“Don’t believe a word!” fumed the old man, visibly irritated. “American trucks are still the best for this country. A Cummins engine, Fuller box and a set of Rockwell diffs have proven their worth here. Remember we have the toughest stretch for trucks in the world. From Durban to Johannesburg the stress on the drivetrain just never stops. You need the toughest of the tough to survive here.”
“Yes, they’ve served us well,” said Braam. “I remember the Eagles you had when I grew up. You could not kill these things.”
“They were wonderful trucks,” said AB. “Do you remember those trips I made into Africa, sometimes two weeks at a time, sometimes for longer, driving myself?”
“I remember,” said Braam. “You only had five then.”
“But they were good trucks and what was important was that you could fix them on the road yourself, even when you were deep in the Congo.”
“The last of the breed were the N Fourteens,” said Braam. “I was sorry to see them go. After that came the computers. How much money have I not paid to a guy who came out, flicked a switch and billed me two and a half thousand rand? How can you charge me so much? I asked. No, he said, he paid a hundred and forty thousand rand for his diagnostic equipment. He has to recoup his costs. That’s why I bought one myself.”
“How much have you paid again?”
“A hundred and twenty.”
“Plus a mechanic.”
“Yes, plus a mechanic. But it keeps us going. Magnus is not bad.”
“Automatic gearboxes and computers,” sniffed AB. “I still say a good driver is your best guarantee to get mileage out of a tank. In my days we didn’t even have the eighteen speed manual boxes you have now. We learnt on the Fuller crash boxes. If you were a new driver you watched until the revs got to one thousand five hundred and then you changed. No synchros for us. You learnt yourself like that, didn’t you?”
“Yes, I did. You sat by me until I no longer needed to look at the rev counter. I could hear when the engine was ready to change. You taught me how to miss a gear when the going was easy and how to time my stops with traffic lights to economise on the diesel.”
“Nowadays if you give a crash box to a driver he will run away so fast you won’t see him again.”
“It’s easier now to drive a four hundred and eighty horsepower horse than my pick-up. I think I must have another look at the new fully automatic Freightliners.”
“What engine?”
“We’ve had Cats and Detroits now for a while, mixing it with the ISX Cummins. I cannot really say there is a difference. Maybe I must let go some of the older high mileage ones.”
“Who was that other chap that I saw coming there? He stayed quit a long time.”
“Ah, he was from the Transport SETA. Came to speak to me about training my staff.”
“What did you tell him?”
“I basically just listened. It is about getting the money back that we pay toward the skills levies. But to be honest, I could not understand head or tail. It was a paper for this and a paper for that. You have to wait so long for this and so long for that. After two hours I was no further than at the beginning. Fine, I had a few calls in between, but after two hours I told him to come back when he had something simple that I could understand and which did not involve a whole truckload of paperwork. All I can remember of the whole thing is WSP.”
“Sounds like a rugby team. I’m so glad we gave them a hiding this year.”
“Yes, but that was only once. The moment their Super Rugby players came back, we lost again. We must stop having our best players poached.”
“So you continue to pay the skills levy?”
“It’s the law. What else can I do? I pay two percent of payroll every month and I get nothing for it, but I’d rather just continue.”
“That’s the intention,” said old man Malan, angry again. “They are just like the insurance companies. Nobody can understand what they are talking about. Meanwhile they get rich on your money. This is corruption, I tell you.”
“Institutionalised robbery,” agreed Braam. He flapped open his iPad, opened a live satellite map and typed in the numbers of the broken down truck. “Ah, there he is,” he said. Next, he punched in another set of numbers. It was for the mechanic and showed him exactly where he was travelling. He pressed a button and connected. “Hey Magnus, I see on the tracker he is forty kilometres from the city centre. You have another twenty to go.”
“So, how are Magda and Laetitia?” asked AB.
“Just fine,” said Braam.
“Too fine, if you ask me,” said AB. “You spoiled them both and you still do. The one is close to forty and the other one is thirty five. Neither one has a husband. When is this going to change?”
“Nobody is good enough, they say.”
“Bollocks. They just pull up their noses for nothing. You pay them too much. Where in this town do you find two women who earn thirty thousand rand a month for doing office work? Nobody wants them because most of the men don’t want a wife who makes more than him and who drives a Porsche on top of it all.”
“Believe it or not, but they actually want an increase,” said Braam. “And they say you and I are the reasons why they cannot find husbands. We are putting off the men because we are too difficult.”
“What nonsense! It is simply too bad that you don’t have a son who can take over. I hoped for a grandson but now that seems not to be happening either.”
“I still have hope,” said Braam.
“Time is running out,” Malan senior. “You are also not getting younger. In five years you are sixty five.”
“Yes, it went fast.” He grabbed for his phone, because it was ringing again.
“Slowly, slowly,” he said. “Where are you? But you should know every pothole on that road by now. Do what you can to keep the animals off the road. I will send Magnus through just now.”
Braam took his stocky frame off the chair and stomped off the veranda. He shook his fist. “Will it never end?” he asked, looking up.
“What happened?” asked his father.
“My number twenty two just rolled with a full load of cattle.”
“How did it happen?”
“The driver said he went through a pothole that took the whole front left wheel of the truck and caused it to roll over. He said the rain of this afternoon filled it up which is why he could not see how deep it was. I asked him how he could not know about it since he does that route every two days. He said it just got deeper since he had last seen it.”
“It sounds like he is alive.”
“They both are.”
He phoned the mechanic again. “Magnus, we have twenty two rolled on the R357. I will give you the exact position in a minute. Drop off those tyres as quickly as you can and then go help twenty two. I will be there myself.”
“Shouldn’t you call the ambulance?” asked AB.
“No, the driver and the assistant are both unhurt. I suppose they were strapped in.” He dialled another number.
“Gert, bad news. My driver just hit a pothole and rolled the truck, fifteen kilometres from your gate. No, I don’t know what the situation is with the cattle. Yes, I know the price of cattle. I have GIT insurance for the load. We will sort you out. My driver and assistant are there and they sound all right but they will need help with the cattle.”
He speed dialled again.
“Magda, twenty two just rolled on the R357 close to Gert’s farm. Alert the traffic police. The crew is ok. They can send an ambulance as long as I don’t have to pay for it. I do, however, need you to get a vet there to check the cattle. We will need a report for the insurance. Let me know when he is leaving.”
“Second one in a month,” commented old man Malan.
“Yes, second one. Last one was four weeks ago. At this rate nobody will want to insure me anymore. We already pay incredible premiums. Damn roads.”
“You haven’t started paying VAT again?”
“No, Dad.
I refuse to. I will not pay VAT, if I can get away with it, until these roads have been fixed! One way or another they will pay for my damages.”
Phone to the ear, he retraced his steps back to the office where his double cab pick-up was parked.
***
Five years later, at age sixty five, Braam Malan put his business in the market. He just could not take any more, he said. Malan senior had passed away and there still was no heir from his unmarried daughters.
“We’ll split the proceeds of sale of the business in three,” he announced to his offspring, “and then you are on your own.”
As for himself, he and his wife packed their most treasured belongings and moved to the coast. They bought a house twenty minutes away from False Bay’s fishing waters. Being well-off, they settled in a suburb that spoke of money, one with big houses, big lawns and a wonderful vista over the sea and far-off Table Mountain. Their elevation was provided by the slopes of the Kamberg.
***
Grant woke up in confusion. He had no idea where he was until he sensed the lee cloth at his back. He was on a yacht. He was sure it was his own but something felt strange. He looked up at the skylight and saw semi-darkness. Then he figured out what was strange. There was pressure on his feet. He slept with his feet facing forward. He had reasoned that this was the right way, because if, heaven forbid, there was a collision on the high seas, his feet would take the shock instead of his head. Now his feet took steady pressure from the bottom of the bunk. How was this possible? They yacht must be pointing straight downwards!
Another thing that was very strange, was the noise. It was a kind of boom, but unlike anything he had heard before. An engine? No. A jet engine, perhaps. That was the instant in which he knew. The storm! It had caught up with them.
He did not bother with a shirt but clambered aft, up the sloping passage that slanted heavily to port at the same time, using both hands and feet. The steps to the companionway were almost vertical but he used the handgrips and came through. Madeleine was at the wheel in the doghouse but on the other side of the Acrylic behind her towered a mountainous sea. Grant knew at once that he had not seen anything like it before. It was approaching, threatening to engulf them.
The rigging made an overpowering, unearthly, screaming noise that he had not heard before either. Not this loud. His attention, however, was on the wave. Even over the inferno from above he could hear it make swallowing noises as it approached. The wake of the boat led diagonally across it, upwards, to the point where it disappeared in a loose jumble of tumbling white water that rolled down the crest of the wave toward them. There were tons of it. He whipped around and looked in the direction in which they were sailing, following the line of the boat to the bow. His blood froze.
There was no horizon, only green water. The yacht was boring deep into the valley between the monster at their back and the wave in front. He looked straight into the heart of the ocean! It was utterly scary.
With a Herculean effort he wrenched his eyes from the mesmerising sight and looked up at the sails. The first thing that he realised was that the breakers had popped on all the sails. Three sails were up and they were pressed flat to the port side, leeches flailing incredibly fast in their efforts to spill the tempest.
And tempest it was. Beyond the crest of the wave in front of them the sea was pitted as the wind impacted on the surface.
Further out sea and sky melded into a single slate grey entity. Above them the clouds were black and in motion. Madly writhing shapes shot over their heads at incredible speed. Electrical discharges flickered in the dark clouds but over the howling in the rigging he could not hear any thunder.
He wondered what time it was and how long he had slept, because it was dark, as in an hour before sunrise, although it should have been much later.
He made all these observations in the space it takes to breathe in sharply and to hold it in shock or surprise. He breathed out with a shout.
“We are going to pitch-pole!” He grabbed the wheel from Madeleine.
Madeleine did not release.
“Leave it! I know what I’m doing,” she shouted back.
“Let go! Now!” roared Grant. “The mate of the monster of last night has caught up with us. I need to handle this.”
Sensing that he was not going to relent, Madeleine lifted her hands and the boat was his to command. Instinctively, he sought out that fine line between being overwhelmed by the steep wall behind them and getting stuck in the wave in front.
“Go below!” he shouted. “We might not be able to manage this.”
“We can do it!” shouted Madeleine. “There are many that passed through already. I managed them all.”
“What?!”
“I managed them all. You have to let me steer so you can take the sails down. We are going too fast!” She put a hand back on the wheel.
“I don’t know if I can let you.”
“I’ve been doing it. I can surf.”
“So can I!”
“I’ve surfed waves as big as this.”
“So have I. Camps Bay, Cape Town.”
“I’ve won many surfing competitions in Bermuda. What have you won?”
“What have I won? Ask casino managers in half the countries on the planet. Some won’t even let me in anymore.” It was absolutely not the place to talk about casinos but then he was still trying to get a grip on what was going on. A lot was happening at the same time.
The monster roared behind them as it closed in. Grant swivelled around and back again. Madeleine had a point. He could not do everything himself. Besides, this was not the place to argue. He composed himself as best as he could.
“OK, I have no choice. Let me just finish this ride and then you can take over. Look at the speed! We are doing twenty knots! Where is your safety harness?”
“I had no time. It all came so suddenly.”
“You should have called me immediately!”
“I could not leave here. The wind and the waves came at the same time. It surprised me.”
“I’ll give you the wheel once you have your harness on. Whoa, how long was this? Half a minute?” he shouted as the mountainous wave at last passed under them and they slipped back into a gully behind it.
“My longest surf so far this morning was fifty five seconds,” said Madeleine, who was finishing off the straps of her harness. It was a hectic morning. She had a rude awakening. The first big wave that hit them almost rolled the boat and washed her out of the cockpit at the same time. There was no time to think, only to act. She rode the second wave from the open-ended cockpit and then scrambled for the wheel in the doghouse, throwing the hatch shut behind her.
“Clip yourself in right here by the wheel,” said Grant. “You are in danger of falling into the saloon. Use the short tether. Do you see those eyes in the floor? That is what they are there for.”
“I did not know,” said Madeleine as she took over the wheel again.
“Yes, they are not there for you to stump you toes on,” he said. Having mastered the wave he was all bravado on the outside. It was a mixed emotion, because inside he was still shaking, mainly from looking into the deep of the ocean a minute before.
The sails had to come down. The sails with roller furling were first. Working from the cockpit he started with the mizzen. Contrary to his grim expectation it rolled up completely. The headsail also responded as required. He trimmed the sail to a quarter of its size. He guessed that he needed it to lift up the bows, so he did not take it all in. The big challenge, he sensed, was getting the mainsail down. No roller furling there.
Having loosened it from its cleat, he paid out the main halyard. The mainsail it did not drop a millimetre. The horizontal force of the wind simply prevented it from coming down. What now? If plan A did not work, try plan B. What was plan B? He quickly tried to make a run for the main mast. As he stepped outside the cockpit the wind took his feet from under him and he ended up on the lifelines. He knew that he was just luck
y. If his feet had not buckled and he went over the lines he would have been lost. Madeleine watched with big eyes but he suspected she had enough sense not to have tried to turn the boat around, should he have gone overboard. Any attempt at turning in these conditions would mean broaching to and rolling, as sure as night followed day. It felt as if the wind was skinning his skull. In an instant he understood why seafarers wore beards. Looking into the wind was simply impossible. He clipped the tether onto the handrails on the side of the coach house. By clipping, reaching and unclipping a few times he reached the mast.
He tilted his head up to see. It was quite clear what the problem was. The big sail got snagged in the spreaders and the shrouds. He had to straighten it. He knew, however, that it would take wind, instead of spilling it, the moment he attempted that. They were going to speed up as a result, which could be just the edge they needed to pitch-pole. Was there a plan C?
The stern lifted as the next big wave overtook them from behind. How fast did these waves move? He estimated thirty knots. He kneeled at the main mast, not looking back, not wanting Madeleine to see the fear in his eyes. Neither did he look over the bow into the deep again but kept his eyes on the deck until the wave had passed. What to do? They were surviving on a knife’s edge. Every surfer knew that no matter how good you were, it was only a matter of time before some anomaly of nature dunked you. It was part of the challenge. The difference was that a surfer came up again, unharmed in his or her wetsuit and looked for the next one. He was not so sure that they were going to get up again in his boat after going down head first. And if they did, not without a mast or two and probably a few other things as well.
Step by step he fought his way back to the doghouse. “The sail is stuck,” he shouted. “How is the speed?”
“We are not much slower,” said Madeleine.
“I need to pull the mainsail back to get it down,” said Grant. “It will speed up the boat quite a bit.”
“What can we do?” asked Madeleine.
“Pray for a miracle,” said Grant.
Just then there was a lull in the wind. Quickly, Grant slipped out, fed the mainsheet into a motorised winch and tightened it. A minute later the whole sail dropped down through the Lazy Jacks. He tied it down and made his way to the main hatch. Once inside he ran down the companionway, found their stash of heavy weather sails and came back with a storm jib.
The Triangle and The Mountain: A Bermuda Triangle Adventure Page 20
