Jim Crace - Quarantine

Miri could have stopped and rested had she wanted to. She couldhavefound some block ofshade andwaited for herhusband. Then she could have walked at his slow pace and made Marta wait alone for them at the summit of the landfall where the scrub collapsed into a steep ravine of scree. But Miri wanted time alone with Marta. She wanted to recapture, if it were possible, the cheerful times when they had worked together on the loom. The landfall was the final opportunity for them to finish what they’d started. While her slow husband laboured like a swaying cart across the scrub, she and Marta could sit cross-legged, facing each other, with the purple and orange birth-mat stretched between them. They’d spread the still untied ends across their laps. They’d bunch the warps in fours and each complete the birth-mat with a hundred knots. They’d finalize their bold, unlikely friendship by tying it into the bold, unlikely wools.

So Miri did her best to keep her friend within sight. It didn’t matter that her arms felt stretched and that her shoulders ached almost beyond endurance so long as she could still see Marta walking ahead of her. By early afternoon they had crossed the plateau and were waiting side by side, at last, at the su^mmit of the landfall as Musa had instructed. Below them, Shim and Aphas had already begun the descent. They could see Shim’s blond head and hear the tumbling scree as he slid through the stones. Aphas was a little way behind, using all the larger rocks to steady himself but moving quickly for a man who’d been so faltering and il. They were not carrying their loads.

‘Look there,’ said Marta, pointing to a ledge of rocks a few steps from the summit of the scree. There were Musa’s saddle- packs, the rugs and bedding, the sack of grain, the two bags of utensils. The men had simply dumped them there and fled.

Miri dropped her bags and panniers where she stood and stretched her a^s and shoulders to relieve the pain, and drank a little water from the bag. It was too warm to be refreshing. Now she had an extra worry. Her husband would be furious when he discovered how his porters had betrayed him. Who’d pay for that? Who’d have to add the saddle-packs, the rugs and bedding, the sack of grain, the two bags of utensils to her load? His wife, ofcourse. But she kept her worries hidden. She couldn’t bringherselfto speak to Marta yet. She did roll out the birth-mat, though. She sat with one end on her lap, as she had planned, and began to bunch and tie the threads. She’d see if Marta volunteered to help without asking. She’d not forgive her otherwise. But Marta did not volunteer to help. She stood and looked out across the valey to the peaks of Moab. Her lip, in profile, was still fat and misshapen. Her hands were trembling.

‘Come on,’ said Miri. ‘Sit down with me. Let’s finish this. Before he comes.’

They had not finished it when Musa finally came into view. He waved Shim’s staff at them from the sloping plateau which led down to the landfail, and called, ‘Wait there.’ He was tired of his own company. He hadn’t spent so much time alone and without assistance for years. The journey so far had been unnerving and exhausting. His ankles ached. His chest was tight. He had to pause after every few steps to catch his breath. He’d not been born for walking. Just one more day, and he’d be back with camels where he belonged. Only the landfall stood between him and the markets ofJericho.

It would be difficult to go down the landfall. He knew how treacherous the scree could be for anyone as large as him. He had already pictured how stones would fall out beneath his feet and slide away, how larger rocks would tumble at him from above. He’d need the women to take him by the elbows and help him down. Marta would refuse, of course. She would not want to touch him.

‘I need more help than you,’ he’d say to Miri. He’d lift his chins at Marta. ‘She has to help as well. Come here.’

CT >.»

‘I won’t.’

He pictured ways of making her.

But when he was just a few hundred paces from the women, so close that he could see the colours of the mat, Marta suddenly stood up, wrapped her fingers round Miri’s wrist and pulled her to her feet.

‘We have to go,’ she said. ‘Don’t look at him. Bring that.’ She pushed the mat into Miri’s hands. ‘We’ll finish it another day. Get water.’

Miri grabbed one of the water-bags — not a moment of bewilde^ent or hesitation — and began to gather the other panniers and her own belongings.

‘Leave those.’ Marta pushed the panniers away, and added Musa’s clothes and wools, the sack of dried fruit and the woven bag of odds-and-ends to the pile. They’d have to leave it aH behind. She pulled the other water-bag to the edge ofthe descent and threw it down as far as she could on to the rocks. ‘Let’s see how he manages,’ she said.

With only the smaHer water-bag and the birth-mat to carry, the women were able to move quickly. They did not have the time to laugh or cry, or answer any ofMusa’s threats and promises. He was too close and dangerous. He was throwing stones at them. They would not stop their hurtling descent until their landlord and their husband and the father of their child was out of hearing and out of sight. They were light-limbed like adolescent girls. They had no need of anybody now. They had no need of miracles.

Marta and Miri hurried on in silence down the landfall, concentrating on the loose rock and the uncertain footing. The scree grew softer as the temperatures increased, closer to the vaUey floor. The earth was gypsum, spiced with salt. It smelt of eggs. But by the middle of the afternoon — already covered in a yellow film of salt — they’d reached more gently sloping and more sweetly smelling ground, a landscape of soft chalk which a child could pull apart in its hands as easily as breaking bread. The land was more reliable, at last, and they could walk side by side down towards the trading road, where travellers and caravans and soldiers were going to and coming from the gated cities of Judea. They walked amongst the donkeys and the men, and only then could exchange their tears and smiles.

‘Where can we go?’ said Miri.

‘To Sawiya.’

‘What will you say to them?’

‘I’ll say you are a widow, abandoned in the wilderness. I’ll say your husband was a merchant who died of fever. I’ll say the wind took all your things away and that it was my duty to offer help to you, because you’re pregnant and you have no one.

‘It’s almost true.’

‘It’s true.’

‘How will I live?’

‘You’ll weave. I’ll be the baby’s aunt.’

Marta’s lip was still a little sore, her body ached, but she felt untroubled for the first time in ten years. Al the bad things in her life had been abandoned at the top of the landfall. The vultures picked them clean. Was she a foolish optimist, made rash and heady by their escape from Musa? Most probably. But, for the moment, she was sure her fortunes had reversed. She’d started running down the scree and everything had changed. Everything outside of her. Everything within. She felt she was not barren any more. She’d heard it said that women knew instinctively when they were pregnant, almost from the moment of conception. They didn’t have to wait for periods or pains. Their faces tingled, as iftheir cheeks had been touched by angels.

With Miri at her side, Marta felt as if she’d already plucked a star out of the sky. One more would not be difficult. Perhaps another star was already brightening inside ofher. It didn’t matter whose it was, if it was Musa’s or the scrub’s or even granted to her in a dream, by the Gaily with his single touch. Her husband, Thaniel, wouldn’t know or care so long as she grew fat. He’d said that she should go away and pray for miracles. She’d been obedient. He had commanded that she should give birth. And now he could rejoice with her.