Ghost Fire

by Wilbur Smith

  Theo didn’t know how long he was unconscious. Maybe only seconds. When he opened his eyes, the Indians were standing around him and the blood still flowed from his wounds. But the ordeal seemed to be over. No one tried to hit him. He was alive.

  But what did that mean?

  “Let me go!” he demanded, spitting out the words through the blood in his mouth. The Indians either didn’t understand or they had other plans. They grabbed his arms and dragged him to the open space in front of the longhouse. Looking down, Theo saw dark specks of ash on the ground, the remains of Gibbs’s pyre.

  He would not show fear.

  They made him kneel. Two of the Indians held him, while Malsum stood over him. He raised a knife for the crowd to inspect and intoned some ritual incantation. Theo remembered what he had done to Gibbs. He braced himself.

  Malsum grabbed a lock of his hair and pulled his head forward. Theo refused to cry out. He felt the steel against his scalp. Blood trickled down the side of his face. The pain was negligible compared with the fire racking his beaten body.

  Locks of his hair rained down over his shoulders. The knife’s edge scraped over bare skin. Perhaps they were not scalping him: were they shaving him? When they had finished, they stripped him naked and took him down to the river to wash him. They dried him and dressed him in the breech clout and buckskin leggings of their own fashion. They daubed red paint on his bald head, and lightning streaks of red and blue down his chest and cheeks. They hung strands of beads and shells around his neck.

  The Indians led him back to the stockade and presented him to the sachem. The old man addressed the tribe with stern, sonorous words. In his guttural, alien voice, it took Theo a moment to realize he was speaking a form of French.

  “We have beaten the white man out of your spirit and washed it out of your blood. From today, you are our kin and our family, a warrior of the Abenaki tribe.”

  Theo was stunned. Not knowing what else to do, he bowed. Would he really be allowed to live? Why had they chosen him?

  A woman came forward out of the crowd. She looked to be about Theo’s own age, with glossy dark hair braided down her back and an almond face that would have been pretty, if not for the ferocious scowl that distorted her features. She wore a silver amulet shaped like a bird of prey.

  The sachem took her hand and placed it in Theo’s. “This is Mgeso,” he announced. “Your wife.”

  “My wife?” Theo wondered if he’d misunderstood.

  “Her husband was killed in the battle.” The chief poked his finger into Theo’s chest, smudging the paint. “You take his place. His home, his weapons, his wife—everything. I think you strong. Your spirit is good.”

  Theo stared at the woman uncertainly. She gazed back, her dark eyes haughty and implacable. Beyond her, he saw Malsum watching him with barely hidden fury.

  Theo might now look like an Indian, but how could he possibly act the part?

  His adoption was a cause for celebration. The feast went on into the night. Theo could not understand how these people, who had tortured his companion so cruelly the day before, could now welcome him as one of their own. They fed him venison, which they dipped in a succulent concoction of bear fat and sugar. They gave him a pipe to smoke, a mix of tobacco and sumac leaves that made him choke. There was singing, and dancing, and a great many speeches that Theo could not understand.

  At the end, they carried Theo and Mgeso to one of the thatched sleeping platforms. Theo wondered if the feast had also served as a sort of wedding, for there was much amusement and nudging among the women of the tribe. They withdrew into the darkness, leaving Theo and Mgeso alone.

  He looked at her uncertainly. What was he supposed to do now? Through all the celebrations, she had remained stony-faced and silent.

  “Perhaps we should go to sleep,” he suggested in French.

  She reached down and lifted her short dress over her head. Underneath, she was naked. She smelt of the forest.

  Dazed and bruised, Theo could only stare.

  They lay down and she straddled him. Slowly, she reached behind her head and unbraided her long plait, combing it out with her fingers. Her breasts rose and fell as she stretched her arms behind her.

  She shook out her hair and bent forward over him. Her long hair brushed his skin; her nipples touched his stomach, making him shiver. She slid lower, so that her body rubbed against his. She took him in her mouth, caressing his manhood with her tongue. And all the while, her dark eyes never left Theo’s.

  Her gaze unsettled him—but his body could only respond to her expert caresses. He grew hard. She pulled herself up again, letting him feel the wetness between her legs. Spreading herself, she sank down on his erect manhood. She sat straight-backed, hardly seeming to move, yet inside Theo felt her pulsing around him, coaxing him with tiny movements that made him groan with desire.

  And still she held his gaze, no hint of emotion crossing her face. She had him trapped, exquisitely. She gripped him inside her, drawing him to the edge of climax and suddenly easing off.

  She was toying with him.

  Theo did not want her like that. There was no privacy on the sleeping platform. Every pair of eyes in the village would be watching and listening from the surrounding darkness, eager to know what sort of man Theo was.

  It would have been so easy to surrender and wait for her to give him release. But even on the brink of orgasm, he thought that it would demean him forever in the eyes of the tribe. Overcoming his body’s desires, he lifted her off and threw her down on the mat beside him.

  Her eyes widened in surprise. Her face flashed with anger, and he felt a surge of satisfaction that he had broken through her reserve. She lashed out, dragging her nails down his back and drawing blood. She grabbed her comb and tried to stab him with it, but he knocked it out of her hand and pinned her arms. She kicked and writhed, but he was stronger. He rolled her onto her stomach and spread himself over her.

  He was still erect, his manhood unsated. He re-entered her. With three quick, brutal thrusts he climaxed. She shuddered and went still.

  For long moments they lay together naked. Warmth glowed off her, sweat pooling between their bodies.

  Theo rose onto his knees. He stared into the darkness. He could feel the eyes on him, even if he could not see them. He wondered what they thought.

  “I will not be your plaything.” He was speaking to Mgeso, but in a voice loud enough to carry to every corner of the village. “Next time you come to my bed, come because you desire me. I would rather sleep alone than with a woman who does not respect me.”

  Mgeso wrapped herself in the blanket and scurried away to wash herself. Theo lay flat on the platform, entirely spent. He listened to the night. Had he turned the tribe against him by his treatment of Mgeso?

  The night offered no answers.

  •••

  The next morning, Theo was surprised to find the tribe busy preparing to leave. Weapons were wrapped in skins, possessions bundled in blankets. He pulled on his unfamiliar clothes, the buckskin trousers with the sharp porcupine frills, and the ruffled shirt. He touched his head, still shocked to feel the smooth skin where his hair had been. His body was stiff and he groaned with the pain from his weals and bruises.

  From across the clearing, Malsum glared at him. Mgeso stayed with the other women, averting her face whenever Theo looked at her. He went down to the river where some of the men were loading canoes. He started picking up bundles and passing them down. The others accepted his help wordlessly.

  “Where are we going?” he asked in French.

  Most of the men ignored him, but one—younger than Theo, with a friendly face—turned and answered, “We are going hunting.”

  “Hunting what?”

  The youth shrugged. “Whatever the spirits send us. Deer, buck-elk, raccoon—the hunting moon has been and gone. It is time to come down from the mountains.”

  “You speak French very well,” Theo complimented him.

  “Ther
e is a French priest who has a mission school at St. Lawrence. I went there to study. My father says we must learn all we can about the Europeans, or they will conspire against us.” He smiled shyly. “I do not mean to be rude. You are one of us now.”

  Theo nodded, though the words made him uneasy. He saw his reflection in the river and flinched at the stranger who stared out of the water. With his head shaved to a single lock of hair, the ornaments protruding from his ears and nose, the unfamiliar clothes, he looked an authentic Indian. The bronzed skin he had inherited from his father completed the picture. How could he return to civilization now—even if he found his way through the miles of wilderness? The French would take him for an Englishman, while the English would shoot him on sight as a French ally.

  The sachem had won. Theo was a member of the tribe, whether he desired it or not.

  “I am Moses,” said the young Indian, who had been watching Theo.

  “That does not sound like an Abenaki name.”

  “The priest at the mission school splashed me with water and gave me this name. My Abenaki name is—”

  He said something so long and unpronounceable that Theo smiled. Moses looked wounded.

  “I am sorry,” Theo apologized. “I fear the Abenaki blood does not yet run strong enough in my veins that I can remember that. I will call you Moses.”

  They slid the canoe into the water. Theo marveled at how light it was: four men could lift it with ease, though it must have measured nearly forty feet long. The hull was made from a single piece of elm bark, bent around hickory ribs and sewn together at the ends. It felt so thin he was sure a single sharp stick could rip it open.

  “Why did the old man save me?” he asked. “Why did you not kill me like Gibbs?”

  “The sachem had a dream the night before you came. A child was alone in the forest. All the women were tending the crops, and the men were away hunting. A wolf stalked the child. Closer and closer, until the child was almost in his jaws.”

  Moses had dropped into a crouch, his body swaying, as if he himself was the wolf, not just retelling an old man’s dream.

  “But as the wolf was about to devour the child, a hawk swooped out of the sky. He wrapped the child in his mighty wings. He pecked and clawed at the wolf’s eyes, avoiding the beast’s jaws, until the animal fled. Then he flew away.”

  Moses was staring at Theo in a most disconcerting way—as if he could see something Theo wasn’t aware of.

  “Next day, you arrived in the village. The sachem looked into your eyes, and he saw the hawk. It means you will be a mighty warrior and save our tribe from some great calamity.”

  At that moment, lost in a hostile wilderness, every muscle in his body aching, it seemed a preposterous idea. Theo thought better of saying so. If the Indians wanted to believe he had a glorious future, he would not disabuse them.

  “Does the sachem always do what his dreams tell him?”

  Moses looked surprised. “It is through dreams that the ancestors speak to us and guide us.”

  “What does your priest think of that?”

  Moses touched the cross he wore around his neck. “There are many spirits in this world. If they speak to us, how can we say they do not exist?”

  •••

  For days, they made slow progress through the wilderness. There was no plan that Theo ever saw, no map or schedule. To an outsider, it would have looked like random meandering. But Theo could sense an unhurried purpose in their route. The Abenaki understood the landscape as intimately as their own thoughts. They rarely discussed where they were going next: they simply knew, or perhaps felt it. These were paths and rhythms from deep in the tribal memory.

  Much of the time they traveled on water. Sometimes they would strike out overland, and carry the canoe for miles before they reached another river. Even when they halted, they did not leave it in the river but carried it to their campsite. There, they overturned it and propped it up on sticks to make a shelter. It was cramped underneath, but its watertight hull was protection against rain.

  On occasion they made a more lasting camp and stayed several days. The men would fill their pouches with cured venison and dried corn, gather their bows and rifles, and head out hunting. Game was plentiful. There were deer, far larger than the swamp deer Theo had occasionally seen in India. There were huge, ox-like creatures with shaggy brown coats and long horns, which grazed on the long grass in wild meadows. Moses told Theo that the French called them “buffaloes.”

  Theo was not given a gun. He followed behind, watching how the hunters tracked their prey with the faintest spoor. He learned how to skin the animals they killed, and how to dress and pack the meat to waste as little as possible. His main purpose was as a beast of burden. When it came to carry the spoils back to camp, Malsum always gave him the heaviest load.

  “Why does Malsum hate me?” Theo asked, struggling under a haunch of venison. Blood ran out of the meat and trickled down the back of his neck. “Is it because I am English?”

  Moses looked surprised. “The blood of the white man has been washed from your veins. You are adopted into our tribe, now.”

  “Yes, I know. But I sometimes wonder if Malsum remembers it.”

  “Malsum does not hate you because you were English,” Moses explained. “He hates you because of Mgeso.”

  Theo waited for him to explain.

  “Malsum was in love with her. But when it came time to marry, she chose another man—the man who was killed by your friend. It is said that Malsum still loves her, that when her husband died he thought he would have his chance at last. Then the sachem declared that you should take her husband’s place.”

  Theo pondered. “And what does Mgeso think?”

  Moses shrugged. “Even the ancestors cannot say what is in a woman’s heart.”

  At the front of the line, a tomahawk flashed. Malsum reached down and lifted up a long brown snake, writhing in his grip. Theo could not believe he would pick it up so casually. Then he saw blood gushing from its neck where the head had been hacked off.

  Malsum bit off a lump of squirming snake flesh and chewed it heartily. He tossed it over his shoulder to Theo. “Hungry?”

  Theo gaped at the creature, still in its death throes. The raw meat glistened pearly white, smeared with blood. His stomach turned. “Is it poisonous?”

  “It is a rattlesnake,” Moses informed him. “One bite will kill you. But the poison is all in the head.”

  The men were watching, Malsum most keenly of all. Theo took the dead snake in both hands, opened his mouth, and bit down hard.

  The flesh was tough and leathery. Theo chewed it to a pulp and swallowed, then took another bite.

  The others laughed and cheered. Theo handed the snake to Moses, who bit through the flesh and passed it on. Theo felt light-headed, but warm with the glow of triumph.

  Malsum turned away without a word.

  •••

  After the first night, Theo didn’t touch Mgeso. When they went to bed, she lay beside him, but separated by a handspan. If Theo rolled over, she moved away. It was always the same distance, a warm chasm of air between their bodies.

  He knew that if he tried to take her, she wouldn’t resist. She was his wife, and she would not fail in her obligations. But he would feel her hatred, every second a rebuke. He did not want her like that.

  He had no idea what he wanted. Chance had thrown him into circumstances he had no control over. He had to trust his intuition, his innate survival instincts.

  He thought of Abigail, their night by the waterfall. But that seemed to belong to a different life. The man he saw when he glimpsed his reflection—shaved head, painted face, pierced ears—had nothing in common with the youth who had arrived in Bethel. The longer he roamed the forest with the Abenaki, the more he felt his old life slipping away. He did not think he would ever see Abigail again. Was she married now? Or had her intended spurned her because of their transgression?

  Some nights he dreamed of her. But
in those dreams she often became Mgeso, writhing on top of him while he thrust into her. He would wake smeared with his own fluid, filled with a confusion of guilt and desire.

  They were in camp one afternoon, on the edge of open grassland, when Malsum approached Theo. He pointed to a thicket on the far side of the meadow. “There is a bees’ nest there. Are you brave enough to fetch the honey?”

  He smiled as he said it. His eyes sidled past Theo to where Mgeso sat on a log mending a blanket. Her face betrayed nothing, but Theo felt her gaze like hot coals on his skin.

  Malsum laughed. “I can go—if Ahoma is so frightened of a bee sting.”

  Ahoma was the nickname he had given Theo. It meant “chicken.”

  Mgeso was bent over her blanket, pretending not to have heard. He stood. “I will go.”

  Theo was dressed in the Abenaki style, barefoot and bare-chested, wearing a loincloth, buckskin breeches and his knife belt. It no longer struck him as foreign dress. In the forest, he moved more like the Indians, long loose strides that avoided his flesh snagging on the undergrowth. His feet, once so used to stout leather shoes, had adapted to the soft moccasins they wore. Even the face he sometimes glimpsed in still water, or on his knife blade, did not seem so alien.

  Theo moved easily through the tall brown grass, enjoying its touch against his bare stomach. As he neared the thicket Malsum had shown him, he heard the hum of bees. He could see them flying out from the trees and swarming angrily. At least Malsum hadn’t lied about the nest. Theo had suspected it might be a prank to make him look ridiculous.

  The trees swayed. If Theo had been paying more attention, he might have thought it strange on that still day. He was too busy thinking about how to remove the honey from the nest. No doubt the Abenaki had a method, but Theo had been too proud to ask in front of Mgeso. He had seen beekeepers in India using smoke to drive off the bees, but he had no flint, and he could not lose face by going back to the camp to fetch a brand from the fire.

  He ducked under a bough and entered the thicket. He became more aware of the noise, not just the furious buzzing of bees, but a crashing of branches as if a gale was blowing through. Ahead, through the leaves, he saw a dark shape halfway up a tree.