Empire of Ivory (28 page)

best he could, and then they waited. They had made enough

noise, to be sure, but the region was vast: they had flown

two days to reach the river, and Laurence was not sanguine.

They slept that night on the bank with no response; and the

second day also passed without event, except that Temeraire

went hunting and brought back four antelope, which they

roasted on a spit for dinner. Not very successfully: Gong

Su had remained back at the camp, to feed the other dragons

who yet continued ill, and young Allen, detailed to turn

the spit, grew distracted and forgot, so that they were

scorched black on one side and unappetizingly raw on the

other. Temeraire put back his ruff in disapproval; he was,

Laurence sadly noted, becoming excessive nice in his

tastes, an unfortunate habit in a soldier.

The third day crept onward, hot and clinging from the

first, and the men wilted gradually into silence; Emily and

Dyer scratched unenthusiastically at their slates, and

Laurence forced himself to rise at intervals to pace back

and forth, that he would not fall asleep. Temeraire gave a

tremendous yawn and put down his head to snore. At an hour

past noon they had their dinner: only bread and butter and

a little grog, but no one wanted more in the heat, even

after the debacle of the previous evening's meal. The sun

dipped only reluctantly back towards the horizon; the day

stretched.

"Are you comfortable, ma'am?" Laurence asked, bringing Mrs.

Erasmus another cup of grog; they had set her up a little

pavilion with the traveling-tents, so she might keep in the

shade: the little girls had been left back at the castle,

in the charge of a maid. She inclined her head and accepted

the cup, seeming as always quite careless of her own

comfort. A necessary quality, to be sure, for a

missionary's wife being dragged the length of the globe,

yet it felt uncivilized to be subjecting her to the

violence of the day's heat for so little evident use; she

did not complain, but she could not have enjoyed being

packed aboard a dragon, however well she concealed her

fears, and she wore a high-necked gown with sleeves to the

wrist, of dark fabric, while the sun beat so ferociously

that it glowed even through the leather of the tent.

"I am sorry we have imposed upon you," he said. "If we hear

nothing tomorrow, I think we must consider our attempt a

failure."

"I will pray for a happier outcome," she said, in her deep

steady voice, briefly, and kept her head bowed down.

Mosquitoes sang happily as dusk drew on, though they did

not come very close to Temeraire; the flies were less

judicious. The shapes of the trees were growing vague when

Temeraire woke with a start and said, "Laurence, there is

someone coming, there," and the grass rustled on the

opposite bank.

A very slight man emerged in the half-light on the far

bank: bare-headed, and naked but for a small blanket which

was draped rather too casually around his body to preserve

modesty. He was carrying a long, slim-hafted assegai, the

blade narrow and spade-shaped, and over his other shoulder

was slung a rather skinny antelope. He did not come across

the stream, keeping a wary eye on Temeraire; he craned his

neck a little to look over their blanket of goods, but

plainly he would come no farther.

"Reverend, perhaps if you would accompany me," Laurence

said softly and set out, Ferris following along doggedly

behind them without having been asked. Laurence paused at

the blanket and lifted up the most elaborate of the cowrie

chains, a neck-collar in six or seven bands of alternating

dark and light shells, interspersed with gold beads.

They forded the river, shallow here and not coming over the

tops of their boots; Laurence surreptitiously touched the

butt of his pistol, looking at the javelin: they would be

vulnerable, coming up the bank. But the hunter only backed

away towards the woods as they emerged from the water, so

in the dim light he was very nearly invisible against the

underbrush, and could easily have dived back into the

obscurity which this afforded: Laurence supposed he had

more right than they to be alarmed, alone to their large

party, with Temeraire behind them sitting cat-like on his

haunches and regarding the situation with anxiety.

"Sir, pray let me," Ferris said, so plaintively Laurence

surrendered the neck-chain to him. He edged cautiously out

across the distance, the necklace offered across his palms.

The hunter hesitated, very obviously tempted, and then he

tentatively held out the antelope towards them, with a

slightly abashed air, as if he did not think it a very fair

exchange.

Ferris shook his head, and then he stiffened: the bushes

behind the hunter had rustled. But it was only a small boy,

no more than six or seven, his hands parting the leaves so

he could peek out at them with large, curious eyes. The

hunter turned and said something to him sharply, in a voice

which lost some of its severity by cracking halfway through

the reprimand. He was not stunted at all, but only a boy

himself, Laurence realized; only a handful of years between

him and the one hiding.

The small boy vanished again instantly, the branches

closing over his head, and the older one turned back to

Ferris with a defiant wary look; his hand was clenched

sufficiently on the assegai to show pale pink at the

knuckles.

"Pray tell him, if you can, that we mean them no harm,"

Laurence said quietly to Erasmus. He did not wonder very

much what might have lured them here to take a risk perhaps

others of his clan had preferred not to run; the hunter was

painfully thin, and the younger boy's face had none of the

soft-cheeked look of childhood.

Erasmus nodded, and approaching tried his few words of

dialect, without success. Retreating to more simplistic

communication, he tapped his chest and said his name. The

boy gave his as Demane; this exchange at least served to

make him grow a little easier: he did not seem quite so

ready to bolt, and he suffered Ferris to approach him

closer, to show him the small sample of the mushroom.

Demane exclaimed, and recoiled in disgust; with no little

cause: its confinement in the leather bag during the day's

heat had not improved its aroma. He laughed at his own

reaction, though, and came back; but though they pointed to

the mushroom, and the string of shells in turn, he

continued to look perfectly blank; although he kept

reaching out to touch the cowries with rather a wistful

expression, rubbing them between thumb and forefinger.

"I suppose he cannot conceive anyone should want to trade

for it," Ferris said, not very much under his breath, his

face averted as much as he could.

"Hannah," Erasmus said, startling Laurence: he had not

noticed Mrs. Erasmus come to join them, her skirts dripping

over her bare feet. Demane stood a little straighter and

dropped his hand from the shells, very like he had been

caught at something by a schoolteacher, and edged back from

her. She spoke to him a little while in her low voice,

slowly and clearly; taking the mushroom from Ferris, she

held it out, imperiously gesturing when Demane made a face.

Once he had gingerly taken it from her, she grasped him by

the wrist and showed him holding it out to Ferris. Ferris

held out the shells in return, miming the transfer, and

comprehension finally dawned.

A small voice piped up from the bushes; Demane answered it

quellingly, then began to talk volubly at Mrs. Erasmus, a

speech full of the odd clicking, which Laurence could not

imagine how he produced, at such speed; she listened,

frowning intently as she tried to follow. He took the

mushroom and knelt down to put it on the ground, next to

the base of a tree, then mimed pulling it up and throwing

it on the ground. "No, no!" Ferris sprang only just in time

to rescue the precious sample from being stamped upon by

his bare heel.

Demane observed his behavior with a baffled expression. "He

says it makes cows sick," Mrs. Erasmus said, and the

gesture was plain enough: the thing was considered a

nuisance, and torn up where it was found; which might

explain its scarcity. It was no wonder, the local tribesmen

being cattle-herders by livelihood, but Laurence was

dismayed, and wondered where they should look for the

enormous quantities necessary to their cause if it had been

the settled practice of generations, perhaps, to eradicate

what to them was nothing more than an unpleasant weed.

Mrs. Erasmus continued to speak to the boy, taking the

mushroom, and miming a gesture of stroking it, gently, to

show him they valued it. "Captain, will you have the crew

bring me a pot?" she asked, and when she had put the

mushroom into it, and made stirring motions, Demane looked

at Laurence and Ferris with a very dubious expression, but

then shrugged expressively and pointed upwards, drawing his

hand from horizon to horizon in a sweeping arc. "Tomorrow,"

she translated, and the boy pointed at the ground where

they stood.

"Does he think he can find us some?" Laurence asked

intently, but either the question or the response she was

unable to convey, and only shook her head after a moment.

"Well, we must hope for the best; tell him if you can that

we will return," and the next day, at the same hour near

dusk, the boys came out of the brush again, the younger now

trotting at Demane's heels, perfectly naked, and with them

a small raggedy dog, its mongrel fur mottled yellow and

brown.

It planted itself on the bank and yapped piercingly and

continuously at Temeraire while the older boy attempted to

negotiate for its services over the noise. Laurence eyed it

dubiously; but Demane took the mushroom piece again and

held it out to the dog's nose, then kneeling down covered

the dog's eyes with his hands. The younger boy ran and hid

the mushroom deep in the grass, and came back again; then

Demane let the dog go again, with a sharp word of command.

It promptly returned to barking madly at Temeraire,

ignoring all his instructions, until, looking painfully

embarrassed, Demane snatched up a stick and hit it on the

rump, hissing at it, and made it smell the leather satchel

where the mushroom had been kept. At last reluctantly it

left off and went bounding across the field, came trotting

back with the mushroom held in its mouth, and dropped it at

Laurence's feet, wagging its tail with enthusiasm.

Having decided, very likely, that they were fools, or at

least very rich, Demane now turned up his nose at the

cowries, wishing rather to be paid in cattle, evidently the

main source of wealth among the Xhosa: he opened the

negotiations at a dozen head. "Tell him we will give them

one cow, for a week of service," Laurence said. "If he

leads us to a good supply of the mushroom, we will consider

extending the bargain, otherwise we will return the two of

them here with their payment." Demane inclined his head and

accepted the diminished offer with a tolerable attempt at

calm gravity; but the wide eyes of the younger boy, whose

name was Sipho, and his rather excited tugging at Demane's

hand, made Laurence suspect he had even so made a poor

bargain by local standards.

Temeraire put his ruff back when the dog was carried

squirming towards him. "It is very noisy," he said

disapprovingly, to which the dog barked an answer equally

impolite, by the tone of it, and tried to jump out of its

master's arms and run away; Demane was no less anxious.

Mrs. Erasmus sought to coax him a little closer, and

reached out to pat Temeraire's forehand to show there was

no danger: perhaps not the best encouragement, since it

drew his attention to the very substantial talons: Demane

pushed a more interested than alarmed Sipho behind him, the

wriggling dog clutched against him with his other arm, and

shaking his head vocally refused to come nearer.

Temeraire cocked his head. "That is a very interesting

sound," he said, and repeated one of the words, mimicking

the clicking noise with more success than any of them but

still not quite correctly. Sipho laughed from behind

Demane's shoulder and said the word to him again; after a

few repetitions Temeraire said, "Oh, I have it," although

the clicking issued a little oddly, from somewhere deeper

in his throat than the boys produced it; and they were

gradually reconciled by the exchange to being loaded

aboard.

Laurence had learnt the art of carrying livestock aboard a

dragon from Tharkay, in the East, by drugging the beasts

with opium before they were loaded on, but they had none of

the drug with them at present, so with a dubious spirit of

experimentation they put the whining dog aboard by main