Читать книгу Not Child's Play - Dave Muller - Страница 10

Cyclops forces us along at a furious pace. Whenever we lag, he points to his big gold watch and then at the sun. Obviously, we have to get somewhere before sunset.

Sandy and I walk together, occasionally holding hands to reassure each other, saying little. Our initial shock is slowly being overtaken by a chill, reasoned fear we are too terrified to articulate. In those few words we do share, we agree that, for the moment, there’s no option but to play along and, for the sake of the children, try to maintain a nonchalant air. It’s just a walk along a beautiful beach, like we often take back home.

At first the children run around, more excited to chase the many scuttling crabs exposed in the receding fans of backwash, than scared by our gun-toting captors. As with all children, their parents’ advice to conserve energy is ignored, and we do not have the heart to deny them this carefree act of freedom.

However, it’s not long before they tire and wedge themselves between us, placing their hands in ours. Occasionally they lift their feet, turning this into play as we are forced to swing them skywards. They shriek with glee while we try to feign joy in this familiar family game, but in reality the beach is comfortless, stretching before us, an unbroken strip of shimmering hot sand.

We walk non-stop for three hours until we come to a grove of fir-like casuarina trees. These offer some shelter from the sun, which is nearly overhead. While the other two captives are ordered to collect water from a shallow seepage behind the trees, we flop down in the relief of the shade, too exhausted to care about the prickly seed pods littering the sand. The old man and woman return carrying a plastic jug of murky water. After the boys have drunk their fill they offer the jug to us. I take this as an encouraging sign that they intend us no harm, at least for the time being. The two bottles Sandy had fetched from Arwen are nearly empty, with just a reserve left for an emergency. We drink deeply and refill our bottles. The water is fresh, with a not unpleasant earthy taste.

While we drink, Cyclops stands over us, talking loudly to his companions, gloating and wringing his hands in obvious satisfaction over this prize he has captured. The old couple sit alongside us, fear in their eyes. They don’t understand English so Sandy softly asks in Zulu, ‘Who are the boys?’

‘Renamo,’ they whisper.

So much for the assurance from the Instituto Nacional do Turismo in Maputo that the area around the islands and near Vilanculos is ‘secure’.

My knowledge of Renamo is vague. I know South Africa previously supported Renamo, considering them a right-wing organisation that would act as a bulwark against the communist/ socialist influence of its northern neighbours. But this changed six years earlier, in 1984, when South Africa and Mozambique signed a nonaggression pact known as the Nkomati Accord. In this agreement, the apartheid government withdrew their support of Renamo and, in turn, the Frelimo-controlled government in Mozambique ceased providing a safe haven for the banned African National Congress. Neither side took the accord seriously, and a few years later South Africa was embarrassed internationally when a raid on a Renamo camp exposed documents implicating South Africa in ongoing support. In an attempt to regain some international credibility, South Africa had withdrawn all support, and not much was heard in the local news about Renamo other than the occasional horror story concerning atrocities they’d committed: a train ambushed and the passengers shot while fleeing; trucks attacked, ransacked and set alight, the drivers killed. I also knew that the American CIA had recently labelled Renamo a terrorist organisation, second only to the notorious Khmer Rouge in Cambodia in terms of committing acts of exceptional brutality.

This should have been enough to discourage anyone from visiting Mozambique, but during the past year numerous reports had appeared in local sailing and travel magazines extolling the virtues of Mozambique’s unspoilt islands, which had escaped the ravages of civil war. My own enquiries confirmed that the civil war was confined to the inland areas around Renamo’s headquarters in Gorongosa National Park. Sanctions meant the options for South Africans seeking international exposure and those wishing to travel were limited, so the siren-like allure of those islands was tempting.

Our respite in the shade is short-lived. After 15 minutes we are back on our feet, striding south. Waves fling themselves higher up the beach as the tide rises, the soft sand hampering our pace. We’re both aware this is the high tide that was meant to refloat Arwen, but will now be washing her even higher up the beach.

We round a headland and the coast once again stretches away into the hazy distance beyond which rises the outline of the conspicuous hill we’d passed the previous day. The boys and the old couple walk ahead; only Cyclops stays with us as we lag, forcing our pace with constant annoyed vamushes. Our feet mire in the soft sand, which sucks the energy from our legs. Eventually Seth sits and refuses to move, adopting a child’s limp-doll strategy of passive resistance. Sandy and I have no choice but to take turns carrying him on our backs. Tammy shows amazing strength, plodding on with her head down and shoulders slumped. By late afternoon we are near collapse and indicate we can no longer carry Seth without a rest. Cyclops shouts to the boys. The youngest stops and, without a word, lifts Seth onto his shoulders. The pace quickens.

As evening advances, cool eddies waft down from the dunes, mixing with the warm sea air, concocting a rich aroma of herbage and iodine. It’s twilight when Cyclops abruptly turns inland to a barren slack between the dunes. We are told to sit on the seaward side of a low hummock dune while the boys and old couple move to a shallow wind-scoured valley beyond.

The sand is warm and soaks up the sweat from our clothes as we lie back staring heavenward. No one speaks. We’re too exhausted, and words would only confirm the reality of what is taking place. Better to say nothing and pretend none of this is happening. From behind the dune we can hear raised voices and animated talk amongst the boys.

‘Sounds as if they are arguing over sharing our things amongst themselves.’

‘Let them,’ Sandy mutters. ‘There is nothing we can do.’

After a few minutes Cyclops reappears.

‘Vamush.’

In the gloom of evening we trudge up the dune face, following the footsteps of the old couple. Our legs ache as the soft sand slides beneath our feet like a treadmill. From the crest, the view inland surprises us. We’d expected a truncated view blocked by more hills, but instead we look down across a canopy of dense forest that undulates inland in ever-darkening grey swathes. A thin crescent moon hangs low in the burnished afterglow above a distant crisp horizon.

Without hesitation, the boys head down the landward side of the dune, following a wind-blown tongue of sand towards the wall of trees. We hold back, reluctant to let go of the certainty of the coastline. Just as I’d used bearings and depth contours to determine our position while sailing, the beach is a reference point that signifies we are not completely lost. Leaving the comfort of that certainty will be much the same as being washed overboard, or having one’s fingers slip from some secure handhold to plummet into the unknown. Descending into the forest entails crossing into an even deeper level of fear, so we hesitate.

Cyclops, however, will have none of our dithering. With a swift ‘Vamush’ he prods us towards the edge of the forest.

We stumble downwards. Leaving the dune crest feels like walking through an unseen curtain into a world suddenly bereft of sound. The roar of the waves is gone, replaced by a hush so palpable that it can be felt as a pressure void in our ears. The trees soak up all sound and the slight breeze I’d hardly noticed before disappears. The air clots around us. In the humid silence, voices in my head, previously ignored, begin whispering a chilling truth: You are now lost. You and your family will vanish – and no one will ever find you.

Cyclops takes the lead and tells three of the boys to trail behind us. I wonder whether this is to prevent us from slipping away in the dark, or to keep us from getting lost. Whichever, it’s a wise action, because escape is very much in our minds. Walking along the beach, Sandy and I had briefly discussed this possibility, but realised it would be absurd to attempt during daylight. Now that we’re in the forest, even the faint glow from the stars disappears and we realise the futility of trying to escape in darkness. We blunder through thickets, forging a path among the unseen tracery of thin branches that whip our bodies. Underfoot is cool, powdery sand, but our bare feet, softened and abraded by the damp beach, are sliced and scuffed on the twigs littering the forest floor.

Sandy and I are once again taking turns carrying Seth who, in a deep, exhausted sleep, has slumped into a dead weight on our backs. We stumble, bent double, following the boys more by sound than sight. Our clothes, saturated with sweat, are chill against our skin and our hearts offer no warmth despite the warm night air.

The boys behind make sure we keep moving. After two hours stumbling through the forest, the canopy opens, and in the dim light we can make out that we’re standing in a shallow valley surrounded by high trees. Stars dust a pale neon sheen across the night sky. The shrill voice of Cyclops, about 20 metres ahead, summons the boys from behind us. They brush past, their AK-47 slings clanking in their hands. We are left, temporarily abandoned. It sounds as if there is an argument about which direction to take. We’re beyond caring and collapse onto the sand, no longer able to carry the weight of our own bodies.

It becomes silent, almost peaceful, but suddenly Cyclops’s strident shouts, on the brink of hysteria, rise above the sound of blades chopping though the lush vegetation. I assume they’ve lost their way and Cyclops is frustrated by the blocked path and the slow progress of the old couple clearing it. More slashing of pulpy vegetation confirms they must be trying to open a route. Curious, I move towards the sound, but a boy appears from the darkness and pushes me back to where the family sit. There’s nothing to do but wait. Tammy nestles between us and Seth lies asleep on the sand.

A minute later Cyclops returns, leading the boys. He stumbles past me, breathing heavily, and plunges into the forest to our left. Sandy hoists Seth onto her back and with Tammy between us we follow. The trees soon part, and to our relief we find ourselves walking along a sandy path that gleams faintly in the star glow. One of the boys catches up with me and, as he passes, thrusts a plastic jug into my hand.

It’s one of the jugs carried by the old man. I’d forgotten about the old couple. The jug handle is sticky. Involuntarily, I lick my fingers. They taste salty and metallic.

I recognise the taste of blood and know what it means.

The sounds we’d heard were bayonets slicing into flesh. I walk on, stunned. During my military training I’d been taught how use a bayonet. The lessons in evisceration had revolted me. There can be few more brutal ways of killing a person. Back then our instructors had had to work their students into a frenzy of imaginary hate in order to overcome our teenaged reluctance to enact such a barbaric act on even straw-filled sacks. They’d assured us that if the time came our training would kick in and override our squeamishness.

This is different. It had been cold-blooded and premeditated. My mind scrambles to find familiar moral handholds, but I find none. Nothing has prepared me for this. My imagination has never ventured into such dark places. Is it possible these children could gag and bind people, and then bayonet them to death?

Those slushy slashing sounds loop again and again in my head as I try to convince myself I am wrong and they were indeed, as first imagined, pangas cutting though lush vegetation. But there are no pangas, and there is no lush vegetation, and there is now no old couple.

After a while I turn to Sandy. ‘Are the old couple behind you?’

‘No,’ she replies after a moment’s hesitation.

‘Do you know what that means?’ I whisper.

‘Yes.’

My fears are confirmed. We’re walking a whimsical path between life and death.

‘Do you think we should make a run for it?’ I ask Sandy. Her reply is a tired chuckle. True, we’re exhausted, have no supplies for survival other than the clothes we wear, The Chatty Parrot, Sandy’s binoculars and two (empty) water bottles. We have only the vaguest idea of where we are and there are two children to protect. For their sake, if no other, the only option is to continue with our charade of nonchalant confidence, and pray. At least the children are unaware of what has just happened. We shuffle along in single file, taking turns to piggyback Seth, Tammy plodding along between us.

Sandy murmurs, ‘No matter what happens we must refuse to be parted from the children.’

‘Yes, even if that means we are killed.’

I cannot believe the sound of my voice. It’s absurd, a sentence I’d never imagined I’d say. But there is no melodrama in Sandy’s confirmation. If – or when – the time comes, will I have the courage to carry it out?

I’m processing the awful implications when the silence is shattered by three shrill whistle blasts from one of the boys at the rear. From far ahead comes a faint answering triple call. We walk on in silence for another 15 minutes until, more sensed than seen, I become aware of movement and eyes staring at us from the flanking bush. Soon soft laughter and hushed talk can be heard. Fires flicker into view between trees, their glow a profound and comforting relief.

We’re ushered from the path into a clearing. In the centre, a small fire stutters and smoulders. Two log benches are positioned on opposite sides of the fire. Before disappearing with the rest of our escort into the darkness, Cyclops indicates that we sit on the ground near the fire. We slump down, grateful to have reached the end of our walk. Our gritty, sweat-soaked clothes cling to our bodies. A grey-headed man emerges from the shadows and hands Sandy a plate half-filled with cold samp and beans. A girl rekindles the fire. The light wakes Seth, who loudly proclaims, ‘I’m thirsty.’ Sandy shows the girl our two empty water bottles and makes filling gestures. She smiles, takes the bottles and disappears into the dark, soon returning with filled bottles.

Our arrival has caused a stir. While we eat, a shuffling procession of men, women and children stare at us from around the edge of the clearing. I look at my family and feel profound admiration. Within the last 24 hours they’ve weathered a violent storm, been shipwrecked and captured by gun-toting boys. They’ve been marched at least 20 kilometres along a beach, first in blistering heat and then in darkness through a dense forest. And yet we can still exchange smiles and words of encouragement. For the moment, simply being alive is sufficient reason for contentment.

After eating, we lie back, allowing our bodies to regain some strength. The horror of the past few hours has banished any desire for Sandy and me to talk. Uttering words would just make manifest, and confirm, thoughts we are trying to expunge. So, other than words encouraging the children, we lie in silence, doing our best to cleanse our minds. Tammy and Seth quickly fall asleep, cradled in our arms. The muscles in my legs begin to stiffen. Apart from the occasional soft voice filtering through the trees, borne on warm, smoky air, all is silent.

Our youngest captor returns and motions us to follow. Painfully, we rise to our feet, lift the children and hobble along behind the boy to a nearby fire. To our relief we are greeted with the words ‘good evening’. A man extends his hand to me. ‘My name, Paul Patrick.’ In the dim firelight, he looks remarkably like a reincarnation of Che Guevara, with a wispy beard and a beret cocked at a jaunty angle.

Paul Patrick’s English does not extend far beyond ‘good evening’. He sits opposite us while we balance on another log bench. The children are on our laps, folded within our arms. Paul Patrick speaks, but we recognise only the occasional word. Knowing our lives could depend on our responses, we try to fill the void with extravagant, animated gesticulations. I’m aware we must look like ventriloquist dummies as we nod or shake our heads emphatically in response to assumed questioning, or display grins of ingratiation to convey special pleasure or agreement. In contrast, Paul Patrick sits impassive, elbows on knees, staring either at us or into the fire. Occasionally he shows understanding and nods sagely, repeating, ‘I see, I see.’

Do we represent an unwelcome problem for him? We already know how his troops solve such problems.

In the middle of his questions, he asks if we know who they are. I shake my head.

‘We Frelimo, you no worry,’ he replies.

Not knowing what to make of this, I gaze impassively back at him, unsure if his is a loaded question. Earlier, Sandy and I had discussed how we should respond in such a situation, and agreed we would not react in any way that showed partisanship or any understanding of the civil war. Best we find out who our hosts are before taking sides.

A whistle blast close by startles us. The call is distinctive, consisting of three trills, each rapidly rising, followed by a longer descending note. Paul Patrick brings the questioning to an end. His parting words are, ‘No worry, tomorrow you go road to Vilanculos.’

This is promising and we can’t help but feel hopeful. Vilanculos is the nearest town – and it has an airport and therefore links to South Africa.

Some teenaged girls who’d been watching from the shadows escort us to another clearing, also with a central fire and seating. We can dimly see a small house built from plaited palm leaves standing to one side of the clearing, while a palisade of vertical tree trunks define two of the other sides. The girls whisper amongst themselves as they lay a blanket on the sand alongside the fire. Sandy is offered a cotton sheet with which to cover us. The implicit message in their kindness does not escape us, and we allow the knotted muscles in our necks and shoulders to relax.

We have Seth’s Chatty Parrot book, our water bottles and Sandy’s binoculars. The children revive so we lie with our heads towards the fire and Sandy opens the brightly coloured book. The girls immediately join us on the blanket. Sandy begins to read, using gestures to explain the storyline for the benefit of the girls. They giggle and point out to each other the amusing and annoying antics of the talkative parrot.

The fire slowly burns down until it’s impossible to continue reading in the ever-fading light. We learn our first Portuguese words as the girls depart with gentle ‘Bon nuits’. Sandwiched between us, Tammy and Seth quickly drift off to sleep again. Sandy and I are too agitated to sleep, so we lie staring at the stars twinkling beyond the leaf canopy; a comforting reminder that a familiar world still exists. The last time I’d stared at those stars was from Arwen’s cockpit the previous night. There seems little to say to each other so we lie bound in our private anguish.

I am filled with fear and a deep, enveloping sense of failure. Our misery is soon compounded when Paul Patrick arrives and sits on one of the benches on the other side of the fire. He brings with him a portable tape player and a 20-litre plastic tub.

Amongst the many things we’d seen taken from Arwen had been a cardboard box containing our supply of spare torch batteries. Thanks to this bonanza, the tape player is turned up to full volume, the music distorting hideously, as if in pain, as it’s squeezed from the undersized speaker. This appears to cause Paul Patrick not the slightest discomfort and draws a number of his younger cronies. They sit around the fire on either side of us, their smooth faces lit by the dancing flames. Methodically, they pass around a glass that is repeatedly topped up with a milky liquid from the plastic tub. With each circuit of the glass their voices grow louder and shriller. I’m offered a taste. Feeling in no position to refuse, I take a polite sip. My tongue curls up along its edges and my lips pucker at the astringent taste.

We try to sleep, but the volatile combination of fear and noise make this impossible. In the middle of the night Sandy suddenly calls out in terror. Paul Patrick had nudged her with his boot. Fortunately, all he wants is to ask us more questions.

From what we can understand, a raiding party has been sent back to Arwen and he wants to know what else is on board. Reading from a list of questions on a notepad, he asks about our radio. What make is it? What’s its power and with whom did we communicate? I explain that it’s a marine VHF radio and only works between ships. Next he wants to know if we have any guns or other weapons on board. I reply we have none. Paul Patrick looks sceptical. Why are we here? I tell him we’re on holiday. With the aid of damp, salty shells retrieved from Tammy’s shorts – a relic from our recent beach walk – I explain that Sandy’s work is to learn about shells and she’s interested in those found around the Bazaruto islands. Any further explanation exceeds the limits of our linguistic improvisations. He eventually gives up with a disbelieving shake of his head. Finally, after more questions about what we’ve done and whom we’ve seen in Maputo, he seems satisfied.

Leaning back, he pronounces, ‘We Renamo,’ and concludes with the mysterious but knowing comment: ‘You know soldier.’

‘What do you think that means?’ Sandy whispers.

I cannot bring myself to answer, the implications too great to verbalise, so I lie in silence, wondering if, when the time comes, I will be brave enough.

In a barely audible voice Sandy breaks the silence. ‘I think they are going to kill us.’

I’m shocked. Sandy is always the positive one in our relationship, the one who sees the half-full glass. To hear her utter such a bleak verdict sets me into free-fall. This is new emotional territory. My brain feels dislodged; my thoughts ensnared as they try to escape the reality of what Sandy has just said. It takes time before I can bring myself to respond.

‘Why do you think that?’

‘They are going to kill us. We’ve seen too much.’

This is such blunt logic. I cannot refute it, nor can I bring myself to accept it. My response sounds fatuous. ‘Try to sleep.’ It’s the best I can do. I don’t want to continue along this line of enervating thought.

Paul Patrick’s ominous words – ‘You know soldier.’ Sandy’s sombre prediction. The viscous sounds of stabs in the dark. Arwen stranded, now even higher up the beach and even more difficult to refloat. My brain shuffles through this litany of bleak scenarios and latches onto the latter. It’s practical, can be defined in a few words, has a clear outcome, and I’m confident I can find a solution. So I lie on my back, thinking of ways to get back to Arwen and refloat her. That is our only hope.

The beer supply has a soporific effect on Paul Patrick and his compatriots. The tape player, left untended, finally wows and whines to silence and, in the quiet, the trilling insect chirps of the Mozambican night, combined with our physical and mental exhaustion, finally bring sleep.

The familiar and comforting call of a fiery-necked nightjar, also called the litany bird, heralds daybreak. It brings back memories of evenings spent building Arwen when we’d heard that onomatopoeic call – ‘Good Lord, deliver us … Good Lord, deliver us’ – drifting up in the still evening air from the nearby Baakens River Valley in Port Elizabeth.

The children sleep on while Sandy and I gather strength for the coming day.

Dawn reveals that we are in the middle of what appears to be a spread-out camp. Other palm-leaf structures in similar clearings can be glimpsed beyond the surrounding trees. Based on the number of women visiting the hut beside us, each departing with bowls and baskets, the hut must be used to store food. A girl energetically stirs the contents of a large pot simmering over the fire. A couple of others look on, chatting and occasionally flashing winsome smiles in the direction of Tammy and Seth. We’re handed a full plate of steaming porridge and, with great sincerity, give thanks for surviving the night and for the food.

Seth, however, refuses to eat. And it doesn’t go unnoticed by Paul Patrick, who looks concerned. We try to explain that he usually sweetens his porridge with sugar. Paul Patrick looks blank; sugar is not an easy word to mime, but after more exaggerated sprinkling gestures coupled with exaggerated facial expressions of delight, understanding dawns. He issues an order to a small boy lurking near the fringe of the clearing. The boy returns a few minutes later carrying a cracked mug containing a few spoonfuls of runny yellow liquid in which are mired an assortment of twigs and insects. Sandy and I exchange dubious glances. Sandy sticks a tentative finger into the substance and gives it a lick. With a smile she looks up and announces, ‘It’s honey!’

After the bleak night, there is some sense of relief. It is unlikely Paul Patrick will have shared a precious resource such as honey if he has any evil intent. Our cup of joy soon overflows even more abundantly.

The girl who made the porridge calls Sandy away behind the leaf clad structure. She returns, grinning. ‘They’ve prepared a basin of hot water for us to wash and you, as the man, apparently have to go first.’ Who am I to question this? I find a basin of hot water balanced on a tripod of sticks in the middle of a shoulder-height enclosure made from plaited palm leaves. Next to the basin a grid of branches covers a soak-away hole. All this goodwill, plus the promise of leaving for the Vilanculos road, buoys my spirits. I am almost ridiculously euphoric. The soap and warm, cleansing water are refreshing and hold a welcome familiarity but, peering over the hedge of palm leaves, the incongruous sight of boys toting AK-47s reminds me this is far from normal for the Muller family.