look barb’ric or stoopit in front o’ the gath’rin’. Abbess asked Meronym to show us Prescience Isle on a map o’ the world, but Meronym jus’ pointed to a spot an’ said, Here.
Where? we asked. See, there weren’t nothin’ but blue sea an’ I for one thinked she was mickin’ us mocksome.
Prescience I weren’t on any map made jus’ b’fore the Fall, Meronym said, ’cos Prescience’s founders kept it secret. It was on older maps, yay, but not the Abbess’s.
I’d got a bit o’ the brave by now an’ I asked our visitor why Prescients with all their high Smart ’n’ all want to learn ’bout us Valleysmen? What could we poss’bly teach her what she din’t know? The learnin’ mind is the livin’ mind, Meronym said, an’ any sort o’ Smart is truesome Smart, old Smart or new, high Smart or low. No un but me seen the arrows o’ flatt’ry them words fired, or how this crafty spyer was usin’ our ign’rance to fog her true ’tentions, so I follered my first question with this pokerer: But you Prescients got more greatsome ’n’ mighty Smart ’n this Hole World, yay? Oh, so slywise she picked her words! We got more ’n the tribes o’ Ha-Why, less ’n Old Uns b’fore the Fall. See? Don’t say a hole lot does it, nay?
I mem’ry jus’ three honest answers she gived us. Ruby o’ Potter’s asked why Prescients’d all got dark skins like cokeynuts, nay, we’d never seen a pale un or pink un come off of their Ship. Meronym said her ancestors b’fore the Fall changed their seeds to make dark-skinned babbits to give ’em protection ’gainst the redscab sickness, an’ so them babbits’ babbits also got it, like father like son, yay, like rabbits ’n’ cukes.
Napes o’ Inouye Dwellin’ asked, was she married, ’cos he was single an’ had a macadnut orchard an’ fig ’n’ lemon plantation all his own. Ev’ryun laughed, even Meronym smiled. She said she’d been married once, yay, an’ had a son named Anafi livin’ on Prescience I, but her husband’d been killed by savages years ago. She sorried losin’ the chance o’ them lemons ’n’ figs but she was too old for the husband market, an’ Napes shaked his head in dis’pointment an’ said, Oh Shipwoman, you breaked my heart yay you do.
Last up, my cuz Kobbery asked, So how old are you? Yay, that was what we was all wond’rin’. No un was ready for her answer tho’. Fifty. Yay, that’s what she said an’ we was ’mazed as you are now. Fifty. The air in our kitchen changed like the cold wind suddenwise comin’. Livin’ to fifty ain’t wondersome, nay, livin’ to fifty is eerie an’ ain’t nat’ral, yay? How old do Prescients live, then? asked Melvil o’ Black Ox. Meronym shrugged. Sixty, seventy?.?.?. Oh, we all got the gaspin’ shock! Norm’ly by forty we’re prayin’ Sonmi to put us out o’ misery an’ reborn us quick in a new body, like bladin’ a dog’s throat what you loved what was sick ’n’ agonyin’. The only Valleysman who’d ever lived to fifty an’ weren’t flakin’ with redscab or dyin’ of mukelung was Truman Third, an’ ev’ryun knowed how he’d done a deal with Old Georgie one hurrycanin’ night, yay, that fool’d sold his soul for some extra years. Well, the yarnin’ was busted prop’ly after that, an’ folks left in gaggles to yibber what’d been said an’ answered, ev’ryun whispin’, Thank Sonmi she’s not stoppin’ in our dwellin’.
I was pleased our dammit crookit guest’d teached ev’ryun to step slywise an’ not trust her, nay, not a flea, but I din’t sleep none that night, ’cos o’ the mozzies an’ nightbirds an’ toads ringin’ an’ a myst’rous someun what was hushly clatt’rin’ thru our dwellin’ pickin’ up stuff here an’ puttin’ it down there an’ the name o’ this myst’rous someun was Change.
First, second, third days the Prescient woman was wormyin’ into my dwellin’. Got to ’fess she din’t b’have like no queeny-bee, nay, she never lazed a beat. She helped Sussy with dairyin’ an’ Ma with twinin ’n’ spinnin’ an’ Jonas took her bird-eggin’ an’ she list’ned to Catkin’s yippin’ ’bout school’ry an’ she fetched water ’n’ chopped wood an’ she was a quicksome learner. Course the yibber was keepin’ a close eye on her an’ visitors kept callin’ to see the wondersome fifty-year-old woman what jus’ looked twenty-five years. Folks what s’pected her to be doin’ tricks ’n’ whizzies was dis’pointed very soon ’cos she din’t, nay. Ma she lost her anxin’ ’bout the Shipwoman in a day or two, yay, she started gettin’ friendsome with her an’ crowy too. Our visitor Meronym this an’ Our visitor Meronym that, it was cockadoodlydooin’ morn till night, an’ Sussy was ten times badder. Meronym she jus’ got on with her work, tho’ at night she’d sit at our table an’ write on spesh paper, oh so finer ’n ours. A whoah fast writer she was, but she din’t write in our tongue, nay, she wrote in some other speakin’. See, there was other tongues spoken in the Old Countries, not just ours. What you writin’ ’bout, Aunt Meronym? asked Catkin, but the Prescient jus’ answered, My days, pretty one, I’m writin’ ’bout my days.
I hated her pretty one stuff in my fam’ly an’ I din’t like the way old folks came creepin’ up askin’ her for lowdown on how to live long. But her writin’ ’bout the Valleys what no Valleysman could read, that anxed me most. Was it Smart or was it spyin’ or was it the touch o’ Old Georgie?
One steamin’ dawn I’d done the milkin’ when our guest asked to come herdin’ the goats with me. Ma said yay, o’ course. I din’t say yay, I said, coolsome ’n’ stony, Grazin’ goats ain’t int’restin’ for folks with so much Smart as you. Meronym said politesome, Ev’rythin’ Valleysmen do is int’restin’ for me, Host Zachry, but course if you jus’ don’t want me to watch your work, that’s fine, jus’ come out an’ say- so. See? Her words was slipp’ry wrestlers, they jus’ flipped your nay into a yay. Ma was hawkeyein’ me so, Sure, fine, yay, come, I’d got to say.
Herdin’ my goats up Elepaio Track, I din’t say nothin’ else. Past Cluny’s Dwellin’ a bro o’ mine, Gubboh Hogboy, shouted, Howzit, Zachry! for a discussin’, but when he seen Meronym he awked an’ jus’ said, Go careful, Zachry. Oh, I wished I could shruck that woman off my back, so I say-soed Stop draggin’, you slugger-buggahs, to my goats an’ hiked harder, hopin’ to wear her out, see, upstream thru Vert’bry Pass we went but she din’t quit, nay, not even on the rocky trail to Moon’s Nest. Prescient tuff it’s a match for goater tuff, I learnt it then. I reck’ned she knowed my thinkin’ an’ was laughin’ at me, inward, so I din’t speak nothin’ more to her.
What did she do when we reached Moon’s Nest? She sat on Thumb Rock an’ got out a writin’ book an’ sketched that whoahsome view. Oh, Meronym’d got whoahsome drawin’-Smart I got to ’fess. On that paper the Nine Folded Valleys appeared an’ the coast ’n’ headlands, an’ highlands ’n’ lowgrounds, jus’ as real as the real uns. I din’t want to give her no int’rest, but I cudn’t stop me. I named ev’rythin’ she’d marked, an’ she wrote the names until it was half-picturin’ half-writin’, I said. ’Zactly so, said Meronym, it’s a map we done here.
Now. I heard a twig snappin’ in a fringe o’ firs b’hind us. Not the fluky wind it weren’t, nay, it was a leg done it sure ’nuff, but a foot or hoof or claw I cudn’t tell. Kona up the Windward Kohalas weren’t knowed but so weren’t Kona at Sloosha’s Crossin’, nay, so into that thicket I went for a look-see. Meronym wanted to come with me but I telled her to stay put. Could it be Old Georgie come back to stone my soul some more? Or jus’ a hermity Mookini wand’rin’ for grinds? I’d got my spiker an’ I crept nearer the firs, nearer the firs?.?.?.
Roses sat straddlin’ a mossy fat stump. See you got fresh comp’ny, she said politesome, but there was a furyin’ dingo bitch in her eyes.
Her? I pointed back at Meronym, who sat watchin’ us talk. Ain’t yibber telled you, the Shipwoman’s older ’n my granny was when Sonmi reborned her! Don’t be jealous o’ her! She ain’t like you, Roses. She’s got so much Smart in her head she’s got a busted neck.
Roses weren’t politesome now. So I ain’t got no Smart?
Women, oh, women! They’ll find the baddest meanin’ in your words an’ hold it up, sayin’, Look what you attacked me with! Lust-bonered hothead what I was, a bit o’ knuckly talkin’d cure Roses’s senses, so I reck’ned. You know that ain’t what I’m sayin’ you dumb vamoosin’ bint—
I din’t finish speakin’ my cure ’cos Roses schnockoed my face so hard the ground dived forward an’ I crashed on my jaxy. So shocked I was I jus’ sat there like a dropped babbit, I dabbed my nose an’ my fingers was red. Oh, said Roses, then Ha! then, You can bitchmouth your nanny goats all you wants, herder, but not me, so Old Georgie stone your soul! Our lovin ’n’ throbbin’ was smashed to a mil’yun ittybitties an’ off Roses went then, swingin’ her basket.
