Bertil is surfing with Vanessa. He really can surf after two weeks. Surfing has taken him over. He spends hours in the surf. Now he is wearing a T-shirt which reads It is not tragic to die doing something you love. Nellie is a little nervous. I promise to speak to Vanessa to make sure that a life-saver is always around when Bertil is surfing. He hasn’t yet tried to ride the very big breakers that come roaring towards the beach. He makes a good job of the smaller waves. I can see that his eyes are on the big surf, which can be terrifying. Bertil tells me, without irony, that surfing is a ‘post-capitalism pastime’. I think he means that it is another way of seeing the world; that the objectives of surfing are entirely personal, without rules; that the ocean is absolutely free and democratic; that it gives no special favours to bankers … et cetera.
Little Isaac wants to surf too. He stands on the beach watching Vanessa and Bertil. They wave to him from the deep water. I take him on a body-board in shallow water with a rope attached and launch him into the gentle waves. He tries to stand up, but so far standing up is beyond him. I show him how I body-surf, without a board at all, but he is not interested. He wants to be a surf dude riding the big waves. It is heart-rending how persistent he is and how often and how cheerfully he falls off the board. God, he is two and a half years old. I too have found myself becoming besotted with him. Bertil and Vanessa often come onto the beach to talk to him and to help him. He is like the baby Jesus, suggesting some special insight. He seems wonderfully happy among us. He calls Lucinda ‘Mom’; there is no mention of another mother. Nellie and I have stopped worrying about where he should be by rights. We have become unnaturally, even culpably, relaxed. Lindiwe is trying to teach Isaac some Xhosa, as if he should be able to speak it because he is black. Actually ‘black’ doesn’t quite describe Isaac. His skin is honey-coloured. His hair has become reddish. Lucinda swims every day now. We are all in thrall to the sea and its magical powers.
I have the idea that I should travel to Natal to see Piet Retief’s grave. I am not sure what I am hoping to find. I see that Nellie and Lucinda don’t really want to come; I detect a little weariness when I bring up Piet’s name. So I suggest we all fly to Durban and book into a hotel so that Bertil can surf, Isaac can paddle, and Lucinda and Nellie can relax on the beach or in the hotel’s swimming pool. And I will set off early in the morning to see the grave, alone if nobody else wants to come, and I will return in the evening. I agree that I should take a driver.
I remember from my childhood only one of Durban’s aspects, the rickshaws on the seafront, pulled by Zulus dressed in extravagant versions of traditional dress, all feathers and porcupine quills and beadwork. The rickshaw men in those days had cow horns on their heads. These rickshaws were once the taxis of Durban, but for many years now they have been a local entertainment, taking tourists for an energetic ride along the front. We watch as they parade, leaping in the air, whistling and shouting as if they were going into battle.
Nellie thinks it would be demeaning to the men to take a ride. On the other hand, we would be supporting local initiative. Isaac and I take a ride and he loves it. He waves at Nellie and Lucinda as we go floating by, and he laughs when our driver leaps in the air blowing a whistle and we can see the ocean through his legs. The air here is heavy and steamy indicating that we have wandered into the tropics. We all go down to the beach to cool off; Bertil wants to try the surfing; he has researched it online and he knows exactly where the best surfing is, Veetchies Break. Surfers have their occult networks. Isaac has an ice cream, which quickly melts onto his vulnerable little chicken chest. Suddenly I see to my amazement Bertil catching a long break and riding it at speed. He is our hero. In a few weeks he has become muscled and brown and quietly pleased with himself. He has the surfer look, a tolerant, visionary appearance. His hair is bleached by the sun and by the ocean.
‘Did you know you could do that?’ I ask him when he comes out of the surf, shaking the water from his head.
‘I was like hoping to try one of these breaks I had read about and we just took off.’
‘You looked so good, Bertil,’ said Nellie. ‘For a moment I couldn’t believe it when Frank said it was you.’
‘I recognised you by your cozzie. The flying palm trees.’
‘It was luck really,’ says Bertil. But we are not fooled.
Lucinda is by the pool at the hotel. We tell her about Bertil’s triumph. She congratulates him as if it is a major development. He smiles modestly.
‘You are one cool dude,’ she says. ‘Nellie, will you be able to look after Isaac if I go with Dad tomorrow to wherever it is he is going?’
‘Of course, darling. I would love to look after him.’
I have been waiting for an opportunity to speak to Lucinda and I am glad that she suggested coming with me. What my father would have called a proper conversation. So far she has still been something of a wraith, not wholly with us. But she has been amiable and content, which is enough for me at this time. I see that this place has had a profound effect on all of us. Living by the sea seems to encourage us to follow its rhythms and to have an awareness of the tides and waves that mark the hours.
Landscapes, I think, remind one of home and encourage a longing to be home. When I am at my house under the mountain, by the sea, I feel that I am home, despite the violence and the desperation that are never far away.