The Story of General Dann and Mara's Daughter, Griot and the Snow Dog. Doris Lessing
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‘The Lands of the Ice from the dry.’
‘Is your land dry?’
‘Not like this’ – and the man looked with repulsion at the dull low gleam of the marsh near them.
‘How far then to the end of the Divide?’
‘The end?’
‘It must have an end.’
The man shrugged. He wanted to be on his way. His eyes strayed to Dann’s sack. Dann pulled out the food bag and gave him another bit of bread. The man hid it in his clothes.
‘When I was a child I was told my grandfather had walked to see what lands there were beyond ours and found none. He walked many days.’
And he set off towards the Centre.
Dann stood there, full of dismay and cursing himself for arrogant stupidity. He had taken it for granted that of course he could walk to the end of this shore; why not? Had he not walked all the way up Ifrik? But how long that had taken … and between him and the end of this shore were wars; these people walking and running, some of them wounded, with bandaged arms and dried blood on them, had run from wars. Did he really want to walk into a war? Into fighting?
What was he going to do, then? Dann went on, and on, slowly, not finding his pace, as he was continually having to stop because of the parties of refugees coming towards him, and so it was all that day and at evening it was like the last, wet everywhere, the reedy marshes and – this evening – pale mists moving over the water, and the smell even worse, because of the mists. It was getting dark. Dann looked east into the dusk and thought he would never see the end of this coast. What did he think he was doing, why was he here?
On a patch of smooth hard mud at the edge of the road he squatted to draw with his knife’s tip a circle, then an oval, then a long thin shape, a circle stretched out – the Middle Sea. Every puddle, every pond, every lake had a shore that went round, enclosing water. Why had he wanted to walk to where the shore of the Middle Sea ended, to turn around on itself? Because he wanted to see the Ice Cliffs of Yerrup for himself, that was the reason. Well, there might be easier ways of doing that than walking for another long part of his life, and marching straight into wars and fighting.
He slid from the edge, as he had done the night before, and landed in a patch of grass where bushes stood about, bent all in one direction, because of the wind from the Ice. He put his sack under his head, his knife ready on his chest, and was pleased with the occasionally appearing moon, which let him keep watch.
He woke in darkness. A large vague white mass was close to him and the moon appeared, letting him see it was another of the great beasts lying there, its eyes open, looking quietly at him. Dann’s hand, on his knife’s hilt, retreated. This was no enemy. The moon went in. There was a smell of wet fur. The moon came out. What was this beast? Dann had never seen anything like it. Impossible to tell under all that fur what its body was like, but the face was fine, eyes well spaced, a small face surrounded by bursts of white hair. This was a beast for cold; one did not need to be told that; it would not do well on desert sand or anywhere the sun struck down hot. Where did it come from? What was it doing, lying so close? Why was it? Down Dann’s face wet was trickling. There was no mist tonight. Tears. Dann did not cry, but he was crying now, and from loneliness, his terrible loneliness defined because of this companionable beast so close there, a friend. Dann dropped off but woke, slept and roused himself so as not to miss the sweetness of this shared trustful sleep. In the early dawn light he woke and the animal was there, its head on its vast shaggy paws, looking at him with green eyes. Like Griot’s. This was not a wild animal: it was accustomed to people. And it wasn’t hungry; showed no interest in Dann’s provisions.
Dann slowly stretched his hand towards the animal’s paws, where its head lay. It closed its eyes, in acknowledgement of him, and then again. Dann was crying like a child, and thought, It’s all right, there’s no one to see. The two lay there as the light strengthened, and then the beast’s pointed ears stood back and it listened. There were voices up on the road. At once it got up, and slunk down the slope of scree to where a white skeleton bush stood shaking in the wind. There it hid.
Dann watched it go, watched his friend go. Then up he leaped, to face the people up there, face what he had to – though he was not sure now what that was.
With his head just above the edge he watched a group stumbling past, too exhausted to look up and see him. He waited. No one else seemed to be coming. He got back on the track and saw that soon the ground rose dry towards a low hill, with trees. He had to fill his water bottle, if the marshes were ending. He stepped off the track on a dryish edge between pools, and stood, his face to the sun, letting it warm him. He had been dreaming, as he lay with the beast so near, and it had been a bright dream. Mara, yes, he had been dreaming of her because of the sweetness of the beast’s companionship. How strange it was, the visit of that animal, in the night.
Dann was looking into a clear pool, with some weed drifting in it. There were three masses of – well, what? Three masses of whitish substance, just below the water. Two large masses and a smaller one … bubbles were coming from it, a muzzle, pointing up … they were animals, like his night’s companion, they were drowned, but wait – bubbles meant life; that smaller thing there, it was alive. He knelt on the very edge of the marshy pool, risking the edge giving way under him, and pulled at the beast, brought it close to his feet, and lifted up the weight of it with a jerk beside him, nearly falling in himself. Dann raised up the sodden mass by the hind legs and watched water stream from the pointed nose. Water was streaming from everywhere. Surely it must be dead? There was not a flicker of the resistance of life, of animation. And still water was pouring from the mouth, from between new little white teeth. The eyes were half open under mats of wet fur. This was a young animal, the cub of those two cloudy masses of white lying so close. Perhaps they weren’t dead either? But Dann had his hands too full, literally, with this young beast. Which suddenly sneezed, a choking spluttering sneeze. Dann put his arm round the heavy dense wetness and held it so the head was down, to let the water out. It was so cold, the air, a heavy deadly cold and the animal was a cold weight. Dann did not feel cold because he was used to exposure, but he knew this animal would die if he couldn’t warm it. He laid it on some grass tussocks, between the pools, and in his sack found the bundle of clothes he always carried. He used one to wipe the beast’s wet skin, where lumps of wet hair lay matted, and then wrapped it in layers of cloth. What was needed here was blankets, thick layers of warmth, and he had nothing. Surely it should be shivering? He could not feel breath. He opened his jacket, of layered cotton, that was warm enough for him, and buttoned the beast against him, head on his shoulder, feet nearly at his knees. The weight of sodden cold made him shudder. What was he going to do? This was a young thing, it needed milk. Dann stood, holding the beast to stop it sliding down, and looked at the two foamy submerged masses which would lie there for days in this cold water before going putrid. Unless something came to eat them?
Marsh birds? There were plenty of small marsh animals. He couldn’t concern himself with them; he doubted if he could have saved the great beasts, even if they did have life in them. He doubted whether he could help this one. He stepped carefully between the marsh tussocks to the path, afraid of overbalancing with this dead weight, and wondered if he should return to the Centre? But that was a good two days’ fast walking to the west. What if he ran? He could not run, with that weight on him. Ahead was the track, winding along the edge of the cliff, but wait – the ground did rise there ahead and where there were trees must, surely, be people. Despite the weight Dann tried to run, but staggered to a stop, and felt against his chest a small but steady beat. At the same time it began sucking at his shoulder. It wanted to live and Dann had nothing, but nothing, to give it. He was crying again. What was wrong with him? He did not cry. This was an animal, out of luck, and he had watched so many die, with dry eyes. But he could not bear it, this young thing that wanted to live and was so helpless. Although the weight was giving him cramps in his legs, he resumed his stumbling run and then, ahead, the dark edge of the wood showed a path going up and, as he thought, people – the beast stopped sucking and whimpered. Dann ran up the path, running for a life, and when ahead he saw a house, more of a shack, with reeds for a roof and reeds for