rungs of the wet ladder and made her way to the ground. The mud splashed coldly as she dived through the rain towards Nuno's hut. The rain was so blinding that she didn't see a tall figure emerge out of the trees . . . she ran full tilt into him. She gasped as hard arms closed around her. Her head went back and she blinked her rain-wet lashes as she met eyes dangerously blue in a face burnished to copper by the streaming rain.
"I was coming to you," he shouted through the noise of the squall.
"I was on my way to Nuno," she gasped.
"My faith," she had never heard that tone from him before, "you must be anxious to be with him to chance a squall like this one !"
"No," she shook her head, "it was awful being alone,
the but was dark, a-and I was worried about you—" He stared down at her as the rain pelted them. "Why should you worry about me ?" he demanded.
Beloved castaway Page 15