Enchanted Islands
Page 24
The talk at dinner turned to politics, and I could feel Ainslie’s ears perk up. The count held forth in both languages about how wonderful Germany was again since Hitler came to power. Ainslie’s distrust of Hitler had infected me and the mention of his name made me nervous, even then, even before we knew what horrors he’d unleash. But the count spoke so fluently and gave such beautiful examples that I had to shake my head to clear the reverie.
Ainslie sat very still during the dinner, smoking one cigarette after another. I could see his knee twitch with the influx of the chemical. Afterward he switched to a pipe, puffing on it like a diver on oxygen. He said very little. I wasn’t sure if this was a tactic or just due to his incomprehension of the parts of the conversation in German. Elke said, “It’s nice to know that the Mutterland is in good hands.”
Heinrich nodded vigorously.
The count motioned to the person who was serving us. The man went out and came back with a flat wrapped object about a foot square. “I bring you this for you, Elke and Heinrich, but also for all of Floreana, with compliments from the Führer.”
Elke unwrapped it to show a portrait of Adolf Hitler. “Danke, Graf Luckner,” she said. “I will make sure it has a place of honor in my home.”
I was abruptly nervous, as though infused with caffeine. I knew Hitler’s view on people like me, that is to say, Jewish people, and also his views on homosexuals. Jews were not welcome in Germany, and by extension now Austria and Czechoslovakia. If he continued on his rise, and on his mission to annex Europe, and if this hatred infected others, we were at risk. I will also admit that I was not pleased to be lumped with Gypsies and homosexuals. Being Jewish was something I was born into; that Ainslie chose to be with other men I thought at that time was a lack of willpower.
My Judaism was not something I thought about often. Sometimes, when talking with Elke, I had to censor a certain memory, but religion didn’t seem to have a place on the island. We all worshipped at the altar of the weather gods, nature, our own self-reliance. Religious faith was incompatible.
Luckner handed us each a printed pamphlet. It was in Spanish and extolled the virtues of a unified and Germanized Europe, with beautiful mountain aeries and buxom fair serving wenches carrying multiple steins of Bier. I scanned the text quickly. What on earth was this supposed to convince people of? And which people were supposed to be convinced? Count von Luckner was too important to be dismissed as a clown, but how was I to read his actions as anything but buffoonish?
The tension in the small room was palpable, the breeze barely blowing. Then Heinrich asked if the count wouldn’t like to perform some tricks, and the count’s mustachioed mouth smiled and he called for something, which arrived in the form of a large black box.
He opened it and rummaged around for a while until he removed a black hat and a white-tipped wand. “Please, someone, give me your watch.” Of course, no one here carried a watch, so no one volunteered. “Very well,” said the count, “I provide my own.” He removed a pocket watch. “This was from my grandfather, ja? The fourth Count of Luckner. It is precious to me, so I will not lose it in the land of magic.”
I giggled, but Elke shot me a severe look so I stifled it. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Ainslie do the same, holding up his pipe so that his hand blocked his mouth. The count put the watch into the hat and waved his wand over it, incanting what was most likely abracadabra in German. Then he flipped the hat high into the air and caught it on his head. The watch was gone. The flipping trick was perhaps the greater feat, but still I applauded. He was not a bad amateur magician.
Afterward he did two card tricks, making the ace of hearts appear under Ainslie’s charger plate, and then pulling out of the deck the card that Elke had picked and sealed in an envelope. Then he lamented that he had no rabbit, but made a Darwin finch appear from the hat. Where had he been keeping the bird all this time?
We were so starved for entertainment that I began to relax and simply enjoy myself. I knew that the count was no mere magician, and this was likely no mere goodwill visit; still, it was a good show. The alcohol slowly took effect. The room was hot and shimmery as if in a dream. The mahogany gleamed; there was carpet on the floor. Carpet! On a ship! I hadn’t seen carpeting in forever. The glasses all matched, and none were chipped. We had eaten vegetables grown outside the islands, food that had been spiced, ice cream even. I saw how someone could be lulled by this excess, by this comfort.
It was reluctantly that we went ashore and made the long trek back to our house. So many of these episodes end, here in the Galápagos, with Ainslie and me trudging home in the dark. Make of that metaphor what you will.
*
The next morning Ainslie asked, “Ready to be a real spy?”
“You mean our super-top-secret feasibility study for a base for a war we probably won’t fight?”
Ainslie ignored my sarcasm. “The portrait of Die Führer.” He exaggerated the German pronunciation. “See if you can get access to its lining. Since you and Frau Elke are such dear friends.” There was some menace behind his statement, but I chose to ignore it.
“Launching Operation Pomegranate,” I said.
I had my opportunity not two days later when I went to Elke’s. She had flowers on a makeshift vase on the table. I was struck again by the civilization of her home. I had made no such improvements to our shack, and even though I thought it was a bit of a waste, to come all the way around the world and then cave to the convention of matching bedspreads, I wondered if Ainslie wouldn’t have preferred me if I were a better homemaker. I still had these thoughts that if I were just a different person, maybe then Ainslie would want me. They came unbidden before I chased them out of my mind.
We batted our gums over tea with goat milk, two terrible-tasting substances that did nothing for each other. Heinrich was working in the garden and called for a hand, and Elke excused herself.
Now was my chance. I took the portrait off the wall. The back was covered with brown paper, already peeling along the edges where the humidity was working its charm. This would be a good hiding place. In fact, it was one of the ones recommended to me during Spy 101.
I was about to tear it farther when I paused. What if this was a trap, to see if I was spying on her? What if she’d rigged up a way to tell if something was disturbed? Another lesson from Spy 101. In fact, I’d already probably disturbed it (a hair, a line of dust). Perhaps she was wondering what this mismatched pair of middle-aged Americans was doing on the islands. I could see things from her point of view, which was startlingly similar to my own. Were we spies? I smiled at the likelihood of Heinrich and Elke having the exact same conversations that Ainslie and I did.
I smoothed my hand over the paper. There was definitely something underneath. But what could it be? It was about the same size as a passport, but also could have been a small book, a manual, or even just a certificate of authenticity for the portrait. I couldn’t tell.
I held the portrait up to the light, but of course I couldn’t see through it. The only way I would know would be to peel back the paper, but no matter how carefully I did it Elke was bound to know that someone had tampered with it, and that the someone was me. Was leaving me here in her house a trap or a test? She was probably looking in on me right now. But no, the dog was sleeping peacefully, which she would never do if her masters were nearby.
If I were to open it and find fake passports, or illicit documents, or…my mind searched for other possibilities and found none plausible, then my friendship with Elke would be over. Not that it was a real friendship—but if I knew for certain that she was here in the same capacity I was, then our afternoons together would be over. It would be too hard to keep up the charade.
And I treasured those afternoons. I genuinely liked her. In another world, we would be friends. And I couldn’t afford to lose the only friend I had, even if it meant that I was a bad spy. I put the portrait back on the wall and told Ainslie I found nothing.
The next time I
came to visit, the portrait was gone.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
News reached us piecemeal of Hitler’s invasion of Poland. First we heard a rumor from an Ecuadorian fishing schooner. It was corroborated by a Norwegian skiff, which was touring the islands looking for possible fishery grounds. Governor Puente stopped by the islands (we hadn’t seen him in a year—governorships were simultaneously a reward and a punishment, and the occupants of the office did not pain themselves trying to fulfill the duties of office) to tell us that members of the Ecuadorian military would be scouting for a place to construct a possible landing strip and a military enclave. That sent our little island into a tizzy. An entire army base? I spent many nights awake worrying that it would come to pass. Ainslie pooh-poohed my worrying in advance. It was Ecuador, remember, where plans were worth less than sucres on the black market. Puente would change his mind a thousand times and then abscond with the money. And that was pretty much what came to pass.
Elke and I avoided the subject of Europe, though she did say she was worried about her children at boarding school in Switzerland if—or when—war broke out. The Great War taught us that wars are started by a few men, and the women and children suffer the consequences. Everyone remembered the shortages during the Greats—War and Depression—and no one wanted to relive that nor wish it on our worst enemies. Elke had a sister, she told me, a bit younger than herself, who had four children. She was married to a local policeman in their small Bavarian town. What would become of them if he got conscripted? Or if England and France decided to retaliate?
Our radio signal was strengthened—we now had access to Guayaquil and Quito without an appointment. Ainslie started going to the radio twice a week for updates. One day he came home with some interesting news. “Elke’s uncle was sent to jail for writing against the Nazis.”
“What does that mean?”
“Not sure,” Ainslie said. “Maybe she’s spying in exchange for his release? Or to prove that her whole family is not that way? Or maybe it’s fabricated?”
This was so like the government, giving intelligence without interpretation so all you could do was file it away under your hat.
“Why would it be fabricated?”
“The Germans love their propaganda. Remember Luckner’s pamphlet? They’ve been feeding misinformation throughout South America for years, have agents in all the major cities.”
“How do you know?” I asked. Ainslie tilted his head in disappointment at me. “I suppose I’m trying to ask what that means for our relationship with Elke and Heinrich. Do we suspect them more or less?”
“Equally,” Ainslie said. “Can we eat?”
*
I had brought along Darwin’s Origin of Species, which I had not read since college. Rereading it gave me solace. It’s the same sort of cold comfort when we look up into a clear sky and see that we are mere specks in the enormous universe. Our actions here on earth contribute, no doubt, to the evolution of civilization, but in such a minor and minuscule way that there is freedom in knowing that what you do doesn’t really matter, can’t matter, in the scheme of things.
Around this time I began to develop ulcers on my legs. I had slipped while hiking in the dark and the scabs never really healed, remaining red and weepy, then turning yellow. They hurt when I walked, then even when I wasn’t walking.
Ainslie frowned at the sores, examining them closely. We poured warm water over my legs, then tried keeping them dry. We treated them with the only alcohol we could find, high-proof German schnapps, but the wounds continued to fester. Soon I was spending most of my time in bed, lying as still as possible.
“When the next ship comes in, Franny, you’re seeing the doctor.”
I wanted to be the brave soul who argued, but I did seem to need medical attention. I started feeling feverish. Throughout our stay, we’d both been free of colds, of course, since we had so little contact with the outside world. We were plagued by minor injuries—sprains, bruises, aches, bites from bugs, and also fungus. Always fungus. But there had never been anything serious. No gunshot wounds or life-threatening illnesses. Until now. I remember feeling very dizzy and then slipping in and out of consciousness.
Ainslie built a large brushfire on the beach as the international signal for “come help us,” and sure enough a tuna boat weighed anchor. Ainslie asked them to go to Chatham and request that a boat with a medical officer stop by. Then I woke up and my arms were tied while Elke poked around with a knife to try to cut out the necrotic tissue. I have never experienced so much pain in my life, searing, fiery agony. Before I passed out, Elke said she thought she saw bone.
As it turns out, a yacht was nearby and a physician was on it. The fishing boat passed on Ainslie’s worry and it quickly motored to Black Bay. This was all told to me afterward, of course, as I was unconscious the whole time.
And what yacht was it, traipsing about our island home? President Roosevelt’s no less, the USS Nourmahal. He was vacationing in the Galápagos and was planning to visit the Americans, so he was headed toward Floreana. Ainslie and Heinrich carried me to the beach and the physician treated my wounds with Dakin’s solution. I’m told I howled; Ainslie said it sounded like a drove of dying donkeys. The doctor wanted me to stay on board with them for a day or two, and so I spent two days luxuriating in a first-class cabin, with electricity for the first time in more than a year, not to mention running water and real bedding. I wish I had been awake to enjoy it.
Ainslie said he met with Roosevelt during this time. I was not allowed to know what was said, or even if Roosevelt was aware of our presence in the Galápagos as intelligence agents before his trip, but Ainslie and I joked later that I had gotten sick on purpose so that he could powwow with the president. I never set eyes on the man, but Ainslie says that he was kind, asking after me.
The president!
*
A month later I was almost healed, back to my regular tasks. Ainslie was arriba and I was at home shelling beans when I heard the honk of a donkey. They really do say “hee-haw.” I wiped my hands quickly on my shorts. It was either a dray belonging to a visitor or a wild donkey raiding my garden. Either way, it would require my immediate attention.
The donkey was indeed foraging through the plants and I could tell by the way it left the lesser melons for the choicer ones that it was one of the island’s domesticated donkeys. It might have been Chuclu; I found donkeys oddly difficult to differentiate. I could tell specific birds from each other, and even the squirrels had personalities, but my hatred of donkeys made them interchangeable.
“Shoo,” I yelled, waving my arms. Occasionally, the donkeys could get mean. I’d seen one turn on its owner on Chatham, bucking and rearing and then pawing him down. The donkey was subdued before it did him harm, and the man merely slapped it on the rump good-naturedly as though it was all in good fun and the donkey had simply won this round. I was not going to be so happy about a charging donkey. This one looked at me with pure condescension in its eyes. It knew an easy mark when it saw one. It dropped the half-eaten melon from its mouth and took a large bite out of a second one, just to spite me. It made sure to twitch its tail at me too, so I knew exactly how much esteem it held for me.
I got braver in the face of this insolence. “Get on out of here!” I said. I was not a total rube; after all, I lived for six years on Mrs. Keane’s farm, where the horses and cows were occasionally intractable, but a wild ass was another thing. I picked up a tin cup and threw it at the donkey. Of course, I missed (I have terrible aim), and it rolled away. The donkey raised an eyebrow at me. So I took a step or two closer and pushed its flank. I was worried it would kick me.
The donkey pushed back at me, forcing me to retreat. I got a pan and a pot, thinking that a loud noise might scare it away, and while my back was turned the donkey trotted over to the table and shoved its nose into my bean pile, eating several hours of work. The rage crashed inside of me. I’m afraid I cursed a blue streak. I’m glad no one heard me.
In other times, other places, I would have let that donkey go with my underthings. But I only had one spare pair, so I could wear one while the other pair was drying. These were extremely important textiles, and I couldn’t let the donkey just run off with them. I took off after him. If he dropped them, I needed to be there to pick them up.
He ran uphill. I recognized the game trail as one leading to Elke and Heinrich’s house; it was the trail their dog took when she bounded ahead. I was able to keep up for a while. And then the donkey turned abruptly down a path that I was not aware of before this moment. The path was less trod, but the marks of pigs’ hooves led me to guess that it, too, was a game trail. The donkey was slowing but still hadn’t dropped my panties. I hoped it would stop at a stream at some point and loosen its jaw to relinquish what was mine. Instead, I followed it deeper and deeper to a place only it knew.
We continued on this way for some time. Thorns tore at my skin and clothing, and I realized how stupid I was being, risking injury, and probably losing what clothing I had left in this bizarre chase. Just then the donkey stopped and I lurched forward to grab my underwear from its mouth. He feinted and bounded onward, and I, committed to my leap, fell over. There was an immediate searing pain in my elbow, and I cursed how idiotic I’d been. I lay on my side for a while as the pain throbbed, trying to catch my breath.
Gingerly, I raised my head and looked at the injury. There was a large thorn embedded half an inch inside the soft part just above my elbow. I removed it, and blood began to emerge. I quickly clamped my hand over it, and now wished that I had the underwear to use as a tourniquet. Instead, I took the handkerchief I often wore around my neck to protect me from sunburn and used it to tie off the bleeding. My arm was beginning to swell.