Island of The World

by Michael D. O'Brien

  “So, we will look after you until you are well, and then we will help you find her. But listen, I’m talking too much. It’s your fault because you don’t say a word, only your name, and I do not blame you for it, after all you’ve been through.

  “But that is little concern to me. You can say nothing at all, if you wish. Besides, it’s nice to have a listening ear. How often do I get a chance to talk, eh? Not often. My brother—the one with the sheep—now there’s a talker. I am a silent man myself, very quiet, just like my Tata was. Though I forget much about him, I remember that! And Marija always has lots to say, that woman, a good scolder she is, but kind in the heart, and Jelena, my princess, is our jewel in the crown. My sons are all grown and working in Rijeka at the shipyard. One is married, two are engaged; such fine lads, but none of them wants the life of the sea. I wonder why? It’s the best way of life, I say, though sometimes she kills, takes a little interest on what she lends. No, I said it wrong, for it’s not really lending—she always gives, and if she takes back from time to time, who are we to begrudge her! It’s we who are all wrong—thinking about it upside down—which, as I’m sure you know, is the way we are, we people, not at all like the birds and the dolphins and the squid. Do you like squid? Tonight we have it for supper. So tasty, cut into little pieces in a secret sauce my wife makes—Oh, I am sorry, do you not like sauce? Well, I will tell her, and you won’t have to eat it with the sauce. She can fry it just as easily—Listen now, I am sorry, Josip—you needn’t cry. Look, don’t worry about anything—”

  Now he is awake most of each day. How long has he been here? There have been three stormy days, overcast, and four or five sunny ones. All have had buras, though none as strong as the night of his swim. His lungs are clearing. Marija claims it is because she is pouring garlic into him and also the juice of crushed citrus seeds. It kills the little devils in the lungs, she assures him.

  Our guest they call him, Mr. Josip. They do not probe for his full name. How much do they guess? He does not want to find out. Silence is best. Yes, he will remain silent. Now his throat can make low sounds, like speech, though he uses it only when the room is empty, when the man is down by the shore doing something with his net, or when the woman is scolding out back, shrieking at hens that have broken into a seed bin. There is a donkey as well. He has become fond of donkeys. He is one. No, he is not! I am a lastavica. I am a dupin! He knows this is fanciful musing, understands full well the fragility of his situation. But why do they help him?

  One afternoon, Drago declares that Josip is well enough to try getting up onto his feet. Let’s go, he insists, and will not take “no” for an answer. He gives Josip some of his clothes—undershirt and underpants, thin and full of holes but clean too, the first such garments Josip has worn in over a year. Then a wool shirt and wool trousers with cuffs that hang at mid-calf, and thick socks knit from the wool of his brother’s flock. Then the host leads the wobbling guest out of the room and into a low-ceilinged kitchen, where it looks as if most of the family life happens. It is a two-room house. There are beds beside the stove, the man and woman have given him their room for the duration of his stay in their home.

  Leaving the kitchen, they go outside into a dooryard, a narrow terrace flagged with uneven pieces of limestone and fenced by a low wall of broken red bricks.

  “Sit here in the sun”, Drago commands pointing to a wooden bench. “Soak it up, you’re as pale as a cod’s belly.”

  It is wonderfully warm here, shielded from the breeze, his back to the sun-baked stones of the house’s front wall. Beyond the retaining wall, the land slopes down ten meters or so to the water’s edge. Jelena is there with the cat. She is tossing pebbles into the waves, and the cat is tormenting crabs that are trying to escape it.

  Goli Otok is to the west and north. Choking, Josip looks away from it. Drago, who has been deftly lighting a hand-rolled cigarette, keeping his eyes on the guest, drags in smoke and blows it out.

  “A fine day”, he muses. “A fine, fine day. And look at the white island, so bright, a man can hardly stand to look at it.” Josip nods and meets the other’s eyes.

  “A bad place, that! Once it was a good place. My grandfather sometimes took his sheep over there in his boat on a calm day. That was before the war. There were plenty of bushes and grass there at one time, though only on the other side—this side has always been naked. The wind strips everything down.

  “Then in ‘48 or ‘49 they built something out there—some say a stone quarry. But why all those watchtowers, and why do the guard-boats circle the island all the time, eh? I tell you, Josip, it’s a strange place. Ghostly it looks and maybe ghostly it is, though pretty enough when the sun shines on it. But at night, Marija says she can hear the cries of men coming from that place. Me, I hear nothing, but Marija, she hears things no other ears can hear. So, she prays for the ghosts who live over there. Jelena does too. All the time they pray. Me, I’m not much of a praying man.

  “But I ask myself, why do they make a wall around that island—not a wall you can see with the eyes, but a wall of fear. Did you know that people who live along the shore have sometimes been shot at from that island, if they go too close. Now, it is my opinion that ghosts do not own guns, and even if they did, they would not shoot them at us people. Whoever is shooting at ordinary fisher folk are up to no good. It seems to me—though I am not a smart man—it seems to me that a wall is something that keeps things inside and keeps other things outside. I do not like walls. A wall on a house is just fine, who could live without such a wall? And a bit of wall to keep the garden and the dooryard from sliding down into the water, that’s a good wall too. But other than that, I don’t like walls. There’s something wrong about them.”

  Suddenly, Drago laughs aloud and slaps his knees. “Wait! What a fool I am! I live on a wall!”

  Josip glances at him curiously.

  “The Dinarics are a wall, are they not? Yes, the biggest wall in Yugoslavia. It keeps some things inside and other things outside. But I must say again that I am not fond of walls. Are you fond of walls, Josip?”

  “No”, Josip croaks, and looks away across the sea.

  “I must tell you a little about myself”, chuckles Drago. “Otherwise, how can we honestly say that you are our guest? If we don’t speak from the heart, that means I am just a hotel keeper, and this would be an insult to you, Josip, for a guest is Christ himself coming into the home—that is what my grandfather taught me, and my father too, before he drowned—I remember that much. Then the hard times came, and a lot of things were forgotten, like a wall somebody built in everyone’s head. A big wall, keeping some things inside and other things outside—and many things that should be inside our heads are kept out.

  “Did I tell you I am a criminal. No? Well, let me tell you, it’s not a pretty story, but I think you will find it interesting. I was never caught—as you can see from the evidence right before your eyes. Here I am, hale and hearty, and puffing my own tobacco, which I grow myself, with a door open to guests at all times. But I am losing track of my story, what was I saying?”

  “You said”, Josip murmurs in a low rasp, after clearing his throat, “that you are a criminal.”

  “Oh, yes, well it’s true. This is what happened, and I’ll tell it just like it was. When I was a young man, I walked all the way to Rijeka; that was before the war, before the Italians came. I was not fond of Italians because they are always trying to push the border from Trieste into our land, and besides they drink too much. Well, we drink too much too, but the way they drink is worse than ours, and they have hot tempers; well, ours are hot too, but theirs are worse. Has Croatia ever invaded anybody’s land? No, never! Has Italy? Yes, always! So, I am not fond of them because of this, and also because they are a bit arrogant, though I guess we can be that way too, but always for better reasons than theirs—Anyway, where was I?”

  “You walked to Rijeka.”

  “Oh, yes, so I was a young man and full of oats, and had not yet
met my Marija, my sons and my princess were only sparkles in the corner of my eyes, but these eyes were sparkling a lot in those days I can tell you, me being about eighteen at the time and so good-looking that all the mothers from St. Juraj to Starigrad were trying to make a match for their daughters. But don’t judge what I’m saying by the way I look now. Sad to say, we grow old. We grow older and older and older, and storm-tossed are we for most of our years, up and down on the waves, and sometimes under them. Well, there I was, not ready to make a family, but hungry to see the wide world. Though I was full of oats, they were not wild ones; I was also in the church every Sunday, and I kept a bench warm beside the confessional, and rubbed the wood raw with my backside, I can tell you, and wore out a few pant-knees afterward, I can tell you as well. I was not a bad boy, Josip, just really stupid. I am still stupid, as you can see, but I try to make up for my crime by doing what I can to help people, especially people who fall into the sea.

  “So, there I am in Rijeka, just gaping about at the big city, with a few coins in my pocket. I stopped into a tavern and treated myself to a nice big fat lunch and some red wine—yes, too many sips of that devilish Italian wine did I have that day. So, after filling my belly, I staggered out into the city square, the biggest city I ever saw in my life—well, to be true, it was the only city I had ever seen—and I came upon a crowd of people shouting and waving red flags. There was a man on a box shouting back at them, making them all hot under the collar. He was one of those Communists from before the war, and he was the Italian kind too, a nasty bunch, not like our friendly Communists here in Yoo—go—slavia”

  Josip eyes the man warily.

  “Istria, as you know, is full of Communists now. They’re really strong in that region, and I think maybe it’s because the Italians were strong there first. Lots of agitation among the workers. Anyway, as a man of the sheep and the sea, I had little use for those factory boys and their shouting. When my family shouts it’s for a good reason, not to work people up into hitting each other on the head. But as I told you, I was three sails to a strong wind that day, and getting hotter as I listened to those idiots. Fistfights broke out, some Ustashe types broke into the crowd, and then the Communists fought back. Oh, it got really bad. Now, I never liked Ustashe; they’re as mean as sharks, though they had some good ideas about Croatia. But you don’t make good countries by bashing heads, I always say, that’s not the Croatian way, not since we made that promise to the Pope a thousand years ago, maybe longer than that. Anyway, as I was saying, I got pulled into the thick of it, and there I was swinging my fists too, like everybody else. Then this Communist thug with a red kerchief around his neck starts in on me with a stick!

  A stick, bang-bang on my poor head. Never in my life have I been hit like that, leastways not on any spot besides my hind end, and that was because I deserved it, and my Tata knew it. Though I forget a lot of things, I remember that about him. Then a Ustasha starts hitting the Communist, and here the two are just whacking each other with sticks and iron bars. To tell you the truth, Josip, they were both crazy. I don’t know what made me do what I did next. I had a bottle of wine in my pocket, with the cork still in it, none of it safely tucked away in my belly, and I tell you it was a heavy one. Quick as lightning, I had it out and banged the Communist on the head, and then the Ustasha, and they both went down—out cold. Just at that moment, the police swooped in and whistles started blowing and guns firing off in the air, and all hell broke loose. I ran for it, I can tell you. And to this day I do not know if they lived or died, but there was a lot of blood. Did I kill the one or the other or both? I just don’t know. It bothers me still . . .”

  Josip has listened to all of this with an open mouth.

  “Of course I took it to confession, but I do wonder from time to time if I ended someone’s life . . .” Drago looks down at the open palms of his hands and sighs. “To kill a Communist, this is not a nice thought. This is not a thought I would like to be known by others.” He looks up suddenly and peers into Josip’s eyes. Drago’s face is an uncomplicated one, an open one.

  “So, you see . . . ” he whispers, then turns his gaze toward Goli Otok.

  Josip nods, “Yes, I see.”

  22

  The boat is Morski Lav, the Sea Lion. Despite her name, she is a little vessel about ten meters long, open topped, with a token pilot’s cabin up front and an inboard diesel engine rumbling and blowing black smoke out the stern. It is the kind of vessel used by countless small-scale fishermen along the coast. Though old and battered, the hull has been brightened by a recent coat of white paint trimmed with royal blue.

  Drago does not own a boat; this is his older brother’s—a wealthy man, it seems, with a boat and a flock. The craft’s draft is too deep to beach her, and she must sit offshore a stone’s throw. Drago rows his skiff out to meet her, with Josip seated on floor boards that are soon swooshing water and smelling strongly of rotted fish. Banging the skiff alongside the larger craft, both men scramble on board, welcomed by a gray-haired version of Drago. The brothers embrace, and introductions are made. Josip, this is my brother. Brother, this is Josip.

  “It’s better you don’t know our family name”, adds Drago.

  The captain of Morski Lav asks no questions, though Josip presumes that the man must either know, or has guessed, the truth of the situation. Even so, Drago runs through the prearranged script, telling his brother that this is the sailor who fell into the sea, and now he must be returned to his home port, which is Split.

  “A long way from Split you were blown by the bura”, says the brother, with an arch smile. “And against the wind, too! But that’s the bura for you, full of surprises it is. Well, let’s get going.”

  The skiff is hauled onto the back deck, then upended and secured to the gunwales with its line. The sky is clear and sunny, with a light wind swooping down from the mountains. The anchor is pulled up. In the cabin, the captain throttles the engine and then makes it roar.

  Marija and Jelena stand on the beach and wave their hands as the Sea Lion gets under way, the boat rocking slightly when the waves hit her broadside, then accelerates and diminishes into the horizon.

  For three days, they slowly proceed southward, encountering no difficulties along the way. Early on, they leave the inland “kanal” at the southern tip of the island of Rab and turn west into the channel between it and the northern tip of Pag. From there they enter rougher and deeper waters, then veer south again, keeping Pag on their port side. They stop only once to refill the fuel tanks, at a quay in Zadar. Here, Josip hides beneath the cabin floorboards. Here too, he learns that Drago’s brother is fully aware of his situation.

  A policeman, strolling along the quay and reading the names on the sterns, stops to chat with Drago and his brother. What jolly, simple-minded men they suddenly become, how without guile or grave interest to others they are! They offer the policeman a cigarette of home-grown tobacco, which he casually accepts. Then they offer him a sip of slivovica, but he declines, being on duty. He asks why they are so far from Rijeka in such a small boat.

  The captain replies with humorous indignation that the Sea Lion is no ordinary dinghy but a mighty seafarer that has weathered more storms than the policeman has years! Then the captain explains that in Split, so he has heard, there are stronger nets to be purchased, and at good prices. He holds up an old net full of rot and gaping holes. Then the captain—true to Drago’s description—launches a lengthy monologue about the strengths and weaknesses of various kinds of nets, and seems unstoppable. The policeman tips his cap in mid-sentence and saunters away.

  Her tanks now filled, the Sea Lion growls and moves on. She passes two great islands on the starboard side before Drago brings Josip up from his hiding hole. The brothers pour water into his dry mouth and give him bread soaked in olive oil, adding strips of smoked fish.

  Hour after hour, seated with his back to the gunwales, Josip ponders their faces. He is immensely grateful to them, but he fears for them, too,
wondering if their generosity will bring them to ruin. Such men are the heart of Croatia. Even so, when they take rosaries from their pockets and pray aloud together, he cannot bring himself to join them. Though Josip admits to himself that an unexplainable dimension has intervened in his life, the mystery that man calls divine may be no more than . . . a mathematical tropism, a cosmic force. In any event, he cannot pray to it.

  Now bitterness is mingled with gratitude—a strange feeling, pulling him inward. He buries his head between his knees as the brothers pray, folds his arms on his knees, closing his eyes.

  Ariadne, Ariadne, soon I will find you. Soon it may become possible to think again about God. Until then . . .

  At night, he sleeps wrapped in a blanket on the pilothouse floor. It seems that the captain sleeps little or not at all, though he naps a few times, letting Drago take the wheel—in the manner of elder brothers bestowing tentative trust. This occurs only when they have left the last island behind and have gone farther west into open sea, in order to sweep around the mountains of the headland above Splitski kanal. Rocking, rocking in the arms of the boat, Josip slides into half-consciousness.

  O Jadransko—

  Sighing, sore at heart, grateful and bitter, fearful and happy, knowing Ariadne is closer and closer, and their child, their beloved, this little soul—soon he will see the baby’s hidden face, and soon he will fall into good dreams again, in his lover’s arms.

  The cosmos is a sea, his tired mind murmurs to itself, we are diatoms, we are living glass—do not break us—do not break us—

  “We are here”, says Drago, shaking Josip’s shoulder. “Wake up.”

  Morski Lav is rocking gently beside a quay inside the harbor. The morning is warm, the light splendid. Across the bay, Diocletian’s palace rises above swaying palm trees. Cars and buses rumble along the waterfront. Above his left shoulder, Josip sees the little mountain of the Marjan park, and to the right above the steeple of the cathedral are the treetops of the Manus district. She will be there with her mother in the family home. Then he recalls vaguely that Vera has fled and Simon is in prison. Maybe Ariadne was released from prison and has returned to their apartment. Yes, he will make his way slowly and unobtrusively through the maze of the palace compound, and climb the steps to the balconata. He will open the door without knocking, and there she will be standing, fresh from a bath, a towel wrapped about her, a sweet baby crawling across the floor toward him. He will step forward to embrace them both at once, he will swell with his love as wide and as deep as the sea, and they will swim in each other’s love—all three—in the waters of bliss. They will close the door and lie down in peace, and they will speak to each other with their eyes and their hands forever.