A yelp wakes me. It’s Phral protesting that Moni hurt him as he turned over. Moni rouses instantly and cuddles Phral. ‘Sorry, sorry …’ Phral licks him forgivingly. Pinkie takes out his notepad and starts scribbling. I wonder what hogwash he’ll fabricate.
Moni’s a soothsayer. Blind, in the tradition of mythic seers, gargantuan in height and cocooned by a nimbus of mysteries, he looks eternal like a lion-headed Hittite deity. The Roma, able to tell people’s ages as unerringly as those of horses, say there’s no span of time engraved on his eyes. This happens, they add, when Fate tangles her strings as She weaves the future. Moni could be as young as a spermatozoon or as old as Big Bang.
Moni starts his day early and follows his nose to run-down neighbourhoods. In the evenings, he plies his vocation in waterfront restaurants. He shuns those who consider clairvoyance a fashionable pastime. He has the gift – as Phral does – of escape, even from unwanted conversations.
He never accepts payment. Grateful punters try to slip a bill into his pocket, but they always fail. The Roma, citing accounts from their own fortune-tellers (who in other circumstances would have regarded Moni as an unwelcome rival), interpret this altruism as the mark of a true diviner. Affirming that his portents are always unerring, they see him as an incarnation of the Theban prophet, Tiresias, who, they claim, was a Roma. That’s worrying, they add, because Tiresias’s avatars appear only at times of cataclysm.
For his auguries, Moni has five circular pebbles that, after years of use, have lost their sheen. Each pebble, he once explained, embodies a primary element: granite for earth; lava for fire; moonstone for sky; coral for sea; a fig’s fossil for evolution. Laying his hands on these pebbles, he shuts his dimmed eyes and delivers his good tidings. He only pronounces good tidings and waits for the bad ones to wreck each other as they eventually do. Most gratifyingly for me, it was Moni who foretold that my life will be forever graced by Belkis.
The Ferry Company, still run by big-hearted mariners, allows him to sleep in their boats and travel gratis. He doesn’t have a family. But allusions to his real identity and the why, how and from where he suddenly appeared seven years ago – about the time Belkis and I met – abound.
Moni himself occasionally quips that he might be a descendant of the shoemaker whom people mistake for the Wandering Jew. More pertinently, he once confessed to Childe Asher that he’ll never know who he is and where he came from because a soothsayer receives the gift only if he forfeits his own past.
He never has any money. The generous meals he and Phral enjoy are forced on them by chefs who elevate regional home-cooking to culinary heights. His clothes are tailored by Armenian seamstresses famous for their skills in copying exclusive creations.
Pinkie lights up another cigarette and continues scribbling.
Phral remains alert.
Phral is another mystery. A few years back, he was a stray playing hide-and-seek with the dogcatchers. One day, while slinking along a busy avenue, he saw Moni stranded on the opposite pavement. He dashed onto the road, brought the cars to a screeching stop and escorted Moni across. Thereafter he has never left Moni’s side.
Phral is enchantingly affectionate to those who esteem Moni, but always wary of unfriendly dogs, suspicious strangers and Pinkies. It was the Roma who, impressed by his devotion to Moni, named him Phral which in Romanes means ‘brother’ and is the origin of our word ‘pal’.
Moni, fully awake now, invites me to his bench. ‘Not swimming today?’
‘No.’
‘Good to see you.’
Pinkie, spurred by Moni’s amity towards me, is writing furiously. I can predict the baloney he’s hatching: ‘Subject meets scruffy bloke in ferry. When latter arrived, subject appeared to be sleeping. On waking up subject contacted bloke. Odd encounter. Recommend check bloke also.’
Moni senses my caution. ‘Ignore him! Fancy good tidings?’
I know the good tidings I seek, but I’m curious to hear what Moni has to say. ‘Sure.’
Moni casts his pebbles.
Phral has the ability to transmit Moni’s vision. But he’ll do so only when trusted souls stroke him.
I stroke the dog.
As Moni trawls the unknown, images appear in my mind’s eye.
A long, wide river.
A hunched figure in a tub made of bulrushes …
‘That’s you, Oric. Sailing in your Moses basket.’
This is the ark in the Nile into which Jochebed placed her baby, Moses, to save him from the Pharaoh’s decree that all new-born Jewish males must be killed. In Moni’s esoteric stratum the basket is the uncertainty to which every mother entrusts her baby.
My Moses basket negotiates tributaries, weirs, rapids.
‘Awesome, eh?’
Time moves on.
My Moses basket has another in tow.
Its occupant has moved into mine.
I ask: ‘That other person – is it Belkis?’
‘Yes. Your twin-soul.’
Time moves further on.
Countless Moses baskets are destroyed; their occupants are massacred by swords, guns, cannons, missiles and nuclear clouds.
My Moses basket is lurching.
Belkis is no longer in it.
‘You again, Oric. A loving man who wants gracious tomorrows, who offers hope to the hopeless – yet desolate as if your Moses basket has become a prison.’
‘Where’s Belkis?’
Two other baskets appear nearby.
‘In her own basket now. With Childe Asher’s next to her.’
I’m talking to somebody …
‘Who am I talking to?’
‘To yourself. Not talking. Quarrelling.’
The baskets of Belkis and Childe Asher pull away.
‘Belkis and Childe Asher – they’re drifting away. Is it because I failed Belkis?’
‘They’re not drifting away. You are.’
‘Me? Makes no sense! Without my Belkis? Without my twin-soul?’
‘Do you wonder why?’
‘I abandoned her!’
‘You stopped navigating. You left her to navigate.’
‘Because she’s better than me.’
‘That’s weakness. You have to do your own navigation.’
My basket is still lurching.
‘I’m lurching … To my end?’
‘Souls don’t have an end. Stop fearing. Fear causes panic.’
‘I know fear. What’s the good tiding?’
Moni collects his pebbles. ‘You’re still in your Moses basket. Still able to navigate. Still imbued with Belkis’s spirit. That’s the good tidings.’
He gets up, hands Phral his leash.
We’ve reached East Strand.
Pinkie has stopped scribbling. Muttering into his mobile, he follows Moni and Phral.
I watch Phral and Moni disembark, like an old couple still in love.
I realise how elementary happiness can be, how all it needs is Love and harmony. Sadly, many who’ve grasped it enjoy it mutely, fearfully. They know that Numen has identified happiness as a threatening force and is determined to root it out.
I should tell him: he won’t succeed. One day happiness will bloom all over the planet. And our odyssey as Dolphineros will reach its destination.
I run after Moni. ‘One more thing …’
‘Yes?’
Pinkie photographs us with his mobile.
‘Will I betray Belkis again?’
Moni’s face oscillates like that of a yogi. ‘I told you way back. You two are destined for each other. Destiny never changes.’
That alleviates my anguish.
Pinkie meets another Pinkie.
Pinkies must be like cabbies at taxi ranks waiting for fares.
The Pinkie from the ferry follows Moni.
The other lingers at the pier.
I think I know why Security is interested in Moni. His good tidings presage a repaired world. Such stuff terrifies Numen.
I’m at the café next to the pier. Earlier it was packed with commuters starting their day with hot drinks. Now there’s only the Pinkie. He’s at a nearby table, smoking while eating a doughnut and watching me.
The café owner and his wife are counting the morning’s takings. They mutter dejectedly. Usual number of teas and coffees sold, but not enough snacks. They’ll have to tighten their belts.
Yet even as they fret, they feel for the commuters. Young, middle-aged or old, most have humdrum jobs. Unable to afford the rents in the city, they’ve holed up in council estates. Their wages – plus the measly overtime they get on national holidays – barely cover the essentials; end of the month many will go cap in hand to moneylenders. Still they’re lucky; they have jobs.
Everywhere there’s fury over unemployment and great empathy for the unemployed. Yet no one blames Numen, condemns him for his personality cult or accuses him of funnelling the nation’s wealth into Swiss banks, wall-to-wall safes, chests and shoe boxes. Why? It can’t be just fear that afflicts people with herd behaviour. Belkis says that it’s battle-fatigue. People no longer have the strength to break silence and tear off blindfolds.
Maybe it’s more deep-rooted than that. A haunting sixth sense and the prescience that the horizon has drained away and that what’s left is the unbearable weight of endless loneliness.
I order another tea and take out my journal. I realise that it is at once a love letter to my wife and son, and a testament to the secret work of the Dolphineros. Once the Leviathans have finished taking their own notes my journal, I hope it finds its way to Childe Asher. It’s my apologia – I want him to hear from me that I tried very hard to be a true Dolphinero. But I surrendered to fear when I should have saved Belkis, whose love coloured my life miraculously. To save colours from grey matters one must shield them, as Newton did when he stacked them in a beam of light.