The Whale Caller

by Zakes Mda

  The Whale Caller changes the tune and Sharisha stops the aerial displays. She moves gently in a circle, the top of her fourteen-metre-long body gleaming in its blackness. The rest of the body below is greyish. Her skin is smooth. She breathes out white vapour from her double blowhole on top of her head and it rises up to five metres high, in a perfect V shape. Then she lies parallel to the water, and performs the tail-slapping dance that is part of the mating ritual. She lobtails repeatedly, making loud smacking sounds that leave the Whale Caller breathing more and more heavily. He blows the horn and screams as if in agony. He is drenched in sweat as his horn ejaculates sounds that rise from deep staccatos to high-pitched wails. Sharisha emits a very deep hollow sound. A prolonged, pained bellow. Then she uses her flippers to steer herself away from the Whale Caller. Breathlessly he watches her wave her flippers as she sails away.

  The Whale Caller feels invigorated as he walks back from the peninsula. Even the sight of Saluni, standing near the green bench as if waiting for him, does not rile him. He smiles at her, for he is in a charitable mood today. But she seems to be in a foul mood. For the first time he feels the need to talk to her. But he does not know what to say, or how to begin. He just stands there grinning foolishly She becomes suspicious of his motives. After all, he has never given her the time of day You don’t all of a sudden become friendly towards a village drunk unless you have some mischief up your sleeve.

  “Don’t mess with me now,” she warns him. “I won’t stand any nonsense from anyone today. A foolish woman deprived me of fame yesterday. I am pissed off!”

  “See how beautiful they are! The whales, I mean. Just see!” says the Whale Caller, oblivious of her anger.

  “A stupid superstitious woman.”

  “You see that one over there? The one sailing away? That one is Sharisha.”

  “You have given them names?”

  “Only Sharisha.”

  Saluni looks at him questioningly, as if she doubts his sanity. Then she walks away, shaking her head pityingly. He is left only with the sweet mouldy smell that urges him to follow her. But he does not. Instead he decides to visit Mr. Yodd, to express his joy and give his thanks. And perhaps to gloat a little. As he walks down to the grotto the grey doves with black wings and the white seagulls with grey wings, all sporting matching red feet, share his excitement by hovering over him, and defecating on his head.

  Hoy, Mr. Yodd! Today you are talking to a fulfilled man. She is back. Sharisha has returned. She has braved man-created dangers to be with me. She has risked ships’ propellers that slice curious whales at this time of the year. She has defied fishing gear entanglements and explosives from oil exploration activity to be here, Mr. Yodd. To be with yours truly. She has returned, Mr. Yodd, she has returned!

  TWO

  The day is grey from an unseasonable summer downpour, and the Whale Caller is relentless in his search for Saluni. He has been at it for days now, sniffing like a dog, hoping to catch her sweet and mouldy odour. The damp soil and the rotting kelp fill the air with smells of their own, making it impossible for him to scent her. He has returned to his old haunts, where Saluni used to materialise from nowhere with the sole aim of annoying him, but she is not there. He has walked the length of Walker Bay, which cradles Hermanus from Danger Point in the east to Mudge Point in the west. He has looked in the lagoons where tourists and adventurous locals carelessly joust with death in throwing themselves from high cliffs into the sea. In the lagoons that don’t have high enough cliffs from which to dive, he has endured the deafening noise from the machines of motorised water sports enthusiasts. He has strolled on the soft white sands of Grotto Beach, the longest and largest of the beaches of Hermanus, stretching all the way eastwards to the mouth of the Klein River. He has visited other beaches as well: the Voelklip with its terraced lawns; the secluded Langbaai, popular with lovers and naturists; the Kammabaai, a haven for surfers; the Onrus, also loved by surfers and body-boarders… the Plankhuis… the Hawston… the string of beaches with white sands. He has even taken his search to the Hoy’s Koppie of his youth, the conical hill with caves, where he used to blow the kelp horn, sending the devout to feats of ballroom dancing on the rocky terrain and to bouts of speaking in tongues. Saluni is nowhere to be found.

  He has not confided in Mr. Yodd because he knows that he will laugh at him and ridicule him. His search is mortifying enough without inviting further mortification from Mr. Yodd. He would not know how to answer if Mr. Yodd were to ask why he is looking for Saluni. Most likely Mr. Yodd does not even remember who Saluni is. Even as he trudges all over town and its environs he is not aware what power compels him to search for her with such desperation. Only that when she did not materialise for many days he became unsettled. He felt that something was missing in his life—the same kind of emptiness he felt when Sharisha had not returned from the southern seas. Yet Sharisha’s spectacular breaching still graces the waters of Hermanns. Every morning he still stands on the highest boulder of his peninsula and blows his kelp horn that inspires astounding aerial displays. How can he feel a void when he has Sharisha all to himself? The sweet and mouldy smell!

  He begins to blame himself. Perhaps if he had paid some attention to Saluni, if he had not ignored her so, she would not have vanished. He knows nothing about her, where she lives, what she does when she is not stalking him. He does not know where to look for her, save to wait at his own haunts, and at all sorts of touristy places, hoping she will show up. It doesn’t occur to him to search in the taverns of Hermanus. That’s where anyone else would have begun the search. Saluni is famous as a village drunk.

  If the Whale Caller had paid a visit to the taverns and pubs of Hermanus—those that are patronised by fisher folk, labourers and layabouts rather than the bars at luxury hotels—he would have known that her disappearance has nothing to do with him. He would have heard the story, told in toothless and frothy mirth, of how Saluni had developed a rash all over her body, as if she had rolled in poison ivy. The rash, however, had not been caused by poison ivy, but by a hairy millipede that the Bored Twins found outside their bedroom window and secretly placed in her bra one morning after she had spent a night of storytelling and celestial singing and snoring with them. In the morning she dressed hurriedly without noticing the millipede snuggling in her B-cup.

  As soon as she walked out of the mansion the millipede began to take a walk in her bosom. She jumped up and down screaming. As she spun in the air and landed on the ground with great force the millipede crawled to what it deemed to be safer parts of her body, and tried to take sanctuary in any nook or cranny that it could find. She danced about in blind panic, ripping off her perpetual coat. The twins were standing just outside the kitchen door, laughing their angelic laughter and clapping their sweet little hands as she stripped her blouse, and then her skirt, all the while screaming and cursing the girls with their mother’s genitalia for laughing at her. The millipede was wiggling all over her body since even the nooks and crannies were opening and closing quite violently in her frenzied dance. Soon the petticoat was off, and then the bra. She was waving these garments about, shaking them, hoping that whatever creature was hiding in them would drop off. The shaking became frantic until she collapsed on the ground, foaming at the mouth.

  Only then did the Bored Twins realise the serious consequence of their game. They tried to revive Saluni by pouring water on her face, all the while crying, “Sorry, auntie… sorry, auntie.” They were struck with terror when they saw a red rash erupting all over her naked body, right before their eyes. It seemed to be flaming where the millipede had walked, leaving a trail of hair that stuck out of her skin like red villi on a fruit. Her girlish breasts had the most hair and it looked almost like bristle.

  After a minute or so she regained consciousness. The girls were relieved to see that she was not dead. They were all over her, confessing their crime, and accusing each other of initiating the prank. She gathered her clothes and put them on, without uttering a wor
d to the Bored Twins, who kept on crying, “Sorry, auntie… sorry, auntie!” They were jumping all around her, hoping to hear her say that she had forgiven them. But she walked away without giving them a second look. She went back to town and back to the taverns. As she sat in a favourite watering hole, drinking wine and relating how the Bored Twins almost killed her in spite of her being a love child, her body was itching all over. She was obviously ill, and the habitués, despite the fact that they had found the story quite funny at first, became concerned. “Whose children are these who play such cruel games on the love child?” they asked. She found herself defending them: “I am sure they didn’t mean any harm. They were playing. They wouldn’t want to harm me on purpose. They are angels.”

  On this grey afternoon the Whale Caller’s relentlessness weakens. He makes a determined effort to forget about Saluni for a while and pay more attention to Sharisha. He will resume the search some other day, for he cannot give her up altogether. At the very least he wants to know what became of her. For now he needs something that will raise his spirits… that will make him soar from the depths of depression in which he has been wallowing lately. And only Sharisha can do that. He goes back to the Wendy house to fetch Sharisha’s special horn.

  He does not need to go to his peninsula because there are no spectators today. They have run away from the rain that is threatening to fall again. They don’t know how to deal with a wet summer, for this is a region of winter rains. He stands on one of the crags at Walker Bay and blows his horn. The whales are taking advantage of the privacy, and a group of them have assembled a hundred metres from where he stands. He performs a small jig, for he will have fun today without gawking eyes. Not only will he enjoy Sharisha’s joyful splashes, he will have a whole spectacle of magical performances by the rest of the whales. Already they are performing without any prompting from him.

  He blows his horn, punctuating each splash with a siren-like wail, but suddenly stops when he notices something odd. Usually the southern rights that are seen close inshore are females, sometimes with calves. But the whales today are distinctly males, about five of them. He has learnt to spot the elusive difference. While some are engaged in the most exhibitionist breaching, others are circling around a spyhopping whale. They are lobtailing, repeatedly slapping the surface of the water with their tails. The Whale Caller blows Sharisha’s song when he sees the callosities on the head that is sticking out of the water—the snout of the spyhopping whale has a perfect bonnet of pure white callosities. It is, of course, Sharisha, and the males are competing for her attentions. Each one is displaying its best moves in an attempt to seduce her.

  The Whale Caller is suddenly seized by a fit of jealousy. He yells at the males, calling them names and shooing them away from his Sharisha. He shouts: “Rapists! You are nothing but a gang of rapists!” But they do not pay any attention to him. They make a concerted effort to reach Sharisha. The Whale Caller blows his horn once again, and this time it surely catches Sharisha’s attention. She thrusts her whole body out of the water in a graceful leap, and splashes down a short distance away from the horny males. He blows once more, hoping for another breaching leap that will take her away from them once and for all. But she seems to be teasing them. She seems to want them to come and have her. The Whale Caller feels betrayed. But he does not give up. He will yet get them away from her. His confidence in her increases when he realises that Sharisha is not really inviting them for any hanky-panky but is tricking them into taking one direction while she takes an evasive action in another direction. The Whale Caller cannot help laughing and applauding and shouting: “That’s my Sharisha!”

  But he has become gleeful too soon. A persistent male is in hot pursuit while others seem to give up hope. She flees into shallow waters, hoping that the male will give up the chase. But the male is eager to have her even at the risk of stranding himself. She rolls onto her back, and the male reaches her. She submits. They lie belly to belly and copulate. The Whale Caller tries to save Sharisha from this rape by blowing his horn and creating havoc in a discordant tune. The other males are not deterred by the discord; they charge towards the mating couple. The mating is brief and each of the males has her, then sails away. By the time the fourth male is lying belly to belly with her the Whale Caller has given up in exasperation. In no time the feast is over and Sharisha sails away; only her flukes can be seen above the water… sailing further and further away from him.

  “They have done it! They have ravaged Sharisha!” mutters the Whale Caller as he walks back to his Wendy house.

  He thinks about it at night, this ravaging of Sharisha. Perhaps it is a good thing for her. Unlike humans, whales don’t indulge in such acts for recreation but for procreation. Sharisha will have a calf next time she returns from the southern seas. And he is blessed for he was there at its conception. He was a participant with his horn. He feels like a father already.

  Then a scary thought strikes him. What if Sharisha is about to go back to the southern seas? What if what he witnessed yesterday afternoon was a final romp, a farewell orgy? Southern rights mate in winter Like the rains, this friskiness in the middle of summer is unseasonable. Perhaps it is heralding her return to the southern seas, though others will be here for another month or two. Sharisha may be on her way to the southern seas already. He jumps out of bed, has a quick wash in a plastic basin, dons the black tie, grabs his horn and runs to the crag. It is dawn and he can hear the songs of the whales. Humpbacks, he concludes. The songs are structured and high-pitched. It can only be the songs of the humpbacks. They are communicating with other humpbacks that may be on breeding grounds hundreds of miles away, for their sound carries well under water. Southern rights sing their songs in a much lower frequency.

  The Whale Caller is pleasantly surprised to see Sharisha close inshore, singing her big heart out. Once again she has learnt to sing like a humpback, a skill she had once acquired but unlearnt in the southern seas. How she does it remains a mystery, for only humpbacks are able to produce the pulsed clicks that Sharisha is producing now. There is a look of fulfilment about her.

  The Whale Caller joins in the music with his kelp horn and together they sing until the sun rises. Sharisha has indeed managed to make him forget Saluni.

  Saluni. She refuses to be forgotten. She is discovered sitting in front of the Hermanns Roll of Honour, above the Old Harbour with the brittle boats. She is guarded by two big grey guns on both sides of the stone column. Cannons of a bygone era. Both plaques of the roll of honour—nailed onto the column and freshly polished by enthusiastic war veterans for the Kalfiefees—reflect a tired yellow light that forms a halo above her head. The sun has returned today. The first panel, older and duller, has eleven names, citizens of Hermanus who died in World War One (1914-1918), and another list of twenty-eight names of those who “gave their lives for freedom” in World War Two (1939-1945). The brighter panel has only four names, citizens of Hermanus who were killed in some war that is not mentioned. It is described only as the Republic of South Africa Roll of Honour 0973-1979)- They dare not even whisper the name of the war, for they died on the border defending apartheid.

  She looks as if she is part of the monument, surrounded by the spiky silver-coloured chain that enhances the monument’s militariness. She sits on the ground, her head now buried between her knees. No more halo. She is exhausted from carousing with sailors till the early hours of the morning. She is a battle-scarred soldier nursing old wounds. The tourists who are congregated like New Age worshippers behind the monument ignore her. They are more interested in getting their turn at the orange telescope that is next to the marble altar with pictures of today’s deities—a humpback and a southern right—and the sacred inscription: Whale-Viewing Site—Indawo Yoku bukela Iminenga.

  Saluni. She is merged with the monument and is in a world of dreams when the Whale Caller, on his way to Mr. Yodd, discovers her. At first he mistakes her for a mangy dog licking its wounds. But when he gets closer he sees the
familiar red hair and red stilettos. And black fishnet stockings this time.

  “Why did you disappear?” he demands, without ceremony.

  She is startled only a little, and looks up at him. Her hang-overed eyes betray amusement even though she pretends to be annoyed. She snarls at him: “Can’t a lady take a nap without being rudely awoken by some… handsome… gentleman?”

  The Whale Caller insists: “Why did you disappear?”

  “From where?” she asks.

  “From everywhere. You just vanished. People don’t just vanish like that.”

  “Be a sport, will you? Get me something to drink.”

  “I have been looking for you everywhere,” he says in anguish.

  “Okay, now you found me.”

  Just like that. As if it was the most natural thing for him to look for her! As if she had been waiting there to be found by him! As if they have been looking for and finding each other all their lives!

  “So please get me a drink of water,” she says. “My throat is on fire.”

  “I’ll do better than water. I’ll get you something else to extinguish that fire.”

  He buys her a vanilla and caramel cone from an ice cream vendor. She snatches it as if it is something he has always owed her. Not even a “thank you.” She licks it with exaggerated delicacy