The Cleft

by Doris Lessing

  There was no question, and they had to know it, of trying to kill an eagle. The birds were determined to prevent another murder of a child. And there were other new defenders: the girls who had recently returned from the valley were allied in their minds with the Squirts, and when labour and birth seemed imminent, positioned themselves ready to snatch up a babe as it appeared, to hand it to the waiting eagles.

  There were always fewer of the old kind of Cleft. How many? But they did not say – or it wasn’t recorded – ‘We were Sixty and now we are Forty,’ or even, ‘We were many and now we are so few.’ They did not say, ‘Once all the caves were full and now half are occupied.’ Half is a concept we take for granted. Why should they?

  Over in the males’ encampment they tended the new babes, and waited for more to arrive in the eagles’ claws.

  Maire and Astre during their pregnancies talked of the males and their gift of life, which was so different from the Clefts’. They thought of the valley – with, yes, I think we can call it affection, though they never used the word or any similar one. No sooner were they over the births than they were ready to go off. For a long time they had not thought of going, but then they had to. They had to. Among all these mysteries, that surely is as important as any.

  But it was not as easy now to leave. Astre’s babe would have to be taken too, if they didn’t want to entrust it to an eagle. They could not leave behind Maire’s infant as once she would have done. They certainly could not leave on the shore the toddling child, the New One; unlikely, they knew, that she would be alive when they got back. Maire’s new babe, Astre’s boy, and the New One must all go. The two girls invited some of the younger Clefts who had shown an interest in the valley to come too. Four young women, one holding the New One, walked past the Killing Rock – where no one had been put out to die for a long time now – then on they went up the mountain. When they reached the top there were whoops and yells from the valley floor, and the boys came running up to greet the girls – who had to defend themselves, as otherwise they would have been raped (a word and a concept that would not appear for a considerable time). Fending off the hungry boys, they reached the valley floor and the big social log. There something happened which illustrated so aptly the new sense that here were new beginnings that it was told in the chronicles of both parties. And reaches us in the crabby faded documents we call histories.

  Maire’s first mating had been with a Squirt whose face she did not particularly notice, and nor did she now, as he approached, knowing her. But the child from that mating was here, and in her arms and as usual making it impossible for anyone to ignore her. And her face, this very young child’s, was the same as the young male’s. Impossible not to notice: everyone did. At first there was silence, which fell suddenly, as they all came near to match the two faces, one a little girl’s or Cleft’s, one the youth’s. The owner of the grown face, Maire’s first mate, did not immediately understand. Mirrors had not been invented or even thought of. People knew how others looked, but not much had been made of a large nose, or eyes too close. But each of them must have seen their faces in the slack lazy by-waters of the river, or even in a big shell standing ready with water for the thirsty. Slowly this young male, once a Monster now a handsome youth, stood fingering his own face, then touching the face of the child, who was pleased with the attention it was getting. Then the father, beginning to realise what these matched faces meant, snatched the child from Maire and ran off to the river bank. All followed, watching as the youth knelt by the river where it made a pool, and looked down at himself and then at the child, mirrored there too. Then he handed the child back to Maire and walked, as it were blindly, certainly unsteadily, to the great log where he sat down. Maire sat by him, with the First One, and he kept looking at her, then at the child, then putting up his hands to touch his face. He was in a fever of wonderment – as they all were.

  These three were a family, as we would know one, but what they made of it we may only guess. When the evening meal was finished and dark was falling over the valley, Maire and this youth and the child went to a shelter by themselves. That there was some sort of communion between them was evident, but what was it? What did it mean?

  The girls who had come to help Astre and Maire entertained the youths, and they all talked of this great mystery, that mating could imprint a grown face on that of a child.

  This visit to the valley, told and then much later written, was not likely to be forgotten, and plenty was said, speculation we would call it: the new people, the old former Monsters, had powers the old Clefts did not. Yes, a baby Cleft might resemble its mother – there were mothers and daughters in the first community – but now the people on the shore looked carefully at every face.

  At that early stage none of the Clefts elected to stay in the valley. There was a suggestion that the valley was very warm, that the shelters were small and uncomfortable. The caves were large and airy, and sea breezes kept them fresh.

  The girls went off to the valley when they had to, and returned knowing that they would in turn give birth. The boys waited for them. The Monsters were taken to the boys by the eagles, and now the deer did not feed them, the boys fetched Clefts. And all this went on, we do not know for how long. The laments of the boys that their numbers were falling ceased: for whatever reason, baby boys were born.

  So, how long? Who knows, now?

  And now this chronicler has a difficulty and it is to do with time, again: but much longer time than the complaint just above.

  We Romans have measured, charted, taken possession of time, so that it would be impossible for us to say, ‘And then it came to pass’… for we would have the year, the month, the day off pat, we are a defining people, but then all we know of events is what was said of them by the appointed Memories, the repeaters, who spoke to those who spoke again, again, what had been agreed long ago should be remembered.

  This historian has no means of knowing how long the Clefts’ story took to evolve. Astre and Maire, when first mentioned, were young Clefts, like the others, and then they thought of themselves as females, when the occurrence of the males made them have to compare and match, but for most of the records they were best known as figures from the ancient past. Their prominence in the tales, both male and female, the fact that it was Maire who gave birth to the First One, meant that their words were heard and then recorded. But soon they were not young females, but founders of families, clans, tribes – and at some point, ages later, evolved into goddesses. We know them under various names, but one is always associated with the star that is the patron of love and female witchery, and the other is an aspect of the moon. Their statues are in every town, village, glade, crossroads. Smiling, beneficent, queens in their own right, Artemis and Diana and Venus, and the rest, they are the most powerful intercessors between us and the heavens; we love them, we know they love us. But travellers may say that only a short horseback ride away, or a few days’ walking, there are goddesses who are cruel and vengeful.

  How long did it take for Astre and Maire to become more than themselves? We have no idea.

  But one thing is certain: that once, very long ago, there was a real young woman who might have been called Maire, and then others, who were the first mothers of our race, carrying in their wombs the babes who were both Cleft and Other, both stuff of the very early people who, it is now thought, came out of the sea – and the new people, who brought restlessness and curiosity with them.

  The girls who went to the valley and returned pregnant sat in the mouths of the caves and guarded their children, who were so different from the others. They walked early, talked early, and had to be watched every minute. Their mothers looked down at the rest of the tribe on the rocks, knew that their children had a double heritage, and noted the infants of the old kind were passive, easy, seldom cried, staying where they were set down; they were active only when they were put into the water, where they swam about and were fearless.

  When the new mothers wanted to
swim, they went all together, carrying their infants, and chose pools not used by the rest of the Clefts, who had split into two parts, one always watching what the other was doing.

  Something else happened, which is hardly mentioned in the old chronicles. It was taken for granted, and that means fire must have been there for a long time.

  In the valley a fire burned always, not far from the log, and it was kept alive, with special attendants. Soon fires were burning outside the caves. These fires appearing are one reason to question the possible timescales that have been suggested.

  No fires at all – neither on the shore nor in the valley – and then, always, fires. When fire first appeared that must have been as much of a shock as the new babies that seem to have come from nowhere.

  Why, suddenly, fire? Certainly for many generations they had seen lightning strike a spark off the edge of a rock into dry leaves, or lightning had flashed into a patch of dry grass and an old log had caught fire and burned there, perhaps for days. Someone walking in the trees had stumbled into an area black on cracked earth, with the charred remains of little animals. Someone might have seen a locust cooked in flames, eaten it, thought: that’s nice. Had they tried a roasted mouse or a bird’s egg cooked in a hollow of a rock as the flames went over it? But not once had this person, or any of them, thought: I’ll take a part of that burning log to where we live and it will warm us at night, it will cook our food.

  Then, suddenly, precisely that thought entered an early mind, or all of them, took possession – and then a great fire burned in the valley bottom, and outside the cave mouths fires burned in the shelter of a great rock as the early people crouched near it. For a long time no fires, then fires, and nuts were roasted and eggs, and perhaps the birds who made the eggs.

  Not these people, not the first males – the Squirts – but that name would go, just as had the Monsters. A memory remained of how it was a doe who fed and warmed the first monstrous babes. There were people of the eagle, people of the deer, so whatever meat was charred on the early fires it was never eagle or deer.

  We may easily look back now and see those early youths around the great fire and brood about that mystery – which we do not know how to answer – which was that for ages – long ages, as long as you like – those early people saw fire frisking about in bushes, leaping in the trees, flashing down from clouds, something familiar to them, like river water, but never thought they could tame it, but then suddenly they did. Perhaps ‘suddenly’ is not right, perhaps it should be ‘slowly’. What causes these changes where something impossible then becomes not only allowed, but necessary? I tell you, to think about this phenomenon for long leads to a disquiet that drives away sleep and makes you doubt yourself. In my lifetime things that were impossible have become what everyone accepts – and why. But why? Did these old people ever think, ‘We have known fire as part of the life of the forest, but now it does our bidding – how did that happen?’ There is no record of it.

  Meanwhile in the valley the young males are still nervous about their numbers. Fire, that great benefice, has not added to their safety. The hazards in great forests go on: a charging boar, or an angry bear; a snake that doesn’t have time to get out of the way of those naked feet; a boulder rolls down a hillside; someone unused to fire sets a handful of burning grass in an unburned place and does not run fast enough to avoid the bounding, leaping flames; poison from plants and insect bites. And the river flowing there is deep and easily sweeps away an incautious child.

  There is a record that fire brought anger and scolding from Maire and from Astre. A toddler staggered into the flames: he was not stopped in time. Maire, arriving for her visit with them, told them they were inconsistent. They complained about how few they were, how seldom the eagles brought them babies, but they did not watch their little children.

  This was not the first time they were scolded.

  Earlier, a young doe stepped down to the river’s edge to drink, and behind her crawled one of the babes she was feeding. As the doe drank, dipping her muzzle into the water, the child, emulating her, doing as his mother was doing – she was that – leaned too far over the edge and fell in.

  ‘Why don’t you set people to watch your infants, why don’t you keep guard?’

  The histories of the females record their incredulity: they simply could not understand the carelessness of the boys who did dangerous and foolish things.

  There are remarks in the females’ records that the boys were clumsy, seemed to lack a feeling for their surroundings, and were inept and did not understand that if they did this, then that would follow.

  But all this time – and who knows how long that was? – a threat continued worse than the dangers of the forest, the river, the fires – it was the animosity of the Old Females and a section of the Clefts who supported them. We have the record of an event that has the texture of improbability, so that it is hard to make it mesh with the rest.

  An Old Female climbed to the top of the mountain ‘to see for herself’. We have the exact words, and how much do they reveal? What a suspicious mind was there, hearing all kinds of descriptions from the young ones, of the events going on in the valley where the Monsters grew and flourished. She had not believed what she was told, that is clear. Hard for us to put ourselves into that cautious old mind. She was one of a species which for long ages had lived on the edge of that warm sea, never moving from it, and the horizon of her mind was limited by the mountain that bounded their world. Yes, she had always looked into a scene of ocean, of waves, the movement and tumble of them, but how can we imagine a mind whose thoughts were limited to a strip of rocky shore? For all her life this creature had not done more than sag from her sleeping cave to the rocks where she lay sunning herself, and from there to loll in the sea, and from there back again; she had scarcely moved in her life and yet now she decided to go to the mountain ‘to see for herself’. Had a drop of that new fever that had forever altered some of the young females danced for a moment in her veins? Or was it that she had no concept of the difficulty of her moving, she who never moved?

  The scenes she and her forebears had known for always had changed. Outside the caves where Maire and Astre and others of the new kind lived with their infants the great fires burned. She and her kind had seen fire flick over the crests of waves, strike across skies, burn in chains along the tops of the little hills behind the shore, but fire as a familiar – never. Now the fires at night were sometimes so tall that fish and sea animals rose to the sea’s surface goggling, because the light of the flames was gilding the waters, and they wondered if the moon or the sun had risen out of turn. The light of the fires running in the hollow of the waves told the Old Ones that nothing they knew was the same, and that the new held dangers for them they had learned already.

  Yet, she would see for herself. She heaved herself up on to her great flabby feet, and supported by the young females who remained loyal to the old ways, staggered off the rocky beaches, and then slowly, step after step, directed herself to the mountain. Before she had moved a few steps she was grumbling and groaning. Before she had even reached the Killing Rock she had to sit and rest. But up she did get, and on she went, across the uneven and stony ground, away from the sea, her element, her safety, and with most of her weight on her supporters she did go on, always more slowly, always stopping. The young ones were begging her to turn back, but she persisted and that in itself had to make us wonder. Perhaps it was only because she had no conception of walking such a distance that she could make herself go on.

  At the foot of the mountain she did let herself down out of those supporting arms, and sit, moaning, but then she dragged herself up. Often on her hands and knees, she crawled up the mountainside. By now the eagles screamed around her, and flapped down close to her and away. She screamed at them, they screamed at her, these enemies who had wanted to kill each other. What could she be thinking of these birds, taller than she was, birds who could lift a young Cleft off the rocks and drop her i
nto the waves? The noise of her ascent was quite frightful, what with her groans and cries and imprecations and shrieks of hate at the birds, the stones she dislodged that bounded off the mountain, the encouraging cries of the young ones. At the top she was among the eagles’ nests, and all around her on the rocks, in the sky above her, were the great birds. She stood, held up by the young Clefts, and looked into the valley, but what could she see with eyes used to focusing on the rough and tumble of waves? But she did try to look and to understand.

  There were shelters down there, but she had never seen anything of the kind. They were made of boughs and screens of river grass, and she could see a dark movement, capped with little white crests, but she did not know it was a river. She had been told there was a big river in the valley, but for her waves tossed and when the wind was rough, rampaged, but it was not easy to think of water confined between banks moving fast from the mountain down to barriers of rock that in fact concealed the waves from her. Down there were people, and there was an enormous fire. They were so few: she was used to seeing the rocks around her covered with basking Clefts. A lot, many, and she was seeing so few. She knew they were Monsters, because she had been told that was what she would see. Some of the boys and some visiting Clefts were in the river, swimming. Some new baby Monsters were with the others down there, but they were inside the shelters. That scene down there, in the valley she had imagined populated, was disappointing her, as we are when imagined armies of enemies, or even crowds, dissolve away in daylight.

  She was here, after that awful journey up the mountain; she ‘had seen for herself’, but there was nothing to see. She did not like the look of that fast wave-topped river; nor the fire, which was fed by dead trees from the forest and was enormous, sending up a column of smoke almost to the height where she stood. She could not make herself go down into the valley, now that she was here. Everything she saw seemed hostile to her. She was aching, ill with the effort she had made. She stood, fanning herself with a frond of dead leaves in her great arm and fatty hand, and she wailed. Her wailing disturbed the scene down there. She watched a few of the Monsters detach themselves from the fire scene and begin climbing towards her. She wailed again because she feared them, and because she could hardly move. She sank on to the earth and moaned; and when the young men came, they saw not only the Old Female, whom they knew they must fear, but young Clefts they did not know. They believed these had come as earlier ones had, with friendly intentions, and so they were grinning and reaching out their hands to these unknown females.