At last she spoke. ‘I need your help, Biddy.’ She halted, then swallowed and continued. ‘Fortune has dealt me a vicious blow. Will you help me?’ She turned straight to face me then. What could I say? I felt right sorry for her, even though common sense told me I was probably going to be put upon something rotten.
‘Yes, My Lady. I told you I would help you.’
I saw her wince.
‘I mean more than what – your position obliges.’
‘What then?’ The babe was getting close to full size; now she had loosened her stays it showed clear enough. ‘You don’t mean to cast it out, do you? For I don’t believe—’
‘Oh, no. No, not that Biddy. Do you think I would kill my own child?’ Her sharp look shamed me.
‘It was only the sassafras oil, My Lady,’ I mumbled.
‘Sassafras?’ She was truly surprised. ‘That is Jesmire’s, for her rheumatics. No, you are a clever girl. You know you are, of course. And given the right costume could pass for—’ She dropped her chin into her hand, covering her mouth as if it might betray her. She had raised my curiosity all right. I racked my brainbox. Did she want me to dress up and fetch her something from a fancy shop?
‘No. It’s too stupid. I once thought you could help me.’ Her head shook quickly, as if to rid herself of a fancy. ‘It’s too ridiculous.’
‘Tell me,’ I demanded. I laid my hand on her sleeve. She was sopping wet and I knew she should be back at the inn tucked up in bed. But I had to know.
‘I’ll help you,’ I said rashly. I was thinking of her brother, of how I had passed as a better sort in Paris. If I had to go and buy some perfume or a new gown, it would at least be entertaining. ‘I’ll do it. If it’s some sort of mimicry you’re after, I’m your girl.’
‘You are remarkably quick. Yes, it is mimicry I want of you, Biddy.’
Then she told me my task. ‘When we arrive in Italy I want you to call on a certain fellow and fetch the key to the villa. That is all. To pass yourself off as me to this Count Carlo. He never met me in his life. And we do both, of course, bear a resemblance to each other.’
‘Do we?’ I was flabbergasted. Me, pass myself off as her in noble company? I was trying to turn it over in my mind but all I could make out was a jumble of notions darting about just like that blizzarding snow.
‘So you will do it? You did say you would do it.’ There was a finger-poke of command in her tone then. The way she said it, it sounded such a slight thing, to call for a key.
‘He has truly never met you?’ I asked slowly.
‘Never. And knows very little of me. He may ask after his friend, my uncle, so I’ll school you on that.’
A queasy spasm gripped my gut. How would I sit, how would I address him, what if he laughed at my stupid attempt?
‘In truth, My Lady, I don’t rightly know if – if I can keep it up.’
‘Listen. You have nothing to do but call on him. Then at last I can be easy.’ She was watching me hard. Two patches of red glowed like fever on her cheeks. ‘You did promise.’
I pressed my chilblained fingers to my lips and wished all our words had never been spoken. Yet they had been, and fool that I was, I had agreed to this pantomime.
I tried out my best, most ladylike, affected tone. ‘Why if it should please you, yes my dear lady.’
‘That’s it Biddy. That’s all you need to do. Very good.’ She patted me on the arm like I was Bengo and had just performed a trick. Then she rose and left and I traipsed mournfully after her, following her snow-blurred footprints back to the inn.
XXIII
The road ahead wound between crags splintered like broken teeth, edged by dizzying crevasses. Never in his life had Loveday imagined such a horrible place. The seasons were trapped by some kind of witchery; rain froze as white as chicken feathers, smothering crops and freezing lakes. With helpless dismay he had watched as the carriage was pulled apart, like a great carcass hacked into joints. Now he was riding a curious wooden chair carried by four strong mountain men. He dared not look about himself. In the corners of his eyes were the flicker of trees, pointed rocks, ice-crusted snow. His senses closed against the succession of horrors; it would be many hours until they stopped at the mountain-top. Commanding his limbs to be still on the narrow chair, he released his spirit to go wherever it chose.
* * *
He was standing on the beach at Lamahona. Sailing towards him was a poor sort of boat with no ritual paint or sails. Three strangers. He turned to run to the village, to bang the hollow tong-tong trunk in warning. But he skewed in his sandy tracks.
Behind the small rowing boat, far out at sea stood something vast and magnificent. Loveday groped for words – a tower of trees hung with banners, a palace of flags, a cage of fluttering shrouds. It was his first ever sighting of a white man’s ship.
* * *
Loveday pushed his way to the front of the excited crowd and stared at the strangers. The three men standing on Lamahona beach had round, fish-like eyes and fat noses like the juru sea-cows. Their skin was not truly white, but pale and misshapen, seamed with scars and horrible lumps. The broadest of the white men made animal sounds. A pale jagged scar ran across his face. To Loveday he looked very old, as crumpled as the flesh-eating lizards of Komodo Island. Like the other men, he wore strange mud-coloured cloths and a headdress of flat leather. The white man lifted a string of beads that was as blue and transparent as solid ocean. After a long pause Chief Korohama snatched them and held them high. A thrill of relief passed amongst the crowd. These horrible creatures wanted to be their friends.
Later, the man he called Scarface again pulled out a bundle, but all he showed them was a grey lump of amber whale stones. Loveday had laughed to see it, the commonplace lump so carefully wrapped in a cloth. All in a jitter of excitement, he and his friends led the white men to the boathouse to show them how the stuff was used. The strangers had made low whispering sounds as they passed the shelf of sacred skulls, but the crowd politely ignored their disrespect. Mounds of pungent whale stones lay heaped all around the boats. One of the boat crew showed the white men how the stuff was diluted to seal the boats. It was the whales’ gift to the hunters and it had always been so.
Towards dusk the white men fetched a lantern from their little boat. While the white men stood on the beach and raised and lowered a little door inside the lantern, the villagers murmured to each other in understanding. They did the same thing when the fish did not come, holding flaming candlenuts by the seashore to call the spirits of the fish. Loveday looked out to the wondrous ship still hanging on the horizon, now spangled with pinpricks of light as the sky grew dark. Only for a fleeting moment did he ponder that if he could see the lamp-lit ship, perhaps its crew could see the flashing language of their comrades’ lantern, calling from the beach.
* * *
Loveday’s eyes snapped open, awake. Many hours had passed since the great feast held for the strangers, but still his manger spirit rattled with the question: who were these white men? Gently, he freed his limbs from Bulan’s warm flesh and listened as their baby son continued to breathe slowly and evenly. At the doorway to his hut he picked up his harpoon, feeling its balance and weight stiffen his courage. Creeping outside, he found his way using his bare toes and his nose. Wood smoke wafted from the fire stones at the village centre; a fug of charred dog meat hung in the direction of the chief’s hall. The sea suddenly loomed, a vast lungful of briny salt. Across its plain of rocking night, the moon’s rays cast a phantom path. The white men’s ship could not be seen.
He turned away from the sea and sank his feet in the soft sandy path. Soon a guttural murmuring reached his ears from the clearing ahead. On the tips of his toes he edged slowly forward. The yellow beam of a lantern waved behind dark trees. His first fear was for the safety of his ancestors’ skulls, but the light was nowhere near the sacred shelf. Next he feared for the boats, the living spirits that carried the villagers across the ocean. No. They were loading some
thing into sacks. Whale stones. There were lots more white men, they must have come secretly from the tall ship. The whole scene was so unbelievably stupid that he snorted out loud.
The lantern swung suddenly towards him. A shout rose, then two men ran towards him. The shock of his discovery felt like a blow that stunned him. The first man was so close now that he could see his monstrous face. Terrorised into action, Loveday headed into the deepest thicket of trees, running at his legs’ full stretch. Behind him followed the crash of heavy footsteps and shouts of pursuit. But he held the advantage; this was his land, he had played in this forest as a boy. Even in the pitchy darkness he knew where to jump high over tangled shrubs and when to stoop low below murderous branches. He headed for the brackish pool at the thicket’s centre, where earth and trees sank into bog. Soon his feet slowed in sucking mud and he used his harpoon to leap like a frog across the water. Reaching the far bank he scrambled into a thicket. Breathless and frightened, he crouched against a tree trunk, his chest panting fast.
He could hear the men crashing behind him and then talking urgently. ‘Kir-im’, they seemed to be saying, and the words meant less to him than a gecko’s bark. He waited, his back pressed hard against the tree, his ears straining for the sound of feet plunging across the water to capture him.
At that moment fula, the brazen moon, flooded the forest with moonbeams. In the bleached light he saw a man pointing a stick towards him, twenty paces away. It looked so stupid, for even if he threw the stick, it could never reach him across the water. Then to Loveday’s amazement, a blinding spark erupted from the stick. A thunderclap sounded, rocking the earth. An invisible fist punched his chest. The next he knew, he was flat on the ground, flung on his back, all the life pressed out of him. Bitter smoke filled his nostrils; his limbs felt as dead as stone.
For a long time his thoughts spun this way and that, like a speared fish beating its tail. When he came to his senses he was clinging to a tree root as if it were his only anchor to life. An open wound in his shoulder lashed him with pain; his limbs were sore and stiff. Slowly, the sounds of the forest returned. But what he first thought were the terrified cries of birds in the distance were not birds. Muffled by distance, they were human wails and shouts. Without warning, a cry like a sacrificed pig tore the night sky apart. Loveday curled even tighter into the earth.
Just beyond the forest edge terrible things were happening. He pictured Bulan and Barut’s suffering and squirmed with self-hatred. He was a hunter, a brave man, a husband, a father. Only he was not those things tonight. As he lay on the forest floor his courage flickered and died. Those white witch-men had cursed him. They had shrunk him from a man into a feeble-witted coward.
Finally, he forced himself to stand up and stagger from tree to tree. Gripping his harpoon pole, he paddled himself along like an old man with a stick. At the edge of the village he stood for a long time, his fists tight with fear. He felt shivering cold and sick.
The village banyan tree, the roofs of the huts, everything was lost in blackness. With a gasping effort he staggered crab-wise towards the chief’s hall. He had barely crept a few paces when his foot bumped against something warm and solid, like a sleeping dog. Using his harpoon pole as a balance, Loveday dropped to a squat very slowly and patted the dog. It was hairless and smooth. As his fingers crept along a thick limb, they sank into something warm and sticky. As he tried to rise, a ringing metal clack rang out from the darkness. Then a lantern opened and Loveday blinked into the golden light of the white men’s lamp.
I am a hunter, he recited to himself. I stand firm. Behind the lamplight stood the man Scarface, dragging a group of village women, all of them haltered with ropes. One of the women straining to see him was his beloved Bulan. Her lovely face was a mask of terror. ‘Husband!’ she called to him. ‘Help me!’ His frantic gaze flickered to the ground where a dozen corpses lay twisted across the village clearing. The body at his feet was Chief Korohama, his throat cut and his dead eyes staring at the stars. While he had cowered in the trees, all these honourable men had fought to save their village.
Though half blinded by the light, Loveday tried to rise with the same majestic grace as when he stood at the rushing prow of his boat. He tried to raise his harpoon straight and point it at the white man. His Bapa’s words returned to him, ‘Stand firm’. Though his arm trembled like a sail in a storm, he aimed the harpoon’s barb precisely at the man’s throat. He rejoiced as he drew back his arm to gather his power. The man would be dead before his next heartbeat.
The fire-flash punched him again, throwing him hard against the wall. To his amazement he was lying in the dirt again, slumped over Chief Korohama’s corpse. His shame was such that he did not ever want to wake again and live. He gave his spirit permission to leave his body and seek his ancestors. Bulan and Barut were alive and suffering and he had not saved them. He wanted never to face another human again.
* * *
His heartfelt wish was refused by the gods. He had woken in a Damong boat, tied by knotted grasses to a wailing old man. He learned that the white men had sold all the village men to their most vicious enemies. The women and children were nowhere to be seen. He caught a glimpse of his home over the boat rail. His island was emerging in the dawn light, the cone of the volcano piercing a crown of fluffy clouds. The water was blue and glittering, the beach a curve of pearl white sand. But from the direction of his village grey smoke rose in streamers. It hung above the trees like a storm cloud, very ugly, very wrong.
Later they came to Damong island, where timber poles paraded the horned skulls of their sacrificial beasts. His insides quailed with fear. Beside him the old man whimpered and lost control of his guts in a hot stink. Courage, he discovered, was not a loyal companion who came at his bidding. It was a fair-weather friend who that day left him stranded and witless.
* * *
Loveday’s mouth was pressed hard against the wooden edge of the chair. He rose to find he had reached a flat plain of snow. Pulling off his hat he felt the thin sun stroke his naked cheek. Above, a huge brown bird hovered gracefully in the sky, its pointed wings spread wide to float on a rising breeze. The great bird, so noble and sleek, its wings as wide as a devil ray, was surely an omen of good? He looked to where they would travel next. There, barely a league below, lay a shore of fertile green where the snowline ended. He had never before understood that green was such a beautiful life-giving colour.
When they set off again, Loveday watched in wonder as the nimble-footed mountaineers carried him down the looping path. He passed a cascade of water frozen like a blink in time, its crystal splashes sparkling like diamonds. Twisting off a knobbly icicle, he let it melt in his palm until all that was left was a pebble of ice enclosing a perfect leaf the size of a fingernail. Turning a corner they faced a mass of twisted ice like a frozen river, tumbling hundreds of feet into blue-green caverns. He would never see such wonders again. One day, he prayed, he might tell his children of where their Bapa had journeyed when he strayed off the edge of the world.
Finally, he saw green blades of grass sprouting bravely through lacy ice. Soon the greenness stretched ahead of him, and he motioned to the men to halt and let him dismount. Taking his last dozen steps on the snow he felt the ground soften into grass beneath his feet. Here was a valley bordered by round grassy hills, and in its midst a stone village of artful towers and red roofs. Throwing off his heavy fur he plucked a scented white blossom from a passing tree. The fragile petals smelled of life and blossoming hope.
XXIV
Piedmont to Montechino
Being St Valentine’s to Ash Wednesday, February 1773
Biddy Leigh, her journal
* * *
Manus Christi
First take your sugar clarified and melt it in water of roses. Seethe these two till the water be consumed and the sugar hard, put in four grains of crushed pearls and precious stones, made in fine powder, then lay it in cakes on a marble stone anointed with oil of roses and lay on
your gold.
An unsurpassed defence against all the sickness, soreness and wounds that do daily assault mankind, written in The Cook’s Jewel, in a very old scriven hand, 1523
* * *
From the day I promised to help my mistress, everything felt tainted. It was like I’d baked a cake with salt instead of sugar; everything looked well enough, but no meddling in the world could ever set it right again. And the shame of it was, that now we were past those fearsome Alps, there never was a lovelier place than Piedmont. Green meadows rose before us like the land of milk and honey, the hills thick with grapevines and the sky china blue and jewel bright. I should have been as happy as a lark, being free to walk outside the carriage with the sun warming my back, but it had all turned sour to me.
‘Do you think that’s why she’s dragged me all this way, just to use me?’ I harped on to Mr Loveday. All this time I had flattered myself that my mistress maybe liked me for myself. But no, she had picked me out to play a part in some trickery. I felt as ill-used as a ten-year-old dishclout.
‘You just go this fellow, fetch the key and then it done, my friend.’
Puffed out from climbing the hill I grasped his arm and stood before him, staring fiercely. ‘She said we look alike. Is that true?’
He stuck out his broad lower lip and looked into my face. ‘You both women, both brown hair. This man never know you not my lady.’
I had to laugh. ‘That’s what you think! I only need open my mouth and he’ll know me for a right clodhopper.’ We carried on walking and I picked a dull blackish berry from a branch, a sort of hard grape. ‘It’s one thing parroting the mistress, but another to talk mannerly with this count fellow.’
An Appetite for Violets Page 15