Sarah Canary Read Online Free

toward him. She nearly fell before consenting to move her feet, but she retained that transported look on her face. There were dark, indented circles under her eyes like moon shadows. Chin continued to pull. She did not look down and stumbled frequently. Occasionally she laughed. Nothing could have been more disconcerting.
     
    The noises of the camp faded behind them, irritatingly commonplace noises, the noises of people who have no problems of their own and no reason to honor anyone else’s. Chin chose a path along the creek, keeping as close to the water as he could. Even as he picked his way, even though patches of bare earth were rare and brambles flourished at his feet and ankles, even though the walking was not thoughtless walking, there was an inertia involved. Once started, it was easier to continue than to stop. The woman must have felt it, too. Soon Chin was able to drop her sleeve and move farther ahead of her. The way was much easier single file. He could hear her trailing him; her breathing was congested but not labored. She hummed from time to time. She spoke occasionally, single, unconnected syllables full of joy. Syllables like wark and shoop. Her inflections rose or fell much like the intonations of Cantonese.
     
    The creek sucked itself over rocks. The trees sawed in the wind. Waterweeds rubbed together, singing with friction like insects. Chin was a small ant, picking his way over the melodic body of the world.
     
    Her syllables began to connect again into whole nonsensical sentences, at first quietly and then gratingly. Her voice rose and followed after Chin. His queue bounced in the small of his back with each step. He thought about opium. He thought about the great silences of opium and the mysteries of the great silences opening like peeled fruit so that you could swallow them, segment by segment, until the mysteries and the silences were all inside you. He must never take opium again; he had recognized this the very first time he tried it. Chin craved tranquillity and clarity too much. Opium was a danger to a man like him. If only he had some opium now. Panta opium. Dangerously fine.
     
    ‘Seattle,’ he said to her once. ‘Did you come from Seattle?’ Her shoes were big and black and buttoned, heeled and caked with mud. She was limping a little; clearly she had already walked a long way. He slowed his own pace, in annoyance, in pity. They should have stayed in camp overnight and begun this journey in the morning. She should have washed her feet and wrapped them in rags dipped in water and just a little pulverized horny toad skin. They would never, never make Steilacoom before dark; she was already limping and he would spend a cold night with the indifferent, almost immortal trees and a woman who was, at best, very ugly and, at worst, some sort of demon spirit.
     
    She smiled at him and her nose hooked toward her mouth. She hummed her answer. Her skin - he noticed this suddenly - was poreless and polished. It shone like Four Flowers porcelain. It was beautiful. He was a little bit frightened. Why was he seeing this? Why hadn’t he seen it before? Why was he seeing it now? Chin faced forward and walked again.
     
    Perhaps three hours later they arrived at a lake. Chin paused beside it hesitantly. He had expected to follow the creek all the way into Steilacoom. He didn’t know the area well, saw no path, had only a vague sense that the Sound lay ahead of them. There should be no lake. He had come too far. They would need to cross the creek now and head directly west. Chin hated to leave the creek behind. He could lose his bearings so easily in the woods.
     
    The woman shouldered past him and slid down the lake bank. The trees on the bank grew at a slant. Chin saw a stain on the back of her black skirt that might have been blood; he didn’t want to think about the implications of this. The stain did not look recent. She found a large, flat stone exactly one step into the water and dropped to