by Derek Hansen
Stupidly I thought I could race them home but they were a lot bigger, older and stronger than me and weren’t handicapped by having half a dozen gurnard tied to the handlebars of their bikes or a fishing rod tied to their crossbars. I figured they’d try to cut me off, force me to stop and give me a couple of thumps on my arm and a knee or two in the thighs. I was going full pelt when Collitt cruised up alongside me and without warning planted his foot into my thigh. My bike buckled under me before I even had time to think. I threw my arms out in front to break my fall but I was wasting my time. I hit the road harder than a ton of bricks dropped from a tenstorey building.
Collitt and his gang didn’t hang around to see the damage they’d done. I guess they didn’t need to. I lay sprawled in the gutter too stunned to move, too winded to breathe and too hurt to cry. I expected someone to come and help me up but no one did. I heard cars pass by, some even slowed down, but no one stopped. I couldn’t understand it. My bike lay on its side behind me, rear wheel spinning. It was obvious I’d had an accident but no one came to my aid and I desperately needed someone to come and tell me I was all right. My head felt funny, really weird, not just hurt but heavy and sort of fuzzy inside. It didn’t feel right at all and there was a whistling sound in my ears I’d never heard before. I began to feel really scared. My wrists hurt so much I thought they were both broken. My knees were bleeding and stinging like someone had doused them in kerosene and set them on fire. Blood trickled down my face and from my mouth but nothing worried me as much as my head. It felt really strange, worryingly strange.
Since no one had come to help I dragged myself up and sat on the kerb gasping for breath. Across the road a man was talking to a woman. The man pointed at me so I guessed they were talking about me. It took my fuzzy head a moment or two to work out that the man was Mr Gillespie. I almost smiled with relief. Mr Gillespie had carried me home when my puppy was run over. I expected him to carry me home now. I let my head sag onto my chest. In truth there was nothing I could do to prevent it. It was so heavy. It felt like someone was lining the inside of my skull with lead sheet, hammering it on with nails. I closed my eyes to shut out the pain and stop the tears that threatened to flow. Any second I expected to hear Mr Gillespie’s voice and feel his hand on my shoulder. I waited. And waited. I forced my eyes open and my head up to see where he was but he’d disappeared. I saw the woman he’d been talking to walk into her house and close the front door behind her. Where was Mr Gillespie? I turned my head to look down the road even though the movement sent pain spearing down my neck and spine. But that was nothing compared to the pain of watching Mr Gillespie walk away from me, as though I was nothing more than a used bus ticket.
A trolley bus went past filled with people coming home from work. All I saw were blank faces staring at me from windows. I thought someone might ask the driver to stop but if anyone did the request was ignored. I tried to get to my feet but pain and giddiness stopped me. I wanted to knock on someone’s door and get help just like we always did when any of us got hurt. I tried to stand once more but that simple action was beyond the realm of possibility. It slowly dawned on me that maybe I was wasting my time even trying. Maybe I could no longer knock on anyone’s door and expect help. Owen, one of my classmates and a member of my team at club, lived just three doors away but he was one of the kids who weren’t allowed to talk to me. I couldn’t imagine his parents being overjoyed at finding me on their doorstep. Judith lived around the corner in Rose Road, close but nowhere near close enough. Another car slowed down but failed to stop. It occurred to me I was being left there to die.
I passed out. It was just like falling asleep and I didn’t realise I’d fainted until I awoke to find Captain Biggs, Sister Kathleen and Sister Glorious kneeling over me. Sister Glorious was crying and Captain Biggs was shouting. I’d never heard him so angry. I was dimly aware of other people standing around who I suppose were the target of his anger. As usual Sister Kathleen was the practical one. She cradled my head in her arm and wiped the blood off my face and told me I’d be all right.
‘My head hurts,’ I said. ‘It feels funny.’
Sister Kathleen’s lips tightened and she forgot to tell me I’d be all right.
‘Are you OK?’ Nigel was crouching down alongside me. Where had he come from? He seemed to just pop there out of the blue. He looked as scared as I felt and panted as though he’d run the whole way up from the shop. ‘Hold on,’ he said, ‘Mum’s coming.’
Hold on? I wasn’t going anywhere. I wanted to tell him this but words wouldn’t come any more. A whirlpool began spinning inside my head, dragging me down into darkness.
Mum arrived just before the ambulance although I was unaware of either event at the time. I awoke briefly in the ambulance taking me to Auckland Hospital, just long enough to realise what was happening and panic. If I was in an ambulance it meant I was really hurt, and whatever was wrong with my head was serious. Fortunately Mum was kneeling alongside me holding my swollen hand.
‘Am I going to die?’ I asked.
‘Don’t be silly,’ she said. ‘You know I won’t let you.’ My mum’s fierce love at its best. She sounded cross with me for even suggesting it.
Christian Berger stood on top of the hill at Achilles Point, gazing northeast towards Great Barrier Island, but islands whose names he had yet to learn blocked his view. However, his disappointment was tempered by the sight of a distant landmass, a towering, dark green peninsula further to the east. He’d seen it years earlier through his periscope on his ill-fated mission, and knew it lay just south of Great Barrier Island, guarding the southern approach to the Hauraki Gulf. Though it wasn’t what he’d hoped to see, it was a fair second prize. More mountainous than Great Barrier Island, the Coromandel Peninsula had the same wild ruggedness that had attracted him and later distracted him as the war had dragged on. As he gazed at its raw beauty his infatuation with his new country grew. Reluctantly he dragged his eyes away and began his walk back towards the city. He paused to admire an ancient pohutukawa, bristling with scarlet flowers, spectacularly beautiful and unlike any tree he’d ever known. As his attention turned back to the harbour he noticed more yachts had ventured out onto the turquoise water. He wished his former comrades, especially Walter and Friedrich, were standing alongside him and seeing what he could see.
When he reached the beachfront at St Heliers he was surprised to discover there were no cafés, no bars and no places to sit down and have lunch. He found a shop called a ‘dairy’ that offered milkshakes and soft drinks but nothing even remotely approaching real coffee. Further on he found a fish and chip shop like the ones he’d encountered in Wales, which sold deep-fried fish and chips wrapped in newspaper. He paid a shilling for a piece of snapper and some chips, and sat and ate them on a wooden bench by the beach, washing down the salt and fat with a Lemon and Paeroa, a soft drink the shopkeeper had recommended but which had the most mystifying taste. The beach was almost deserted, virtually his for the moment. A millionaire’s view spread in front of him and fifty seagulls waited at his feet. But what pleased him most was the fact that again he’d escaped recognition. This fact encouraged him to believe that acceptance was inevitable and would probably come sooner rather than later. Auckland and its harbour glowed in the summer sunlight. It was inconceivable that hatred could fester and flourish in such a benign setting.
He spent the rest of the afternoon wandering along the waterfront, stopping for lemonade at Kohimarama and a cup of coffee made from Bushell’s Coffee & Chicory Essence at Mission Bay in the only café he found. No one recognised him or was anything other than courteous. By the time he caught a bus to take him back to the city his earlier optimism seemed totally vindicated and Captain Biggs’s dire warnings overly cautious. Instead of catching the Richmond Road bus, which would take him to the corner shop just down from the Church Army, he decided to catch a bus that would let him off at Karangahape Road. According to his map, if he got off near the intersection with Ponsonby Road he�
�d be left with just a twenty-minute walk back to the Church Army. The idea of walking the last stretch appealed to him. He wanted to finish the day as pleasantly as he’d spent it.
The shops that lined Karangahape Road were closing as he stepped off the bus. By his reckoning Ponsonby Road was no more than two hundred metres away. Men spilled out from a pub onto the pavement in front of him, glasses of beer in hand, talking, laughing. Christian smiled to himself. He’d come eighteen thousand kilometres from the other side of the world but some things never changed. He could’ve been walking down any street in the Hamburg docks, although he was a bit surprised to discover the drinking began so early. The scene was more typical of ten o’clock at night in Hamburg. He was tempted to have a beer himself but realised he was already running the risk of being late for dinner. He moved towards the edge of the pavement to avoid bumping into the drinkers.
‘Hey you!’
Christian turned at the shout, a simple reaction, not considering for an instant that the shout was directed towards him. The moment he saw the yellow knit shirt, the abrasions and the flushed face of the man who’d got onto the trolley bus two stops after him, he knew he was in trouble.
‘It’s him! That fuckin’ U-boat bastard. That fuckin’ Kraut!’
Christian kept walking, trying to maintain dignity while putting as much distance between himself and his accuser as possible.
‘Come back, ya lily-livered coward, it’s time someone taught ya a lesson.’
Christian heard a glass break behind him and someone swear. He didn’t look back. He’d learned in Hamburg that looking back could be interpreted as intimidation. He’d also learned that violent intentions often diluted to verbal abuse with distance. He kept walking. Other pedestrians, people returning from work, stared at him and stepped aside as though he was infected with something unspeakable. Christian didn’t mind the stares. Stares were harmless.
‘Hey Burt! Stop him!’
Christian hadn’t a clue who Burt was but soon found out. A giant of a man stepped in front of him, stopping him in his tracks.
‘My pal wants a word with you.’
Christian tried to step around him but the man grabbed his arm. His breath reeked of beer and his slurred speech suggested he’d spent the whole afternoon going from one pub to another.
‘Weren’t you fuckin’ listenin’, pal?’
Christian quickly considered his options. The man was huge but his beer paunch suggested a lack of condition. Nevertheless the man was obviously strong and the strength of the grip on his arm was clear evidence of that. Christian didn’t want a fight but being dragged back to the pub or held while yellow shirt and his mates used him as a punching bag wasn’t an option.
‘Let go of me,’ he said.
‘Get stuffed. You’re goin’ nowhere, pal.’
Christian dropped the map he was carrying, leaned back and threw a punch with his free right arm. His fist thudded into the man’s jaw. It was a punch that should’ve decided the issue but, even though the man reeled backwards, his grip on Christian’s left arm never weakened. The roar of outrage that came from the pub sent a chill down Christian’s spine. He realised he had no choice but to hit the man again, to force him to let go. He threw a wild, round-arm swing that connected sickeningly with the side of the man’s head. Christian’s knuckles split open with the force of the blow. But the hand holding his arm still held firm.
‘You finished?’ said the man. A grin spread across his face as though he was enjoying himself and Christian’s best punches no more than an irritation. ‘You’re goin’ ta pay for that, pal.’ He jerked Christian towards him and at the same time slammed his knee into his groin. ‘Welcome to New Zealand.’
The sudden explosion of pain stunned Christian, doubled him over and left him gasping for air. Worse, it left him defenceless. The first punch broke his nose, the second split his eyebrow, the third burrowed so deeply into his stomach he thought it might snap his spine. He dropped like a felled tree. Boots thudded into the side of his head, his legs, his arms, his back and his buttocks as the pub mob joined in. He curled up as best he could to protect his groin and his stomach and tried to cover his head with arms. His efforts were in vain. A boot penetrated his defences and knocked him senseless.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Captain Berger didn’t expect the destroyer—if it was still there—to make any move until they were well above the one-fifty metre mark. He wondered if Walter Harmann’s counterpart was awake to them and aware of his tactics. The first indication would be sonar pings. The destroyer’s captain held all the cards. He could depth-charge them or let them surface and sink them with gunfire. Or capture them. He wondered what he would do in the destroyer captain’s place. Capture the U-boat or sink it? Given that the U-boat had just torpedoed the freighter he might want retribution. Indeed, the anger among the destroyer’s crew might demand it. They’d seen the freighter go down, seen the men in the water, watched them drown, watched them die.
One-fifty, one-thirty, one-twenty.
Walter Harmann’s hand shook as he swept the sea around them. One-ten and no asdic.
Ninety, eighty, seventy.
At thirty metres Captain Berger adjusted the craft’s buoyancy and began levelling off. As gently as possible he ascended to periscope depth. He began his sweep. The seas had risen with foam cresting the waves. Under normal circumstances, they were ideal conditions to conceal a periscope’s wake. He scanned forty-five degrees, ninety, one-eighty, three-sixty. Conceivably a wave over the scope could’ve concealed a destroyer at the critical instant but in his gut Captain Berger knew there was nothing above them but empty sea. He lowered the periscope.
‘Surface.’
AN EXTRACT FROM ‘DEATH OF A U-BOAT’
Dad raced up to the hospital as soon as heard the news from Rod. He had to show the dragon on the front desk his driver’s licence before she’d let him up to the ward because she refused to believe he was my father. Apparently he got pretty irate. Mum and Dad stayed with me even after it was clear my skull wasn’t fractured and I was only concussed. There was some concern over my wrists but they turned out to be just badly sprained. Let me tell you, I looked a sight. My head, both hands, both wrists and both knees were swathed in bandages. My hands looked like Easter eggs and my knees like coconuts at a coconut-shy. My eyes were red and swollen as though they’d been stung by a swarm of bees, but that was from crying. Every time someone shone a torch in my eyes I thought they’d find conclusive evidence I was dying. Even if I wasn’t dying, I was certain the X-ray machine was going to kill me. In our games, we used X-rays to blow enemy spaceships apart, something we learned from Eagle comics. I had visions of my head turning into a tomato omelette and splattering against the wall. But the worst part was the way the doctors whispered to my parents. I was certain they were telling them there was nothing they could do except hold my hand and watch me fade away. Everything they did seemed contrived to scare the living daylights out of me. A nurse gave me some tablets to calm me down and put me to sleep. I fought the pills. People died in their sleep and I didn’t want to join them.
‘What about my bike?’ I asked as the fog began to roll in.
Mum told me Nigel had ridden it home.
‘What about my gurnard?’ It’s nice to know that despite the thump on my head my sense of priorities never wavered.
Dad told me Rod had filleted them. They were going to have them for dinner when they got home. They were delighted I’d caught so many. I tried to feel proud but I was too busy feeling scared. Mum and Dad were getting ready to leave when Captain Biggs pushed through the curtains surrounding my bed. The grim look on his face made me think I was in trouble, that the dragon downstairs had spilled the beans. He took Mum and Dad aside and whispered to them. That had to be more bad news. Nothing penetrates fog quite like panic. I thought maybe Nigel had been run over or Rod had set the house on fire cooking the fish and cooked himself instead. Dire visions piled one on top of the ot
her. Honestly, my head hurt enough without having more things to worry about. Mum blanched and her lips pulled back to a single thin red line. Dad shook his head and got the concerned look on his face that always came when his books didn’t balance. They both glanced at me and immediately wished they hadn’t.
‘What’s wrong?’ I asked. My voice sounded miles away.
‘Nothing,’ said Mum. She would’ve given the same answer if she’d just learned the Russians had invaded New Zealand or dropped an atom bomb on London. It absolutely convinced me something bad had happened. Tears welled up in my eyes. Again. Mum spotted them as all mums are supposed to and rushed over.
‘What’s the matter?’ she asked.
That was going to be my line. My befogged brain tried to think of another. ‘What did Captain Biggs say?’
‘Nothing to do with you.’
‘Then who?’
‘Just go to sleep. I’ll tell you in the morning.’
‘Tell me now.’
‘If I tell you now, you’ll forget by morning.’
Mum was right. Whatever had happened was best kept till morning. I could no longer keep my eyes open. The clouds were rolling in, dense and unstoppable. A delicious paralysis crept through my body, beginning at my toes and working its way up until my brain turned to blancmange. Mum smiled and I tried to smile back with relief. I figured she wouldn’t smile if something had happened to Rod or Nigel. She leaned over and gave me a kiss, which switched off the lights and made everyone and everything disappear.
Morning came after at least half a dozen false dawns. All through the night nurses kept waking me to shine a torch in my eyes. A neurologist came to see me straight after breakfast and made me do childish things like touch the tip of my nose with the tiny bit of index finger that poked out from the end of the bandages, and asked me a lot of stupid questions: what was my name, where did I live, what school did I go to, who was my teacher, and threw in a bit of mental arithmetic any eight-year-old could do. It was embarrassing. I was in a public ward with nine other patients, most of whom were watching the performance. The neurologist gave me a big smile and told me I was fine. I returned his smile and mentally told him he was an idiot.