Cloth of Gold

My friend Alvina was once bitten by a cloth of gold. The story was chilling. I came to hear it when I asked why her left index finger looked different from the corresponding one.

"When we lived in Dar, I was bitten by a poisonous sea snail. I nearly died." She picked a small pretty shell from a basket and put it in my daughter's hand. "This one." We both shivered.

Alvina went on calmly. "In Dar es Salaam, we lived right on the Indian Ocean. I used to collect shells from the beach, and I picked up this pretty little thing. I thought it was empty but I felt it bite my finger."

"Did you know it was poisonous?" I asked.

"I suspected it might be, so I dropped it in my basket and took it home to show Tom. He recognized it -- said it was a Cone shell, or cloth of gold. By that time, I felt pins and needles in my arm. I lay on the bed while Tom called the doctor."

"By the time the doctor came, I was in bad shape. He looked at my hand and arm and said the neural toxin from the shellfish was spreading. By then my whole arm felt numb."

"Wow. That must have been scary."

"Yes, I knew the toxin could be fatal. There was no antidote. The doctor said I was lucky to be bitten just on the end of the finger like that. It was also fortunate that I was young and strong. If I was still alive by evening, he reckoned I'd probably survive."

I regarded my friend with a new respect. I tried to imagine it, lying under the mosquito net in the afternoon, trying to make peace with the shadow of imminent death -- not certain death, but the strong possibility. With such suddenness can mortality confront us. And how ironic that this tiny deadly shellfish is so pretty-looking.