The Canal House

by Mark Lee

  “We’ve got food here, but no transport.” I looked over at the churchyard. “If I can get a truck, we can go to your village this afternoon.”

  “You’ll need soldiers, too,” she said. “The militia has been killing anyone in favor of independence. Their leader Cristiano is an evil man and the others are scared of him. One of my students was guarding us last night. He let me run away.”

  “How long will the people survive on the wharf?”

  “Two days. Then everyone will die.”

  GETTING DIRECTIONS FROM the Australian soldiers, I walked with Sister Xavier down the waterfront boulevard to the military command post at the Turismo Hotel. A colonel told us that General Bates was the only person who could send troops to Liquica, but he was out at the airport talking to some UN officials. The colonel got us onto a truck going there to get supplies.

  The Interfet camp was on a dirt field about a half mile from the airport. Soldiers were setting up a barbed-wire fence, tents, and an electric generator. Military Land Rovers and armored personnel carriers roared in and out of the camp, stirring up red dust that drifted through the air.

  General Bates had already left, but we met an American named Larry Stans who had some mysterious job with the UN force. He wore a baseball cap and a bush jacket with epaulets and sat in the shade of a large tent talking into his portable radio. Apparently they were driving around Dili inspecting the area. The radio buzzed and hummed, and Larry’s team kept saying “I copy that” and “Over” like they were bad actors in a television police show. The population of Dili was reduced to Friendlies, Possible Unfriendlies, and Bad Guys.

  “Sorry you missed the general,” Larry said. “Great guy. Strong leader. Knows how to prioritize.”

  “We need his permission to send soldiers and a medical team to Sister Xavier’s village.”

  Larry smiled at Sister Xavier. “Are you a community leader, ma’am? We’re making a list of community leaders.”

  “I’m just a nun.”

  “That qualifies.” Larry wrote down Sister Xavier’s name.

  “Perhaps you could contact General Bates on your radio,” I said.

  “Well, I could, but I can’t. Got to save my ammo for the big bears in the woods. All this pacification stuff takes time. Bates will start deploying troops in about four or five days. Can’t save the world overnight.”

  Sister Xavier shook her head. “I just want to save my village.”

  “We’re wasting time here,” I said. “Let’s go back to the city.” I turned from Larry and headed for the road.

  “Want some water bottles?” he asked.

  I stopped walking. “Go back to America, Mr. Stans. You’re a bloody fool.”

  “Calm down, Doc. We’re all on the same team.”

  We stood by the entrance to the camp, then hitched a ride on an APC with some Australian soldiers, young and happy to be in control of an armored vehicle with a large machine gun. They were elaborately polite when we climbed in and kept making sure we were comfortable. With the hatch open, we sped down the road. Hot air roared around us; the sun burned down and the sky was painfully blue.

  “Here’s our theme song,” said a corporal named Trevor and he played a tape on his portable stereo. It turned out to be something called “Highway to Hell” and the young soldiers sang along.

  General Bates was back at the Turismo Hotel, but he was very busy and Major Holden told us to wait. Sister Xavier and I sat down on a saggy couch in the lobby and watched Australian officers hurry down the hallway carrying faxes. They were tan and fit and ready for action. “Timor is the big show,” one lieutenant told me. “If you’re going to be in the army, you’ve got to be here.”

  I tried to talk to Sister Xavier, but she was like a smooth granite wall. There weren’t any cracks or soft places in her personality, nothing to hold on to in a conversation. Everything was reduced to a single desire: we must save the village. I wanted to resist this single-mindedness, but I knew she was right, that we had to keep everyone from dying.

  It was almost five o’clock when Major Holden ushered us in to the general’s office. Bates sat behind a desk studying a fax and making notes. I introduced myself and Sister Xavier, trying to keep the desperation out of my voice as I explained the situation.

  “Hand-to-Hand has enough food and medical supplies,” I said. “What we need is transportation and a military escort. We should leave immediately, before it gets dark.”

  As I tried to make the journey sound quick and easy, the general kept glancing at the map of East Timor taped to the wall. I knew what he was thinking. Loo-key-sah. Where on earth is this village?

  “Thank you for telling me about this problem,” Bates said. “We’ve received similar reports of people having trouble with the militia.” He picked up a water bottle and tore off the plastic safety seal. “Right now we’re completing Stage One, the process of inserting our forces and taking firm control of Dili. Stage Two will begin in a few days. We’ll secure Liquica and the other nearby towns.”

  “But we can’t wait for Stage Two,” I said. “These people are dying right now.”

  “It’s just like building a bridge, Dr. Cadell. First, you construct a solid foundation. Then you extend yourself inch by inch to the other side.”

  “You don’t need a bridge,” Sister Xavier said. “You can drive to my village in thirty minutes.”

  “Yes. But what if there’s an ambush waiting for us? Roadblocks? Land mines? You’ve already told me that these militiamen are dangerous. What we need is a fully organized military operation.”

  I shook my head. “If you can get me a truck or a Land Rover, I’ll take the risk and go there alone.”

  “I’m sorry, Doctor. In order to protect you and other civilians no unauthorized vehicles are being allowed out of the city.”

  Major Holden seemed to have a natural instinct as to when a meeting was over. Suddenly he reappeared carrying more bottles of water. “I’m afraid that the general has a conference call in five minutes,” he told us.

  “The militia will run away the moment you send in soldiers,” I said.

  Bates tapped his finger on the desk. “That’s what the Americans thought during the UN action in Somalia. And it was a disaster. They had unacceptable casualties.”

  “East Timor isn’t like Somalia. If the Australian government didn’t want to risk its soldiers, then it shouldn’t have sent them here.”

  “We’re fulfilling our obligations.”

  “Yes. Of course. But I think that you need to be a bit more aggressive.”

  “These troops are my responsibility.” Bates paused dramatically as if the room were filled with young Australian soldiers and their mothers. “I’m going to make sure that no one gets hurt during this operation.”

  “But what about the hundreds of civilians who are going to die because you didn’t go twenty-four miles down the road.”

  Looking angry, Bates picked up a pushpin and walked over to the map on the wall. “Good-bye, Doctor.”

  “I’m sorry, General Bates,” I said. “I apologize. But don’t you see that—”

  “This conversation is over.” Bates turned away from us and forced the pushpin into the black dot that marked Liquica.

  WE LEFT THE HOTEL and walked down the boulevard toward the wharf. I saw Nicky standing next to an Australian APC. Someone had wired a white plastic skull to the machine-gun bracket and Nicky was taking a photograph of this decoration.

  “Hey, Julia. Hand-to-Hand was the news story of the day. No competition.”

  “Where’s Daniel?”

  “We lost our phone. He’s back at the hotel using Tristram Müller’s gear.”

  I introduced Sister Xavier and told him about the meeting with Bates. The nun reached out to shake Nicky’s hand, but he raised his camera and took a picture.

  “You’re an American, Mr. Bettencourt?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Could you talk to the United States Army? Perhaps
the Americans would go down to my village.”

  “Our army’s not involved in this. The only Americans here are UN officials and the pilots flying the planes.”

  Sister Xavier looked at me. “Then we need British soldiers.”

  “The British are part of the Interfet forces,” I said. “General Bates is officially their commander.”

  Nicky lowered his camera. “I’ve met the man in charge of the Gurkhas. He’s all right. Maybe you can talk to him.”

  He led us back to the hotel. A British army captain was sitting on the grass in the overgrown courtyard, eating rations with some of his men. All I wanted was a few words from Nicky, perhaps a suggestion that going to Liquica was a good idea, but he acted as neutral and uncommitted as ever. Nicky was always the man watching, no matter what was going on. He made the introduction, then stepped back and fingered his camera.

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Captain Jenkins. Where are you from in Britain?”

  “Dorset,” he said. “But I don’t give a damn about the place. I’m here, doing my job. That’s good enough for me.”

  I began talking, but I could see that Jenkins didn’t care if all the people in Liquica died. Their lives were an abstraction to him, a useless number. He ate a spoonful of canned peaches, then scratched a mosquito bite on his hand.

  “Perhaps this isn’t your direct responsibility,” I said. “But nobody else wants to get involved.”

  Jenkins nodded politely to show that he was listening. Then he scratched his neck.

  “You know that protecting these people is the right thing to do. That’s why we’ve been sent to this country.”

  I looked hard at Jenkins, willing him to listen to me. The captain nodded again, but this time he appeared a bit more interested. Doing the right thing was something he could understand.

  “I’m sorry to put this in your hands,” I said. “But I can’t travel to the village alone. You can stay here and do—whatever. Or go down the coast road with us and save some lives.”

  Jenkins didn’t look at the grass or the trees or the canned peaches anymore. He faced me directly and I knew that he had made a decision. “All right. You’ve made your point, Dr. Cadell. Let me go talk to our senior officers. There aren’t a lot of British here so the chain of command is a bit more informal.”

  “Thank you, Captain. You can find me at the Seria on the wharf or …” I glanced at Nicky.

  “Or at the Resende Inn. Room 212.”

  “I can’t promise anything of course, but I’ll give it a try. My men feel a bit useless guarding the people at this hotel.”

  Sister Xavier was still worried as we left the hotel. “Perhaps the British will also say no,” she said.

  “It’s possible.”

  “Maybe we should talk to the Portuguese.”

  “Forget about that,” Nicky said. “It’s late. We need to get off the street.”

  Sister Xavier went to the bishop’s compound to search for some nuns from her order. Nicky and I turned toward the wharf. The sun was dropping toward the mountains and orange clouds glowed on the horizon. Night was coming and I could feel a wave of fear spreading through the city. Everyone started walking a little faster. Tires whipped through the trash scattered across the pavement as a Land Rover raced back to the airport. People wanted to find shelter before the sun went down.

  Nicky stopped to take a photograph of the Igreja Motael. “The first day we arrived, Daniel and I went to this church together.” As he switched lenses on one of his cameras, he told me how Daniel had given all of his water to a sick woman.

  “You make it sound like a mistake,” I said.

  “He shouldn’t do things like that.”

  “You won’t lose your license if you occasionally got involved, Nicky.”

  “Helping people is your job, but that’s not what we do. If Daniel keeps crossing the line, he’s going to get into trouble.”

  The food line on the wharf had disappeared. Richard was back on the ship and Collins was standing guard with his rifle. I paid my helpers with triple rations and was just about to leave when Billy came down the wharf carrying his rifle. “Where’d you go with that nun?” he asked.

  “Out to the airport and back. Then we saw General Bates. Sister Xavier needs some soldiers to take control of her village.”

  Billy rolled his eyes as if I’d told a bad joke. “You’re a very helpful person, Julia. Too bad you weren’t wearing the Hand-to-Hand shirt.”

  “Where’s Richard?”

  “He’s giving an interview up in his cabin, talking to reporters from the Guardian and the Times. Daniel’s going to miss out on the big story and that’s us. Everything’s working out perfectly.”

  DANIEL, NICKY, AND I ate dinner that night at their hotel with Tristram Müller and a journalist named Peter who worked for a French wire service. Tristram had bought two large pineapples and Nicky cored them with his Swiss Army knife, the juice dripping onto the floor. The hotel manager served us pancakes for fifty Australian dollars each and I ate two of them before I realized that I was dining on food made from Hand-to-Hand supplies. Someone had already sold his cornmeal and cooking oil to the manager. I had to smile. One way or another, we had helped restart the local economy. Tristram produced a tin of strawberry jam and this was smeared across the pancakes. There wasn’t any alcohol for dinner, but the sugary meal surged into our bloodstreams and made everyone feel giddy.

  Tristram insisted that Peter tell us about his hobby. It turned out that he spent his spare time taking photographs of different women baring their breasts in famous locations. He had scrapbooks of photos back at his apartment in Paris, the nipples appearing at the White House, the Kremlin, and Buckingham Palace. Daniel had once gotten Peter and his girlfriend into the Vatican garden and now he wanted Daniel to sneak him into the pope’s bedroom. For an hour or so, I forgot about Sister Xavier and her villagers. I sat on the floor next to Daniel, his arm wrapped around me, and laughed when Peter described bare breasts at Napoleon’s tomb.

  We left them as Tristram ordered another round of pancakes. Nicky was talking about a Florida millionaire who had offered a hundred thousand dollars to anyone who could take a photograph of a soul leaving the human body.

  Peter looked amused. “That’s very American.”

  “Hey, the money’s real. So how we going to get it?”

  “I don’t believe in soul or spirit or inneres Licht.” Tristram said. “It’s all just flesh and Coca-Cola. Isn’t that right, Julia? We need a medical opinion.”

  I could have easily sat down and resumed the conversation, but now I wanted to be alone with Daniel. “I’ll give my prognosis tomorrow,” I said, slipping out the door.

  We stumbled upstairs in the dark, fumbled with the key, and finally got into the room. Daniel closed the door and locked it. A breeze came through the open window and the curtains flapped like tattered flags.

  “I missed you,” Daniel said and put his arms around me. I closed my eyes and felt his body pressing against mine. Lying down on the bare mattress, we kissed each other and then I touched his face. I had thought about Daniel so often, his nose and mouth and eyes; now that we were back together I had to make sure that he was real.

  “You look tired,” I said.

  “And you look beautiful.”

  “I don’t quite believe that. I thought journalists were supposed to tell the truth.”

  “I am telling the truth.” Daniel embraced me and I felt the muscles of his back and shoulders. Both of us moved slowly, lingering on each sensation, as if we were back at the Canal House, with all the time in the world.

  We made love as the final light disappeared, then lay together in the dark room. It was colder now and I pulled the scratchy blanket over my body. Daniel stood up, walked over to the window, and pushed back the curtains. I could see part of the moon and thousands of stars. Someone was firing an automatic rifle in the distance—two short bursts, then silence, then a longer burst that exhausted the cli
p.

  “Victor Zikowski was always teasing me about being an American,” Daniel said. “He said we were a cheerful culture, obsessed with happy endings. That’s why America stayed so long in Vietnam. We didn’t want to win the war. We just wanted to feel good about leaving.”

  “Happy endings aren’t always possible,” I said.

  “No. Time keeps pushing us forward. You might be happy at one particular moment, but the world keeps changing.” He came back to the mattress. “No matter how much we wanted, we couldn’t stay in Italy.”

  Daniel kissed the palm of my hand and lay down beside me. He went to sleep a few minutes later. I drank some water from one of our bottles, then watched a moth as it fluttered in through the open window. Oh God, I thought. Protect us, please. Daniel’s legs twitched and his hands reached out as if he was fighting demons in some dark place.

  THE NEXT MORNING Captain Jenkins came to our room with one of his Gurkha soldiers. Sergeant Santbir Gurung had a broad, smooth face and carried his kukri knife in a custom-made sheath. Gurung looked tough and disciplined, but there was an alert intelligence in his eyes. He stared at Daniel and me as if judging us, searching for our weaknesses.

  “I spoke to my senior officers about your situation,” Jenkins said. “We all agree that the UN could be a bit more aggressive in a situation like this, but we’re supposed to obey General Bates.”

  “And you can’t just drive to the village on your own?” I asked.

  “I’m sorry, Doctor. We can confiscate weapons, return fire, things like that, but military escorts need to be cleared through Interfet.”

  “So you can’t help us.”

  “We can’t officially escort you to Liquica. Nevertheless, I’ve been ordered to take a platoon down the coast road, on a reconnaissance mission. We’re supposed to evaluate the situation and see if anti-independence forces are in the area.”

  “And what if we followed you?” I asked.

  Jenkins nodded slightly, like a teacher who had been waiting for the right answer. “Your actions would not be authorized by Interfet and we couldn’t provide you with a vehicle. However, no one would stop you from coming along.”