Canal Dreams

by Iain Banks

  Canal Dreams

  Iain Banks

  Hisako Onoda, world famous cellist, refuses to fly. And so she travels through the Panama Canal as a passenger on a tanker bound for Europe. But Panama is a country whose politics are as volatile as the local freedom fighters. When Hisako's ship is captured, it is not long before the atmosphere is as flammable as an oxy-acetylene torch, and the tension as sharp as the spike on her cello…

  'Apocalyptic is the first word that springs to mind to describe this violent and powerful novel in which Banks once again demonstrates his extraordinary dark powers of imagination… impressive' The Times

  'Brilliantly crafted' Scotsman

  'Currents of dark wit swirl through Banks' writing, enriching its buoyancy… and, like Graham Greene, he can readily open the reader's senses to the «foreignness» of places' Scotland on Sunday

  'Extraordinary, brilliant, bloody' Fay Weldon

  Canal Dreams by Iain Banks

  DEMURRAGE

  demurrage n. Rate or amount payable to shipowner by charterer for failure to load or discharge ship within time allowed; similar charge on railway trucks or goods; such detention, delay. [f. OF demo(u)rage (demorer, as DEMUR see — AGE)]

  1: Fantasia del Mer

  tic tic tic tic… Tiny noises of compression, sounding through her skull.

  She'd been alarmed, the first time she'd heard them, over the noise of her breathing and the tinny wheezes of the scuba gear which sat on her back, wrapping its plastic limbs round her and jamming rubber and metal into her mouth. Now she just listened to the ticking noises, imagining they were the signature of some erratic internal metronome; the unsteady beats of a tiny, bony heart.

  The noises were her skull's reaction to the increasing weight of water above her as she dived, descending from the unsteady mirror of the surface, through the warm waters of the lake, to the muddy floor and the stumps of the long-dead trees.

  She had held a skull once, and seen the minute fissures marking its surface; tiny hairline cracks stretching from side to side and end to end, jagged valleys on an ivory planet. They were called sutures. Plates of bone grew and met while the baby was still in the womb. The bones jammed together and locked, but left one area free so that the infant's head could pass through its mother's pelvis, producing the spot on a baby's head which remained soft and vulnerable until the bones had clasped there too, and the brain was safe, locked in behind its wall.

  When she'd first heard the noises in her head, she'd thought it was caused by those bone-plates in her skull pressing harder in against each other, and the noise travelling through those bones to her ears… but then Philippe had disillusioned her; it was the sinuses which produced the faint, irregular clicking sounds.

  It came again, like some slow abacus. tic tic tic…

  She pinched her nose and blew, equalising the pressure on either side of her eardrums.

  Deeper; she followed Philippe down, keeping his slowly stroking flippers a couple of metres in front of her, conscious of her rhythm matching his, her legs moving through the water in time to Philippe's. His white legs looked like stocky, strangely graceful worms; she laughed into the mouthpiece. The mask pressed harder into her face as they continued down. tic tic…

  Philippe began to level out. She could see the lake floor clearly now; a crumpled, grey landscape fading slowly away into the gloom. The old tree stumps poked up through the mud, flat eruptions of drowned life. Philippe looked round briefly at her, and she waved, then levelled out too, to follow him along the water-buried surface of the land, over the sliced trunks and the slow bursts of mud produced by his flippers. tic.

  The pressures equalised, the column of water above her and the fluids and gases of her body achieving a temporary equilibrium. The warm water moved against her skin in silky folds, and her hair ruffled behind her in the slipstream of her body, stroking the nape of her neck.

  Settled into the pace of swimming, balanced and lulled, flying slowly over the slow settlement of a near-century, following the just-tangible turbulence of the man's wake, she let her mind wander.

  She felt — as she always did, down here — untied from the commonality of breath that was the air above. Here, however briefly, she was free. It was a freedom with its own many and precise rules — of times and depths, atmospheres and experience, maintained equipment and weights of air and it was a freedom purchased through surrender to the technology that was strapped to her back (clicking and hissing and burbling) but it was freedom. The air in the mouthpiece tasted of it.

  Under the waves, with the skull adjusted. Headlong through the warm waters, like an easy and continual birth. Swimming like flying; the one buoyant image of her fear she could accept.

  This had been rainforest; the trees had grown in the wind and the sunlight, and trawled the air for clouds and mist. Now they were gone, long turned to planks and rafters and ribs and seats. Perhaps some of the great trees were pulped, and became paper; perhaps some were turned into sleepers for the railways that helped the canal be built; perhaps some formed the buildings in the Zone, and perhaps some became small ships; boats that had plied the lakes. Sunk, their waterlogged timbers would nestle in these shaded depths, rejoined. Maybe some became musical instruments; a cello, even! She laughed to herself again.

  She listened for more tics, but heard none.

  She followed the man. In a few strokes and kicks, she knew, she could pass and out-distance him. She was stronger than he knew, perhaps she was even stronger than he was… but he was younger; he was a man, and proud. So she let him lead.

  In a few minutes, hypnotically over the drowned forest, they came to what had once been a road. Philippe stopped briefly, treading water over the muddied track, raising clouds of soft grime beneath him while he studied the plastic-wrapped map. She drifted nearby, watching his bubbles wobble their way to the surface. His breath.

  He put the map back under his T-shirt, nodded down the road and set off. She kept pace. She knew the gesture he'd just made, and knew the sort of grunt that accompanied it; she imagined she'd heard it translated through the water. She followed him, thinking dreamily of whale songs.

  Before they found the village, they heard the noise of an engine. She heard it first, and hardly thought about it, though some part of her was trying to analyse the noise, put a name and a key to it. She realised it was engine noise just as Philippe stopped in front of her, looking around and up, and holding his breath. He gestured to his ears, looking at her; she nodded. They stared up.

  The shadow of the boat's hull went past, not overhead but a few tens of metres to their right; a long dark shape dragging a twisted thread of bubbles after it. The noise of its passing grew, peaked, then fell away. She looked at Philippe once the boat had passed, and he shrugged; he pointed down the road again. She hesitated, then nodded.

  She followed Philippe, but the mood was different now. Something in her wanted to go back to the Gemini. The inflatable they'd set out from was moored a hundred metres away, in roughly the direction the boat had been heading. She had wondered if the noise of the boat would alter after they'd passed, telling her it had slowed and stopped at the Gemini after all, it might look as though it had been abandoned — but the boat seemed to have continued on beyond that, heading for the middle of the lake and the ships anchored there.

  She wanted to go back, to return to the Gemini and then to the ships; to find out what that boat was doing, and who was on it.

  She didn't know why she felt so nervous, so suddenly full of a low, nagging dread. But the feeling was there. The war might be coming to touch them at last.

  The drowned road dipped, and they followed it. tic tic she heard, diving deeper. tic tic, as they swam towards the ruins.

  When Hisako Onoda was six her
mother took her to a concert in Sapporo; the NHK Orchestra playing works by Haydn and Handel. Hisako Onoda was a restless, occasionally recalcitrant child and her weary mother suspected she'd have to remove the squirming, wriggling, and quietly but insistently complaining child before the end of the first piece, but she didn't. Hisako Onoda sat still, looked straight ahead at the stage, didn't rustle her bag of taka rabukoro, and — instead, incredibly — listened.

  When the concert was over she didn't clap with everybody else, but started eating the deep-fried tofu in the bag instead. Meanwhile her mother stood up with everybody else, clapping brightly and happily with small, fast movements of her hands, blinking furiously and gesturing to Hisako to stand and applaud too. The child did not stand, but sat looking around at the politely enthusiastic adults towering everywhere about her with an expression somewhere between mystification and annoyance. When the applause faded at last, Hisako Onoda pointed to the stage and told her mother, 'I would like one, please.

  Her mother thought — for one confused moment — that her seemingly gifted but undeniably troublesome and disobedient daughter wanted a Western symphony orchestra of her own. It was some time before she was able, through patient questioning, to discover that what the child wanted was a cello.

  The drowned village was wrapped in weeds and mud, like tendrils of some solid, cloying mist. The roofs had all collapsed, caved in on their timbers, tiles lying scattered and ruffled-looking under the wrapping of grey mud. She thought the houses looked small and pathetic. Floating over a broken street, she was reminded of a row of rotten teeth.

  The church was the largest building. Its roof seemed to have been removed; there was no wreckage inside the shell. Philippe swam down into it, and trod water above the flat stone table that had been the altar, raising lazy clouds of dust about him like slow smoke. She swam through a narrow window and rubbed one of the walls, wondering if there were any paintings under the film of mud. The wall was dull white, though, unmarked.

  She watched Philippe investigate the niches in the wall behind the altar, and tried to imagine the church full of people. The sunlight must have shone on its roof and through the windows, and the people in their Sunday best must have trooped in here, and sung, and listened to the priest, and filed out again, and the place must have been cool in the summer heat, and white and clean. But it was difficult to imagine. The thickness of the underwater light, the monotonous ubiquity of the grey mud, the enfolding quietness of the place, somehow denied the past that had brought the village and the church into existence; it was as though it had always been like this, was always meant to be like this, and the chatter and light of the village — when only the wind had flowed down these streets and around these walls — had been a dream; a brief, breezy, immature little life, before the burying permanence of the water extinguished it.

  The noise of an engine drilled through her thoughts. The sound was far away, just audible, and soon faded. She imagined the faint grumble echoing off the muddy walls of the drowned church's shell, the only vestige of music left to the place.

  Philippe swam over to her and gestured at his watch; they both struck up for the surface, flippers waving down at the wrecked church beneath them, as though saying goodbye.

  The Gemini bounced across Gatún Lake beneath a bright overcast sky, heading for the moored ships. She sat in the bows, slowly drying her hair, watching the three vessels coming closer.

  'Perhaps it was the National Guard. She turned round to look at Philippe. 'But it sounded bigger than a Gemini.

  'Perhaps. Philippe nodded slowly. 'But it did not come from the direction of Gatún. Frijoles, perhaps.

  'The Fantasia? She smiled back at him, watching his brown tanned face, looking at the small lines around his eyes which made him look older than he was.

  A frown crossed the man's face. 'I think it is not to come until tomorrow. He shrugged.

  She smiled again. 'We'll know soon, when we get to the ships.

  He nodded, but the frown resurfaced briefly. He was gazing past her, watching their course. There were old logs floating in the lake, almost waterlogged, that could turn a Gemini over or break its outboard prop. Hisako Onoda studied the man's face for a while, and found herself thinking she ought to write again to her mother; perhaps that evening. Maybe she would mention Philippe this time, but maybe not. She felt a little warmth rise to her face, and then felt foolish.

  I am forty-four years old, she told herself, and still feel embarrassed to tell my mother I have a lover. Dear Mother, Here I am in Panama in the middle of the war. I dive, we have parties, we see artillery battles and missile streaks, and planes scream over us sometimes. Food good, weather warm mostly. Love, Hisako. PS. I have a boyfriend.

  A French boyfriend. A married French boyfriend who was younger than she was. Ah well.

  She looked at her fingertips, crinkled from the water as though after a long bath. Maybe I should have flown, she thought, rubbing at the corrugated flesh.

  'Hisako, Hisako, it's only a few hours!

  'To Europe?

  Mr Moriya looked exasperated. He waved his pudgy fingers around. 'Not much more. What am I? An airport information place? He heaved himself out of his chair and went over to the window, where a repairman was kneeling, fixing the office air-conditioning unit. Moriya wiped his brow with a white handkerchief, and stood watching the young engineer as he stripped the faulty unit and laid the pieces on a white sheet spread over the fawn carpet.

  Hisako folded her hands on her lap and said nothing.

  'It will mean weeks at sea.

  'Yes, she said. She used the word Hai , which was almost like saying, 'Yes, sir!

  Mr Moriya shook his head, stuffed the sweaty handkerchief away in the breast pocket of his short-sleeved jacket. 'Your cello! He looked suddenly pleased with himself.

  'Yes?

  'Won't it… warp, or something? All that sea air; the salt.

  'Moriya-san, I did not mean to go… "steerage".

  'What?

  'I think the ship will have ventilation; air-conditioning.

  'Air-conditioning breaks down! Mr Moriya said victoriously, pointing at the dismantled unit spread out on the white sheet like some dead machine being prepared for interment. The young engineer glanced up for a moment.

  Hisako looked dutifully at the defunct unit. She could see the glittering towers of downtown Tokyo through the gap under the window where the unit normally sat. She shrugged.

  'Don't they? Mr Moriya was talking to the engineer now. He had to repeat his question before the young man realised he was being addressed. When he did he jumped up.

  'Hai?

  'Air-conditioning machines break down, don't they? Mr Moriya asked him. Hisako thought it would be a tricky question to answer in the negative, given that the young man was standing surrounded by bits of a machine that had done just that.

  'Yes, sir, sometimes. The engineer was practically standing at attention, gaze fixed at a point over Mr Moriya's head.

  'Thank you, Mr Moriya said, nodding. 'What can I do? he said loudly, gesturing widely with his arms and walking past the engineer to look out of the window. The young man's gaze followed him; he seemed to be uncertain whether this was a rhetorical question or not. 'Eh? Mr Moriya said. He tapped the young man on the shoulder, then pointed at Hisako. 'What would you do? This lady is one of the finest cellists in the world. The world! Finally, after years…. decades almost of invitations, she decides to go to Europe; do concerts, give classes… but she won't fly.

  The young engineer was looking embarrassed, smiling.

  'Planes crash, Hisako said.

  'Ships sink, retorted Mr Moriya.

  'They have lifeboats.

  'Well, planes have parachutes! Moriya spluttered.

  'I don't think so, Moriya-san.

  Mr Moriya turned to the engineer. 'I'm sorry; forgive me; go back to your work.

  The young man looked grateful, and knelt down again. 'Perhaps the situation in Russia will chan
ge, Mr Moriya said, shaking his head. 'They might open up the railway again. He wiped his neck with the handkerchief.

  'Perhaps.

  'Soviets, ha! Mr Moriya said, angrily, shaking his head at the Tokyo cityscape.

  Hisako raised one hand to her brow, traced the line of a bead of perspiration. She put her hands back on her lap. 'There will be storms around the Cape! Mr Moriya said, trying to sound knowledgeable.

  'There is a canal through Panama, I believe, Hisako said, tiring of the argument.

  'Is that still working?

  'It is.

  'There's a war there!

  'Not officially.

  'What? Officially? What is to be official about in a war? Mr Moriya sounded incredulous.

  'It has not been declared, she told him. 'It is a local dispute; bandits in the hills. A police operation.

  'And all those American Marines at… at… last year, at-

  'Limón.

  Mr Moriya looked confused. 'I thought it was Cosa… Costal…

  'Costa Rica, Hisako told him. She pronounced the 'r' sound in the gaijin manner, even exaggerated it a little.

  'That was police?

  'No, a rescue mission. Hisako smiled faintly. The air conditioning engineer was scratching the back of his head. He sucked air through his clenched teeth and looked up at Mr Moriya, who wasn't noticing him.

  'Hisako; if it looks like a war, sounds like a war-

  'The Americans will keep the canal safe.

  'Like this Rimón place?

  'Moriya-san, Hisako said, looking up at him. 'I would like to fly, but I cannot. I go by ship or I do not go. I could go to California and then by train to New York and another ship, or through Suez, which I would also like to see, but I would prefer to come back that way.

  Mr Moriya sighed and sat down heavily in his seat, behind his desk, 'Couldn't you do what I do? he suggested. 'Get very drunk the night before the flight — beer, sake, whisky and young Australian red wine always works, I find — so that you have such a bad hangover you feel death would come as a welcome release?