Children of the Dusk

by Berliner, Janet

  Bruqah shook his head vehemently. "Zana-Malata can live only within she own self. Same as me. My people, Vazimba, no longer a tribe. We are like traveler's tree. We nourish Malagasy who need us."

  Miriam opened her eyes and looked down the west side of the hill through a break in the foliage. She pointed toward another, smaller hill. "This island can't be more than five kilometers square," she said to Sol. "One of Erich's books called it two hills and an apron of rain forest."

  Bruqah spread his arms as if to encompass the sun. "Once before, this island drowned in blood. Bruqah died, then."

  "You mean your ancestors died," Sol said.

  "I mean Bruqah," the Malagasy said quietly. "You know little, Solly. But you will learn...next time island drowns in blood."

  Sol watched what looked like a ground squirrel poke a berry into its mouth, masticating with absolute concentration. The human intruders were of no concern, the food its universe. A deep envy overwhelmed Sol. How dare it be wiser than he, to know such single-mindedness of purpose? He must learn survival from such animals.

  He looked around, assessing his friends and adversaries, who sat or stood milling in four groups. The largest group were his fellow Jews, one hundred and forty-two men who, against his better judgment, called him rabbi and leader. They had been plucked, like himself, from the degradation of Sachsenhausen, to be in the lead party for the Nazi's planned forced exodus.

  Next in number were forty Nazi guards, also products of the camp, hand-picked for the expedition by Hempel, who had returned and stood with a hand on the shoulder of Wasj Pleshdimer, the murderer who in Sachsenhausen had been elevated to barracks guard. Both men appeared to be looking at something down slope of the shack. At Hempel's feet, his wolfhound whined. Also at Hempel's feet, leashed like the dog, was young Misha. A great sadness took hold of Sol, and he promised himself that he would find a way soon to communicate with the boy.

  He looked at Erich, the man whom he had once called blood brother and, at Erich's insistence--inventing a ceremony to match --a brother-in-blood. Why, Sol chided himself, had he never before considered the implications of that syntactic twist? For him, blood had meant kinship. For Erich it had meant...what? He claimed he had no family. His mother and father, though still living, were dead as far as he was concerned. Miriam was his by right of marriage but not love, and the child only possibly his, and that perhaps by virtue of rape. He loved his dogs and communed with them, or so he asserted, but they were hardly blood relatives. Still he did love them, all twelve of them but most especially Taurus, and he certainly felt affection for the eleven other trainers who made up his zodiac team. The Abwehr canine command had been selected by Himmler himself for the expedition, probably because Erich and his men had proven too powerful, and possibly too non-Nazi, for Reichsführer Himmler to allow them to remain in Germany any longer.

  As for the Nazi Party, which so many officers loved as family, Erich Alois hated it.

  Lounging in smaller groups among the others were sailors from the Altmark, the supply ship for Germany's indomitable raider, the Graf Spee. They would leave soon, Solomon was sure, and with them Tyrolt, the ship's doctor. Miriam was doubtless dreading that, for she would soon need medical attention. And Sol too needed Doctor Tyrolt. Not for his physical needs but for his psyche. Tyrolt alone among all the Nazis he had met was a man Sol felt he could trust.

  Several dogs jumped up, growling, as two ox-like animals, humped and sporting enormous dewlaps, huge ears, and curved horns, wandered from beyond the shack and into the clearing. Their appearance broke Sol's reverie.

  "Zebu," Bruqah said, brightening.

  Sol knew that the animals, while not sacred to the Malagasy, were the main measure of wealth among the islanders.

  "Zebulun," he said to Bruqah. "Jacob's tenth son. Father of the tribe of Israel. What might he have thought of this place?"

  Bruqah wasn't listening. He stood, hands on hips and head thrust forward. The mouselemur perched on his left shoulder also leaned forward. It was as if both man and animal were appraising the zebus' worth.

  Pleshdimer raised his rifle and Bruqah's face went vapid with horror.

  "No!" Bruqah ran toward the Kapo. "Please, no, do not shoot!"

  Pleshdimer hesitated. Hempel squeezed his shoulder and the Kapo swung the rifle across his back and took off in a waddling run toward the animals. Waving his arms and yelling, he chased the zebu from the clearing.

  Sol looked down at Miriam. He was about to tell her he would find her some water to drink when Erich came striding across the meadow and stopped beside them. Sol ignored him, effecting a studied nonchalance. Erich steered his gaze clear of all of them. "Will whoever lives there come back, Bruqah?" he asked, pointing at the lopsided shack.

  "Of course." The mouselemur, which seemed to be perpetually on Bruqah's shoulder, shifted position away from Erich. It clung to Bruqah's hair, its sad, dark eyes too large for so tiny a head. "All Malagash come back. Living or dead, they come. As Bruqah come back."

  "Bruqah is Vazimba. His ancestors came from Indonesia," Miriam said, to Sol's surprise. He wondered how she could talk to Erich, after all he had done to her. "He told me that his people were Madagascar's first inhabitants."

  Sol started to say something to Miriam, then stopped as it dawned on him that she was not speaking to Erich at all, not looking at him but through him. As though he did not exist. What had Bruqah called Nosy Mangabéy, back on the ship? Island where the dead dream.

  He shuddered, wondering where the ghost that had inhabited him for seventeen years had gone.

  "Vazimba, first race," Bruqah said. "Zana-Malata, last race." His teeth were bared in what could have been mistaken for a smile, but a hard look had risen into his eyes. "We are beginning and end, he and me."

  "You know the man who lives there?" Erich asked.

  "For too long." As if to end the discussion, Bruqah reached up to one side, plucked a fig from a tree, and handed it to Miriam along with a piece of wild ginger.

  "Ha-haai! Ha-haai!"

  Like spectators at a stadium, heads turned in unison to look in the direction of the sound, Erich's among them.

  The cry came again from the northern edge of the surrounding forest, this time followed by the body of a creature that looked like a cross between the flying squirrel and the lemurs Sol had seen illustrated in the books about Madagascar. With the grace of a trapeze artist, the animal leapt from the overstory and landed on a beech branch entwined with liana the size of a man's arm. Slowly, almost insolently, the creature raised its plumed tail.

  "Ha-haai! Ha-haai!"

  Sol stared at the coppery ball of fur. Its two enormous, sad-looking eyes seemed to stare back at him with human intelligence. Its tail was wrapped around the liana and its fingers gripped the branch.

  As if carefully timing his action for maximum dramatic effect, Hempel unsnapped his holster, and lifted and aimed his Mann. Misha seized the opportunity and scuttled toward the closest group of Jews, two of whom put their arms around him protectively. The wolfhound hunkered down in the grass and waited.

  "Ha-haai! Ha-haai!"

  The major smiled a tight-lipped smile and clicked off his safety catch.

  "Don't shoot," Erich ordered, apparently fascinated by the creature.

  Hempel did not immediately lower the Mann. The aye-aye, with almost human understanding, lifted its left hand and pointed at Hempel. It had a thumb and three fingers, the middle one of which extended far beyond the other two--fleshless as the finger of a corpse long dead.

  "H'aye-aye have finger of death," Bruqah said.

  The mouselemur on his shoulder squeaked and burrowed down, but the Malagasy did not appear to notice. He stood perfectly still, his usually placid features rigid with fear.

  Commanding his wolfhound to stay, Hempel strode toward Bruqah. "Shut your mouth, or I'll kill you where you stand."

  Something made Sol look back at the aye-aye. Its hand was still raised, its long bony finger extended to
ward the wolfhound, which had risen to its feet in defiance of Hempel's orders.

  Back arched, snarling, Boris turned to face the trees.

  Into the silence came a muffled roar, like the distant thunder of an approaching storm, followed by another. Clearer this time. Closer. Accompanied by the pounding of hooves through the underbrush and a blur of movement, a massive boar, head lowered, burst from the brush. In a lightning movement that defied the creature's lumbering bulk, it lifted the wolfhound high into the air and held it up there, a bloody trophy impaled upon one curved horn. Lowering its head once more, it shook off the dog's body, and raised its foot. A shot rang out. The boar looked up, snorted, shook itself, and trotted back into the forest.

  Hempel walked over to his dog and nudged it with his boot. Like statuary imbued with life, the rest of the stunned watchers returned to movement. The shepherds, growling, tugged at their leashes, and the aye-aye, its business apparently finished, leapt back into the overstory.

  "Dead?" Erich strode over to where Hempel stood, gun in hand, and looked down at the wolfhound. Even at a distance, Sol could see that it was a bloody heap of fur and flesh.

  "Might as well be," Hempel said. "Fat lot of good he will be to me now."

  "Shoot him."

  Erich issued the order without raising his voice, yet loudly and firmly enough to be heard over the shepherds.

  Hempel turned to face him. "Who the hell are you to order me to shoot my dog?"

  "I am the commanding officer of this operation."

  Hempel paused, raised his gun, and aimed down at the dog. "For now," he said.

  If he could shoot Erich instead, he would, Sol thought, watching the unfolding tableau. Miriam had told him about Killi, the dog Hitler had ordered Erich to shoot during the Olympics party at Pfaueninsel--Berlin's Peacock Island. Sol wondered if Pfaueninsel torchlights flickered, now, within Erich's brain.

  But Erich was not looking at the wolfhound, or at Hempel. He was staring at a bare-chested, sinewy black man who had stepped from the shack and into the clearing. He was clothed in a ragged clay-colored loincloth that matched the red that peppered his curly white hair. As he stood surveying the newcomers to his domain, two animals with red fur and feline faces joined him, muzzles twitching.

  There's more lunacy here than The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Sol thought, as the shepherds again started up their insane barking.

  "The dogs they care not for the fossas," Bruqah remarked.

  Hempel swiveled and pointed the Mann at the newcomer. Judging from the look on his face, it would not take much to make him use it. Small wonder, Sol thought. Simply looking at the wiry black man was a challenge. There was a gaping pink hole where his nose and mouth should have been. The hand he held up to Erich in mock greeting was eaten away like the flesh of a leper. Dangling from his fingers like an offering was a large gray wriggling worm.

  Seeing that he had Erich's attention, the man tilted his head. With some innate sense of drama, he waited just long enough to allow the horror around him to peak. Then his tongue emerged to envelope the worm and draw it down into his throat.

  "Pisces, no!"

  Pulling free from his trainer, who was apparently too caught up in the spectacle to hold firmly to the choke chain, one of the dogs bounded at the black man.

  The fossas whirled around and darted into the underbrush. Reacting almost as fast, the black man leapt toward the hut and scrambled beneath it. The dog leapt after him, frenziedly digging his way under the structure.

  Sol waited for the screams of pain which must come when a trained killer tears into the flesh of man. He turned his head to look at Erich, then at the faces of the other watchers. Their expressions held varying degrees of expectation and horror.

  From underneath the hut, came a mewling conciliatory cry, and the faceless creature crawled out on his elbows. Swiveling on his stomach, the muscles on his lean back glistening with his sweat, he reached underneath the hut and drew out the dog by its chain.

  The dog lay passively where he left it, inert, defeated, head hanging limply.

  Sol turned his attention back to Erich. A series of emotions played across his features: puzzlement; admiration; jealousy; and finally anger. Either the creature's empathic abilities with dogs far exceeded Erich's own or this was another demonstration of African magic at work.

  The stranger stood up. The hole that had once been his mouth turned upward in a ghoulish imitation of a smile. Placing his hands on his hips, he bowed slightly as if acknowledging his victory. Sol heard Erich's dog, Taurus, whimpering softly from her stretcher; dysplasia--inflammation of the hip joint--had rendered her almost incapable of walking. Beside her, likewise bound to a stretcher, lay Aquarius, ill nearly to the point of death from the long journey.

  One dog crippled, one near death from seasickness, one gored to death, one turned into a rag doll by some crazy Malagasy...and we've just arrived, Sol thought. Perhaps there is hope for escape after all.

  "Bruqah!" Erich turned and shouted. "What the hell! Who--what--is that thing?"

  "Zana-Malata."

  "Leper?"

  "Syphilitic." Bruqah gripped his crotch for emphasis.

  "By the looks of him, that thing turns twigs into something less benign than chameleons," Miriam told Sol with an edge of fear.

  Sol started to reassure her but stopped when he realized that he felt much the same way. Apparently sorcery was endemic to Africa. He was sure they would find out soon enough what that meant to them. For now they both had watch and learn.

  "Let the dogs go!" Erich commanded. "Stop that bastard!"

  Snarling, nine healthy shepherds leapt forward. From the encircling forest, varicolored birds lifted into startled flight. The screams of lemurs joined with the softly insistent shrill of an aye-aye hidden in the trees.

  The dogs never reached their victim.

  When they were close enough so he could surely feel their heated breath, the Zana-Malata crouched and patted the earth.

  Sol watched in disbelief as the animals that comprised what was probably Germany's finest canine contingent stopped in their tracks and, in unison and panting heavily, crawled on their bellies to huddle like house pets around the man's feet.

  Again, Sol witnessed Erich's struggle to understand the Zana-Malata's control over the dogs.

  "How the devil--?" Erich asked Bruqah.

  The Malagasy tapped his temple. "He like you with the dogs, Mister Germantownman."

  Sol turned his attention back to the Zana-Malata. Ignoring the ruckus, the syphilitic made his way across the clearing toward Hempel. Either because he recognized the Zana-Malata as a potentially powerful ally, or perhaps because he, like the dogs, was an animal being controlled, the major moved toward him. Misha left what little protection and comfort the prisoners could offer and, knowing he would be beaten if he failed to stay close to the major, trailed behind, head down.

  Motioning for Hempel to follow him, the Zana-Malata bent down and gathered the wolfhound in his arms. Seemingly without effort, he lifted the animal and carried it into the shack, leaving Sol to wonder if the heat had already affected his brain and caused him to imagine the whole thing.

  Pistol in hand, Erich burst past the dogs. They rose to their feet and shook themselves, disoriented. He leapt the shack's steps and slapped past the zebu-hide door, only to re-emerge moments later. For a split second he went rigid. His hand shot out as if seeking support, and his head snapped up.

  "M-must have g-gone out a b-back way."

  He waved the gun, but it seemed to be a motion without purpose. Sol waited for him to order dogs and trainers, perhaps the guards as well, into the surrounding rain forest to search for the man. Instead, he stumbled down the steps. "F-forget him, f-for now," he stammered.

  Sol had not heard Erich stammer in fifteen years. Had the lightning, petite mal seizure--finished almost the moment it occurred--had a greater effect on him than usual?

  "W-we'll deal with him later," Erich told his troops.
Confidence was returning to his face and voice, and his stammering was already less pronounced. "We have a military compound to build. W-we must always--always--keep our primary mission in mind."

  Moving with an easy kind of grace despite the heat, the soggy earth, and the momentary physical lapse, he turned to look at the inhabitants of his new empire.

  "Though I...I'm a man of action rather than words," he began, "I feel I should inform you of why you are here and what our plans are for you." He started a slow pacing in front of the men, who gathered together despite the animosity between the guards, sailors, and dog trainers. The prisoners likewise clustered, though apart from the Nazis.

  "Four hundred years ago," Erich continued, "this tiny island, here in the middle of Antongil Bay, was the site of the hospital of a colony began by one Augustus de Benyowsky, a Hungarian-Polish Count who attempted to civilize the local tribes...and wrote Madagascar's first constitution. Two hundred years after that, the island served as a base for British pirates. Later, it belonged to the French. Now"--he made a fist, showing his resolve--"it is the F-Fatherland's turn. What we create here on Mangabéy is only a beginning. Eventually, we will also p-penetrate the mainland." He turned his attention toward the prisoners. "Shiploads of Jews will follow you here. This is your new homeland." He looked at Sol. "Your Jerusalem--"

  Sol stopped listening. Erich's desire for a benign dictatorship was pathetic. Even if he meant what he said, Hempel would never allow it. The Jews' hope for survival lay in Sol's recovering his wits and strength. He recalled the voices of his mentors, voices from visions he had experienced for seventeen years as the result of the dybbuk, the wandering soul, that had possessed him since that terrible day when he had witnessed the assassination of Germany's Foreign Minister, Walther Rathenau, a Jew, and Miriam's uncle.

  Eyes closed, Solomon recalled the words of Beadle Cohen, his mentor: sometimes souls seek refuge in the bodies of living persons, causing instability, speaking foreign words through their mouths. Such lost souls, the beadle had maintained, were unable to transmigrate to a higher world because they had sinned against humanity.