Dragon Dance Read Free

attention elsewhere.
    They went to the swimming hole below the village. While Brad was strenuously scrubbing himself, Simon said: “She obviously doesn’t give a monkey’s whether I get drowned. How do you do it, Brad?”
    Brad contented himself with a filthy look. “I’ve had enough of this. Did you see Stone Blade’s face while his mom was doing her hugging bit? Today was probably a spur-of-the-moment effort. Next time he’ll plan things properly.” Brad climbed out of the hole and rubbed himself with the coarse towel. “You stay if you like. I’m going.”
    â€œRight now?”
    â€œIf past form is anything to go by, the feast tonight will wind up with them all getting high on thorn apple. It’ll be late tomorrow afternoon before they start taking notice again.”
    Simon nodded. “And that would give us time to get well clear. I don’t suppose Night Eagle would be keen on sending out a search party, but Little Green Bird might make him. So, dawn tomorrow?”
    â€œYes. We can grab a few days’ rations from the leftovers.”
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    The feast began with speeches and long declamatory poems, continuing with songs to an accompaniment of an orchestra of rattles, whistles, and drums. If you had a taste for it, it probably sounded great. To Simon, it felt like having his eardrums sandblasted.
    Things improved when the women started bringing food round—by now he was ravenously hungry. Little Green Bird attended to Brad personally, giving him the tastiest morsels together with pats and squeezes. The eating and drinking were punctuated by more songs and by dances. The shamans, their leader magnificently attired in a white deerskin and feather-and-pebble headdress, performed a special dance which ended with the passing round of the first of the pipes of glowing thorn apple. The pipe passed from the shamans to the chief, and then to the braves.
    Simon wondered about their future. Even apart from Brad’s special problems, he realized it would have been difficult, perhaps impossible, for them to become regular members of the tribe. To live the Indian life, you needed to have been Indian reared. Their backgrounds of twentieth-century English (or American, in Brad’s case) just didn’t fit.
    But he thought too, and with a touch of resentment, about the fact that once again it was Brad making the big decision, himself simply acquiescing in it. When they first met, back in prefireball England, his cousin’s cocksureness had incensed him. It had been satisfying when he had goaded Brad into fighting, and even more satisfying that his own greater physical strength was going to put the result beyond doubt. Brad, though, had refused to give in, and it had been he, in the end, who had offered the apology and stuck a hand out.
    Since then, it seemed, although he had won a few minor conflicts, Brad’s view had prevailed on all the major issues. Did this prove him the weaker character? He supposed it must. On the other hand, since Brad was not going to be swayed once he had made his mind up, it always seemed more rational to goalong with him. One thing certain about this perilous world was that they were safer together than apart. If they ever got back to their own world, Brad could do whatever crazy thing he liked, and he would wave him a more than cheerful good-bye. But that was a bigger pipe dream than the one the braves were working up to. There was no way back.
    Brad nudged him.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œI think it’s getting to them. Four pipes in circulation, and they’re reaching the noisy stage. In half an hour, they should start passing out.”
    There was a hush as the chief shaman began to sing again, a wailing chant accompanied by peculiar jerkings of his arms and feet. Outlined against the light of the fire, his antics were bizarre—a comic turn, though definitely not one to be laughed at,