The Cleft (16 page)

Whatever form these negotiations took, we may be sure of one thing: the two must have been aware of the children and the problems they made, because both histories record it was a noisy night, the little boys demanding attention, awake or asleep. The boys who had been told they would go with Horsa were overexcited and boastful, perhaps because they were kept awake by the boys with Maronna who were having nightmares and imagined they saw murderous pigs everywhere. The boys who had lived in the trees in the clearing mocked them and said they imagined the pigs, but the fact was that two little boys had been killed, and they were known to all the children. Nightmares and crying out in their sleep, tears and quarrels and tantrums … the girls who wanted to be with the men, particularly as they
had only just understood that the expedition might take the men away for a good time, had to spend the night calming the children.

By the time morning came, it was a listless, weary community, and the children were – well, behaving like small children. Horsa presumably had tried to persuade Maronna of his ideas, but she persuaded him to let her see the ‘fleet' that was going to set off.

She was so shocked by what she saw she assaulted Horsa, battering him with her fists and weeping that he was mad. The ‘fleet', which had been assembled over months, consisted of rafts, tied together with forest rope, logs, some hollowed out, round boats made of hides stretched over enlaced circles of wood, bundles of reeds, canoes made of bark. All of these makeshift boats had been used for fishing close around the shores, and some had proved themselves safe – at least for these limited purposes. What Maronna saw we may only imagine, but what she exclaimed was, ‘You want to kill them, you want to kill our children.'

Whose children? Now, that was a point indeed, relating uncomfortably to her accusation, ‘Don't you care about us?' Who? The women? The small males without whom the people could have no future?

‘You cannot take little children with you,' said Maronna – ‘hysterical', said the men's history,
‘indignant' said the women's account. What is interesting is that Horsa apparently meekly agreed.

The fact was, he had no idea small children needed so much attention – and that was because of the special conditions in the forest.

The little boys arrived after their ‘escape' from the women's shore, delirious with excitement, usually with some girls, and at once went up the trees. There was also in the glade a shallow pretty stream, perfect for children. The stream was safe, and the trees too, though a watch was always kept for the big felines who prowled, and insinuated and slithered through the branches, hoping to find a small boy off guard. Had there been casualties? This is not recorded. It can be seen from this short explanation that looking after the small boys in the forest was not an arduous business. A few young men took on this task. There was only one rule to be kept. As the light drained back into the sky and the trees stood dark and hidden, every child had to be out of the trees and into the circles of firelight, later to be shut into one of the sheds for the night. Horsa scarcely had to see much of the boys, and if one broke a limb or got sick, back they went to the women.

That night under the great watching moon, when the children clamoured and demanded and made so much noise, had been a nasty revelation to Horsa.

When Maronna had seen his assembly of ‘ships'
and scorned them and him, he then said he would not take the smaller boys, only older ones.

Why did he not say he would take no boys at all? I think it was pride. To capitulate completely – no, and even as it was, the men had to submit to shrieks of sarcastic laughter. We may fairly assume this laughter. Which of us males has not been subjected to it?

The smaller boys, told they were not to be with the men, rebelled and said they would run back to the forest clearing, to the trees, and wait there till the men returned.

The men had no intention of being bound by promises of return. But before they could set off, something had to be done to warn the children off the forest. All the little boys, those returning with Maronna to the women's shore, and those going with Horsa, set off, accompanied by the hunters with their weapons. It was quite a distance to the forest place on that day, when they were all tired, and there were many small boys. (
Many
: that is the word they used.) To reach the shore, and the men's place, by nightfall meant forcing the pace, and the boys who knew the trees let out cries of joy on seeing them, but then the cries and jubilation stopped. Stretched out in the middle of the forest clearing was a family of the great felines, lying as if this place were theirs. The felines were what the children had been brought here to see, and even a look at them made their backs freeze with
fear. Where were the pigs who had, only a couple of days before, taken two boys? A big sow, black, with gleaming tusks and teeth, was lying across the stream and even damming it: water was spilling in shallow lakes all around her. Her size was why she and the other porkers were safe from the felines. What animal could possibly take on a herd of lean fast pigs? Perhaps a pack of dogs.

The children stood looking forlornly at their paradise, and some began to cry. It was dangerous there, despite the young hunters. Maronna set off for the women's shore, with the smaller boys – chosen arbitrarily, by height and size. The larger small boys – it sounds as if they were about ten or so – escorted by the youths, set off back to find the men. It was already afternoon. Not possible to reach the men while it was still light. This company of boys reached a shore. (How many? ‘Quite a few.') They settled on a wide beach, spent the night unfed, vigilant, while unfamiliar waves crashed near them and then far away as the tide went out.

That was how the day ended when Maronna and Horsa were ‘reconciled'. And the women with her resumed their usual life. It is recorded that right from the start they fretted over Horsa and the vagueness of his plans, and very much about the children he had taken with him.

The boys who were to go with Horsa were given
rules they must learn and keep. These first rules were stringent, and there were punishments. Obedience was being taught, or being attempted. If Horsa was sorry he had agreed to taking any boys at all, even older ones, he never admitted it.

The first day showed that Horsa had had no idea of what he was taking on.

Imagine the excitement of the boys, each with his raft or a bundle of reeds, or even a tree trunk, setting off with the men on the first stage of the journey. They were wild, paddling with sticks or several bound together, or even their hands, getting in the way of the men in their larger vessels. They kept falling in and had to be rescued. They could all swim, of course, no question of their drowning, these water babies, but the ‘fleet' planned by Horsa and his aides had to go slowly, the little boys took up so much of their attention. By the end of the first day it was clear: if the expedition was to make any progress the little boys would have to be removed from it. Horsa issued an edict. No boy could be part of the ‘fleet', join the men, if he had not achieved his man's body. Did that mean puberty? Did it mean older? What it certainly did mean was a crowd of boys sulking, angry, weeping, saying it wasn't fair.

But Horsa was adamant. The smaller boys would be on the shore, and they would be watched over by the youths, the hunters and trackers, and this part of
Horsa's company would go along the shore parallel to the men in their boats. In the evenings they would all meet up by the fires and for the feasting. … Yes, there was too much of the theoretical here even for Horsa who is revealed by this ‘edict' to be one of those leaders who would expect difficulties simply to melt away.

A shore has inlets, the mouths of rivers, some large; marshes, cliffs, and although watched over by the big boys, these children were bound to have a hard time working along that shore. And there were wild animals, too. All the boys had weapons. What weapons? Mentioned are knives, both seashell splinters and of sharpened bone, a kind of catapult, deadly even for big animals, bows and arrows. These little boys knew how to defend themselves. But they were soon tired out and complaining, and behaved, in short, like children, crying and subject to tantrums and tempers. The older boys complained. So the order was softened. Keeping parallel with the fleet of little ships meant running along the beaches, not going further inland, so the whole expedition had sometimes to wait for days while the children negotiated some mangrove swamp or big cliff. More than once the ‘fleet' had to come in and lift the little boys round an obstacle, and when this happened they clamoured to be allowed to join the main party on their improvised boats. Complaints and tears and trouble, and
there are songs from that time, sardonic songs, telling of the brave warriors who had often to leave their adventures and look after children.

How Horsa must have cursed his decision ever to allow children, yet he did not voice what he felt.

Before the expedition had gone too far away, some girls returned to the women's shore, and always took some boys with them. This was for their own safety, because of wild animals, but it may be assumed that Horsa was glad to get rid of a boy or two or more when he could. Meanwhile the women's shore became ever more crowded and noisy and inconvenient.

The returning girls said that journeying with Horsa was difficult, not least because there were not enough girls to match the men. There is mention – for the very first time in our histories – that there were couples, recognised pairs. Horsa did not like this; it caused dissension, even to the point of fighting and quarrelling over the girls.

Horsa was too much of a tyrant, said the returning girls.

Horsa … who, in fact, was he? First, he – or a Horsa – had ended the fighting among the different groups in the forest, taking command, making a whole from many subdivisions. ‘The forest became safe,' say the women's histories, ‘and we could go anywhere there, unharmed, provided we went in groups.'

That was surely Horsa's best self, the brilliant
commander whom everyone was happy to obey. And then he organised the forest life, keeping the little boys safe in their trees, choosing the hunters and trackers, and who would look after the clearing, the sheds and the lean-tos and the fires. The predators who prowled and watched the company were kept at a distance. Yet he was also the leader who brought the expedition to disaster. Two different people? Names, in those old days, were attached to qualities: Maronna seemed always to be the name of the women's leader. Horsa had diplomacy and tact, necessary for a commander of many men (how many?), but he did not know how to manage his expedition, which the women called foolhardy, dangerous, ill-planned, stupid. And Horsa's adventure turned out to be all those things.

For a long time, at least the period of a pregnancy, the seas the ‘fleet' travelled over were serene, warm and gentle. The dug-outs and logs, the bundles of reeds and coracles, went happily along by the beaches, well in sight of the little boys, and it was easy to come in to the warm sands for meals, or for the night. Nothing was difficult, then, at the beginning.

Then there was something Horsa could not have avoided, and he must have reckoned with the possibility: there was a big storm, and all the little craft, which so comfortably and pleasurably carried those young men along, were smashed and lay wrecked
along the beaches, together with other refuse from the storm. To reassemble the little craft was not a big challenge, and a few little vessels were put together, but Horsa did not at once suggest setting forth. They all camped along the beaches, made their great fires, hunted in the forests, cooked their meat, sent parties inland for fruit and green stuff – and seemed to be waiting. For what? The fact was the expedition had failed, and the smashed craft were only a confirmation of that.

The trouble was the little boys – who, we must remember, cannot be compared with our children of the same age. They were ten, eleven, twelve, did not ‘have their man's bodies' yet, but could use all the weapons, could hunt with the hunters and track with the trackers, but they were rebellious and complaining, and dissatisfied with everything. Day after day, arduously clambering along these shores, which were sometimes easy but often not, watching for the arrival of the men from the sea, this was not what their early excitement for ‘adventure' had promised. And they were tired, too. Some were children as young as seven or eight, if they had been well grown for their ages at the time Maronna had set off home, taking the younger ones. They sometimes wanted their mothers, or at least the women who liked children enough to be given childcaring as their work by Maronna. Horsa had known almost from
the start that bringing the boys had been a mistake, but they were a long way from home – if home was the forest – and a longer way from the women's shore.

He planned to send all the boys back home, with the young men as guards, but when the plan was put to them the youths said no, to have to look after these peevish disobedient children for long and difficult travelling – no. We do not have another record of his young men saying no to Horsa. Then that meant the whole expedition would have simply to confess failure and go home?

That would not be easy, would it? To say to the ever scornful Maronna that she was right – bad enough. But there was worse. Horsa had said he wanted to find out if, by following the shore, he would one day simply return to where they had started out – suddenly see the women on their rocks and know they had made a full circle of their land. And more, Horsa wanted to find another land, other shores, other – people? That was never ever suggested. But surely these people must sometimes have wondered if somewhere others like themselves lived as they did, wondering if they were alone in the seas and the forests?

To go home to Maronna and the women and say … I find it hard to imagine words Horsa would use.