by Philip Roy
“You saved us, Los. Thank you.”
He shrugged. “It was nothing.”
“Yes, it was. It was the bravest thing I ever saw.”
He smiled and showed his teeth. “We’re even. You saved me; I saved you.”
“Yah, but I didn’t risk my life to save you.”
“But you would have, Alfred. I know it. Anyway, you wanted to see elephants. Now you have seen elephants.” He grinned.
“Yup. I have.”
I would have liked to believe that Los was right—that I would have risked my life to save him, too. But it seemed to me, you only know what you will do when the time comes. I had believed that Los would have been the first one out of the trenches to fight the enemy. He had just proved to me that I was right. He may have been impulsive and reckless, but he was the most courageous person I had ever met.
Chapter Eighteen
WE ARRIVED IN LADYSMITH early in the evening. The sun was already falling on the Drakensberg Mountains. A soft, buttery light covered the trees, houses, and churches of the town. It was a pretty old town in a river valley. The river was dry, but was known to flood. There were mountains in the west and south, and hills in the east and north. The town sat in between them, and it was so pretty you would have thought it was a movie set.
Los pulled up in front of a small, plain white house with a steel roof and porch. The house was narrow in the front, but extended out in the back. There was a wooden picket fence all around, a backyard with trees, and a small barn. When he shut the motor off, the silence slowly began to replace the ringing in my head. Los stood up and stretched. I did the same. Hollie jumped out, trotted over to a tree, peed, and came back with a look of expectation on his face. I reached in and picked up the tool bag. Little Laura stared at me through the mesh. I stared back. I think she wanted out. “Just a tiny bit longer, Little Laura.” I hung the bag over my shoulder and followed Los to the house. Seaweed dropped out of the sky and landed beside Hollie. “Hey, Seaweed. Nice to see you.” He hopped onto the motorbike, spied the pizza box, and went looking for crusts.
Los rapped lightly on the screen door with his knuckles, and spoke with a much softer voice than I had heard him use before. “Katharina. It is Los. I have brought a friend.”
There were sounds inside, and a shadow appeared behind the screen. As my eyes adjusted, the shadow grew into a dark-haired lady with bright shiny eyes and shiny teeth. She swung open the door with a great big smile, opened her arms wide, and wrapped them tightly around Los.
“My . . . dear . . . boy.” It was a long hug. She didn’t look at me until she let go. “And who is this?” She said this as if I had come from another world. I supposed I had.
“I’m Alfred. And this is Hollie.” I pulled the tool bag out with my arm. “And this is Little Laura.” I glanced over at Seaweed, but he had disappeared inside the sidecar. He didn’t care for introductions.
Katharina smiled at Hollie and Little Laura, then took my hand and squeezed it. I was surprised how strong she was. She gripped my hand tightly the way a labouring man would. Then she gave me a short hug, and it was as if someone had sat on me. “Come in!” she said, and disappeared inside the house. We followed her in.
Katharina was a special person. It was just as Los had said. She reminded me a lot of Sheba. Sheba lived on her own island, one of the tiniest islands in Bonavista Bay, Newfoundland. She lived in a house full of animals, birds, reptiles, and butterflies, and kept a hydroponic garden. I met her on my first voyage at sea, when I moored in her cove, thinking it was empty, and she discovered me, and thought I was a creature from the deep. Ever since then, she treated me like a son. Then she met Ziegfried, and it was love at first sight. Now they were married.
Sheba loved everyone, and everything, and was full of wisdom, dreams, and the ability to see into the future. Katharina was like that too, except that she didn’t have animals of her own. All of the world was her family, she said. That’s what Sheba would say, too. I didn’t believe there could be another person in the world like Sheba, until I met Katharina. You would have thought they were sisters, even though they couldn’t possibly have looked more different.
Sheba was tall and lean, with long, flowing red hair, and thousands of tiny, wave-like curls. She had bright green eyes, and when she fixed them on you, they had a power over you, warm and loving, but a power all the same.
Katharina was shorter and stockier—about my height. She also had long hair, but it was thick and black, and she braided it into tight, shiny coils that hung down straight, and held strings of colourful beads. Like Sheba, Katharina wore lots of jewellery, but it was thicker and heavier than Sheba’s. Her limbs were smooth and muscular, like a gymnast, or a boxer. She always went barefoot. And her feet, like her grip, were tough. One thing that Katharina said really struck me. She told me she had been a witch in a former life. That wouldn’t have startled me so much if Sheba hadn’t said exactly the same thing. And that made me wonder if maybe they really had been sisters, somehow, in another life, if things really worked that way. I didn’t know if they did.
Katharina’s house was clean, tidy and bare. She didn’t have much stuff. There was a wooden table in the kitchen, a few chairs, and in the living room there were cushions on the floor, but no sofa or bureaus or bookshelves. There were books, but they were piled neatly on the floor. There was music playing, but it sounded ancient. In another room, there was an exercise mat, weights, a pull-up bar on the wall, and a massage table. I wondered what she did for work.
“I’m an occupational therapist,” she said, as if she had been reading my mind, which was probably true. “I’m also a yoga instructor, a personal trainer, and a dance instructor. I wear lots of hats. Mostly, I help people get better after an injury on the job.” She looked at me. “Do you know this music?”
“I think maybe I heard it at another friend’s house. You remind me of her.”
“Do I? You must tell me about her. This is Hildegard von Bingen. She was a twelfth-century mystic and composer. Listen to how fresh her music is. You would think it had been written this morning.”
“It sounds pretty old to me.” I smiled.
“The instruments are old. The music is young. It’s eternal.”
“Cool.”
Katharina grinned widely. She had nice teeth. “Yes, it is.”
We had a great supper. Katharina cooked rice with vegetables, nuts, and tofu, and served pita bread, salsa, hummus, and tabouli. Los and I cut up the vegetables. It was not the kind of meal that Hollie got excited about. But there was fresh fruit, and Little Laura was very happy about that. She rode around the house on Hollie’s back, which made Katharina bend over and laugh out loud. While we ate supper, we talked.
“So. Los. Where is your plane?” Katharina’s voice was a little tough, too, but you could feel the warmth behind it.
Los raised his eyebrows but continued staring at his plate. I could tell he didn’t really want to answer. “It sank to the bottom of the sea, but we raised it. Now, it is hidden on the ground, between some trees. I will borrow a truck and retrieve it. But it is in Mozambique.”
Katharina was stunned. “No! You flew all the way to the sea? That is very far.”
“I tried to turn around, but the air currents pushed me into the water. That’s when I met Alfred. He was there in his submarine.”
Katharina’s mouth dropped open and she turned towards me. “You were in a submarine?”
“Yes.”
She looked at both of us. “How can this be? One of you is in an airplane, the other is in a submarine, and you meet?”
We both took a bite, and nodded.
“If Alfred had not been there, I would have drowned.”
Katharina stared at me with a serious face. “You saved his life?”
“Yes. But today Los saved my life by chasing away an elephant.”
“I didn’t chase it away. It ran away.”
“He ran in front of it, and led it away. That saved u
s.”
Katharina waved her hands in the air above her head as if she were dancing. “Hallelujah! You two were meant to meet. It is obvious you share a destiny.”
Los made a serious face. “I would like to build a submarine, Katharina. Like Alfred has. That is why I have asked him to come here, to help me get started.”
Katharina turned to me again and stared intensely, as if she were reading my face for clues. I wondered what she was thinking. “And do you think my Los can build a submarine like yours?”
“Umm . . . maybe. I’m not sure. It’s a lot of work. It will take at least a couple of years. I just agreed to come and help look around for a suitable tank. I can’t stay long.”
“Where is your submarine now?”
“At Richards Bay. Under the water.”
“Alfred is being followed by pirates,” said Los.
Katharina continued to stare at me. I was starting to feel like a bug under a microscope. “Why are pirates chasing you?”
“I sank their boat, with drugs and guns on it. And I stole their money.”
Katharina stood up, carried one dish over to the counter, and brought another one back. She was thinking hard, but maybe didn’t want to share it. She turned to Los. “Could you make a submarine here?”
“If you would let me.”
“Los. I would let you build a temple to Zarathustra here, if that’s what you wanted to do.”
“Thank you, my dear friend.”
“You are welcome. What is troubling you?”
“I left my best tools in Soweto.”
Katharina’s face changed. She looked stiff now, and worried. “But you have many tools here.”
“Yes, but the ones I need the most are in Soweto.”
“But . . . you cannot go to Soweto, Los. You know that.”
“I can go when the national football comes. Do you know when the next time will be?”
Katharina hesitated. She knew, but she didn’t want to say. She answered so softly, we almost couldn’t hear her. “Next week.”
“Next week? That’s great!”
“Is it?” She questioned him with her eyes. “Los?”
“Don’t worry so much, Katharina. I will be careful.”
Katharina didn’t smile. She wasn’t reassured at all.
“I will be careful. I promise you.”
Her eyes fell onto the floor. She looked lost in thought, as if she were remembering something difficult. I had the feeling she wanted to say more, but wouldn’t. She wouldn’t interfere with his decisions. She wanted to, but respected him too much. I could tell it was difficult for her. Sheba would have been tougher with me. She would have fixed me with her stare, looked into my future, and tried to convince me to reconsider.
Maybe Katharina wanted to do that with Los. But he was older. And he was very stubborn. Besides, it was his decision to make. It was his life. And he had promised to be careful. Maybe that was enough. Maybe it wasn’t so dangerous, after all.
After supper, Los showed me the barn. It was thirty feet long and fifteen feet high—just big enough for building a sub, if the sub were the same size as mine. But Ladysmith was a long way from the sea. You’d have to haul the sub on the road in the middle of the night, the way Ziegfried and I did, and launch early in the morning, to avoid getting a lot of unwanted attention. And you’d need a big truck and a special trailer. It was so much work. I didn’t think Los knew what he was getting himself into. How could he? Still, I had to try to help. I would feel lousy if I didn’t. And who knew anyway, maybe he could do it? After all, how many people could build their own plane, and fly it?
Chapter Nineteen
WE SLEPT IN THE BARN. There was a wooden landing on one side where we put sleeping bags down and made ourselves comfortable. Hollie and Little Laura huddled together at the foot of my bag. Seaweed slept close by. I was tired, but these days, it seemed harder and harder for me to sleep on a surface that wasn’t moving. And it didn’t help that Los’ snores echoed inside the barn like the wind inside a barrel, but it wasn’t as nice as that. In the middle of night, I got up to pee. Hollie raised his head, but I shook mine, so he dropped his and stayed where he was.
I went into the backyard and stood between the trees. It was a clear night. I stared up at the stars. This was Africa. The night sky spread out its stars differently here. The constellations were different, though I couldn’t say exactly how. It made the sky look as foreign as the land, and the land was definitely foreign to me. I didn’t know how to describe it except to say that it looked older than time, like the tortoise we had lifted off the road. It was dry, dusty, and tough.
Yet it was oddly full of humour, like the colours and shapes of its animals. And there was anger here, too, unless I had just been at the wrong place at the wrong time. I didn’t think so. I remembered the elephant and the hippos. And I remembered the dead pirate. I remembered what he looked like, alive and dead, and the sound of his voice, and the stink of him. He had been filled with anger. And it finally brought him down, like a waterlogged boat. Sometimes, back home, a fisherman would leave his boat in the water too long. Then, one day, it would just sink. I remembered the sound of the scuffling that was his murder. I think I would always remember it. It was the sound of anger and hatred. It was hard to imagine it happening anywhere else. But I supposed it did. Of course it did. Then I remembered the coldness of his heart for locking Little Laura inside the sinking boat. That made me shudder for a moment, as warm as the night was. And then I heard a sound.
Katharina was in the backyard. She was down at the bottom of the fence, near the back of the barn. I didn’t think she had seen me. She was looking up at the stars, too. On my way back to the barn, she saw me. She smiled warmly and came over. “You are not sleeping?”
“I just woke up. I’ll go back to sleep.”
She nodded. I bet she didn’t say a lot of the things she was thinking. “You like Africa?”
“Yes. It’s . . . different, that’s for sure.”
“How is it different?”
“I don’t know; it’s sort of serious and funny at the same time. I think I am just not used to it yet.”
“I think you have already learned something very true about Africa.”
“Maybe. I don’t know.”
“Let me ask you something.”
“Okay.”
“How is it you can ride your submarine all over the world like this, with dangers everywhere, and yet here you stand, fit, healthy, and ready to wake up to the next day full of life?”
Her question really surprised me. I didn’t know how to answer it. I would have to think about it. “I don’t know.”
“I think I can tell you how.”
“How?”
“You have an angel watching over you. I feel it.”
“Really?”
“Yes. There is an energy around you. You have many adventures, but you always survive them, yes?”
“So far.”
She reached out her hand for mine, so I gave it to her. This time, she didn’t squeeze it; she held it gently. She turned it over, opened it, and pulled the palm of her hand slowly over the palm of mine. “You will live for a long time, Alfred. You will look out for many people. Many animals, too.” She raised her eyes and stared at me through her dark braids and beads. Her eyes were warm, but I saw pain in them, too. “Will you look out for him?”
“Who? Los?”
“Yes. He is my peaceful warrior.”
Peaceful warrior? That sounded like a contradiction to me. “What is a peaceful warrior?”
“Someone who is here to wage war against suffering and injustice and apathy.”
“Like Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu?”
“Yes, like them. And like you. You are also a peaceful warrior, Alfred.”
“I don’t know about that.”
“You are. I see it. But he . . .” She tossed her head towards the barn. “He has already suffered more than you could ever know. It is a testa
ment to the greatness of his spirit that he is still here, building, creating, dreaming, sharing. He has so much inside of him, so much love to share with all the world, if only he can escape his own demons.”
“His demons?”
She stared deeply into my eyes, and I knew that she wasn’t going to tell me any more than that.
“Does he not have an angel, too?”
Katharina smiled widely, and her teeth showed in the dark. “He does.” She looked serious again. “But his path is not as clear as yours. He shouldn’t go to Soweto. It is too dangerous for him. But I cannot stop him. I know it. Sometimes, when we interfere with the journey of the ones we love, we cause them even more suffering without knowing it.”
“Oh.”
“Will you go with him?”
“To Soweto?” That sounded dangerous to me.
“I know you cannot protect him from every evil. But the angel that watches over you will watch over him also. Will you go with him?”
“I, uhh . . . I guess so. I have my crew, though.”
“I will keep them safe for you.”
I took a deep breath. “Is it as Los said it is—that everyone leaves Soweto when the national football comes?”
“Mostly everyone. He is right; it is the only time for him to go.”
“Maybe I could go with him then.”
Katharina nodded in the darkness as if we had just made a pact. Then, she took my hand again and pointed up into the sky. “There. Do you see those four stars?”
“Yes.”
“That is the Southern Cross. You cannot see it in the northern hemisphere. Only here.” She gripped my shoulder with her powerful hand, reached over, and planted a kiss on my cheek. “You will always be welcome in my home, Alfred.” Then she returned to the house without a sound.
In the morning, we went out to explore the industrial yards around Ladysmith. Hollie and Little Laura stayed behind with Katharina, who was working at home. She said she had a client coming in, but that it would do her client a world of good to see a small parrot running around the house on the back of a small dog—a different kind of therapy.