Nation - Пратчетт Терри Дэвид Джон - Страница 53

Daphne couldn’t look at his face. “Yes,” she said.

“Savages, we are to them. Some sort of animal. Darkies.”

“Yes.” She still did not dare to look up, in case she met his gaze. She’d pulled the trigger, she remembered, on that first day. And he had thanked her for the gift of fire.

“When the ghost girl first met me — ” Mau began.

Oh, no, he’s not going to tell them, is he? she thought. Surely he won’t. But that little smile of his, that’s the smile he smiles when he’s really angry!

“ — she gave me food,” Mau went on, “and later she gave me a gun to help me light a fire, even though she was far from home and frightened. She was thoughtful enough, too, to take out the little ball that flies and kills, so that I would come to no harm. And she invited me into the Sweet Judy and gave me wonderful lobster-flavored cakes. You all know the ghost girl.”

She looked up. Everyone was staring at her. Now Mau stood up and walked into the center of the circle.

“These men were different,” he said, “and the ghost girl knew how their minds worked. They would not sing the beer song because they thought we were a sort of animal, and they were too proud and great to sing an animal’s song. She knew this.” He looked around the circle. “The ghost girl thinks she killed a man. Did she? You must decide.”

Daphne tried to make out what was said next, but people all started talking at once, and because everyone was talking at once, everyone started talking louder. But something was happening. Little conversations got bigger, and then were picked up and rolled from tongue to tongue around the circle. Whatever the result was going to be, she thought, it probably was not going to be one simple word. Then Pilu wandered around the circle, hunkering down here and there, joining in for a little while, and then strolling on to another point and doing the same thing again.

No one stuck up their hands and there was no voting, but she thought, I wonder if it was like this in ancient Athens? This is pure democracy. People don’t just get a vote; they have a say.

And now it was settling down. Pilu got up from his last conversation and walked back to the center of the ring. He nodded to Mau and started to speak: “A man who will kill a priest, or kill a man for the pleasure of seeing him die, or kill a dolphin” — this one got a big groan from the circle — “could not be a man at all. It must have been an evil demon haunting the shell of a man, they say. The ghost girl could not have killed him, because he was already dead.”

Mau cupped his hands over his mouth. “Is this what you think?” There was a roar of agreement.

“Good.” He clapped his hands together and raised his voice. “We’ve still got to finish the pig fence, everyone, and we still need timber from the Judy, and the fish trap is not going to build itself!”

The circle rose and became a crisscrossing of hurrying people. No one had banged a table with a wooden hammer, or worn a robe. They had just done a thing that needed doing, without much fuss, and now, well, there was the pig fence to repair.

“Is this what you wanted?” asked Mau, suddenly beside her.

“Sorry? What?” She hadn’t even seen him approaching. “Oh, yes. Er, yes. Thank you. That was a very good, er, judgment,” she said. “And you?”

“I think they have decided and I think it is settled,” said Mau briskly. “The man brought Locaha here and his pistols serve him. But Locaha is no one’s servant.”

CHAPTER 12

Cannon and Politics

MAU SAT DOWN ON a god stone.

“Where is Cox now, do you think?”

“I hope to goodness the wave drowned him!” said Daphne. “I know I shouldn’t, but I do.”

“And you fear that it did not,” said Mau. It wasn’t a question.

“That’s true. I think it would take more than a wave. Hah, Foxlip said he killed Cox. That was just because he wanted to look big, I’m sure. But Polegrave said something about Cox having cannibal chums. Could that happen?”

“I don’t know. The Raiders kill for glory and skulls. You say he kills for no reason. He kills things because they are alive. He sounds like a bad dream, a monster. They will not know what to make of him.”

“Soup?” Daphne suggested.

“I doubt it,” said Mau. “A cannibal has to be careful who he eats. Milo would make them strong, Pilu would give them a magic voice, and I would give them… indigestion. Who would want to eat a madman?”

Daphne shuddered. “Just so long as they don’t eat me!”

“No, they would never eat a woman,” said Mau.

“That’s very gentlemanly of them!”

“They would feed you to their wives, so that they become beautiful.”

There was one of those pauses that are icy-cold and red-hot at the same time. It was stuffed with soundless words, words that should not be said, or said another time, or in a different way, or could be said or needed to be said but couldn’t be said, and they would go on tumbling through the pause forever, or until one of them fell out —

“Ahem,” said Daphne, and all the other words escaped forever. Much later, and many times, she wondered about what might have happened if she hadn’t chosen a word that clearly belonged to her grandmother. And that was that. For some people, there is only one right moment for the right word. This is sad, but there seems to be nothing that can be done about it. “Well, I don’t see him being eaten by anybody, or even left on the side of the plate,” she went on quickly, to drown out the last echoes of “Ahem” in her head. “I’m sure the captain was right when he said Cox will take over any vessel that finds him, like an disease. It’s amazing what you can do if you don’t care who you kill. And he will kill. Those two were sent as scouts, I’m sure of it. And that means he’s found a bigger boat.”

“The boat they came in is still here, but a canoe was stolen last night,” said Mau. “I think we are not good at understanding this sort of thing.”

“I don’t think it will make any difference.”

“That’s true. The Raiders are following — hunting the survivors. They will get here sooner or later. But I want to — ”

“Er… ”

It was a small boy. Daphne could not remember his name but he was hopping up and down like someone who does not want to intrude but needs to, well, intrude.

“Yes, Hoti?” said Mau.

“Er… please, they say they are running out of thorns to fence the big field,” said the child nervously.

“Run and tell them there is a big stand to the west of the Grandfathers’ cave.” As the boy ran off, Mau shouted after him, “Tell them I said to cut the lengths much longer! It’s a waste to cut them short!”

“You must defend your island,” said Daphne.

He reacted as if he’d been struck. “Do you think I won’t, ghost girl? Do you think that?”

“It’s not just your people! You must defend your gods!”

“What? How can you say this to me?”

“Not the metaphysical… the ones with the god stones and the sacrifices and all the rest of it! I mean the statues and all the other things in the cave!”

“Those? Just more stones. Worthless… stuff.”

“No! No, they aren’t worthless. They tell you who you are!” She sagged a little. Things had been quite busy lately, and “ghost girl” said so sharply had hurt. It did. Of course, they all called her ghost girl, even Mau sometimes, and it had never worried her. But this time it told her to go away, trouserman girl, you are not one of us.

She pulled herself together. “You didn’t look. You didn’t see what I saw in the cave! You remember Air, Fire, and Water all with their globes? And the headless statue?”

“I’m sorry,” said Mau, putting his head in his hands.

“Pardon?”

“I’ve upset you. I know when you’re upset. Your face goes shiny, and then you try to act as if nothing has happened. I’m sorry I shouted. It’s all been… well, you know.”