by Tony Park
As Isabella had finished tying the bandage, a grey bird, about the size of a seagull, but with a large, fanned crest, landed on the windowsill and gave a whining call from the other side of the ragged flyscreen. Kway-kway, it mourned.
‘What do you want, bird? I see him every day, you know, and always he talks to me like this,’ Isabella said to both Mike and the bird as she removed her latex gloves with a snap.
‘He’s telling you to go away,’ he said.
‘What do you mean, go away? He is the one who should go away.’
‘It’s a grey lourie – a male. He is called the “go-away” bird because of his call. Listen.’ They both stayed silent and the bird gave his call again.
‘It sounds like something else to me,’ she said, as the lourie took off, perhaps unnerved by their sudden interest in him. ‘Like those lizards, the one’s that say “fuck you”,’ she added, utterly deadpan. She had watched his face for a reaction. He had laughed aloud.
She then asked him how he knew about the bird and, when he explained, tested him by pointing out a few more at random from the window. He stood, and to see the birds, all of which he identified correctly, he had to stand so close to her that they were almost touching. He smelled the perspiration on her body and the shampoo on her hair. For a second he felt like he needed to sit down, and he didn’t think it was the loss of blood from his wound.
‘I’ve been here in Africa for nearly a year and, do you know, I know no birds and I have not seen any animals at all. Not even an elephant. Have you seen an elephant, Major?’ she asked.
They had moved away from the window and he was now lacing his boot. She sat on the edge of the cheap steel desk, her legs swinging like a little girl’s as she filled out some details on her clipboard.
‘I’ve seen plenty of elephants, and lion and leopard and buffalo, you name it.’
‘Here in Mozambique?’
‘No, in the bush here all you see are snakes and landmines.’
She laughed. ‘So you have been on the safari?’
‘I’m a trained safari guide.’
‘Tell me how an Australian soldier becomes a safari guide.’
‘Over dinner. It’s a long story,’ he had said, as he stood to leave, testing the weight on his bad foot. Instinctively, he reached in his top pocket and drew out his cigarettes and Zippo lighter.
‘Those things will kill you, you know,’ she said, changing the subject.
‘Not as quickly as a landmine,’ he replied. He feared he had been too forward in inviting her to dinner, and had blown his chances.
She smiled and said, ‘May I?’ She reached for the packet of cigarettes in his hand. Soft, clean fingers had brushed his as she took one from the pack. ‘Come, I walk with you outside.’
As they stood in the strong morning sunshine she raised the cigarette to her lips and leaned towards him. He lit both their cigarettes.
She reclined against the grubby white concrete of the building, cocked her head to one side and said, ‘You ask me out to dinner, but how do you know I’m not married?’
‘You’re here. This isn’t a country you bring a husband or a wife to. This is a place for people who are married to their jobs. And besides, you’re not wearing a ring.’
‘I would not wear a ring during a surgical procedure anyway. Are you married to your job, Major Mike?’
‘I suppose I am, but I’d file for a divorce today if I got a better offer. What about dinner?’
‘That is the best offer I have had all day.’ She gave a little laugh as she exhaled and added, ‘In fact, it is the only offer I have had today.’
She must have gone home for the afternoon siesta, he realised, because when he arrived back at the hospital that evening she had changed. She wore a pale blue sleeveless summer dress with a short hemline that showed off her legs. Her leather sandals slapped on the linoleum floor as she walked out into the reception area of the hospital to meet him. A pink tropical flower behind her ear softened her short hairdo. A gold bangle worn high above her elbow complemented her olive skin perfectly and he was almost drunk at the sight of her.
‘I’m sorry, I don’t even know your first name,’ Mike had said as he led her out of the decaying hospital to where he had parked the Nissan.
‘Isabella. I was wondering when you would ask.’ She laughed. She pronounced her name with the accent on the bell. He opened the door for her and offered his hand to help her up. She declined and he had to force himself to turn away as she slid up into the seat, revealing a stretch of golden thigh. They had made small talk during the short drive about the state of Maputo’s roads, as he dodged potholes, motorcycles, chapas and vendors selling everything from live chickens to bootlaces.
They ate lobster on the verandah of the Costa do Sol hotel, watching the bobbing lights of small fishing boats and their reflections waver like shimmering silver ribbons out on the dark Indian Ocean. He told her how he came to be a qualified safari guide, and of his travels for work and pleasure in Africa. He had brought along an old field guide on the birds of southern Africa and told Isabella she could keep it for as long as she wanted.
She seemed genuinely pleased by the gesture and looked up the page with a picture of the grey lourie. ‘Our bird,’ she said, finishing her glass of vinho verde. They laughed and he filled her glass again.
‘Tell me your story, Isabella. I find it hard to believe you’re not married.’
‘I prefer women,’ she said.
He had coughed, choking on his wine and had to wipe his mouth with his serviette.
‘No,’ she giggled, reaching out to pat his hand reassuringly. ‘I am joking. Are you OK?’
He had nodded and taken another sip of wine while she continued. ‘I come from a good Catholic family, from Lisbon. I go to good school and to university, but my parents, they don’t like my taste in men. I met a man while I was at university. He was a poet and we lived together. I used my allowance to support him, but my parents, they threaten to cut me off unless we break up.’
‘And did you?’ he asked, as she paused to take a long sip of wine and stub out her cigarette.
‘I told them we were going to get married. He had asked me, but I had been putting it off. I loved him very much and I knew then for sure that I wanted to spend all my days with this man. Then, one day when I was working as an intern at a hospital in Lisbon I see him in the corridor. “What is wrong?” I ask him.’
She looked out at the ocean and took another sip of wine. He sat in silence, letting her finish in her own time. She blinked her eyes twice, took a breath, and said, ‘ “Cancer,” he says to me. We got married and I watched him die. I was with him at the end.’
‘I’m so sorry, Isabella.’
‘Is not your fault. In Lisbon there was too much to remind me of him. All my friends, they are so sorry for me. And my family, I hate them because I think they are secretly pleased he is gone. So, I disappoint them all and pack up and come to Mozambique. Now is your turn.’
He told her about Janice and the baby and how he had given up on the thought of marrying again, which, he realised as he looked deep into her dark eyes, was a lie.
‘I am sorry about your marriage and your baby. You are alone, like me, but I think you like it here in Mozambique, no?’
‘I like it here, yes. How can you tell?’
‘I see it in your eyes.’
He had stared hard into her dark eyes, watching the dance of the reflected flickering candlelight. He could have stayed like that, transfixed, forever. But it was late, and the waiter was hovering nearby.
They called it a night and she had given him a little peck on the cheek when he dropped her outside her apartment block. He offered to walk her up, but she declined.
‘Can I see you again?’ he had asked her as she turned to walk up the path to her building.
‘Of course, next time you have another ingrown toenail you know where to find me.’
‘I’m serious.’
�
��I know you are. You are too serious, and I am joking.’
He saw her again whenever he could, and she seemed as excited as he was at each new meeting. They went to the beach together at weekends, to dinner in the evenings and to a cocktail party at the American high commission that Jake had invited him to. All the men had stared at her and all their wives did too, but for different reasons.
A month after their first meeting he was in Jake’s office looking at a map of southern Mozambique and discussing a new area into which they were about to send a mine-clearing team when there was a knock at the door. It was MacDonald, the team’s big, red-faced Scottish quartermaster and transport officer, who complained that one of the Nissans needed a new rear window, and that the Maputo dealership had none in stock.
‘How long will it take them to get one in?’ Jake asked.
‘Near enough two weeks,’ MacDonald replied, acknowledging Mike’s presence with a nod.
‘Without a window it’ll get stolen again the first time we park it on a public street,’ Mike said. The vehicle in question had already been stolen once, although the South African Police had recovered it in Komatipoort, just across the border. The thieves had re-sprayed the vehicle a metallic blue, which everyone thought was much nicer than the original white.
‘I’d head across the border to South Africa and pick up a window over there, only I’m supposed to go north tomorrow for a spot of leave, boss,’ MacDonald added in a half-pleading tone.
The germ of a sweet idea crossed Mike’s mind and he said, ‘I’ll go. But give me the weekend as well.’
Jake knew he was up to something; however, he had little choice but to accede as everyone else was out in the field or, like MacDonald, off on leave.
MacDonald signed the Nissan over to Mike and he drove immediately to the hospital. He had to wait for Isabella to finish operating on a young girl who had lost a hand by trying to pick up a mine. Isabella looked tired and gaunt when she finally stepped out into the reception area where he had been waiting.
‘Poor thing. She will be lucky to escape gangrene once she’s back home in her village,’ she said absently.
‘Sometimes I think we’ve got the easy job. We rarely have to see the results of a landmine detonation. You’ve saved a life today,’ Mike said.
‘Sometimes I just want to scream. Sometimes I just want to run away from this place.’
‘Isabella, I’ve got to go to South Africa for the weekend. Come with me, and I’ll show you all the animals you’ve ever dreamed of,’ he said.
She cocked her head and bit her lip as she stared at him for a few long seconds. He guessed she was wondering where a weekend away would lead their relationship.
‘Where will we stay?’ she finally asked.
‘We’ll camp. In the Kruger National Park. There’s no better game viewing in Africa.’
‘Two tents,’ she said.
‘Two tents,’ he repeated.
They left the next day and sped out of Maputo along the new South African-constructed tollway that links Johannesburg with the beaches of Mozambique. Isabella was wearing khaki bush shorts, rafter sandals and a pink tank top with a black bikini top showing beneath it as a bra. She looked cool and sexy, and Mike realised he had fallen for her completely. He had no idea how the weekend would unfold, but neither, he thought, did she, despite her insistence on separate tents.
The border post was packed with the poor of Mozambique queuing for the chance to serve as cheap labour in the comparative El Dorado of South Africa. The process was hot, tedious and officious, but they had smiled and tried to ease their snail-like progress through customs and immigration on both sides of the border by being friendly to the bored civil servants who, eventually, stamped their passports with an almighty thud-thud.
As always, Mike felt the stress fall off him as they drove through the border gate into South Africa. For a short time at least, he would not be worrying about landmines, the enormity of the job at hand and the risks faced by the men he tasked every day. As a bonus there was a beautiful woman in the car with him this time.
MacDonald had given him the address of a parts place in Nelspruit, the first major town on the South African side, a little over a hundred kilometres past the border. They travelled fast on a road designed for Mercedes and BMWs. Finally, they pulled off the motorway into the hot provincial city and found the auto parts place.
After Mike had signed for the rear window and had it fitted they drove around until they found a supermarket. Together they pushed a shopping trolley up and down the aisles, learning more and more about each other as they stocked up for the weekend.
‘Bran. You must have bran in your cereal,’ she said.
‘I don’t like bran.’
‘Is good for you.’
‘That’s why I don’t like it. How about sugar?’
And so it went on. Mike loved it. Thinking back on it he felt like they were already married. He found himself not minding that prospect at all. They bought huge fillet steaks and a thick, dark coil of boervoers sausage, as well as beers, ice and red wine.
‘We can buy food inside the park, but it’s getting late and we have to be inside the national park and booked into one of the rest camps by no later than six o’clock,’ he told her.
With the sun sinking fast behind them they backtracked down the N4 tollway and raced for the sleepy highway town of Malelane, which they had passed through earlier that day. Mike’s back was sticking to the vinyl seat and Isabella fanned her face with a magazine as they sped through hot, flat country, flanked by sugarcane fields. At Malelane they turned off to the left, following a sign to the Kruger park decorated with the South African National Parks Board’s symbol, a kudu’s head.
Just short of the entrance to the park they crossed the Crocodile River, which forms Kruger’s southern border. Mike stopped on the bridge and coaxed Isabella from the Nissan to the side railing. From below them came a loud honking and bellowing.
‘What is it?’ she asked, a little nervously.
‘Hippo. There, look, he’s leaving the water.’ The great beast, judging it was now cool enough to leave the water, was wading ponderously up the sandy bank, preparing for a night’s feeding.
It was about five by the time Mike had paid their entrance fee to the young woman in khaki at the gate office.
‘What do we do now?’ Isabella asked as a green-uniformed ranger lifted the boom gate and saluted smartly as they drove through. Isabella returned his salute with a solemn look and he smiled back at her, white teeth splitting his broad black face.
‘We look for animals. Roll down your window.’
‘But you said there were lions here. If I open my window I will get eaten,’ she said, turning big eyes on Mike, and he could see she had some genuine concerns about her safety.
‘This is probably the safest place to view game in Africa. All the camps are surrounded by electric fences. The animals are wild, but most of them are used to the sight and sound of vehicles. As long as you keep your head and arms inside, you’ll be fine.’
‘How far are we from Mozambique again?’ she asked.
‘Not far, twenty or thirty kilometres. Kruger runs up and down the border between South Africa and Mozambique. The park’s about four hundred kilometres from top to bottom and about seventy kilometres at its widest.’
Mike was forced to remember his safari guide training as Isabella’s questions started coming in rapid succession.
‘What tree is that? Look, is that a monkey? Is that a deer? Where are the elephants?’
He answered her as best he could as he drove along a sealed road for a while before turning off onto a dirt road that followed a snaking path up into an area of mountain bushveldt which dominated the park’s south-western corner. They stopped to watch a herd of kudu, large buck which stand nearly as high as a man at the shoulder. Mike leaned into the back of the four-wheel drive and freed two cans of Lion lager from the cold box, popped the ring-pulls and handed one to
Isabella. He drank his as greedily as he devoured the sight of the afternoon sunlight playing on Isabella’s golden arms.
The big kudu bull, with his long spiralled horns, returned Isabella’s stare for a full minute or more before trotting off into the bush. His females followed him, one taking fright and jumping high into the air.
They drove on a little further until Isabella cried, ‘Stop!’
There, just off to the left of the road, no more than six or seven metres from the vehicle, was a big male white rhinocerous. Mike killed the engine, and Isabella looked worried. ‘It’s OK,’ he whispered. ‘He’s half blind, but his hearing is excellent. He’ll take off if he’s worried.’
The rhino raised his massive head from the grass he had been grazing on and sniffed the air. His big ears rotated like antennae and he squinted through tiny myopic eyes in the general direction of their vehicle. After a moment he returned to his tasty grass shoots. Isabella was rapt. She rested her chin on her hands on the windowsill and stared at the prehistoric beast. ‘He is beautiful. Just beautiful,’ she whispered.
‘We’ll stay at Malelane Camp. It’s just inside the park, near the gate where we entered. It’s small and quiet, and it overlooks the river,’ he said.
When they arrived it was nearly dark. Apart from a grassy lawn for tents and caravans there were ablution and cooking huts, and a few accommodation chalets, known as rondavels in Afrikaans. There appeared to be only one other couple staying and they were in one of the rondavels.
Mike stopped the Nissan near the fence at the far end of the camping ground, away from the huts and under the spreading boughs of a big, shady marula tree. Four small grey vervet monkeys with black faces darted from the tree in alarm. He knew they’d be back in search of any food left lying out. He quickly began unloading their cooking gear and food. He felt a gentle hand on his shoulder and turned around. Isabella stood quietly and left her hand resting on his shoulder for a second more.
‘Thank you,’ she said, and gave a little smile as she self-consciously removed her hand.
‘What for?’
‘For getting me out of Maputo, for the rhino, for the unhealthy meal you are going to cook me. Sometimes I think I am dying in that hospital. I feel it eating away at me every day and sometimes I think . . . I don’t know, that I will die there too if I don’t get out.’
