Soul

by Tobsha Learner

  He groaned softly then extracted her hands. ‘So that’s what this is for,’ he said, grinning and holding up his left hand to indicate his wedding ring. Turning he started pushing her trolley to the exit. She followed reluctantly. ‘Where’s the car?’

  Two men came into sight—a limousine driver and another individual Julia recognised immediately. Colonel Hank Smith-Royston was head of the psychology division of the Department of Defense—the official who had originally authorised her research trip. Why were they here, she wondered nervously. Had she violated some protocol she wasn’t aware of? A report of the ambush in Afghanistan had been filed, and, after assessing her for any psychological trauma, they had debriefed her in Kabul and reassured her that any account of her behaviour was both confidential and sealed. So why the escort now?

  Reading her face, Klaus squeezed her hand reassuringly. ‘Sorry, but the DOD insisted—apparently they have a proposal that can’t wait, and I couldn’t resist the prospect of a stretch limo. But don’t worry, I’ll sit in the front seat like a good boy.’

  ‘We are going straight home?’

  ‘That’s what the big boys promised.’

  Rain splattered against the windows of the limousine. Julia stared out at the miniature oil wells that stood at the edge of the La Brea freeway; the scaled-down mechanisms with the one metal arm ceaselessly pumping had always fascinated her. Colonel Smith-Royston sat beside her. A muscular man in his forties, radiating a humorous irony that Julia suspected helped keep him both buoyant and optimistic in a job that was often grim. He had an empathetic air that allowed one to be comfortably silent in his company.

  ‘It’s nice to see you again, Professor,’ he said smiling.

  ‘You too, Colonel, but I’m kind of surprised.’

  ‘Indeed. I apologise for my audacity.’ He checked his watch. ‘I promise we’ll have you and your husband home within the hour.’

  ‘You’re forgiven. Anyhow, it’s good to know my tax dollar now stretches to a military chauffeur service.’

  He laughed. Julia glanced across at Klaus, who was sitting with the driver in the front, behind the glass partition. She couldn’t hear a word he was saying, but from his animated gestures she guessed he was probably engaging the driver in one of his endless anecdotes about the entertainment industry. Klaus loved an audience, and he also loved extracting stories from lay people—gardeners, chauffeurs, cable technicians—the hidden nuggets of suburban fables.

  The colonel spoke again, lowering his voice. ‘I know this is a little unorthodox, but there is some urgency involved, as well as high security.’

  Julia looked at the briefcase resting next to her companion. ‘If it’s about the ambush…’

  ‘Professor Huntington, we’re in Los Angeles now. Whatever happened over there stays over there.’

  ‘I don’t want anyone to know.’ She indicated Klaus. ‘Not even my husband.’

  ‘I understand.’

  Relieved, Julia relaxed into the plush leather seat. Why was she so ashamed of how she had reacted in the ambush? What was she—some kind of aberration? She examined her psychology with a forensic objectivity: she had acted in self-defence and therefore there was some moral justification to the killing. But what she found so disturbing was the very private acknowledgement that she had experienced a complete lack of remorse, or any other emotion.

  ‘Trust me, Professor, the whole incident is buried. I’m here on an entirely different matter. As you’re aware, the DOD has followed your work for a good decade now, and certainly in my division we’re all big fans.’

  ‘Thank you.’ She replied cautiously, slightly suspicious about where all this flattery was leading to.

  ‘To put it bluntly, we’re offering you a job. A commission. We want you to establish whether there is any possible link between genetic make-up and violence that we could use to identify potential crack combat soldiers specifically to recruit for our Delta Force. We’re looking for people with a genetic propensity for close combat without emotional engagement, who will not, and I repeat, not, suffer from PTSD. In other words, the two per cent you are so obsessed with, Professor. Now I know genetic profiling is currently illegal, but we’re looking to the future here when everyone will be profiled at birth, and we will be allowed to approach those natural born soldiers. Look at it this way: we’re offering to finance—and finance generously—the natural trajectory of your current research.’

  Julia struggled to conceal her excitement. To discover such a gene function would ensure her own scientific legacy, and would secure enough funding to keep the small laboratory she ran at the University of California going for decades. Yet she was aware of the potential pitfalls: the scientific complexity of the research, as well as the ethical questions surrounding the location of such a gene function. Indeed, some research indicated that a gene could lie dormant for generations until an external event—occurring either in utero or in the developing adult—triggered it into activity. Julia’s work involved eliminating the obvious candidate genes, whose various functions were already known, and isolating new genes that may be linked to a psychological and emotional predisposition for close combat. If such a gene function could be identified, Julia knew the army would be quick to capitalise on it.

  The colonel opened his briefcase and pulled out a large brown file. He pushed it across the seat towards her.

  ‘Five hundred twins from the veterans database—all potential subjects for the research. Thought a little ground work might make it easier for you.’

  She waited for a moment, watching him lean forward. She knew he was anxious for her to jump at the opportunity.

  ‘Professor, we both know the terrible cost of posttraumatic stress disorder on ex-soldiers, their families and society itself. If we can locate the men who don’t ever suffer from it, we’ll be doing society and humanity an immense favour.’

  In the ensuing pause while Julia contemplated the offer, the sound of the rain against the windows seemed to grow louder. The colonel glanced out of the window. Julia looked down at his hands; one of them was clenched, betraying his casual façade.

  ‘You don’t have to make a decision now. Sleep on it,’ he murmured.

  The limousine turned into Los Feliz Boulevard then drove past Julia’s local diner. To the colonel’s relief, she lifted the file and rested it on her lap.

  ‘I don’t have to. I’ll take the commission.’

  4

  ‘IT TOOK OVER AN HOUR TO get through customs. I’m amazed they didn’t confiscate my samples.’

  ‘Homeland security,’ Klaus said wryly. ‘The getting of wisdom for this land fair and free.’

  Since the lethal attack on the twin towers of the World Trade Center the previous September, security had become terrifyingly rigorous. Fear laced the air like a sudden chill in every public space, from car parks to baseball grounds.

  Klaus, his black hair sprinkled with sawdust, picked up a chisel and continued his woodcarving. ‘America is like a woman who has lost her virginity in a gang bang. I’m still surprised it’s taken this long for the United States to experience a serious terrorist attack within its borders.’

  ‘Blame our foreign policy. Besides, we’ve had serious terrorist attacks before.’

  Julia, showered and unpacked, caffeine pounding the last of her energy into a jittery wakefulness, felt herself being drawn into a reluctant discussion when all she wanted was to make love. But after she’d told Klaus about the job offer, he’d been uncharacteristically unsupportive.

  ‘You have got no idea,’ he said, looking up from his work. ‘Europe is made from war. Look at the Balkans, the Basque movement, Northern Ireland. My parents still remember famine under the German occupation. Europeans wade through centuries of vendettas, racism and battles over sovereignty every day on the way to the bus stop. A European can’t escape, unless he goes to the New World, and now it’s here too. You know you can’t take this commission,’ he concluded grimly.

  Julia kissed
him across the wood vice, hoping to defuse his darkening mood. The sawdust slipping from his hair showered her cheeks.

  ‘Yeah, and I love you too. But if you can think of another way of making the mortgage, I’m open to suggestions.’

  Klaus frowned. ‘Wonderful, you’ve been back for two hours and we’re already arguing about my inability to match your income.’

  ‘I have to take the job, baby, it’s a huge opportunity.’

  ‘Sweetheart, you always get so swept up you never see the broader implications. This will lead to genetic profiling.’

  ‘Not necessarily.’

  ‘Yes necessarily.’

  Julia stood at the workbench that ran along one side of the tool shed Klaus had redesigned as his writing studio. Built at the back of the yard in the 1950s for a previous resident’s wayward teenage son, the small hut was made from pale pine that still exuded a sweet scent in the summer. It was Klaus’s sanctuary, an inherently masculine domain hung with icons from his Belgian adolescence: Anderlecht football club posters, a photo from a drunken student reunion, a battered hockey stick, a picture of an ex-girlfriend, blonde and toothy, on a horse.

  Above the desk was a shelf packed with books on script writing; next to that stood a metal cabinet filled with television screenplays filed meticulously, the labels winking hopefully: sci-fi, crime, supernatural, comedy—all unproduced.

  The workbench was where Klaus relieved his frustration with his career by constructing things—from small carvings to cabinetmaking. It was a form of meditation for him, this rhythm of the wood rasp, the tattoo and swing of the hammer. It was how the writer stopped thinking, and also how he assuaged his aggravation at the precariousness of the entertainment industry by smashing the occasional object he had created.

  ‘If there is a mutant gene function, and I don’t find it, you realise another geneticist will—eventually. So why not me?’ Julia caressed his shoulder. ‘Please, let’s not argue. I missed you, honey bear.’

  Klaus turned back to his work without responding.

  A half-carved head was clamped in the vice attached to the bench, powdery with shavings. Watching the chisel bite into the rose-tinged wood, Julia tried unsuccessfully to stop her mind crowding with the overwhelming myriad of ethical questions that always swirled around her research. How did her colleagues survive? They all held wildly different opinions. Craig Venter, the maverick who had shocked the scientific community by using a large percentage of his own genome as the first generic prototype, was an agnostic who believed all research was valid. His nemesis, Francis Collins, a born-again Christian, believed in strict ethical codes on research, but still alleged that the discovery and mapping of the genome fell under God’s plan. Then there was the actual pioneer of the genome, James Watson, whose original motivation was to prove that there was no God, no grand designer of man and nature.

  Where did Julia stand among these three schools of thought? The ache of jet lag burned behind her eyes. She sank into a chair and stared over Klaus’s shoulder at the small window framing the sky. A zeppelin advertising Dunlop tyres floated across a corner of the blue canvas. For a moment the ground seemed to tilt slightly with it, as if Julia was still on the airplane, terra firma as insubstantial as the falling air beneath the jet.

  The wood shavings curling back like thick locks of auburn hair, Klaus’s mallet tapping down onto the end of the carving tool in a ceaseless beat—both converged into a seductively familiar rhythm that pressed Julia’s recent experiences in the Middle East into a surreal pastiche that suddenly seemed to belong to somebody else’s memory. You’re home now, she reassured herself. Relax, this is where you belong; no more strange hotel rooms, 4 a.m. drives through collapsed, war-torn suburbs, the gallows humour of bored soldiers, no more ambushes.

  Outside, the rain had stopped and the afternoon sun caught the top of the bench, transforming the wood shaving into a fine golden powder. Julia traced an outline in it with her finger—a small stick figure, a primitive man with a spear in his hand. She looked at the back of her husband’s neck, the soft feathering of his hairline, the tangible presence of him bringing back the sharp sense of missing him when she was away. Two months. They hadn’t made love for two months.

  She moved behind him and gently bit the back of his neck. The beating of the mallet stopped as, groaning softly despite his irritation, Klaus arched his neck in response. Then, pushing back the work chair, he wrapped his long arms around her.

  They kissed and he bit her lower lip playfully. Even after ten years of marriage, Julia still felt that tug of desire, as if Klaus were a new lover with each seduction. Nevertheless, they did not make love enough, and she had often puzzled over the awkward balance between domesticity and desire. She was a workaholic, and both of them were cerebral animals, easily distracted by anxiety. Sometimes Julia fantasised about a life where they could be more spontaneous. She’d even contemplated renting a room to recreate the excitement of a clandestine encounter, to eroticise the familiar.

  Sliding her hand around Klaus’s growing erection, she slipped her tongue into his mouth, curling one leg around him. He kissed her back passionately, all annoyance evaporating.

  He hauled her skirt up over her hips, his fingers between her legs, playing her. Groaning, she propelled him toward the dusty old couch against the wall. Pushing him down, she sank to her knees and took him into her mouth.

  How she loved the scent of him. It was like coming home; the familiar rich buttery concoction, tinged with sweat and something a little darker, was overwhelmingly sexual to her, flooding her with a pungent masculinity that was completely his—his individual pheromone fingerprint.

  He weaved his fingers through her long hair and she felt him growing harder, tremors of pleasure running up his cock, his thighs quivering under her hands. He pulled her face up to his and she mounted him, easing him into her, filling with a delicious sense of recognition as both their bodies relaxed into each other. She paused, the thickness of him causing her to gasp. Searching his face, she could find nothing but affection and the history of all their couplings reflected in his irises, a chronology of moments like these, their time together, their intimacy.

  And then, their lovemaking grew more frenzied, the images of Afghanistan, of the spinning wheel of the Humvee, the blood on the stones, the eyes of the startled goats, all started to leave her as—with each gasp—she was drawn into the moment, into this homecoming, this union that was the core of the two of them.

  Her swollen breasts brushed the stubble on his unshaven chin, his lips tugged at her nipples, as, closing her legs, she drew the ecstasy between them into a tight ambiguity, mounting higher and higher until both of them came—he, buried in the black wave of her hair, she screaming out loud in a tremendous release of grief and deliverance.

  Afterwards, as she lay in the crook of his armpit, Klaus ran his hands thoughtfully across her breasts and down to her belly.

  ‘You’re bigger. Your nipples are darker.’

  She buried her eyes in the underside of his arms, not wanting him to read them.

  ‘Julia?’

  She said nothing but he felt her heart accelerate under his palm.

  ‘You’re pregnant, aren’t you?’

  She nodded, her hair brushing his skin. Klaus sat up, instantly pulling away from her. ‘Great.’

  She looked up to see his face buried in his hands.

  ‘It’s what we’ve always wanted, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’s just that the timing’s so wrong. You have this commission; I have this possible television series.’

  ‘When is it ever right?’

  He looked at her then, and smiled uncertainly.

  ‘Klaus, I want this baby.’

  Kneeling, he placed his head against her belly. ‘Uwl moeder is een genie,’ he murmured to the unborn child.

  ‘I’m not sure that’s going to make him bilingual. But it’s a good beginning. And no, I’m not a genius.’

  ‘Your Flemish is impr
oving. How do you know it’s a boy?’

  ‘Feminine intuition. What do you think of the name Aidan James—after my grandfather and great-grandfather? James Huntington.’

  ‘Okay, my love, Aidan James Huntington-Dumont it is. Julia, Klaus and Aidan—fantastic. Life is good. It’s all going to be okay.’

  For one small moment Julia wondered whether he wasn’t just trying to convince himself.

  5

  The Amazon, 1856

  COLONEL JAMES HUNTINGTON STOOD taller than the men around him, a good foot taller. Gilo, his assistant and translator, adjusted the large box camera that perched awkwardly at the edge of the clearing. Amid the plumes of white curling smoke and against the thick green jungle foliage it looked absurdly incongruous: an icon of a modern world set in a primordial landscape. The anthropologist worried whether Gilo would be able to capture a clear image. The Bakairi had agreed to allow the Colonel to be photographed during the ritual but not themselves. After the Colonel had explained the workings of the camera and assured them it would not steal their spirit—which seemed to be their prevailing fear—and that the instrument would carry their story around the world, the shaman had reluctantly allowed the photography of the villagers in all other practices, but not this—the conjuring up of Evaki, their goddess of day and night.

  The tribesmen had insisted that the Colonel be near naked for the ceremony, his white skin smeared with ochre. He felt as though he were now in the skin of another man—a creature of instinct, despite his scientific bent, his bare feet anchored against the spongy moss and undergrowth, the earth throbbing beneath him as the hallucinogenic trickled through his veins like a thick honey. Already, the branches above him writhed and the sky had begun to turn.

  He was to be initiated as the twenty-second in a group of shamans, and, in keeping with the tribal laws, had fasted the day before to purify his spirit. There was little James Huntington wanted more than this—to be invited to participate in an ancient ritual no white man had been involved in before. The lure of both experience and knowledge was irresistible. The anthropologist’s knees trembled, and his stomach clenched in rhythm with the drums that four young boys—no older than ten—played beside the fire that burned in a shallow pit in the centre of the cleared arena. The other twenty-one initiates stood around him, forming a circle. In the centre stood the chief shaman, his broad wizened face solemn with concentration, the band of red ochre across his cheekbones highlighting the piercing intelligence of his black eyes.