and we went through. Beyond the gate the path went more steeply up the hillside, leading to a narrow cleft in the rock. We clambered through, and I saw that the corners and angles of the rock had been worn smooth by feet. Now the path went down, while the walls of rock steepened above us. A few small trees and bushes grew on the ground beside us, but the rock was bare, crowned with foliage, darkening the vale.
Three people were walking hack along the path towards us, but they passed without saying anything. It was oppressively quiet in the tiny valley, and the few things Seri and I said to each other were in hushed voices. It was the same sort of quietude adopted by non-believers who visit a church; here in the mountains the same serene stasis existed.
I heard the sound of water, and as the path turned towards the tallest face of rock I saw the pool.
There was a spring in the rock, flowing across a flat surface, and trickling out over the edge were a number of tiny waterfalls. They poured down into the dank pool below, making a sonorous dripping noise, amplified into a hollow echoing by the concave wall of rock behind. The pool itself was black, with an illusion of greenness from the overhanging shrubbery. Its surface trembled continuously, while the unceasing water fell from above.
Although the air in the valley was as warm as elsewhere, there was a chill quality given by the sound of the water. Unaccountably, I felt myself shiver, the nervous tic that brings an unexplained shudder, the feeling that is said to be like someone walking over your grave. The pool was beautiful in a simple way, but it had a presence I could not like. It was cluttered with incongruity.
Hanging from the lip of the water shelf was a bizarre array of household items. There, in the flow of water, someone had dangled an old shoe. Next to it swung a child's knitted jacket, bobbing as the water turned it. Then there was a pair of sandals, a wooden matchbox, a ball of string, a raffia basket, a necktie, a glove. They had a faint sheen of greyness, unclearly seen as the water poured over and through them.
This juxtaposition had an eerie, unexplained quality to it, like a sheep's heart nailed to a door, a token of ritual magic.
Seri said: 'They're petrifying, turning to stone.'
'Not literally.'
'No . . . but there's something in the water. Silica, I think. Anything hung in the water builds up a coating.'
'But why should anyone want a stone shoe?'
'That's the people who run the souvenir shop. They put most of the stuff here, although anyone can leave something. The people in the shop say it will bring you luck. It's just a novelty, really.'
'Is this what you brought me to see?' I said.
'Yes.'
'Why, Seri?'
'I'm not sure. I thought you'd like it here.'
We sat down together on the grass, regarding the petrifying pool and its motley of domestic fetishes. While we were there, more people walked through the vale and visited the pool. They were in a group of about ten, with children running around and making a noise. They made much of the objects dangling in the falls, and one of the men was photographed leaning out over the pool with his hand in the trickling water. Afterwards, as they walked away, he was still pretending his hand had been turned to stone, as he wielded it like a rigid claw.
I wondered what would happen if something living really was laid out beneath the falling water. Would it too acquire a veneer of stone, or would skin reject it? Obviously a human being or an animal would simply not keep still or stay long enough. A corpse, though, could probably turn to stone; organic death to inorganic permanence.
With such distracting macabre thoughts I sat silently with Seri while the birds made their strange noise overhead. It was still warm, but I noticed a gradual reduction in the intensity of sunlight on the trees above us. I was unused to being so far south as this, and the sudden twilights still surprised me.
'What time does it get dark?' I said.
Seri glanced at her wristwatch. 'Not long. We ought to get back up to the road. There's a bus in about half an hour.'
'If it hasn't broken down again.'
'That's if it has,' she said with a wry smile. We walked up through the little valley, then along the path to the bridge over the river. Lights were coming on in the village as we passed through, and by the time we had clambered up to the road it was almost dark. We sat down on one of the benches and listened to the evening sounds. Cicadas scraped for a while, but then there was a brief and lovely burst of hirdsong, like the dawn chorus in the Faiandland countryside, transformed in the tropics. Below us, we heard music from the village, and the shallow river.
As the dark became absolute, the physical tension we had both been suppressing suddenly was released. Without either of us initiating it, or so it seemed, we were kissing passionately, leaving no doubts. But in a while, Seri drew back from me and said: 'The bus won't be coming now. It's too late.
Nothing's allowed on the road past the airport after dark.'
I said: 'You knew that before we came here.'
'Well, yes.' She kissed me.
'Can we stay somewhere in the village?'
'I think I know a place.'
We went slowly down the wooded path, stumbling on the steps, heading down to the village lights we could just see through the trees. Seri led me to a house set back slightly from the road, and spoke in patois to the woman who came to the door. Money changed hands, and we were taken up to a room tucked under the roof: black- painted wooden rafters sloped over the bed. We had said nothing on the way, suspending it all, but as soon as we were alone, Seri slipped out of her clothes and lay on the bed. I quickly joined her.
An hour or two later, drained of the tension but still not really knowing each other, we dressed and went across to the restaurant. There were no other visitors in the village, and the owner had closed for the night.
