The Knowledge Stone Page 5

  Maretta

  ‘He knows so much,’ she thought ecstatically, literally hugging herself in her delight, ‘and I have so much to learn.’ The girl just loved to sit close to the handsome (to her, beautiful) Malik as he spoke in what to her was a clear, educated voice. She had no idea that the world was filled with so many things; how could this wonderful young man know so much? He had told her so many amazing facts that it almost made her head spin.

  Dreamily, she called to mind some of the wonders he had told her about: strange and dangerous places far away that could only be reached by crossing huge oceans of water in gigantic boats filled with hundreds of men! … fierce wars between huge armies which lasted for many years. In these conflicts, there were numerous heroic deeds done by brave knights dressed in armour of bright metal and sitting astride mighty battle horses! … victorious kings and lords who lived in impregnable castles. Some also had gorgeous palaces filled with priceless treasure – more gold, silver and precious stones than she could ever imagine! … incredible lands where the mountains were so high that they were permanently covered with deep white snow that had fallen from the sky (he had to explain to her what snow was).

  Why, he even knew about the sun, the moon and the stars!

  She quivered in delight as she thought of the way he clasped her hands so tenderly as he told her these things; his broad and strong hands were always so warm and alive. Sometimes, she managed to be so close to him as they sat on a grassy knoll that she could feel the warmth of his firm thigh against hers. As he spoke, she could not take her eyes away from his; not that she wanted to – not for a minute, a second. His beautiful brown eyes were filled with such intelligence and strength. She was in love with this most remarkable of men and being in love was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened to her in her life!

  He was so delightfully playful, too, she reflected. They both enjoyed laughing together, telling each other about the extremely funny events they had seen: the ropes of that heavily-loaded hay cart breaking and the road completely blocked with many bundles of hay; it had taken such a long time to reload the cart and no-one could pass by for hours! … the old fisherman overbalancing on the bridge and falling into the water among the fish he was trying to catch. How wet and furious he had been! … the village merchant’s carefully built display of apples, so lovingly and painstakingly constructed into a high tower outside his shop, suddenly collapsing catastrophically. How hilarious it had been to see the fruit rolling away in all directions! How funny to see the merchant dashing this way and that to retrieve his precious produce! Did you see? Some of the apples had even rolled away down the hill!

  Oh, how they laughed until the tears ran down their cheeks.

  Her mind now turned to the part of their tryst that she loved most: their special chasing game. How thrilling and exciting it always was to dash breathlessly around the trees, avoiding his outstretched arms, until that moment when he caught her. That glorious moment when his arm fell across her body! She recalled how they had played this wonderful game many times and the pressure of his arm on her back was the culmination of their amazing time together. It filled her with such yearning and suffused her with a feeling of absolute peace.

  Then her smile faded to solemn introspection as she recalled the day before. They had had gone to the forest as they usually did. Their chasing game had been played with all its energetic joy and the time had come for that moment of unified peace. Her old dress was so loose on her body that she was completely unaware of its billowing travel from feet to shoulders at that moment when she threw herself down on the leaves. She only realised that something unusual had happened when she found large copious folds of thick black material underneath her hands, arms and upper body. Certainly she would never have expected the closer-fitting undergarment to be lifted up too, to reveal her body almost completely.

  So instead of the usual light pressure of his muscular forearm across the loose waistband of her dress, it was a surprise, though certainly in no way unpleasant, to feel the touch of his warm flesh upon her own. It was then, registering his unexpected touch along with the distinctive caress of cool air upon the complete length of her lower limbs that she realised fully what had happened. At such moments, the human brain works remarkably quickly. On this occasion, the age-old wisdom of womanhood took over. She did nothing. She made no movement. She lay completely still.

  Wisdom can be instinctive and some wisdom is exactly that. But most wisdom is garnered and honed by the experience and learning that the progression of life brings. Maretta was the second child in a very poor serf family; her elder brother was a few years older and a younger brother had followed her. Family life had always been very hard. They lived precariously on a very small patch of infertile, rocky land which was, in fact, common land.

  The family were aware they had no rights to live on this common land and so were in constant fear of eviction. They knew that such evictions happened periodically and, if it ever happened to them, they knew they would be driven out of the area with anger and violence. Members of serf families had been injured or even killed in the course of such evictions.

  The five members of the family lived in a rude shack built on this land and they attempted to grow root vegetables and keep a few animals on the extremely poor soil surrounding the shack. This was mainly unsuccessful; the crops were stunted at best and the only animals that survived were a few thin and scrawny hens, providing them with infrequent eggs.

  Maretta’s father and mother were absent throughout the length of the day, having to take any labouring work they could find at neighbouring farms or businesses, their pay usually being in the form of some food to feed the family in the evening; mostly, the food they were “paid” was inadequate and, in consequence, the family was almost always hungry. With the absence of her parents, Maretta was looked after by her elder brother throughout the day.

  By the time Maretta was around eight or nine years old, her mother had felt it appropriate to inform her daughter that girls and boys were very different from each other:

  ‘You need to be careful,’ the mother warned her daughter, looking at her significantly. However, she did not elaborate further. This lack of explanation did not surprise Maretta, because serious conversations with her parents were very infrequent and invariably brief. By the time the adults returned from their day’s labours, they had little energy for conversation and the whole family retired to their sleeping areas as soon as the meagre evening meal had been consumed.

  Later that evening, lying in her narrow bunk, Maretta recalled her mother’s teaching. What had she meant, “very different”? The girl turned her thoughts to her little brother who was around five years old at this time. Like Maretta herself, the little boy was in the care of her elder sibling during the day; this care included giving him his daily wash in a large wooden tub, set down in front of the shack and filled to a shallow depth from their supply of collected rainwater.

  This was a routine that had previously been applied to Maretta when she was younger; of course she was now much too old to need someone to wash her and these days her ablutions were carried out carefully and in private. In her mind, she now scrutinised her little brother’s naked body as he stood in the tub, examining it slowly and with great care to establish all the significant differences between his body and her own.

  No “big sister” of a baby boy is unaware of the physical difference between baby boys and themselves. On first sight of the child being bathed or changed, their curious eyes are drawn to that peculiar (ugly?) little tube of flesh set in the groin and, in response to their questions, spoken or unspoken, their mother explains that “all boys are made like this”. It is common for the girl to accept this explanation with pensive neutrality.

  Remembering this scene some years before and now visualising the familiar sight of her little brother standing naked in the tub, Maretta could not
identify any other physical differences; in fact, as far as she was concerned, all other parts of the little boy’s body were identical to her own. Head, neck, shoulders, arms, body and legs were just like her own.

  She puzzled about this for a while, then she thought: ‘Maybe it’s other boys who are “very different”. How can I find that out?’

  Despite her young age and disadvantaged life, Maretta was an intelligent and resourceful little girl, well used to solving her own problems. Now she lay quietly and wondered how she could solve this particular problem. Suddenly, she brightened: ‘I know exactly how I’m going to do it!’ she whispered triumphantly and turned over to go to sleep with a little smile of satisfaction on her face.

  The opportunity to put her plan into action came several days later when her elder brother took his sister and brother into the village to buy a small quantity of salt for the family. The previous day, his father had been paid a few coins for his day’s work and the family needed to replenish their small stock of this essential item, used for cooking and flavouring.

  The day was perfect for Maretta’s purposes, being very hot and still. On such a day, she knew it was highly likely that some of the village boys would be swimming and splashing in the river near the bridge; they usually did this if the weather was very hot. Because she knew that the boys always played naked in the water, this would offer Maretta the perfect opportunity to make a detailed inspection of their bodies.

  On reaching the village, Maretta told her brother she would sit down near the road to the bridge and enjoy the sunshine while he went to the village store.

  ‘I’ll stay near here,’ she assured him artfully, already hearing the shouts and laughter of the boys playing in the river nearby.

  ‘All right,’ her brother replied. ‘Stay there and I won’t be long.’

  As soon as her brother was out of sight, Maretta crept down to the river and concealed herself in a large bush growing beside the riverbank. Sure enough, several naked boys were playing in the river and she had a completely clear view. As the boys dived from the bank, swam in the water or stood up and wrestled with each other, shouting, screaming and fighting each other with various degrees of violence, the hidden girl examined each one with great care.

  After ten minutes or so of detailed study, Maretta judged that her mission had been accomplished and withdrew from the cover of the bush, skipping quickly back to the crossroads where she had arranged to wait for her brother. Once seated there, frowning with concentration, she recalled all she had seen and formulated her conclusions: ‘Now I know for certain,’ she thought with satisfaction, ‘all boys look like that. They’re all just the same as my little brother. There’s just that one little difference between each one of them and me – and I know exactly what it is.’ She felt quite sure of the result of her investigation.

  Then her smirk of satisfaction faded: ‘But why did Mother tell me they were very different? And why must I be careful?’ Now she felt confused again.

  For some time, the girl sat quite still with her eyes tight shut, frowning and concentrating as hard as she could on this difficult problem. Then, in a sudden flash of understanding, she remembered the behaviour of the boys in the river – weren’t they so rough with each other? Weren’t they always jumping upon each other, pushing each other beneath the water, fighting, shouting and screaming?

  ‘That’s it,’ she thought, her frown cleared from her face by a wide smile, ‘they are very different, because they’re always fighting and they’re so very rough. And that’s why I need to be careful.’ At last she understood!

  After this, in the weeks and months that followed her great investigative adventure on the riverbank, Maretta often looked down at her own smooth, streamlined body as she stood naked in the tub and, with a gentle smile of satisfaction, remembered the rough behaviour of the boys in the river and whispered that traditional mantra of femininity: ‘I’m glad I’m not a boy.’

  There comes a time when children (quite suddenly, it seems) become taller, quite elegant creatures and seem to leave much of their childishness behind. Time had passed and it was now obvious that Maretta had crossed that mysterious threshold. It was then that a new routine was introduced into her life by her elder brother.

  One day, just after she had made a visit to the privy, he led her behind the shack and told her he needed to check that she was cleaning her body properly after such a visit. Maretta was completely unperturbed by his request. She loved and admired her elder brother; he was like a second father to her – in fact he was more like a father to her than her real father, who was absent all day, every day. So she happily lifted up her clothes and exposed her body to him. At first, his examination was restricted to a perfunctory visual check but soon he began to touch her soft intimate flesh.

  In the weeks and months that followed, these examinations were called for periodically and Maretta chattered quite happily to her brother as his hands probed her with increasing thoroughness. Gradually, however, she found herself becoming more reluctant to submit to these examinations. She began to feel that her body should be private and she was sure she was perfectly capable of keeping her whole body clean, including these parts that he insisted in examining. On the other hand, she did not want to offend her brother; after all, he was only doing this for her own good, wasn’t he?

  Then came the day when the usual inspection was called for and Maretta was conducted to the familiar spot behind the shack. On this day she was unhappy, now very reluctant to bare her body and she communicated this to her brother in no uncertain terms. Her brother insisted. It was his responsibility to look after her, he said. She should not be so ungrateful. He was very disappointed in her.

  Thus rebuked and hanging her head in shame, Maretta complied with his wishes but winced as his hands touched her. This time, the examination was particularly thorough: ‘This is taking a long time,’ she thought, wriggling uncomfortably, ‘I wish he would hurry up.’ Hard on the heels of this thought, there came a sudden blinding flash of revelation that made her lift her head suddenly and look deep into her brother’s eyes. It was in the depth of those eyes that she saw the truth.

  In an instant, her brother’s face flushed deeply; then he broke away from her accusing gaze and mumbled something incomprehensible before stumbling away. This was the last inspection of her body that Maretta had to endure. More importantly, at that moment Maretta the girl-woman had gained a timeless wisdom about men and women and life.

  It was that same wisdom that kept her body motionless on that day in the forest, lying prone upon the soft bed of leaves, pretending to be tangled in the folds of her dress and fully aware of the astounded gaze of her beloved and beautiful Malik.

  Maretta was more than happy to leave the next move to Malik. Whatever it was, it would be the right action for the moment, she told herself. Nevertheless she was a little disappointed when the heavy material of her skirt wafted away the intoxicating caress of the cool air on her sensitive skin before moulding itself to the contours of her body.

  Within seconds, his strong arm had lifted her to her feet. For a moment they stood close together, looking at each other with new and knowing eyes.

  Finally he spoke quietly but with great firmness: ‘Not until we are man and wife. I love you too much for that.’

  She understood and loved him all the more, hardly realising that he had just made a proposal of marriage. That night, she had agonised over what had happened in the forest and eventually decided she must set him free. She was not a suitable wife for such an important man. She was a poor serf who would never be anything else. And she wept the night away.

  When they met on the following day, she blurted out her decision to part from him but he held her arms gently, looked straight into her eyes and rejected the suggestion with such force that her resolve shattered into delightful submission. From that time her life turned i
nto a whirlwind of preparation, anticipation and joy, all spiced with a tinge of fear.

  At the farm, Maretta was delighted with her new home and settled in to become the new and loving wife who worked tirelessly to make everything perfect for her handsome and attentive husband.

  ‘What very happy days these are,’ she thought as she cleaned the shack and its surrounds until everything was neat and bright.

  She was deeply grateful to Young Malik’s father who had welcomed her into the family with open arms. She had become very fond of the old man.

  With a woman’s instinct, she knew why her mother-in-law acted at first with stiff formality towards her and she right away began to work hard to forge a friendly, slightly subservient relationship with the older woman. In the event, this proved to be quite easy. Maretta was quick to help with the many chores of a farmer’s wife and this, along with her ready humour and attractive beauty, soon won over the older woman. In fact the quick transition from tension to friendship was due not only to Maretta’s efforts. Young Malik’s mother knew that her beloved son was deeply in love with his new wife, and she was pleased to see him so happy.

  Maretta looked forward eagerly to being pregnant. She did not care whether her first baby was a boy or a girl – after all, there would be so many more! However as the months and then the years passed, it became increasingly obvious that the blessing of pregnancy was not being visited upon her. She tolerated all the visits from the physicians and apothecaries; she knew her husband was trying his best to solve their problem and bring the blessing of babies to their family. The remedies they gave her often tasted horrible and some of them made her sick. Some of the ointments and tinctures were also foul-smelling and some were injurious, irritating or even burning her skin. Nevertheless she was always obedient, firstly because it was what Young Malik wanted her to do but also because she was desperate to present him with the son he yearned for.