Heaven's Edge Read Free

They were made by the paws of a large animal, maybe from one of Eldon’s celebrated game parks. Anything was possible: that was the point, I told myself, about an island of dreams.
    I followed the prints until the track itself dwindled to a thin groove barely visible in the long grass. Then the vegetation grew thicker and thornier. The path disappeared. Scrub turned to jungle, wildwood and dung bramble. I carried on, feeling a little apprehensive but also quite chuffed at having come close to a jungle habitat. I didn’t mind missing the next village. Picking my way through a tangle of trees and bushes I reached the edge of a small pond, no bigger than a playground paddling pool; a layer of green and brown duckweed covered most of the surface. Near the crust a few blanched flowers soaked in the sun. Sharp, thin leaves hung motionless from the trees. It seemed a scene out of the ancient chronicles Eldon used to try to interest me in when I was young. The heat, even with the water close by, was intense; the skin on my top lip burned as I exhaled. I tried to remember what I had once learned about stilling the mind and cooling the body. I felt a little dizzy. Perhaps it was a premonition. I wiped the perspiration around my eyes and tried to contemplate life after death. Then I noticed a movement in the bushes on the other side of the pond. I held my breath, hardly daring to hope I might observe some real wildlife: a langur or a hoopoe, perhaps a loris, or even the leopard whose tracks I was convinced I hadseen. I felt a thrill I had never felt before, the promise of a glimpse into the primeval, but what emerged instead was a young woman in a yellow T-shirt and patchwork jeans.
    At the water’s edge she crouched down over a small bamboo cage and quickly released a catch. The speed and sureness with which she moved in the heat was hard to believe. I stepped forward to see what she had with her, and snapped a twig by accident. She looked up startled. Hastily she shook the cage, poised to run.
    â€˜Wait.’ I bared my hands to show I meant her no harm. It could have been merely animal instinct, but I felt drawn to her. I went over. She shook back her long black hair. Her face was brimming with light. I couldn’t stop staring.
    A pair of green doves peeked out of the open cage. ‘Shoo!’ Her fingers danced in the air and the birds flew up in a clumsy flurry of brilliant feathers. They took refuge in one of the trees behind her, dislodging a small red fruit.
    She kept her eyes on me while she bent down to pick it up. Her arm was trembling, but she looked more annoyed than frightened at being found out. Her face tightened; she seemed to suck in the air around her. The breeze turned the leaves above her head and I heard the flapping of wings again. The birds cooed.
    â€˜Emerald doves?’ I asked, for some absurd reason expecting the words to placate her. I recognised the birds and was glad that they conformed to the jewelled picture I had from my boyhood bird books. The way she held herself without moving reminded me of something in myself. It was not desire but a kind of energy that absorbed as much as it gave out. I took a step closer.
    The nerves straining inside her loosened, freeing her face briefly from irritation into surprise. ‘You know emerald doves?’ She brushed her hair back from her eyes, knottingit and pulling at the strands. Her nails were short but shaped and shiny; a thin metal bracelet slipped down one wrist. Streaks of sweat marked her face making her look flustered. The puffs under her eyes were wet and thin rings glistened around her slightly swollen neck. A few drops trickled to the seam of her top creating a small damp pattern in the cloth.
    â€˜You speak English?’
    She nodded, perplexed. Then suspicion seemed to contract the muscles around her eyes again. ‘Everyone can, no?’
    That was what I had been led to believe too. ‘But no one in this place