Mara and Dann. Doris Lessing

a bad idea to forget them. ‘What you don’t know won’t hurt you,’ she said.

      Often Mara climbed on Daima’s lap, but when Dann was asleep, because she didn’t want him to know that she often felt like a baby too. She hugged Daima, and felt the bones in the hard arms and the hard lap. Daima was not soft anywhere. Mara laid her face in Daima’s bony shoulder and thought about her mother, though it was hard now to remember her face, and how she was soft everywhere and had a sweet, spicy smell, who had hugged her with arms that had bracelets on them, and long black hair where Mara could bury her face. Daima smelled dry and sour and dusty. Dust, the smell of dust, the feel of dust on everything: soft pads of dust underfoot, dust piling up in the grooves the door slid along in, dust on the rocks of the floor, which had to be swept out every day into the dust outside. Films of dust settled on the food even while they ate it, and often winds whirled dust and grass up into the air and the sunlight became spotty and dirty-looking.

      ‘Perhaps it will rain,’ Mara implored Daima, who said, ‘Well, perhaps it will.’

      Soon Mishka began giving much less milk. Some mornings there was hardly any. There was something in the way Rabat smiled and looked that made Mara ask if perhaps Rabat was going out at night to steal milk. Daima said yes, she thought so. She said to Mara, ‘Don’t be too hard. She has nothing to eat.’

      ‘Why doesn’t she go out and dig up roots, the way we do?’

      Daima sighed and said that it was no good expecting people to do what they couldn’t do.

      ‘Why can’t she?’

      Daima lowered her voice, though they were alone, and said, ‘She’s a bit simple-minded.’ And then, lower still, ‘That’s why the others have never wanted anything to do with her. And why she was glad to be friends with me.’ She gave the grim smile that Mara had learned to dread. ‘Two outcasts.’

      ‘Will Mishka give more milk when it rains?’

      ‘Yes, but she is getting old and it is time she was mated. Her milk will dry up altogether soon if she isn’t.’

      ‘Why can’t she be mated?’

      ‘Kulik owns the only male milk beast, and he won’t let it mate with ours.’

      Mara was in such a tumult of feelings: she had just taken in that Daima’s only friend all these years was a loony woman; and now, how cruel Kulik was.

      She went off into the room where her rock bed was, and lay on it, and turned her face to the wall and thought hard. She knew she could not tell Daima what she wanted to do, because she would say no. She waited until Daima had gone out with Dann to take some water to Mishka, and then she went through the village, smiling politely at people, to where she knew most of the men were in the hot midday. Against a disused rock house was a long seat made of rocks, shaded by some old thatch that had slipped down the roof. Along this bench sat about ten men, their hands on their knees, apparently half asleep. Among them was Kulik.

      It was difficult to walk towards them, seeing how their faces grew hard as she got near. This is the look she had seen on the faces of Rock People all her life when any of the People were near. Their eyes were narrowed, their mouths tight and angry.

      She made herself smile, but not too much, and stood in front of Kulik. She said, ‘Please, our Mishka needs to be mated.’ In spite of herself, her voice was weak and her lips trembled.

      First there were looks between the men, who were surprised. Then they laughed: ugly, short laughter, like barks. Then they all stared at her, their faces hard again. Kulik, however, had a grin on his face, and his teeth showed.

      Mara said, her voice stumbling, ‘My little brother, he needs the milk.’

      Kulik narrowed his eyes, stared hard, kept his thin, ugly grin, and said, ‘And what do I get in exchange?’

      ‘I don’t think we’ve got anything. I could get some roots for you.’

      More laughter from the men.

      ‘I wasn’t thinking of roots,’ said Kulik. Then slowly, and with his face so full of hatred for her she could hardly keep standing there in front of him, ‘Down on your knees, Mahondi brat, down on your knees and beg.’

      At first Mara was not sure what he wanted her to do, but she dropped to her knees in the dust, and when she looked at him she could hardly see through her tears.

      ‘Now bend right down, three times,’ said Kulik.

      Mara had to think again, but she bent down once, twice, three times, trying to keep her hair out of the dust. On the last time she felt Kulik’s big hand on her head, grinding her face down into the dirt. Then he let go. She straightened to her knees and, since he did not say anything, stood up. The dust was falling past her eyes from her head.

      She said, ‘Please will you let Mishka be mated?’

      And now a big roar of astonished laughter from all of them – except Kulik, who did not laugh this time but only grinned, and sat forward and said, almost spitting as he talked into her face, ‘You bring her when she is ready. I’m sure you know all about that from your hard work on the farms.’

      ‘I do know,’ said Mara. ‘I learned about how to mate animals.’

      ‘That would come in useful, to give orders to your slaves.’

      ‘Please,’ said Mara, ‘please.’

      ‘Bring your animal. But you must come alone. I’m not dealing with that old bag Daima. Alone, do you hear?’

      Mara was angry that he’d called Daima an old bag, but she made herself smile. ‘Thank you,’ she said.

      ‘And if the kid turns out to be male, I shall have it.’

      ‘Oh, thank you, thank you – ’ and she ran off.

      She told Daima what she had done, and Daima caught her hand to her heart and had to sit down. ‘Mara,’ she said, ‘Mara … That was so dangerous. I’ve known Kulik kill someone who stood up to him.’

      ‘What is a Mahondi?’

      ‘We are Mahondis. The People are Mahondis. Did he call you a Mahondi? Well, you are one. And me. And Dann.’

      ‘And he wants the kid if it is male. That means, we can keep it if it is female and have milk from her when she grows up.’

      ‘There are too many females,’ said Daima. ‘We can’t feed what we have. He wants another male because his is old and he can keep control of who has milk and who doesn’t.’

      ‘Perhaps Mishka will have twins.’

      ‘Don’t wish for that. We would have to kill one. How could we keep them fed? You know yourself how hard it is to find food for them.’

      When Daima said that Mishka was ready, Mara put the rope around her horns and went through the houses to where the men sat.

      She stood in front of Kulik with the beast and said, ‘Here is Mishka. I’ve come by myself, as you said.’

      ‘What makes you think I haven’t changed my mind?’ said Kulik, and went on grinning there, a long time, to keep her afraid in case he had changed his mind.

      ‘You promised,’ said Mara at last, not crying, for she was determined not to.

      ‘Very well, you come with me.’

      He got up, in his heavy, slow way – like an animal that has decided to tread all over you, Mara thought – and went towards the enclosure where his male milk beast was, all by itself. Mishka began to jump and rush about at the end of her rope.

      Kulik turned his head to grin back and say, ‘Can’t wait for it, can she? – you are all the same.’

      Mara had no idea what he meant.

      At the entrance to the enclosure, which was a small one – just room for one animal and a bit over – he