Poor Gloria! Stretching out beside his daughter again, Vince prepared himself for a night of insomnia. His muscles are aching after all these days on the water. This churn of thought, he sensed, the evening’s sounds and images, they wouldn’t release him. Suddenly to know you are dying like that! he remembered, to feel your body changing, you’re head filling with blood. She had rushed to the phone. She had apologised. I’m so, so sorry, Vince. He listened to the words again and again. The minutes passed. Perhaps she had only meant: I’m sorry I’m dying. He let the thoughts flow on. Let them flow. I won’t fight them. She hadn’t meant that. I don’t feel unhappy, he decided. He had seen the girl’s lithe body, her dark sex. It’s strange. He didn’t feel depressed or guilty at all.
LIKE GODS
I know this will sound a bit weirdy — beardy, Clive said, but I want you all to close your eyes for a minute, okay? Close them Phil. Moment’s sheer silence. You’re all kitted up, right, you’re in your boats, nice and tight, okay? You’ve got your hands on your paddles. Good. Now, take three or four long slow breaths, in and out. No, really slow. Fill your lungs and empty them. Mark? Slowly. And again. Okay. And while you’re doing that, I want you to remember the last time you did something really cool in your kayak, something you’re really proud of. Maybe it was the perfect tail squirt. Okay? You went vertical without capsizing. Or maybe you were surfing a busy wave, right on the crest, or you rolled up perfectly in a stopper. Some moment when you and the water seemed to go together like old friends. You were helping each other. The paddle was like a wand. Remember? Picture it. Keep breathing deeply, eyes closed, and picture that moment. Got it? The sheer magic, the well — being, you and the water. It was great. Right, now, on the count of three, I want everyone to say out loud, no, I want you to shout out loud: TODAY I’M GOING TO PADDLE LIKE A GOD! Okay? Then we’ll open our eyes and we’re away. Ready? But I want you to really belt it out, okay? Psyche yourselves up. Even Adam who hates this mystical stuff, he’s going to say it. Right Adam? Okay, on the count of three. One Two Three …
They were lined up on the bank. It had begun to rain, hard. The high plateau was flat here and the river seemed tame enough. I’m going to paddle like a god! they shouted. And again! Go for it! I’m going to paddle like a god! Great, now, everybody launch and eddy out river — right below the bend. Did I hear, like a clod? Max asked. Like a sod! Brian giggled. Your buoyancy aid’s not buckled, Adam muttered to his son. Buckle it.
Michela didn’t shout with the others. She hadn’t eaten breakfast. Enjoy yourself, Keith had told Vince by the kitchen tent. Remember, the leader said, the key to survival is to be totally alert and totally relaxed at the same time. The Louts were cooking bacon sandwiches. The Slobs prepared the packed lunches. Food in the boat today, guys! And never fight the water, the leader confided. Which is funny, I know, coming from a guy with his arm in a sling. But the moment you’re fighting it, you can guarantee you’ve lost.
Eat for energy everybody! Mandy shouted. The bacon smell was overpowering. Vince ate, but then felt sick. Shut that hamster up! Adam yelled. The tall chinless man went round with a cardboard box full of wine gums and jelly babies. Instant glucose, he promised. At least six packets in every boat. Believe me, you really don’t have to worry, the hamster sang. Mandy came to eat her bacon next to Vince, but now he had to get up for the first of his pre — trip craps. You’re going to have a great day, she told him. When they left, Tom still hadn’t appeared from his tent.
The minibus led the way pulling the trailer, while Vince drove behind in his car to run the shuttle. Entering the gorge, Adam asked Clive if there weren’t any places they should get out and scout on the way up, what with all the rain there’d been. The decision to include his son seemed to have settled the quarrel between the two men. They were both intent on the job. Can’t from the road, Clive said. We have to scout as we paddle down. Practise for the four — stars.
In fact, almost immediately above Sand in Taufers the road left the river to climb and wind spectacularly over the valley. Jesus, Mark whispered. Clive drove surprisingly fast beside drops of hundreds of feet. Jesus Christ! It was a landscape both massive and crumbling. From the seat behind, Brian plunged his hand down Amelia’s T — shirt to grab Wally. Not funny, she said. The boy couldn’t get the string over her head. You’re hurting! It had tangled in her hair. Her eyes were red. The minibus attacked another hairpin. Belts everybody! Adam shouted. Brian!
I hope I can keep my breakfast down, Vince was saying in the car behind. To his pleased surprise, just as the two vehicles were setting off, Michela had climbed out of the minibus and come over to his car. In case you get lost, she explained. Now she smiled, but without opening her eyes. She had her head back on the headrest. The nerves will go as soon as you are on the water. After a pause, she added: When you speak someone else’s language, you are always repeating what someone else has said. Vince was eager to please, but couldn’t understand. Her eyes still shut, the girl seemed to be elsewhere. What’s repeating on me is the bacon, he said. In front, the minibus had dived down a steep track towards the river.
After the kayaks had been lifted off the trailer, and everybody had changed and put their dry clothes back in the bus, Vince and Clive had to run the shuttle: that is, to drive both vehicles back down to the get — out point, then return in the car, so that minibus and trailer would be waiting at the bottom when the group arrived, tired and perhaps cold, in the late afternoon. So forty minutes later Vince would again be fighting his nausea as he drove up the steep road a second time, now with Clive beside him. The rain had begun to fall. Large sections of the landscape grew grey and insubstantial.
Any demonstrations planned? Vince asked. Talk of the river would only make him more nervous. There was the international heads of government summit on global warming in Berlin next week, Clive said. He drummed his fingers on the dashboard. And you’re going? Sure. With Michela? A bunch of people they knew, Clive explained, would be there to picket. We’re in touch through the net all the time. The cheap flights make it easier.
Then Vince said that, leaving aside the clash with Adam, he admired Clive for his commitment. Why do I keep telling them this? he wondered. He was thinking of the man lying on the wooden floor of the chalet with his reading glasses and stacks of photocopies while the pretty young woman stretched naked on the bed. He wanted to understand. So often, he started to say, people can see that a cause is right, you know, but it seems impossible actually to do anything about it. They were stuck now behind a tractor pulling a trailer loaded with logs. Like, up on the glacier, you were saying how all together we’ve managed to destroy it, without even really trying, but individually we feel powerless to reverse the process, our lives are so set. Clive leaned forward and stared into the rain. He wore a peaked cap on his long, tawny hair. This is one hell of a river, he said quietly. Let’s enjoy it. About twenty minutes later Vince got into his boat, secured the spray — deck and shouted: Today I’m going to paddle like a god! He didn’t even notice the nerves had gone.
Four — star assessment! Clive shouted. Rescues. Time out, guys. They had run about two kilometres of hectic river. The plateau ended in a narrow race of water bouncing through stones, eroding its way into the gorge. Vince’s right shoulder ached from the wrench it had taken yesterday pulling Mandy’s boat off the rock. All in all, though, the old body was holding up surprisingly well. Gloria would be proud, he thought. He’d learned so much so quickly. Up front, Michela paddled mechanically in Clive’s wake. The boys darted all over the place, crashing over rocks into stoppers. Wild, but manageable, Adam remarked, banging into Brian’s boat when they eddied out. We need volunteers, Clive said. Three swimmers to be rescued by our three four — star candidates. All you have to do is jump into the stream from the bank. Nothing dangerous here. The rescuers will throw you a line from the bank and haul you in. Important technique, kids, because we’ll probably need to do it in anger at least once today when things get trickier.