Wings of the Morning Read online

  Benoit joined him again, asking ‘What do you think of our twin beauties?’

  ‘I think they’re absolutely stunning,’ he said, ‘and not just good looking either. They’re great company and fun to be with.’

  He meant it. But it was certainly true that Aissata and Ouye were very beautiful indeed. He would have liked to have met their mother, or anyway to have seen a picture of her. The girls benefited from the mixed blood of their parentage. Their colour was a striking cafe au lait, they had a marvellous bone structure with a deep forehead, slightly concave cheeks beneath prominent bones, piercing eyes quite deep set in their sockets and a retroussé nose, but if all these came from their mother, they must thank their father for their mouth, wide, warm and welcoming. It was in that feature that David could see Jonas Savimbi so clearly.

  He realised that he was musing in the singular, but that was another point. Look at Aischa and you looked at Ouye. Their likeness was astounding: two outstandingly elegant and feminine girls with poise, style and dramatic figures. I’ll start drooling in a minute, he told himself sternly, and turned back to renew his conversation with Benoit. But even as he did so, Aischa reappeared by his side and before she could say anything, he put the question to her which had formed his reverie.

  ‘How can you two be told apart?’ he asked her.

  Aischa put her hands on her slender hips and smiled down at him.

  ‘We dress differently,’ she replied sweetly, ‘otherwise, you would struggle! Now come over here and talk to Rafa for me. Ouye and I want to come and see you off at the harbour tomorrow, and he’s being difficult about it’.

  She led him away from Benoit who bowed his head in acknowledgement of the superior invitation. David followed the gliding form, graceful in her full length deep maroon skirt surmounted by a deliciously tight fitting top, to where Rafa was still holding court at the head of his table with Ouye taking a seat beside him, her print blouse tucked loosely into tight white jeans which set off her impossibly long legs.

  They partied on. In time, David came to meet almost everybody in the group, and was struck by the warmth of welcome and apparently genuine interest in his provenance, why he was there this evening, when he would be returning. It often happened as the evening wore on that he would find himself back in the company of Benoit, whose conversation was very entertaining. He was sitting with him again when Rafa came up to announce that it was time to head for home.

  ‘After all, David,’ he said, ‘we’ve all got to get up in the morning, but no one more than you’.

  They made some noisy farewells, the bill was somehow settled, and David found himself back in the car park, pleasantly the worse for wear. They did not wait for long before Jaou reappeared with the car, and David was placed beside him in the front whilst the three siblings lounged behind as they drove through almost deserted streets to the large family house. It was 1.30 am.

  They bade each other good night and arranged to breakfast at nine before going to catch the boat. Rafa was worn down by his sisters into agreeing that they could come. He guided David to the door of his room and left him there with wishes to sleep well. David undressed and showered, amazed to note that the clothes he had dropped on the floor were already returned, clean and ironed. The fan over the large bed continued its steady sweep. He stood by the open window for a few minutes, savouring the smell of the sea. The city slept. Somewhere close at hand, a dog barked plaintively. He left a light burning in the bathroom, took a last batch of his pills, and feeling lightheaded from the effects of either the medication or the party or both, he sank naked into the middle of the blissfully comfortable bed and fell instantly asleep.

  It was as dark as before when he woke suddenly and the face of his luminous watch told him that it was just after three in the morning. He felt tense. Something had woken him from a deep sleep and he could not locate the cause. The fan droned on, the dog still barked intermittently, he lay silent and unmoving as he tried to work out what had disturbed him. At last, he raised his head slowly from the pillows and had the immediate sense that the door of the room had opened. His anxiety increased. He was fully awake, suddenly poised for fight or flight, whichever.

  And then a voice spoke from the darkness by the bed head.

  ‘It’s true. You can’t tell us apart if we are dressed the same ... or not dressed at all.’

  Then there was the rustle of the sheet above him, moving as two slender forms slipped into the great bed, one on either side of him.

  For a fleeting instant, strange reactions chased each other through him. Relief that he certainly did not need to either fight or fly, panic at what Rafa would say, much greater panic at what Savimbi would do. And then a marvellous calm as the four arms closed around him and Ouye whispered in his ear.

  ‘This is very forward behaviour. We are not normally quite this naughty, but you’re fun and not here for long, and most important, we do not get many chances to try out an Englishman.’

  After which, of course, he was just twenty-seven, red blooded, slightly drunk, slightly drugged, to hell with anyone else and to hell with any consequences.

  The four arms concentrated into ten fingers marching deliciously across his body, soft mouths alternated with nipping teeth, perfect, pliant breasts danced tantalisingly before him and the moonlight through the window caught the waves of hair cascading halfway down a naked back. The sensuous long legs surrounded him, beneath him, above him and finally encasing him. Yet still there were muffled giggles and endearments, even the feeling of a bit of a scorecard being composed and compared. Above all else, there was a sense of fun.

  If this was not paradise, David had just the time to think to himself, then it was as close as he would ever get.

  He had woken alone, the twins having slipped out in the grey dawn as silently as they arrived. They left the house on schedule and farewells at the harbour had been warm, but decorous. Sad but happy, he watched Mocamedes recede into the distance and dozed for most of the voyage south. The remainder of the trip back to Johannesburg had been uneventful and now it all seemed like a dream, to be wrapped up and treasured, brought out for review from time to time.

  Back in London, however, there had to be confrontation. David went straight from the airport to Westbourne Grove to give Sol and Martin a carefully edited account of his experience.

  ‘Savimbi was right about the journey. That was exactly as it happened. I flew back into Jo’burg and had a last talk to Soldemeyer. I made no commitments about the arms list, but I have a mass to do about stuff for the mines. Now I’m here and you two know what happened. I’m open for questions of course but I do have a few of my own.’

  David stood up from his chair and moved to pour himself another coffee from the pot standing on a side table. Behind him, Sol clasped troubled hands behind his neck and Martin chewed his pencil. It was for Sol to explain to them both, and at last he stared to speak.

  ‘It seems that I should apologise to you boys, and by God I need an apology and an explanation from Glucky. I’ve told you that I met him on a train and I did: it was taking us both from Berlin to Dachau. We were together in the Camp, but we lost touch afterwards. Then here in London, I bumped into him again, but only about ten years ago and that was at Lancaster Gate tube station if you can believe it. Since then, I’ve seen him every six months or so and we’ve talked of this and that — old memories and such like. You can imagine. But we’ve not spoken about business, not really. He said he was in the rag trade — mostly cheap jewellery and I never questioned further although I knew he had a smart address. And he never mentioned the arms business, and I know why. I told him I’d never go near war again or anything to do with it. I’ve seen too much already and suffered from it. I’m suffering still. I guess Glucky got word of a fat opportunity in our part of the world of which he knows nothing and decided he’d try to get my help without asking first. He’d have known my reaction.

  Well, let’s forget it boys, and I’m sorry to have put you th
rough it, Davy. You must have handled yourself well to get out of there. But Glucky has lied to me and fooled me. That’s his mistake as he’s lost any chance of that business now, and my friendship with it. But I’ll get even yet. He owes me now.’

  Sol’s voice drifted away. He was sad and diminished. David could understand why.

  He spoke again. ‘I hope you ‘ll excuse me if I leave now. I need a bit of time to myself.’

  ‘Go, go,’ Sol bellowed, ‘you deserve a break.’

  David went. It was good therapy to walk and think things through. He passed through Kensington Gardens and went on swinging down the pavements of Chelsea and Fulham towards Parson’s Green and home.

  ALEXA BUSHELL — 1971

  In September, Alexa married Peter Bushell, twenty-one months after arriving in Australia.

  It was a marriage of convenience, but also a successful union which brought contentment to them both although they knew that death would part them sooner rather than later.

  On ‘Alexa’s flight’ as he thought of it, Peter had known that he was approaching an early end to his career. A year previously, he had sought advice in Sydney about the persistent tingling in his hands and forearms which had started to trouble him. He was told this was probably the onset of multiple sclerosis and the diagnosis was confirmed by a leading authority in Harley Street, so Peter knew he was heading home to tender his resignation from Qantas.

  That was important, but not urgent. It was the state of Alexa which was screaming critical as the aircraft cruised over the Arafura Sea and entered Australian airspace before putting down at Darwin to refuel. Peter was sitting with her at the back of the plane in an area screened off for crew rest and he was willing her to last the final hop to Sydney. They were taking advice from his brother Mark who would meet the plane on the tarmac at Kingsford Smith and meantime, all he could do was to keep her going by guess and by God.

  Alexa’s condition was deteriorating. She couldn’t or wouldn’t speak now, but she gibbered constantly. She moved around in her seat, tossing her head about, occasionally giving out a high pitched keening sound. Once, when they were in some turbulence, she sprang up with a chilling yell and Peter had to restrain her physically. She was at her best when curled into a foetal position but even then she shivered no matter how many blankets he put over her.

  Peter knew she had been lucky, even if she was now almost wiped out. Lucky that someone had sent that message, lucky that Aveling was there for her, lucky they had got out of Bahraini airspace. She was luckier still that he now had help for her from within his own family.

  Mark Bushell was his only sibling and about ten years younger, in his mid-forties. Mark was a psychiatrist. He had trained in general medicine and studied further at the expense of the Australian government. Enlisted in their Army Medical Corps, he had spent time in Vietnam and emerged as a specialist in post-traumatic stress disorders. The brothers, different in appearance and professions, had always been close despite the age gap, a natural friendship enhanced through the tragedy of losing both parents in a car crash when Mark was still a schoolboy. He had grown to be a big, cuddly man. He was much darker than Peter, habitually in need of a shave. He had a great crop of curly black hair, ran easily to overweight and wore heavy horn rimmed spectacles. He had a marvellous humour always at the ready, and spoke in an irreverent, typically Australian style at odds with his profession. But in the dawn of the seventies, Mark Bushell stood at the forefront of international expertise in the treatment of severe mental disturbance and Peter felt a profound relief as his brother took over at Sydney Airport, emanating calm and care as he helped Alexa into the private ambulance which stood on the tarmac. If anyone could help her, it would be his younger brother.

  Peter went off to handle the paperwork and make his own phone calls. He spoke to Joffrey and Elizabeth Labarre in Paris and they came running to arrive at Alexa’s bedside two days later. They were shocked to the core by the zombie state of their only daughter, whom they had last seen as a clever, beautiful and composed young woman, if a little wilful. Alexa had been placed in a private clinic in North Sydney, to which Mark Bushell was one of several consultants. At that point, she had no idea who she was, where she was, whether she was alive or dead, not even sure which she wanted to be. She was heavily sedated, fundamentally damaged. She was unconscious and uncaring. She did not recognise her parents but actually shrank from them.

  Mark Bushell kept his consulting rooms in the city, in Pitt Street, but he lived at Castle Crag on the North Shore with his wife and two children. He spent much time at the Clinic which was convenient to his home and the day before the Labarres flew back to Paris, they sat together in a small lounge close to Alexa’s bedroom, where they were joined by Peter. Elizabeth asked Mark when they should return to see their daughter.

  Mark knitted his brow and steepled his hands as he answered, ‘Look, Elizabeth, I’m buggered if I know. I’m only the shrink around here you know.’

  They all had a laugh, even Peter who heard it coming. He knew his brother’s style of giving confidence to anxious relatives. Mark continued,

  ‘The best way I can put it is this. If Alexa had been seriously injured in some accident and I said to you that she was on life support, then you’d understand, right? She wouldn’t be able to survive without machines taking over the vital functions until she became fit to fly free again.’

  Joffrey Labarre nodded at him.

  ‘OK’, resumed Mark, ‘then what I’m asking you to appreciate is that Alexa is now on life support. It’s necessary, not for her body but for her brain and that’s the most complex element of what makes us all tick. The medication I’m giving her is cutting edge stuff, plus I’m experimenting as we go. It’s supporting her, but only to the extent of keeping her reasonably calm. That’s just the start of getting back her sanity and any sort of normality, like the rest of us. I’m sorry, but I can’t tell you yet how long this stage will continue. I can’t even say if it will succeed. Alexa is very damaged, very traumatised. She has panophobia which means she’s suffering terror and blind panic attacks which are way beyond the experience of the rest of us.

  I’m putting this to you in such stark terms because you have to understand if you’re going to help her later on. Alexa is in very deep trouble, and I don’t know if she can come through this. But if anyone can help her through, I believe I can. So all I ask of you is to trust me, and to trust Alexa herself. If we can do this thing, we’ll do it together. And remember, I’ll never bullshit you. I’ll always tell you how I see things. Right now I’m saying fly on home, stay in close contact, plan on being back in six weeks or so. Otherwise, just hope and pray.’

  Joffrey Labarre felt shattered, and yet perversely a lifting of his spirits. Here was honest to God truth. He didn’t feel inclined to ask for more.

  ‘We’ll see you in six weeks to the day, Mark. And thank you.’

  He swept Elizabeth up in his arms and guided her away on their first steps back home to France. They returned in mid-February as planned and went on travelling regularly between Paris and Sydney during all that year. In the interim periods, they spoke every Friday to Mark who gave them the unvarnished facts. He had to report that Alexa’s progress was patchy and spasmodic. She veered from suicidal to aggressive to lucid: huge mood swings and instant changes of mindset. She would encourage Mark one day only to have the most savage regression on the next. He felt both challenged and depressed. Deliberately, he matched her vagaries with his own stark differences in approach. Sometimes he would be all tea and sympathy, consoling her as the victim of monstrous abuse, but in other conversations he would be very tough, reprimanding her for being unable to find the courage to confront her demons.

  Over Christmas, Alexa had a visit from her younger brother Bernard and Mark saw that his presence was a therapy. He managed to drag Alexa from her listlessness to share memories of childhood days in the chateau outside Limoges, to talk even of their long lost brother Michel, sometimes even
to laugh a little. That was a start and by the time Mark was again with Elizabeth and Joffrey in March 1971, he was able to give them positive news.

  ‘Look,’ he said, ‘you’re going to see a change in Alexa this trip. Somehow we’ve found a trigger point. Something has tripped a switch in her mind and she is now saying, acting and believing that she can get her life back. Honest to God, I don’t know whether that is due to the medication or to my sessions with her. Whatever, I’m sure that Bernard played a part. Best guess is that we were able to keep her going whilst she found the key for herself. It’s extraordinary what the human brain and spirit can accomplish, but they need the surroundings which give them the chance to recover themselves. Look back to the First World War and you’ll find shell shock victims who did make it back to mental stability, but not while they were still in Flanders.’

  The Labarres recognised that Mark was making light of his own professional efforts. They were uplifted by the improvement in Alexa and even more delighted when they returned in April, exchanging the early scent of spring in Paris for bright autumn colours in Sydney. They could sense their daughter coming back to them, a bittersweet contrast to the homecoming which had never happened for her brother Michel.

  Mark told them, ‘She’s turned the corner, no question. But there’s something else you should know. My big brother Pete is often here to be with her. He’s part of the therapy for Alexa, and I’ve got a professional and personal involvement. His own sickness has really got its claws into him. In many cases, MS means a gradual deterioration over a long period. But for some, it can be a real aggressive son of a bitch and Pete is seriously affected. He’s completely out of Qantas now and he’ll never fly again. He still drives although I’m not so sure he should. His reaction time is way down. His speech is sometimes a bit slurred and he’s just about always using a stick to help him walk. But with all this, Pete hardly lets a day go by without coming to see Alexa and to be brutally honest, I think it helps her to feel she’s moving forwards while someone near and dear is getting worse. That’s the brain for you. Anyway, you see and judge for yourselves.’