CHAPTER SIX #3
“Who are they fighting? How long has it been going on?” I asked for information, feeling the small trickle of memory dry up with the heat of the day.
“There are tribes on the island who do not want what we want.”
“What do you want?” I asked sincerely.
Sali stopped walking and turned to face me, weary eyes conveyed her words, “To be left alone.”
We came upon a bend in the path and began climbing up a large hill. A rocky outcropping loomed just ahead. Ancient looking stones in various conditions of erosion, mapped our ascent like stairs.
A group of children playing caught my attention, their raucous games quieted as we passed by.
At an opening in the rocks ahead of us, I marveled at the architecture of the ancient looking stones stacked on top of one other like smashed sandwiches, where they formed a large space that gaped like a mouth. I shivered before entering, despite the heat.
The light in the stone structure was dim, the air cool. It took my eyes a few seconds to adjust, but once they did, I saw a table with an odd-looking candle and a handful of half-dressed men hunched over the table engaged in lively discussion in a language unknown to me.
An awkward silence filled the space as soon as they saw me. Two of the men looked more like young boys and stood looking me up and down. I felt their apprehension. They were afraid of me—intimidated. I took this small flicker of courage to speak before Sali had a chance.
“Where did you find me?” my force surprised me. “Was there anyone else with me?”
The men began to speak quietly and then more forcefully, directing their attention to the one in the middle.
His brow darkened as he looked at me. I saw his black eyes turn to slits as he considered the explanations of his men.
Finally he silenced them with one forceful phrase of gibberish and all the men, except one, shuffled out of the hut.
Sali was at my elbow, whispering something… I had to concentrate to hear her.
“Jahnu is chief Hundi. You mun show respect.” Now it was my turn to feel intimidated. What they lacked in height, they made up for in strength. Both dark skinned, their torsos shone, bare to the waist.
The leader—Jahnu—was young and lean. With wiry muscled arms. I could see the finely chiseled striations of his deltoids, biceps, and the slight rise of pectoral muscles, dappled with black fuzz. His waist tapered to narrow hips which lent him an air of swift fierceness.
Though he was the younger of the two, it was clear to whom the title of chief belonged. I sensed an air of disciplined control about him, completely missing from the other.
The other man was larger, older, the shape of his body like a barrel, wide from chest to knees.
He seemed restless, agitated, like a wild dog on a short chain, and his eyes roamed my body unrestrained with a mix of hatred and lust. He was obviously not scared of me—I swallowed my fear and focused on the chief.
“Please…sir…chief…I…I don’t remember what happened. I don’t remember why I’m here or who I’m with.” I looked to Sali to help translate but she gently shook her head.
“Jahnu knows de English,” Sali said.
A bit bewildered I looked back at him. He was thoughtful for a moment and then spoke to his man in his native tongue.
“Mimbeck says you were alone when he found you.” I was surprised at how well he spoke English. Each word was uttered forcefully, and accented—as if he’d learned from a British teacher.
As soon as his words registered, I felt the fear slide down my throat and immediately turn into hot rage as soon as it hit my stomach.
“Well, what other information does he have? I hit my head! I don’t remember anything! Where did he find me?”
The large man, Mimbeck, began to shout, but Jahnu silenced him with a few phrases before he stormed out of the hut.
Sali and Jahnu exchanged a knowing glance.
What did that look mean? I felt myself drowning in a sea of confusion.
Did they know something and weren’t telling me?
Were they good people? They had certainly been kind so far, feeding me, dressing my wounds.
I felt safe with Sali, but didn’t trust this Jahnu fellow and certainly did not feel safe around Mimbeck. In my very limited experience with the Hindu—no—Hundi?—people thus far, I felt about as certain of my immediate future as I did about my past, lost.
However, in my current state I didn’t have much choice but to avail myself to whatever help they may offer. I breathed out slowly, feeling the anger abate.
“Please…I…I don’t know what to do.” I watched as the muscles in chief Jahnu’s jaw clenched and the gears in this man’s mind began to turn, with fierce, yet calm eyes, as he spun multiple scenarios in a few seconds.
His gaze, dark and fathomless, never left mine.
“You will stay as long as necessary.” Was it an invitation or something else? I had no context to place the words and I didn’t trust myself to keep calm. I swallowed my tears, turned on my heel and left him in the shadows.
It took a few seconds for my eyes to adjust to the brightness. I blinked hard and shook with the force of my helplessness, the familiar rush of heart rate and adrenaline whooshed through my ears like a freight train. Sali was at my elbow.
“It will be alright,” she said, but her voice felt far away. I tripped over a large boulder-step, scraping my shin, and finally allowed Sali to help me to a seated position.
“How?! How will it be alright?” I yelled, “I’m lost!
I don’t remember anything and I may as well be that man’s prisoner for all the help he’s giving me!
” I was experiencing tachycardia—how did I know that?
—knew I must bring my heart rate back down.
I began breathing slowly, and the rush in my ears and the abnormal beating of my heart quieted.
Sali sat without speaking and the sounds of the forest began to reassert themselves into my consciousness. I looked at the new scrape on my shin, the pain just now registering with a small sting, and noticed an almost identical scrape on the other leg. How had I acquired that injury?
A thread of logical reasoning presented itself within my brain like the rising glow of a gas lamp.
True, there were missing pieces to this scenario, but overreacting wasn’t going to help anything.
The best course of action was to continue with life as normal—whatever normal meant—and hope that whatever brain swelling I had would eventually subside, given enough time.
Could I play the part—go through with whatever happened until I could put the pieces back together?
I knew I must, and determined to remain in control of myself since I obviously wasn’t in control of the situation. Where had I heard that before?
The internal dialogue of the facts calmed me, and the raging emotions settled back into their place like a spirited dog being stuffed back into a cage. This felt more familiar. I reached for the logic like a life-line when the sounds of children playing woke me from my thoughts.
They were crowding around a large, rudimentary rope swing tied high in a tree.
The swing’s radius was huge, and the whoops and hollers from the bunch erupted with each rise of the swing.
A boy clad only in shorts stood on the wood that made the seat, floating weightless through the air.
A small child tottled unsteadily in front of the swing and I knew what was happening before it happened.
“Watch out!” Just as the words left my mouth, the swing collided with the toddlers face. He was thrown backward, and hit his head on the hard ground—I was up and running before I’d decided what to do.
After I pushed my way through the crowd of children encircling the small boy, I fell to my knees beside him.
His face was covered in blood, and I didn’t know if it was coming from his nose or mouth, or both.
Thankfully, he was wailing and not knocked unconscious, but hadn’t yet caught his breath.
I checked his vital signs, raised his eyelids and blew in his face so he would take in some oxygen.
He gulped and continued to scream, the sheer level of it piercing my ears like a siege.
I looked around for something to stop the flow of blood, but finding all the children barely dressed, quickly took off my t-shirt, bit the seam and ripped it in half.
I pressed one part to his face, gently clearing his nostrils in case his nose was broken, and used the other half to cradle his head, hoping there was no head wound.
I felt the swelling of a goose egg, to some relief.
Always better to swell out than in, when the head was concerned.
I glanced up to see Sali joining the circle of astonished onlookers, realizing the only thing covering my lily-white torso was my light-pink, sweat-laced bra—but I couldn’t think about that now.
“Where do you take the injured? Where…where can we take him?” The little boy continued to scream as I scooped him off the ground, cradling his little black body against mine.
“It’s just up the hill,” Sali said, shooing the children away. Some had already run off, most likely to spread the gossip of what the white lady had done.
“I’ll need some water, clean bandages. I doubt you have ice around here…
a suture kit. He may need stitches, but I won’t know until I can get a look at the…
” Sali turned around abruptly, nearly causing me to run into her.
“How do you know all o’ dis?” I blinked at her, the realization coming on the tail end of the little boy’s last scream. “Because...I’m...I’m a nurse.”
Sali turned around abruptly, nearly causing me to run into her. “How do you know all o’ dis?”
I blinked at her, the realization coming on the tail end of the little boy’s last scream.
“Because…I’m…I’m a nurse.”