“Es dificil,” Elke said.
“All languages are difficult,” I said. “Even English I struggle with.”
“But is hardest to say what is in the heart,” Elke said. She sounded like she was quoting something.
Her eyes were squinted from the sun, and I saw she had a small scar near her temple. How could she be a spy? How could I? We had more in common than we even knew, and I decided that if she was keeping tabs on us, she was doing it in the same way I was, which was to say, ineptly and incidentally. I decided she was my friend.
*
Elke and I began to spend more time together. My days had been lonely, I realized, without Ainslie or anyone, really, except for a cat to talk to. We didn’t see each other every day; it was, after all, a two-hour walk for a visit, but we saw each other often enough. Elke and I tried to speak in Spanish, to practice, but when neither person speaks a language as a native, it is difficult to know if one is getting better or not. So we spoke a lot of English.
What did we do together? We combined some of our household chores, and it made it easier on both of us. I’d mill the flour while she sorted the beans. And that way less was wasted and the entire activity went faster, both for the efficiency and the company. Elke knew to prune the melons before they overgrew and lost their taste or exploded. I knew you could remove weevils from grain by spreading it out in the sun. My house was better for drying plants: husks and grain and corn and fruit. And hers was better equipped for cooking, baking, rolling out dough, pounding meat, chopping. Either home was fine for mending clothes (clothes on Floreana needed constant mending) while we chatted. So it came to pass that I heard about her life in Germany before she was with Heinrich.
Her family suffered much after the Great War, and she came of age right when morale and money were at their lowest. She had wanted to go to university, but her parents insisted that she go to work instead.
“Me too!” I grabbed her arm in excitement. “What did you do?”
“I marry,” she said. “But the school is impossible. I want, how you say? Ingenieurin?”
I could only imagine how difficult it would be to become an engineer as a woman in postwar Germany. It was hard enough for me to study literature in America, and my heart went out to her. For as different as we were, we had lived mirrored lives. She chose one path and ended up here, and I chose another and ended up here as well. It made me consider the existence of fate.
For my part, I told her about my family in Duluth (leaving out the Jewish part). Maybe this was why I was so comfortable around Elke. She had the same habits that Rosalie’s mother had. She and Heinrich shared a bed, but they each had separate coverlets. Both Elke’s and Rosalie’s mothers crimped the edges of their loaves with the same pinching motion. Elke even occasionally braided her hair like Rosalie’s mother had, in a wall of hair high up over her forehead.
Around this time I began to dream of Rosalie. She came to me in my sleep and asked about things on Floreana. In one dream, she arrived on the Velero III with Hancock, sitting in his stuffy bunk and looking for a piece of ice for her whiskey. I had to tell her that I hadn’t seen ice in months. In another, she was helping me hunt crabs on the beach, but we beat them too hard and the bodies were too mangled to eat. In yet another, I found her in bed with Ainslie.
*
Ainslie insisted we throw a dinner party. There was no particular occasion for this fiesta, but I think he was hoping that someone would bring real tobacco and he could stop smoking the cured banana leaves that were a poor substitute.
Our dinner party bore only a rudimentary resemblance to its citified cousin. First of all, I couldn’t consult a recipe book for the dish. It was Floreana boar pork roast with potatoes and gravy. I took some of our precious factory-made sugar and prepared a sort of papaya tart. It actually looked appetizing. Second, it was bring your own dishes, for Ainslie and I had only three plates and forks.
I bustled around that day, sweeping and re-sweeping the floor. “For goodness’ sake, Frances,” said Ainslie, finally, exasperated. “It’s not like we’re trying to keep up with the Joneses here. We all have the same dirt floor.”
“I know,” I said, putting down my broom. “I’m nervous. We haven’t socialized in so long.”
“It’s like riding a bike,” Ainslie said. “Wobbly and possibly injurious.”
“Very funny,” I said. “All you have to do is make a bench. I am in charge of all the food. I haven’t cooked for more than two people…” I thought about it for a minute. “Ever.”
“This is only my second bench,” Ainslie said. “And cooking for two is more than I’ve ever done. But, if you want to switch…”
I swiped at his feet with the broom and he laughed.
His bench was an interesting affair. He ran a palo santo branch into the notched crotch made of two crossing branches lashed with a muyuyo vine. He made three of these braces and produced a bench fit for only the smallest of bottoms. We then ran into trouble. There were no large trees on the island. Instead, Ainslie cut a series of palos in half with the ax and lashed them to the structure. It would not be a seat fit for a king, but our Galápagos bottoms were accustomed to much worse. Ainslie spent several hours leveling it out in his perfectionist manner.
Our guests were the Jiménezes and Elke and Heinrich. Of course we had extended invitations to the Weiss family and the Muellers, but they both declined, the older couple saying that they preferred their solitude and that it was hard for them to travel at night, and the Weisses said their child was too fragile. Therefore, we would have a crowd of six, including us.
We had called the party for three hours before sunset. A bit early for dinner, perhaps, but no one wanted to make their way home in the dark. Elke and Heinrich were the first to arrive, of course, being German. Elke had made cheese from milk from her goat, and paired it with a sort of flatbread. It made an excellent appetizer. She also baked a batch of her famous yucca cookies. Heinrich brought a bottle of aquavit he said had been given to him the last time Count von Luckner had been through the islands. He had been saving it for a special occasion. I suppose he must have deemed this adequate, and perhaps he had started celebrating the occasion a bit early, as the bottle had obviously been sampled from. It was impossible to be an alcoholic on the islands, but I have no doubt that both Heinrich and Ainslie would have walked miles to get to the pub, were there one.
The Jiménezes were fashionably late, in the Ecuadorian manner. They arrived with a cucumber, radish, and tomato salad. Gansa also brought an avocado-and-banana pudding (it’s better than it sounds). Together with Elke’s cheese and my pork roast, potatoes, and tart, we would have a real meal tonight.
It is difficult to reproduce our conversations because no real sentences were spoken, and yet they seemed to flow as naturally (or nearly so) as a conversation that included people who spoke the same language. Gansa pointed out an improvement to our hearth that made it burn much hotter while consuming less fuel. Elke told a story about the disastrous results the first time she cooked for Heinrich, soon after they met.
Once the aquavit had made its way around the table, the trilingual conversation got more lively. Ainslie loved an audience. He recounted his war experience, how he found himself in the Philippines, then got promoted by accident and sent to France. He told it in English, and I translated into Spanish. The story trickled down into German as well, as Heinrich’s English was not as good as Elke’s. But mostly Ainslie acted it out, his long limbs adding to the buffoonishness of it. Then he and Heinrich acted out their various experiences fighting the French, Heinrich pantomiming his unfortunate arm injury. He showed us how he tried to light his pipe one-handed, which had him following it around the room like a bird trapped indoors. We all laughed.
“I hope the Germans can work things out,” Gansa said in Spanish. “Lord knows we don’t want another world war.”
There was a silence while each of us decided how to respond to her statement. Elke looked at her hands, Heinrich at his pipe
. Gonzalo looked at his wife and I looked at Ainslie. The tension rose, spongy like wet moss.
Ainslie saved the day. “Why is politics never discussed during the meat course?”
No one spoke.
“Because one gives you indigestion and the other needs steak sauce.”
Elke began to laugh first. She translated for Heinrich and then into Spanish for Gansa and Gonzalo, who also giggled.
“Is the coffee ready, do you think?” Ainslie asked.
As I was cleaning up later that evening, belly full as there was no refrigeration for the cheese or bread box for the bread and therefore both had to be eaten that evening (we would never allow a full stomach to let us waste food), Ainslie came up behind me and put his hands on my shoulders. He sighed. “That was fun. Didn’t feel like work.”
“You like people,” I said. “This is hard for you, this living here.” It was easier to talk in the dark when I didn’t have to see his face, just feel his warm body behind me while I scrubbed dishes.
“I’m just glad you’re here with me,” he said. “It would be infinitely harder alone.”
*
Soon after, it was Christmas, and Heinrich and Elke invited us to their casita for dinner. We spent a pleasant evening singing Christmas carols by their fire. The Jiménezes came as well, and I finally met the Weiss family, and I agreed with Ainslie that their child did not look well. I made a note to myself that when the next luxury yacht with a doctor stopped, I would insist that he attend to the child. The Muellers had visited earlier in the day with a gift of many lemons, which was nice enough of them.
There was chicha (a rice and corn beer) and a rum made from sugarcane, but Ainslie only had a sip. Lest you think he was being abstemious, it tastes rather like curdled milk. Elke had decorated with a small artificial tree that looked oddly out of place where nothing else had been machine-produced. On the table lay her good tablecloth dotted with hibiscus blossoms. She had sliced all varieties of fruits and vegetables: four kinds of bananas, pineapples, tomatoes, avocados, guavas. But the pièce de résistance was her Weihnachtskuchen, several kinds of traditional German Christmas cakes and cookies. She must have saved up the refined sugar, white flour, and baking powder for months.
When we sang “Silent Night” in our respective languages, Ainslie took my hand. I let myself believe for a moment that he and I experienced such a moment of peace as I would assume most Christians feel on the holiest of days. His warmth spread, though I had not known that I was cold.
*
The new year in the Galápagos means the end of the rainy season and the return of abundant sunshine. It was wonderful to see the sun again, until the heat wave hit. Even with a hat my brain turned to mush under its rays. Everyone was lethargic; all activity had to cease midday for a siesta in the shade, and fanning ourselves was not worth the effort. I have never anywhere experienced heat like this. When it was this hot, my body began to shut down all nonessential functions. I moved little; I spoke little; I ate little. I was reduced to my reptilian brain—breathing, sleeping, blinking.
Then finally it rained and the heat broke and I resumed functioning again, albeit slowly, to reap the fruits of our labor in the garden. The year anniversary of our arrival on the islands was fast approaching, the end of our period of service. Ainslie waited until April and asked about the plans for our removal in his weekly radio check-in. It must have taken a while to trickle up to HQ, as we heard nothing back. We could not leave until we had our orders, and though we could have caught a ride back to Guayaquil with one of the passing boats, until we had an actual piece of paper, we risked being charged with going AWOL. Why we had not thought of this before we left, I don’t know. But we would have to wait.
It was not a hardship. I found myself extremely at peace. Ainslie and Elke were tremendously good company, and there was so much satisfaction in eating only what we grew with our own hands. I slept like a puppy at night, exhausted from my labors, and felt younger than I had in years. My hands grew tough with calluses, and I ceased to wear shoes most of the time. I was proud of myself and what I was doing. And a little bit of Ainslie’s “improvement syndrome” must have hit me, for I started enlarging the garden, though I knew we might have to abandon it at any time.
By the time Ainslie heard back from HQ, I was happily planting another row of each vegetable, and even some flowers for sheer decoration. They wanted us to stay another year. And could Ainslie write a feasibility study for a potential military outpost on the island (water, place for an airstrip, etc.)? I told Ainslie I’d like to, blasé, without thinking, and he agreed and so there was no reason to discuss it any further.
*
In May, Ainslie happened to be up high on the pampa and could therefore spot the incoming boat from very far. So it was that we were down on the beach waiting when it dropped anchor. It was the Seeteufel, whose captain was Count von Luckner, provider of the aquavit that had so enhanced our dinner party. By then I had heard all sorts of stories about Luckner, from nearly everyone who came to the islands and from Elke and Heinrich, who considered him a good friend. There was no way he could live up to his reputation. Supposedly, he was the strongest man anyone had ever seen. He could bend nails with one hand, lift large rocks without aid. He was a trained opera baritone and spoke six languages as a native. During the Great War he had been a feared pirate who managed to commandeer ships without bloodshed, and he escaped from a prison in New Zealand. He was also an accomplished magician. Really, he was the stuff of legend.
So imagine my excitement when I knew I would finally get to meet this modern-day Hercules. The dinghy approached. I suppose he was handsome. Even if his hair was thinning, he had typical chiseled German features. As to his physique, I suppose he was muscular, and even a bit large, unlike all the other Europeans I knew in the Galápagos, who were thin and wiry. One thing I did notice was how pale he was, even after thirty years on the sea.
He stepped daintily out of the boat before it beached, and made his way to land where he took my hand and kissed it passionately. I couldn’t help it; I giggled. “Felix Graf von Luckner, a votre service.” He bowed low.
“I’m Frances Conway, and this is my husband, Ainslie.”
“Of course I know,” he said. His English was fluent, yes, but he would be hard-pressed to convince any native speaker that it was his mother tongue. “The reports of your beauty did not do you justice.” Now I knew he was merely slinging sunshine; I’d been called a lot of things in my life, but beautiful was not one. Handsome, perhaps, or winsome. Beautiful, not likely. He extended his hand to Ainslie to shake. “Sir,” he said.
Ainslie shook briefly then pulled his hand back and rubbed it.
While we’d been talking, Elke and Heinrich had arrived on the beach. The count kissed Elke’s hand and shook Heinrich’s. All this time his companions had been unloading crates from the panga. Elke, Heinrich, and the count exchanged pleasantries in German. I could understand them, but it was hardly the stuff of spying. Gossip about people they knew in common, who had given birth, how so-and-so’s rheumatism was. They knew Elke’s cousin in common, and the count told her a story about running into him at the cinema in Berlin, and also something about a small dog which I didn’t quite get.
Elke and Heinrich’s hound had accompanied them, and she knew the count as well. He must have given her treats when he last saw her, for she turned in circles in excitement, sniffing at his pockets and crotch. The count bent over and wrestled her head playfully, then fed her something out of his pocket. As ludicrous as I found this man, I had to admire his ability to charm every living thing.
He parceled out his gifts—for me a new frying pan (how did he know?) and for Ainslie some real tobacco from the West Indies. For Elke he brought a stack of magazines and mail. Heinrich actually was a journalist; his byline appeared and was translated into magazines all over the globe. Perhaps Elke had told me the literal truth—they were a journalist and his lover escaping her husband. The two pieces in
English talked about our life on the island. One was a humorous struggle to make their house a home, and the other talked about the food they grew and shot. Of the Norwegian version we could make neither head nor tails, but the count assured us it was a faithful translation.
In one of the magazines there was a picture of me and Ainslie along with Elke and Heinrich. Ainslie was a giant, and I was laughing about something with my mouth open. My hair was in disarray, and I was holding one of our larger chickens. Ainslie’s gaze was outside the photo, toward something distant; he had a humoring smile on his face. Elke and Heinrich were holding hands. We looked, to all unsuspecting eyes, like a pair of neighbors having a drink in the summertime. We looked like we were having fun.
It bothered me that I couldn’t remember having had that picture taken. Everyone who visited Floreana wanted to take pictures of us, the zoo animals. We generally obliged. The picture was indistinguishable from the others—I was wearing the same thing in all of them, of course, as was everyone. A moment captured on film forever and forgotten by me.
The count had our mail. I was hoping for a letter from Rosalie. I had received one per month, though they arrived in clumps of two or three via the consulate in Guayaquil where I’m sure someone read them. Though they were deadly dull, full of news about people I didn’t remember meeting or the exploits of her children, I savored them. But today there was nothing for me except the magazine subscriptions, held for me at the American Express office in Guayaquil. I was excited to get to read Life and The Saturday Evening Post. There were a good six issues of each.
And then the count invited everyone back to his ship for supper. The Seeteufel was large and well-appointed, even if it was showing its age a bit. It had been outfitted as a goodwill touring yacht, so it had comfortable staterooms and a large gathering salon. We ate fish, canned vegetables, and even cow cheese (what a luxury!). Most of all, we drank wine, a good German Riesling, which was deliciously cold. I might have had more than my share.
Enchanted Islands Page 23
