could keep me calm and free of hallucinations all day. Who had recommended this admixture of opium to her, I never found out.
For me, the opium did indeed keep Daniel in his grave, but at the price of making me listless of mind, weak of body, and unbearably thirsty. I half-dreamed my life over the coming weeks, growing immeasurably frail, until I spoke in a whisper and desired only to lie in bed with the shutters closed. I felt like the center of me was now made of soft dark wool.
After a month of strict convalescence, my leg was strong enough to support my weight but, floating along in my drugged state, I refused to give up my crutches. Mama once said of this time that I was passing further each day through the Gate of Death. Yet she was too afraid to stop giving me opium. Panicked and alone, suffering from insomnia herself, she could not have been thinking clearly.
For years afterward, I considered that she had been exaggerating my nearness to death, as I was not aware of my own pitiful state in any conscious way. But when I spoke to Luna Oliveira about that time, she said that she, too, had been convinced that I would soon be joining Daniel. She said that losing him and Violeta had shattered my young heart.
While I was struggling to remain in our world, Father sent us advance notice of his return. He had already reached Lisbon and had decided to spend three nights there in order to conduct some business for the Douro Wine Company, shave his beard, and rid himself of his seagoing odor. The letter was two days in arriving, however. It was on the very next day, the Twenty-Ninth of August, that he was to dock in Porto, around noon.
Mother and I feared that we would fail miserably in making a good first impression, so on the morning of the great day, at precisely eleven o’clock, she administered a dose and a half of her tincture of opium. I became so disoriented that, in order to appear healthy, I ran upstairs at the last minute, punctured my finger with a pin, and rubbed blood into my pale cheeks.
The ship was late, and it was not until well after one o’clock that we saw it sailing up the Douro. As the
He had not come alone. With him was a wee dark-skinned man, no more than five feet tall. Months later, I found out his original name, which was Tsamma, the word in his language for a particular melon from the Kalahari Desert. This fruit was of special importance to his people and, indeed, to all the creatures of southern Africa, as its liquid-sweet flesh sustained one and all during periods of drought. But he was introduced to me as Midnight.
XII
The first thing I noticed about Midnight on the wharf that afternoon was his coloring, which was not pure black — as his name might imply — but bronze. The second was his diminutive stature, for he was clearly only a shade taller than my mother. This might have been the expected size of a lad with some growing yet to do, but he was surely a man of twenty-five or even thirty years of age.
I was soon to discover that he, too, was uncertain of his age, since his people dated their births by referring to natural events in the world. When we spoke of it, he offered a response that astounded me: “I might be the age of the wildflowers that blossomed in the year of the hailstorm over Gemsbok Valley. The whole of the valley was very, very green, you see.” He circled his hands in the air, then brought them together and opened them in a swirl of blossoms. “As bright and as colorful as a desert oasis of flowers.”
More than that he could not say.
Midnight smiled broadly at me as he walked onto land, his gait sprightly, as though he enjoyed the simple act of walking as much as he might a rousing ball game. His eyes — dark and slightly slanted in the Oriental manner — seemed to harbor some secret amusement of which only he was aware. In my apprehension, I mistook this as an indication that he found me comical in some way, which irritated me. Though frail as a paper doll and drowsy, I kept my eyes wide open and my posture stiff. Midnight kept smiling at me as he and Papa approached, and I remember thinking,
I looked up at my mother, who wore an expression of dread.
Turning away from her, I noticed that Midnight’s ears, tucked close to his head and tapering upward, were like those I’d seen at the Olive Tree Sisters’ house in images of Pan. His black hair was wound into tight clusters, like small balls of wool.
Papa, after kissing my mother and me and saying that he had missed us enormously, introduced his African visitor. He said that he intended, if we agreed, for Midnight to stay with us for “a few short weeks.” Dumbfounded, Mama ventured no reply.
Midnight lifted her hand to shake it, a bit more vigorously than might have been considered appropriate, and said, “Good day, Mrs. Stewart. We saw you from afar and we are dying of hunger.”
There was no trace of humor in his voice; on the contrary, he spoke with veneration, as though in the presence of royalty. My father explained that it was the traditional greeting of Midnight’s people.
My mother replied, “I am pleased to make your acquaintance, sir,” mentioning nothing yet about his proposed stay with us.
I refused to shake his hand and said nothing at all when he told me that he was most happy to meet me after hearing so much about me from my father. I kept my arms locked behind my back and my mouth sealed tight in spiteful silence.
Papa looked at me crossly. That was when Midnight seemed to notice a stain or crumb on my face. Only later did I realize he had remarked on an L-shaped scar that I incurred in my tumble off our roof. With a worried look, he reached down to me. I flung my right hand up to prevent his fingers from touching me, but I wasn’t quick enough. He held my chin in his hand and his fingers were cool. He stared at me. He had eyes like moons.
“The lad is indeed most ill,” Midnight said, looking up at my father with concern.
Papa knelt in front of me and grimaced in fear. “How badly has it gone with John?” he asked my mother.
“I shall tell you at home.”
“Tell me now.”
She ignored him and asked if
“Yes,” Papa said, slapping his hat against his hip in anger, “I just told you that that was my intention.”
“Then let us proceed,” she said tersely.
It was a tense walk from the riverside to our house. Mama, who had been planning to fall into Father’s arms and cede all her worries to him, swiftly abandoned that course of action. She spoke only when spoken to, and then only in monosyllables. Father held her hand as though afraid she would vanish if he let go. He stole worried glances at me and looked increasingly glum, undoubtedly convinced that our lives had grown more desperate than he had ever feared. I was painfully self-conscious and tried not to look at Midnight, who pranced along beside me.
Once at home, Mother ordered me to take our guest into the garden, in such a frigid tone that I dared not protest. As we stepped outside, Midnight said, “Your father tells me that you have been seeing a friend of yours who died.”
Furious, I refused to answer, because I was not of the opinion that sharing this secret with strangers was within my father’s rights.
Fanny waddled toward us, her tail wagging. Despite my stern look of warning, she took an immediate liking to our guest and was soon licking his hands and face. He giggled and spoke to her in bizarre clicking sounds.
“Leave her alone. She only understands my whistles.”
He stood up. “Does she do many tricks perhaps?”
“Only one. She bites strangers!” I snapped.
He laughed at that, his broad shoulders jiggling. Drugged to a trance, perfumed like a princess, irate as a bull, and ornamented with a red ribbon at my collar, I must have been a truly wretched and risible sight. I naturally believed that this was why Midnight kept looking furtively at me as he stepped through the tangled mess that was
