Quarantine (34 page)

on its drawstring round her neck would swing between them

like an incense pot. Now Musa had a happy image of himself

He'd seize her by her drawstring and pull her breasts and lips

back on to his. That's what he'd do, one of the many things

he'd do, when he had trapped her in the cave.

Musa pushed the shawl away from his genitals and let the cold

air calm him down. He dared not touch himself again, not yet.

He had already come too close to ejaculating. That would be

expenditure without returns. How many times he had had sex

with women just like this, alone, his penis in his hand, recalling

some short encounter from that day. If only he could possess

these half-glimpsed women in the flesh, every one of them. If

only he could rope them up in bunches and hang them by their

ankles from his camel sides, like monkeys. He'd go each night

to pick a plump one from the bunch. He was deserving of them

all. If they aroused him, then they should satisfy him too. Women

that he'd only glimpsed for moments in a market crowd. Women

married to his cousins, caught out half dressed at their ablutions.

Older women, careless with their clothes. Girls too young to

wear a shawl, too young to care if Musa saw their legs. Women

who had argued with him at his stall, their faces fiery and their

shoulders square. Women seen with sickles in their fields as Musa

and his camels journeyed by; he'd call to them, and they would

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stand up, perhaps, arch and stretch their aching backs, and wave

at him, shake all the chaff and dust from off their clothes.

How easy it had been to dip his hands into their remembered

lives at night. To rove about them with his fingertips. To have

these strangers do exactly as he said in his imaginings. There'd

been no bruises and no screams from them, except, of course,

on those occasions when he summoned little Miri to his bed to

stand in for the woman that he'd picked that day. 'Wave at me,

Miri. Do it, do it. Stand there. Arch your back. That's right. Be

quiet! Pull up your tunic. Stretch.' Be someone else, besides my

wife. Be anybody else. Be everyone.

Now Musa's heart was beating far too fast for comfort. His

breath was laboured, but, at least, he would not have to waste

himself into his hands or on his wife that night. There was a

chance - a certainty - that all these beating, breathless moments

in his past could, by some miracle, be brought to life. He'd help

himself, through Marta, to all the women he had ever seen, to

all the chances he had ever missed. He would express himself

on her, like he'd expressed his anger on the little jenny he had

killed. He'd put his pestle to good use again. He'd kick the

woman's shanks. She'd go down on her knees. He'd like to see

the stubborn creature's head fall loose. He'd like to see her

tumble to the ground. She'd close her eyes when he pushed into

her. He saw her face, he planned how it would be, and it was

plump and beautiful and bruised. Her fabrics were all silks, and

all her silks were tom. Do what you want to me, he'd make her

say. You are the landlord. This is rent.

Musa lifted his head up off the ground, rolled on to his side,

and shifted his weight on to his knees. There was no one to pull

him to his feet. But he was nimble for a change. He felt so young

and well, and aided by strong demons who helped him stand.

He had waited thirty days for this, and he would take his time.

It was still too dark outside the cave for him to see the damage

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of the night, how the wind had ripped the branches from the

trees, exposed the roots of plants and left a unifying cloak of dust

across the scrub. But there was light enough for him to make

his way, her shawl around his shoulders, between his own cave

and his neighbour's. He looked around, and listened carefully.

No sound, except for his own panting. No sign of anyone about.

The badu always made a noise if he was moving. He must be

sleeping, then. Musa edged along the sloping ground. No poppies

had survived the night. He watched his step. He did not want

to send a stone rattling down the hillside, and wake her up and

rouse the badu. He had to be as sudden as he could. He had to

take her by surprise. His clothes were loosened, and his testicles

furrowed and retracted in the cold, like shrinking slugs with salt

put on their backs.

This was not wickedness, he told himself This was his duty

and his right. Marta wanted him. Why else would someone such

as her, sophisticated, wealthy, well-born, well-built, waste so

many days with Miri, except to use his wife as an excuse to

spend a little time with him, the story-teller and the merchant

king? Why else had she such tempting breasts, such thighs, if

not to have them touched? Why else had she come to the caves

at all except to go back to her husband pregnant? He'd overheard

her say as much herself That's what she'd prayed for on the

promontory. She wanted to return to Sawiya, transformed by

miracles, made fertile by her quarantine. He would oblige. He'd

do what the little Gaily had refused to do. He'd throw his seed

on to her fallow ground.

Musa had an image of her from the day before, sitting on the

rocks while he invented and recounted his adventures without

water in the desert. She had not stared at Miri but at him. Her

lips had parted when he spoke. One leg had fallen loosely to the

side, beneath her clothes. She was loose-limbed for him. Her

eyes were wide and fixed on his mouth. Her face and skin were

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full and clear. She'd smiled at him. She'd given him her shawl

as a favour and a sign. This was an invitation to her cave. This

was her fault.

She'd thank him, afterwards. He'd see to that. He'd not be

satisfied until she'd said how glad she was he'd come. 'A miracle.

You are not barren now,' he'd say when he had finished with

her. 'That husband of yours is the only one to blame. He's not

a man. He isn't any use. But see how big my Miri is becoming.

See how big the barren women are whenever I come to their

market-places. I send them home with something in their bags,

and they've not parted with a single coin. They've made a profit

out of me. Their trees are heavy with my fruit. You've never

seen such vines as theirs. That is the magic of my trade. My

caravans supply fertility. What good is fasting, then? What good

are prayers? What good's obedience to all the laws, when Musa

takes you as his bride?'

'Up, up!' he'd say. He'd make her pull him to his feet.

Marta had not slept much during the wind, of course. She

was less self-possessed than Musa. Storms never brought good

luck or gentle dreams to her. And even after the storm she was

too uneasy and uncomfortable to sleep. She was still awake when

Musa crept up outside and stood waiting for some better light

to act as his accomplice. Now that the wind had gone, each tiny

sound he made was amplified inside her cave. She heard her

landlord's breathing, and she heard the scuffle of his feet. But

Marta was not frightened by the sounds at first. She did not

imagine for a moment that Musa was outside. She'd seen how

ill he was the evening before. How hot and heavy he had been,

how weak his speech. She'd have to go when it was light to take

him water, to check if he were dead, but she was in no hurry

for the dawn to come. She entertained herselfby thinking what

the sounds might mean.

At worst the scuffiings in the scrub, she thought, would be

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the badu, tugging at his hair and turning over rocks with his

toes. He never seemed to sleep. He often prowled around at

night and made strange, liquid noises, like a hyena with its snout

inside a deer. The more she listened, though, the more she

wondered if these sounds were human at all. A man's disturbances

would be more weighty. These were too light and birdlike to

be threatening. An owl. Gazelles, perhaps? It was - at best, the

very best - that little, straw-boned sister from the tent, with

untied hair, and a peeping, rodent face. Her Miri, then - come

up to the scarp with rugs and pillows and 'something sweet' as

she'd been instructed by her husband, only to find him dead

inside his cave? She was ashamed, but Marta wished it could be

so. Then she and Miri could be sisters till the end of time. She

could be an aunt to Miri's child. They'd go back to Sawiya, arm

in arm, the widow and the barren wife. That would be worth a

thousand days of quarantine.

Marta listened carefully, but she could not really fool herself

that this was Miri waiting in the dark. She'd not make that

mistake again. Yes, surely these were the same sounds that had

frightened her before, on her first day. The raucous snails, the

lizards and the flies, the worms, the millipedes, the whip bugs

and the slugs had gone into the cistern for their drink. It was the

fourth day of creation yet again, and the water teemed with life.

Once more, she listened, held her breath. But, no, she hadn't

got the answer yet. The sounds were too dry and close to be the

cistern. The sounds were unfamiliar as well, except for one which

finally she recognized, the flux and reflux of a breath too regular

to be an animal's. It was the sound of someone inhaling and

exhaling through his nose.

It was not long before what little light there'd been outside

had disappeared. The someone who'd been breathing blocked

the entrance to her cave and was standing there, as dark and still

as some large stone. Marta prayed. She had to be an optimist.

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She had to think it was the healer. She'd half-expected he would

come. Their meeting was ordained. Perhaps there'd be a miracle.

That's what she'd prayed for, after all. That is what she'd dreamed.

That was why she'd spent so many evenings, when it would

have been much easier to stay with Miri at the loom, waiting

on the promontory and watching for a sign of life outside his

cave. It had to be the Gaily, then, who blocked her light. Who

else? There wasn't anybody else. Please god there wasn't anybody

else.

She heard his tongue. She heard his lips. She heard the salt-bush

rustling and then her own name, whispered by a man. She even

welcomed it. 'Marta, I have come for you.' She did not want to·

recognize the voice at first. It was so soft, and too distorted by

the echo in the cave. It still might be the Galilean voice. How

could she be certain anyway? She'd never heard him speak. She'd

never even seen his face. She'd only caught the almost-sight of

him, the shy and nearly shadow on the precipice. She'd only

ever seen his humming rocks. She held her breath. She waited

for the shadow to approach. There was still room for hope.

'Come in, ' she said, and prayed, All thanks to god, and let it

be the Gaily. Let him have climbed the precipice to minister to

me. 'Marta, I've come for you,' he'd said. He knew her name.

The first of many miracles. He'd swell into the holy king and

reach into her cave. He'd cup her face inside his giant palm, 'Be

well . . . ', and he would build his kingdom in her empty spaces.

Again he said her name. And now she knew his voice was far

too high and comical for one so pitying and strong. She watched

the shadow, and, yes, it swelled and reached into her cave as she

had dreamed. It came into her empty spaces. This was no boyish

skin and bones. This man was large, and getting larger too. He

held her wrists. He cupped her head inside his giant palms.

What was her latest article of faith? If anything could happen,