The Imaginary Lives of Mechanical Men

by Randy F. Nelson

  Some of the sand spills to either side like a huge furrow being cut into the face of the earth, but most of it simply disappears under the broadening shadow of the hull, now rising impossibly high above us. A shallow depression forms for thirty yards on both sides of the prow, which the tide and the ship’s own bilges immediately fill. It is as though a giant has suddenly stepped away from the shore and nature now rushes to seal the vacuum. Long after the propeller loses its purchase, the Sendai Maru continues her course inland, her plates groaning under an earthly weight that they were never designed to bear and revealing a crusty underside that no one is meant to see.

  I have heard that, from time to time, a man will break away from the crowd and rush down the shore as one of these ships emerges from the water under full power and is no longer controllable by the hand of any pilot. Whether from an excess of bravado or out of a desire to commit suicide, it is impossible to say. He stares out to sea as if indifferent to the danger or hypnotized by the prospect of something better and far away. Then, when the ship makes that final sideways lurch, he is either spared by blind chance or else simply annihilated, ground into the sand by abrasions above and below. In either case, he is rarely seen again.

  I know of course that the Sendai Maru has never been animated by anything other than her engines, but in the sudden silence I am struck by the paradox that something has indeed just died. For a moment no one moves. It’s like the awkward hush at graveside after the last prayer and the benediction. And I know that in the morning’s low tide tiny creatures will swarm over this ship and begin to dismantle the body. But for one shared moment we keep quiet, each one of us with his private thoughts. Even I, counting what has been lost.

  It is one of the sad and fundamental principles of maritime law that a ship out of water is no longer a ship, but a heap of metal. Like a marriage out of love.

  Sammy steers me toward another ship farther down the beach.

  We reach Robert N’mburo’s wreck by walking over a plank pathway thrown across deep ruts in the sand and then after a few moments by wading to a rough scaffolding. Sammy takes off his sandals and throws them on the beach. I roll my trousers and tie my shoes to the briefcase because I remember reading that most deaths in the shipbreaking industry actually occur from tetanus and bacterial infections that began in simple cuts. I will return to my shoes as soon as I reach deck and then will watch my step thereafter. From that one thought arises a mild concern that grows, as we ascend the scaffolding, into a unreasoning fear that literally no one in the world knows where I am. I could slip and fall into the sea at any moment; I could be electrocuted by any one of the land lines snaking from arc lamps on deck down into the water and across the beach to a sputtering generator; or I could step onto a metal gangway that collapses like a fire escape tearing loose from rotting bricks and mortar. No one would know, because I’ve lied to Narissa and put myself into the hands of a child named Sammy. I could die like one of the workers. And for the first time I realize that I could be replaced just as easily.

  I go over the railing and onto the deck with slow and careful movements, clutching the briefcase as if it were an infant.

  Below us a man climbs the anchor chain with no more effort than someone climbing a flight of stairs. He disappears into the hawsehole, and after a moment comes the crackle of an acetylene torch and the haunting glow of blue-white light, as if he had been a ghost opening the door of another world. Already the ship has been relieved of her wood, glass, plastic, rubber, porcelain, canvas, hemp, copper, brass, and silver. What is left is a world of iron and a world of iron sounds. We have to shout now to hear each other because most of the “cutting” at this stage is done with sledgehammers. Acetylene torches are rare and precious in this part of the world, and they are dangerous, slicing into pockets of every vaporized chemical that can be hauled by ship and not infrequently exploding. This ship, like most, is simply being beaten apart and hauled away by hand, a process that takes up to a year for the supertankers that are the prized treasure-ships of men like Robert N’mburo, and the principal killers of his men. As we stand on the half-deck and peer into the canyon beneath us, it is like looking into a village that had been bombed from the air.

  We step through a maze of cables and descend the first stair to a point perhaps twelve feet below the scuppers, a place that’s shadowed by the uppermost hull plates and where we pause to adjust our eyes like men stepping into a darkened theater. In this dim twilight we have to be careful to step over buckets of bolts, coiled electrical wires, and one-inch steel plates stacked like rusty playing cards. Below us are more landings and more metal stairs, all taking odd turns and occasionally hanging like catwalks where former walls have been stripped away. The infrequent shafts of light coming from portholes resemble spotlights focused on the backstage machinery of an experimental drama, and I feel like an actor descending to some unseen production by M. C. Escher. The hammering, which should have echoed like gunshots, becomes no more than a faint tinkling, perhaps muffled by the insane geometry of the demolition or perhaps simply swallowed by the immensity of the ship. It is like walking into a skyscraper that someone has left lying on its side. I go with one hand on a railing and one, where possible, flat against the inner hull. Down and down, past cabins and storage holds, at each level getting a glimpse of the antmen at work, some banging with sledges, some hauling out miles of intestines, some carrying away iron slabs like leaf-cutters deep in the Amazon.

  At last we reach a narrow passage leading through two iron hatches to the orlop, a half-deck just above the bilges where waste spills into the open ocean twenty feet below. The entire stern of our ship has already been cut away, and the unguarded view of the outer harbor, in less dangerous circumstances, might have looked like early evening from one of the antiseptic balconies of a cruise ship. There are the murmuring breakers below us, the quaint commercial vessels at a distance, and a reddening sun that must be setting Brazil ablaze. High above the artificial horizon is our evening star, a sparkling hole in the hull where a torch has just cut through. The sparks fall for thirty feet and then skid down the inner hull like marbles of molten glass.

  Someone behind us says, “It looks like an amphitheater, doesn’t it?”

  The unexpected accent startles me more than actual violence would have done, and the man’s demeanor seems almost as alien as my own. Taller than Sammy, and far more substantial in body, he resembles in my imagination a professional athlete or an American diplomat who has dressed in the local costume for an afternoon of celebrity touring.

  “Whenever I look up from this point,” he continues, “I always think of one of those paintings of nineteenth-century surgeries, you know, the ones with the medical students peering down into the pit, the one light playing off the surgeon in his bloody apron and cravat—and of course the very pale lady on the table.” He chuckles at some private amusement and extends a hand.

  “Charles Allemand,” I say. “You must be Mr. N’mburo.”

  “Yeah. For about a year now. Before that I was a white guy like you.” The man I had come four thousand miles to meet waits to see if I will laugh. He studies me with an intensity that would have been considered rude, even insulting, in most African cultures. “You look a little wet,” he says. “Why don’t you chuck that overboard,” he nods at my briefcase, “and let’s sit and talk for a while. I’ve got a feeling you’re going to miss your flight.”

  His words are both casual and sinister, like those of a soldier who’s grown indifferent to death and to high-sounding causes. When he comes closer, I see that fate has in fact touched him. There is a bandage hanging loose at one palm like a boxer’s hand wrapping. A gray scar over his left eye. And as he walks it becomes apparent that he favors one leg and that he is gradually being bent under whatever weight he has chosen to bear. Still, there’s nothing wounded about his voice, and he speaks like a man who expects his words to have an effect. He lowers himself to his haunches and rests his elbows on his knees the way I had
seen the Bassa people doing in pictures.

  I say to him, “Maybe you’ll forgive me for suggesting that you’re not exactly what I expected.”

  “No shit?”

  “You’re American?”

  “Used to be. Used to be a lot more than that.”

  “I see.”

  “I doubt that, chief. I doubt you have any idea what you’re seeing.”

  “Look, Mr. N’mburo, or Mr….”

  “Rosello. Can you believe that? Somewhere along the line my family must have been owned by the only slaveholders in Brooklyn. You think that might have been it? Now, I myself find the name Robert Rosello far stranger than anything I’m about to tell you.”

  “I appreciate that. But I want you to understand that I’m not here to do anything other than …”

  “I know why you’re here. I even have an idea of how much you’re getting paid to cradle your little briefcase. I could tell old Sammy there, but he wouldn’t believe that there’s that much money in the world. This is a strange place, Chuck. A very strange place indeed. I want you to think about that. Then toss your goodies out into the surf there. And then listen carefully.”

  “I’m afraid I can’t do that.”

  “Let me ask you something. Have things been going well for you since you got here?”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Me, I had a headache for weeks. Sinus, diarrhea, heat exhaustion. It takes a while to adapt, let me tell you. Then, after you adapt, it’s a pretty good sign that you’re going to end up like everybody else around here. Seen anything yet that makes you want to stay?”

  “If I could just get you to sign these papers …”

  “Chuck, listen to me. I’m the guy they sent out here before you.”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t …”

  “Listen to what I’m saying. I want you to toss the papers. Tell them nobody’s signing anything. Tell them the breaking yard is staying open.”

  “For God’s sake why? This place is a disaster. It’s killing every man who works here and the environment too.”

  “You’re right. And, besides that, you own it—or at least your clients own it. And they can shut it down, make a few bucks by selling off the scrap, and win the corporate clean-up award all in one afternoon. Is that still the plan?”

  “It doesn’t make any difference whether you sign or not. If you’re the guy they sent out here before me, then you already know that.”

  “It can delay things, and that’s all we want.”

  “It won’t make any difference in the end.”

  “Nothing makes any difference in the end, Chuck. It’s the middle that counts. And, whatever else happens, it’s better than starving to death. Right? Every man out there understands that, except here’s what he understands that you don’t understand. When he starves, his family starves, and not just his immediate family either. Ever watch anybody starve to death? It’s like cancer without the tumors. But for every man who dies in the breaking yard there are ten trying to take his place. Why? Because where they come from it’s worse.”

  “You’re preaching.”

  “Damn right I am.”

  “You’re preaching to the wrong person.”

  “No, I’m preaching to the right person. You’re a scumbag, Charles. I want you to do what scumbags always do.”

  “Which is?”

  “Look out for yourself. Switch sides. I want you to drop a monkey wrench into the corporate makeover. I want you to lose your luggage. Whatever would cause a delay, that’s what I want you to do.”

  “Wouldn’t that be a slight conflict of interest?”

  “Not if you came over to our side.”

  “Simple as that, eh?”

  “Simple as that.”

  “And what I would gain for myself out of all this would be precisely what?”

  “If we can get a long enough delay, we can form a corporation under Liberian law, a genuine co-op where the workers would own principal interest. Then we could begin modernizing, cleaning up, and paying a guy like you.”

  “Sorry.”

  “It could work.”

  “Maybe in the Land of Oz. Not here. You’ve got real problems out there, Robert. And I’ve got a plane to catch. So maybe next time. We’ll do the whole world peace thing together. Nice meeting you. But don’t get up; I can show myself out.”

  “That’s what we thought you’d say.”

  I feel a sudden chill. A door bangs shut. And it occurs to me once again that no one knows where I am. I look up from the pit of his amphitheater and see faces looking back. My head aches, and I understand that if I sit down with this man I will be negotiating for my life.

  I stand very still, looking at Robert N’mburo for a long time, trying to imagine him organizing documents at a conference table. I try to imagine him in the finest suits and sitting in leather chairs. Summoning his morning coffee with the push of a button, like me. It is a leap my mind cannot make. Robert is too scarred and warped, too taken by the life he’s chosen, and probably, I realize, quite simply insane from the suffering he has seen. So I take a slow breath and consider my options. I do not sit. I do not make sudden motions. I do not look down at the churning sea.

  I negotiate.

  We begin with little things, the warp and woof of life among the lowly. I promise him oranges, dates, and cheese. Soy milk and wheat. Torches and winches and trucks. Within minutes we are outside of all reality, my own words sounding as hollow as those of any politician. Only the gathering darkness suggests that there can be any end to this babbling, to my judicious monotone. And although the man across from me seems mesmerized, I do not doubt the truth—that he’s following these words the way a cobra follows the flute.

  I promise him medicine, tools, and fuel. Then books and building materials. Fresh water. Maybe a school. Whatever, in a word, might sound reasonable to a man who has lost his reason. But it is not enough. His darkened face grows darker, and I see the sadness that precedes some violent act. When he starts to stand, I know we’ve reached the end. I’ve tried and found no argument-stopping words. Now it’s the shuffling mob or the foam beneath the stern.

  And one last chance. Robert looks at my briefcase, raises his eyebrows in silent question, and seems unsurprised that I find the courage to shake my head. But it’s all I’ve got. We both know the gesture won’t help. And he starts to walk away.

  From some deep well I hear a voice, quite clearly, proclaim, “Give me Sammy then.”

  It stops him and turns his head.

  And suddenly I’m saying, “There’s a midnight plane to Marrakech. Passports if you have the dollars. And if I can get him into France …”

  He looks at Sammy and then looks at me, the muscles knotting at his jaw.

  “I can do it. You know I can.”

  “Not just to France. All the way to America?” He’s bargaining again. I can hear the hope in his voice and something else, a hint of something else in my own.

  “All the way.”

  “You swear?”

  “On the life of my son.”

  “And until he’s grown?”

  “Yes.”

  “You swear this?”

  “Robert—listen to me. I can save him. You know I can.”

  River Story

  FOR SUSAN

  Behavioral and personality changes are often the first signs of CNS involvement. Later more florid psychological changes may occur, with hallucinations or delusions. Reversion of sleep rhythm is characteristic, with drowsiness during the day, a feature from which the disease derives its name. Other nervous symptoms include tremor, most characteristically of the face and lips, and hyperesthesia, causing some patients to avoid common practices such as closing or locking doors. Without treatment, the patient’s level of consciousness progressively deteriorates.

  —Quinn, African Trypanosomiasis

  I have the sleeping sickness. I believe that Brawley has it too, so I watch him very carefully.

  I w
atch him focus on the flies, reaching rather than swatting with the hand that holds his cigarette. Half a swarm buzzes up through the smoke, settling on the lip of his glass, strutting like soldiers on parade, and he begins to quarrel without even looking in my direction. “Okay, here’s the problem,” he tells me. “World’s got no lost cities anymore, right? Blokes like you and me? This is it. I mean what I’m sayin’, Jocko. This—right here—is it. That’s the problem.” And pecks at the table with blunt fingers, scattering ashes without disturbing the insect world around him. “Jesus Christ, I’m sweatin’. What time is it?”

  “Eight o’clock.”

  “I’m sweatin’ like the dengue ’n it ain’t even eight o’clock yet. And lookit that fog. Out there on the river an’ all. You know wha’ that means? Means today’s gonna be stinking bloody hell and a half, that’s what.” While we watch the barge drift closer, waiting for the inevitable collision and the sharp, satisfying sounds of disaster.

  I let the flies drink from the back of my hand. They are not tsetse flies; they’re handsome iridescent creatures, quick, alert, top-of-the-line flies, as green and glowing as peacock feathers. The tsetse is drab and slow, a gray-brown unattractive fly that drinks from below the skin. It owns this part of Africa. That’s what I’ve learned.

  Brawley tries to smoke himself into consciousness, studying the grain of the tabletop, listening suspiciously to beggars and fruit vendors below us. Their bellow and cry. After a while he shifts his squint to a European couple besieged at one end of the market—something about them that he doesn’t like. “You know they got French tourists in Machu Picchu? You know that? Amer’can teenagers all over Kathmandu and no place to get lost at. You hear what I’m sayin’? I seen whole Jap families up there at Abu Simbel crawling across the feet of Ramses the bloody Second, that’s what. Flittin’ and crawling about. It’s like Edgar Rice Burroughs is dead in this part of the world, how you like that for a report on your life?”