“We’re going to bathe,” Mitchell told me. I had mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I was so filthy that the thought of getting clean was more appealing than I could imagine. On the other, the thought of getting undressed in front of him sent a sickening shiver down my spine. Mitchell lifted up one of the rubber containers we had carried with us and nodded at me. “Take your clothes off,” he commanded. I froze, the words cutting me to the core. I flashed back to the first morning in the tent when Barzee had commanded me to take my pajamas off. When I didn’t move, Mitchell took a step toward me, the bucket in his hand. Knowing I couldn’t fight him, I pulled the linen robe over my head and dropped it on top of the nearest shrub. Mitchell moved me toward the center of the little stream where the mud was thick and squished between my toes. I stood naked as he dipped the bucket in a pool of standing water and poured it over my head. I nearly went into shock, it was so cold! The water washed over my hair and down my body. He handed me a rough bar of soap and a squirt of all-natural organic shampoo and told me to wash up. He only gave me a couple seconds. Another bucket of ice-cold water and that was it. My weekly bath was through.
Shivering, I moved to a spot in the sun to dry off while he and Barzee washed themselves. When they were finished, we put our dirty robes back on, then I helped to fill the water containers, working carefully to leave as many footprints in the soft mud as I could. Above the spring, on the north side of the mountain, there was a dusty patch, and I tried to leave my footprints there as well. But we only stayed at the stream for a couple of minutes. Mitchell was anxious to get back up to our camp. So we quickly filled our water containers, then headed up the side of the mountain again.
It was hot, exhausting work. The summer sun bore down. A hundred yards up, I was already dirty and exhausted. I held two one-gallon plastic containers of water and they sloshed heavily in my arms. Up we climbed, my cable dragging behind me. I don’t know if Mitchell had decided I wouldn’t run off or if he was only getting sloppy, but after a while I picked it up and carried it myself. Up we climbed, then we turned to our right. The crucible lay before us. Steep mountain and sharp rocks. I didn’t know how I would do it. Climbing. Slipping. Barely catching my fall. The water felt like a load of heavy sand in my arms. It grew heavier and heavier. We stopped every five or ten minutes to rest. Across the crucible. Farther up the mountain. As we climbed, I looked ahead of us, not knowing for certain where our camp was. Late that afternoon, we finally stumbled into camp.
Before I even had a chance to sit down, Mitchell walked over and locked my cable with the padlock again.
I was thinking that, you know, maybe he would leave me uncabled for a while. Maybe he trusted me, at least a little. Maybe he would give me a few minutes without being cabled to the trees. But that wasn’t to be the case.
At least I can dream, I thought as I listened to the click of the padlock being snapped again.
18.
Food and Wine
A little more than a week into my captivity, we ran out of food. Up to that point, we hadn’t eaten well, but we had enough to get by. And I hadn’t given a lot of thought as to where our food had come from, or where any more food was going to come from in the future. I just didn’t think about it. It was obvious Mitchell and Barzee had been in the camp for a long time. They hadn’t starved. They had to continue eating in the future. Surely they had a plan.
But then we ran out of food. The coolers were completely empty. Nothing in the plastic containers. No raisins. No tortillas. No crackers or apples. Nothing at all to eat.
In my church, on the first Sunday of the month, we fast for twenty-four hours, then take what money we would have spent on food and give it to the poor. It’s a day of fasting and prayer and giving, which is a good thing. But I guess I’m just a baby. It was always really hard for me to go hungry.
So even though I was used to going a day without eating, it was very discouraging to be trapped in the camp without any food. I’m the kind of person who has to eat every three hours or I feel miserable and become a little cranky. And I don’t think I’m alone. Most of us don’t realize, or we forget because we don’t have to do it very often, how quickly we feel hungry and how badly we want to eat.
We went a morning without eating. And then a day. And then another. I was getting really hungry. All of us were. It was miserable. My belly hurt. Then I started to wonder, What’s going to happen? Is he going to go and get us some food? How is he going to get it? How long is it going to take?
About midmorning, Barzee and I were in the tent. She was teaching me how to patch our robes, which was a good wifely duty and one I had to learn. To do this, she had brought out new robes for us to wear while we mended the linen ones. (Initially they had been a whitish light-beige color but now they were more brown than beige.) The new robes were made from gold sheets that we had to pull over our heads, then secure with a clasp and tie with a sash. The material was cheap and flimsy, but the sheets were not well worn, making them the finest clothing in the camp. They were awkward and ugly, though, with sleeves that fell to our sides in huge triangles, giving them the appearance of an African muumuu. All morning we sewed and patched away, getting the linen robes into fine shape. But it was hot and miserable. And I was getting so hungry. It was the only thing that I could think about.
Finally, Mitchell poked his head into the tent and announced, “I’m going to go down to Babylon to plunder.”