She heard it before I did, and looked up. So did Tonk and Bart. They weren’t alarmed, but they were excited, surprised. Then I saw him too, high above us, swinging through the branches. It was Other One. He’d come back. I was so pleased to see him. But there was something strange going on, something I couldn’t understand at all. I thought I could hear him breathing. But that wasn’t possible, because he was far away, thirty, maybe forty feet above us. Yet I was definitely hearing the sound of breathing, heavy breathing.
In fact it wasn’t just breathing, it was heaving, it was puffing and blowing and snorting. Then I knew. Then I understood. No one puffed and blew and snorted like that, except Oona. As I stood up, I saw Oona come wandering out of the trees towards the rock, her trunk reaching slowly up towards me, scenting for me, feeling for me. And walking along on all fours just behind her was another dark-haired orang-utan, a female. Like Oona, she had stopped now, and was gazing up at me.
“What kept you, Oona?” I said. And then the tears did come.
Burning bright
nce down off the rock, I set the three little orang-utans down on the ground. With Oona there towering over them, they were reluctant to leave me at first, but then Charlie seemed to recognise the dark-haired orang-utan as one of her own. She needed no encouragement after that. Giving a wide berth to Oona, she scampered over to what must have seemed to her at long last to be a proper-looking mother. Tonk and Bart followed, and soon the mother orang-utan was being besieged by all three. She looked a little overwhelmed, as they clambered all over her, but perfectly happy. I noticed though that it was with Charlie that she was at her most attentive, most affectionate.
Oona’s trunk was the only part of her I could hug – I’d done it often enough before. I waited for the deep rumble of contentment that I remembered so well, and sure enough it came, vibrating all through her, and all through me too. It was so good to feel that wrinkled roughness again, to trace once again the patterns of the pinkish markings in her skin, to look up into her all-seeing eyes, to be wafted again by her great ears. She was still dusty from some recent mud bath, and a bit smelly too, but it was an old familiar smell, that I found as reassuring as the rest of her.
She was turning then, kneeling for me, her trunk curling around and lifting me up on to her neck. I was back where I loved to be, where I belonged. I caught a glimpse of Other One too, sitting high up above us in among the leaves, looking down on us all, satisfaction written all over his face, as if he had engineered this whole thing, had somehow brought us all together. I believed at that moment that he had, and I still believe it.
“Thank you, Other One,” I cried. “Thank you, Oona.” I was whooping and punching the air then, the sheer joy of the moment surging through me. “You see, Charlie, Bart, Tonk, I told you Oona would come looking for us. I knew she’d find us. I knew it.” But the little orang-utans were far too busy with their new-found mother, to be listening to me at all. They were all over her and all over each other too, squealing with excitement, jockeying for the best place to get the most attention. She was sharing it out as well as she could, but the longer I watched the more it became clear to me that little Charlie might well be her own baby, that she was without any question her favoured one. She was the only one she was allowing to try to suckle, her little fists clenched tight in her mother’s straggly brown hair.
Bart and Tonk were not rejected as such, not pushed away. They were allowed to cling on, but not to interfere with Charlie. As I looked on, I felt overwhelmed by a huge sense of relief. Not only was I safely back with Oona, but the three little orang-utans I had looked after all this time had survived their ordeal, and were at last reunited with one of their own kind.
I noticed then for the first time that there was a livid red scar across the mother orang-utan’s forehead, and that she often held her left arm up across her chest, supporting it if she could with her other hand, as if she was nursing a damaged shoulder. I was sure of it then. This had to be the mother I’d seen falling out of the fig tree that day, the one that had been lying there, dead as I had thought, with her baby still clutching her. And Charlie was that baby.
A bullet must have grazed the mother’s forehead. She’d fallen out of the fig tree, and had lain there unconscious on the ground, while the hunters grabbed Charlie and carried her off. I knew well enough by now just how tight Charlie would have clung to her, how they must have had to tear her off her mother. The whole picture of the brutality of the massacre flashed through my mind then, enraging me all over again. But not even that could take away how privileged I felt at that moment, to be there to witness the tenderness of their reunion.
There was enough fruit and water to be found for us all to be able to stay where we were by the rock for the rest of the day. Other One hung around, literally sometimes, and watched from afar as the little orang-utans gambolled about, swinging in among the trees, ambushing one another. I’d never seen them so relaxed and happy.
Sitting alone up on the rock, with Oona busy at her feeding and the orang-utans at play, I’ve got to admit that after a while I was beginning to feel ignored, abandoned even. It was as if they had forgotten all about me. So when I saw the mother climbing up the rock towards me, and bringing the little ones with her, I felt very grateful to her. She came to sit nearby, watching me, considering me. I sensed caution in her gaze, but approval too, almost as if the little ones had told her everything that had happened, about all we had been through together – which I knew was absurd, but I thought it anyway. And when after some time she reached out and touched my hand, I felt sure there was real affection in the gesture, and maybe even gratitude.
That evening the mother orang-utan climbed high into a tree, to make her sleeping nest, carrying all three of them. She went a great deal higher than I had ever managed. Again, I have to say I did feel excluded, which was ridiculous, I know, but it was why I left my rock, and went to lie down on the forest floor with Oona in the crook of her leg, braving the damp and the creepy-crawlies. I didn’t want to be alone. I wanted to be close to her that night. I was missing my little family, and the intimacy of the sleeping nest.
But I had forgotten what good company Oona was, and what a good listener too. Never for one moment could I forget she was there. She was right beside me, the whole wonderful wrinkly, smelly, leathery bulk of her. I think I must have told her everything that night, all about Mister Anthony and Kaya and our escape from the cage, about the hunters and their dogs who came after us.
She kept touching me from time to time with the tip of her trunk, to reassure me perhaps; or maybe to reassure both of us, herself as well, that this had really happened, that we were together again, and not dreaming it. As I told her my story, leaning back against her side, hands behind my head, I could hear her stomach churning and gurgling and groaning. As I expected, of course, this familiar elephant melody would be accompanied by a formidable elephant fart whenever she felt like it, which was often. This was one of many reasons why I think I must have gone to sleep that night with a laugh in my heart and a big big smile on my face.
I was nudged awake next morning by Oona’s trunk. She wanted me to get up. The first thing I noticed was that the jungle was filled with mist. Everything was lost in it, except Oona and the looming shadow of the rock, and the forest floor. Oona was unsettled, troubled by something, tossing her head. She wanted to be on her way, and she was in a hurry too. It was then that I began to realise that there was something wrong about the mist, something strange and unnatural. It didn’t drift in among the high canopy of the jungle as I’d seen it so often before. Instead it hung low everywhere, clinging to the trees. It was swirling all about us, snaking its way through the forest. And it wasn’t white, but almost yellow. It smelled different too. Now I knew it for what it was. It wasn’t mist at all. It was smoke, drifting smoke. The jungle was on fire. The jungle was burning.
As I listened, I could hear, above me and around me, that all the invisible creatures of the forest wer
e on the move. Whooping, cackling, cawing and screeching, they were fleeing for their lives. I could only hope that in among them somewhere were the mother orang-utan and the three little ones, and Other One.
I felt Oona’s trunk come around me, pulling me in. She was urging me to mount. I needed little encouragement. I climbed up on to her neck. She was on the move at once, striding out, almost on the run already. She lifted her trunk and trumpeted. Then she was charging through the trees in full flight. Because everything had happened so fast, I hadn’t been able to collect my thoughts. It was a while before I could, and when I did everything became horribly clear. I remembered then what Mister Anthony had told me, every chilling word: “I burn them down. I make a ruddy great bonfire of the forest.”
We were careering through the trees now. It was all I could do not to fall off. It was a while since I’d ridden Oona, and not since the day of the tsunami had she ever stampeded quite like this. It took me some time to find my balance again, my riding seat, but I rediscovered my old technique quickly enough. I gripped with my legs, dug my heels into her neck, and managed to ride the pitch and toss, clutching desperately on to any folds of skin my fingers could cling on to. But however fast Oona was running from it, the smoke seemed always to be there, all around us. In patches it was so dense now that I was forced to hold my breath until we were out of it, and that was terrifying, because once in the middle of a suffocating whiteout like this, I would wonder if we’d ever come out of it into clearer air beyond, whether I’d ever be able to take a breath again.
In the end, with less and less good air to breathe, I had to breathe in whatever there was, knowing even as I was doing it, that I had to be taking in as much smoke as air. I forced myself to make believe I was under water, not to breathe at all. But of course, I had to. So then I could only try not to breathe in deeply, not to gasp. But I couldn’t help myself. All I could do then was to try to control the coughing that was racking my whole body.
But the harder I tried to stop myself from coughing, the more I began to choke, and the giddier I was becoming. My whole head felt as if it was filling with smoke. I had my mouth closed. But somehow it seemed to be finding its way into me through my eyes, through my ears. I felt myself fainting, and for a few moments I tried to resist giving in to it. But there was nothing I could do about it. I fell heavily on to the forest floor – I remember that – and lay there for a few moments, gasping for breath. But on the ground I found there was at last some proper air to breathe. I looked up, and saw that Oona was coming back for me. Then she was trying to lift me, to get me to sit up.
With better air to breathe at last I recovered quickly. I had coughed and spluttered the smoke out of my lungs, and was thinking I was feeling just about strong enough now to climb back up on to Oona, when I felt myself being taken very firmly by the hand. I turned to see the mother orang-utan standing beside me, up on her two legs now, the three little ones clinging on to her. The strength in her grip was so powerful that, like it or not, I had to get to my feet and go with her, go wherever she wanted to take me, do whatever she wanted me to do. Her eyes were pleading with me, trying to make me understand. I knew she was telling me something. One look at her arm was enough to know what it was.
From the way she was holding it, I could tell it must be hurting her dreadfully. It was obvious to me then that she could not cope on her own any longer with all three of them, that she needed my help, that she was asking for it. When I reached out a hand, there was barely a moment’s hesitation before Bart grabbed it, and swung himself up on my shoulders, where he grasped my hair with his fists, and hung on, painfully. Tonk followed suit, without even being prompted, and nestled himself contentedly in the crook of my arm. Seemingly satisfied now, the mother orang-utan released my hand, and set off along the trail ahead of us walking three-legged, with Charlie’s arms wrapped round her, and looking back all the while at me over her mother’s shoulder.
I was unsure at first whether I should follow her or not. But when the orang-utan stopped and turned to look back at us, I was left in no doubt then she was waiting for us, that she meant us to follow her, and that she knew exactly where she was going. I had the distinct impression that she was taking charge. Oona seemed to sense it too for she began to move on along the trail following the orang-utan, and without stopping to offer me a ride either. I was a little disappointed at that, until I thought about it. I’d forgotten just how intelligent Oona was, how wise. It took me a while, but I soon understood that she must have known I was far better off where I was, down on the forest floor, out of the worst of the smoke.
Progress was slow now. We were having to travel at the leisurely pace of the mother orang-utan. And in places, where the trail was overgrown, or where it disappeared altogether, we were having to make our way through dense undergrowth. But at least, as we went, the air was becoming easier to breathe for all of us. Little Charlie was still suffering a bit. I could hear her struggling for breath sometimes, wheezing and coughing. We kept moving all through the heavy heat of the day. Then, towards evening a sudden breeze blew up, clearing the smoke at last.
When it came on to rain, when lightning crashed and thunder rolled and rattled over the jungle, it didn’t bother me in the slightest. Bart and Tonk were hating every moment of it, burrowing their heads into whatever crannies in me they could find, an armpit or a neck, but I knew that if this storm could only last long enough, then it would put out any fire Mister Anthony had started.
With the smoke gone, and weary of walking now, I begged a ride up on Oona. I had Bart and Tonk still attached, but as we rode, both of them seemed surprisingly unfazed either by Oona, or by their novel mode of transport. Ahead of us, the mother orang-utan plodded on with Charlie, showing no sign of slowing or stopping, even though the light was beginning to fail. There was an intrepid determination about her gait. Uphill, downhill, she just kept on going. I could see that she knew where she was going too. She wasn’t just wandering aimlessly through the jungle. There could be no doubt about it. This was a trail she knew well. She was our pathfinder, she was showing us the way. We would stop when she was good and ready to stop, and not before.
But then, high above us, I heard and saw that Other One was still with us. He wasn’t shadowing us though, he wasn’t simply accompanying us. He was going on ahead of us, swinging through the trees, in front of the mother orang-utan. It was he that was leading us on our way, not her. I’d got it wrong. She was following him, and we were following both of them. More and more I was coming to think of Other One now as our guardian orang-utan, our guardian angel, that maybe he had been all along, from the very start.
It was nearly dark when we emerged at last out of the forest, into a different world, it seemed to me, and a lighter world too. We were being led along a narrow track, that wound steeply ever upwards, a sheer cliff face to one side of us. The track was only just wide enough for Oona. She trod gingerly, as surefooted and as careful as ever, and I was thankful for that, because I could see there was a drop on the other side of the trail, hundreds of feet down to a river and to the canopy of the forest below. As I looked back I could see all across the distant horizon the glow of a great fire, still burning bright despite the storm, and above it a blackened, apocalyptic sky, flickering with forked lightning.
Oona had stopped in her tracks and I soon understood why. The mother orang-utan had vanished, disappeared with Charlie into the cliff face itself it seemed. But she reappeared some moments later. She was up on two legs now, and appeared to be waiting for us. As we approached her I could see that she was standing outside the mouth of a cave, and making it quite plain that this was to be our refuge for the night.
Oona wasn’t at all sure about this. She used her trunk as her antenna, satisfying herself that all was well before she ventured in. She took her time, and it was just as well. A sudden cloud of screeching bats came whirling out of the cave above our heads, a great roaring rush of them. This mass exodus seemed to go on and on. I was mi
ghtily relieved when it was over. Even after so long in the jungle, I still could never look at a bat without thinking of vampires. I knew they were only fruit bats, but they always alarmed me, particularly when they filled the air like this, in their thousands. Inside, the stench of the cave was so rank and foul that at first I could hardly bear to take a breath at all. But I got used to it.
The cave turned out to be a welcome resting place all the same, and not just for me either. I knew well enough that orang-utans loathed getting wet, and this at least would be dry. I liked dry too, even if the stench was foul. Oona seemed rather disappointed that there wasn’t food about, but that didn’t stop her searching. She found some in the end, as she always did. I could hear her exploring deep in the blackness of the cave. It sounded as if she was rubbing away with her trunk at the roof of the cave. Whatever it was she had discovered there – I thought it must be minerals or salt in the rock maybe – it kept her busy, and happy too. I could tell she was enjoying it, from the endless rumblings of satisfaction that echoed through the cave all night long.
I woke in the middle of the night to find Charlie crawling over me, her breath on my face, and the mother orang-utan sitting beside me holding my hand in hers. I thought then of Mum, of the night after we’d heard the news of Dad’s death, how she’d lain beside me on my bed, how she’d held my hand all night. It was the first time that I’d thought about that in a very long time. I lay awake for the rest of the night, remembering but not crying. I felt strangely unaffected by it. I was remembering it as if it had happened to someone else. It was during that night in the cave that I think I finally accepted that Mum was really gone, that I wouldn’t see her again, whether or not I ever got out of this jungle, whether or not I ever got back home. And there was something else too. It occured to me that I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to get back home at all.
The Classic Morpurgo Collection (six novels) Page 34
