John Grisham - 1999 The Testament by John Grisham

Author:John Grisham [Grisham, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Thrillers
ISBN: 0440234743
Google: sRKSGCRjGawC
Amazon: B003B02O7I
Barnesnoble: B003B02O7I
Publisher: Dell
Published: 2010-03-16T05:00:00+00:00

TWENTY-NINE

_____________

Few of the Indians around Nate knew the girl’s name was Ayesh. She was only a child and she lived in another village. They all knew, though, that a girl had been bitten. They gossiped about it throughout the day while they kept their own children closer at hand.

Word came during dinner that the girl had died. A messenger arrived in a rush and delivered the news to the chief, and it swept through the huts in a matter of minutes. Mothers gathered their little ones even closer.

Dinner resumed until there was movement along the main trail. Rachel was returning with Lako and the other men who’d been with her all day. As she entered the village, the eating and the chatting stopped as everyone stood and stared. They lowered their heads as she walked by their huts. She smiled at some, whispered to others, paused long enough to say something to the chief, then continued to her hut, followed by Lako, whose limp was worse.

She passed near the tree where Nate and Jevy and their Indian had spent most of the afternoon, but she didn’t see them. She wasn’t looking. She was tired and suffering and seemed anxious to get home.

“What do we do now?” Nate asked Jevy, who passed the question along in Portuguese.

“We wait,” came the reply.

“Surprise, surprise.”

Lako found them as the sun was falling behind the mountains. Jevy and the Indian went to eat leftovers. Nate followed the boy along the trail to Rachel’s dwelling. She was standing in the door, drying her face with a hand towel. Her hair was wet and she had changed clothes.

“Good evening, Mr. O’Riley,” she said, in the same low, slow tone that betrayed nothing.

“Hello, Rachel. Please call me Nate.”

“Sit over there, Nate,” she said, pointing to a short square stump remarkably similar to the one he’d been perched upon for the past six hours. It was in front of the hut, near a ring of rocks where she made her fires. He sat, his rear still numb.

“I’m sorry about the little girl,” Nate said.

“She is with the Lord.”

“Her poor parents aren’t.”

“No. They are grieving. It’s very sad.”

She sat in the doorway, arms folded over her knees, eyes lost in the distance. The boy stood guard under a nearby tree, almost unseen in the darkness.

“I would invite you into my home,” she said. “But it would not be proper.”

“No problem here.”

“Only married people can be alone indoors at this time of the day. It’s a custom.”

“When in Rome, do like the Romans.”

“Rome is very far away.”

“Everything is very far away.”

“Yes it is. Are you hungry?”

“Are you?”

“No. But then I don’t eat much.”

“I’m fine. We need to talk.”

“I’m sorry about today. I’m sure you understand.”

“Of course.”

“I have some manioc and some juice if you’d like.”

“No, really, I’m okay.”

“What did you do today?”

“Oh, we met with the chief, had breakfast at his table, hiked back to the first village, got the boat, worked on it, set up our tent behind the chief’s hut, then waited for you.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.