From far, far away he heard a voice call something in a strange language and he opened his eyes. The smoke had cleared a little, the heat seemed less intense. His skin was pink, like a baby’s. He was damp all over with sweat and his skin was smooth as a sun-warmed lizard.

‘She says you can come out!’ he heard in English. But it was not the command but the sound of Suckahanna’s voice which brought him from his daze, up the steps and out into the sunlight.

‘Ah,’ the old woman said with pleasure at his appearance. She nodded at Suckahanna, and then tossed a buckskin cape around John’s shoulders to keep the chill of the evening air from him.

John looked around for his clothes. Everything was gone except his boots. Suckahanna was standing among a small group of women, they were all looking at his nakedness with a cheerful curiosity.

Suckahanna stepped forward and held out a bundle of clothing to him. As John took it he saw that it was a clout – a piece of cloth to twist between his buttocks and tie on a strap around his waist – a deerskin kilt and a deerskin shirt. He recoiled. ‘Where are my clothes?’

Suckahanna shook her head firmly. ‘They smelled,’ she said. ‘And they had lice and fleas. We are a clean people. You could not wear those clothes in our houses.’

He felt ashamed and unable to argue.

‘Put those on,’ she said. ‘We are all waiting for you.’

He tied the strings of the clout around his waist and felt better with his nakedness hidden from so many bright black eyes. ‘Why are they all here?’

‘To find the herb for your hand,’ she said.

John looked down into his palm. The wound was cleaner from the sweating, but there was still a crease of rotting flesh at its centre.

He pulled on the shirt and straightened the kilt. He thought that he must look absurd with his big white legs under this beautifully embroidered skirt and then his own heavy boots on his feet; but none of the women laughed. They moved off, one trotting behind another, with the old woman at the front and Suckahanna at the rear. She glanced back at John. ‘Follow,’ was all she said.

He remembered then the unbearable steady pace she would use when they were in the woods together. All the women moved at that remorseless trot which was too fast for him to walk and too slow for him to run. He walked and then ran after them in short, breathless bursts and Suckahanna never turned her head to see if he could keep up, but just kept her own steady pace as if there were neither thorns nor stones under her light moccasins.