‘Yeah.’
Zeph cleared his throat. ‘Uh, it goes, ‘I smoke two joints in the morning, and I smoke two joints at night, and I smoke two joints in the afternoon, and then I feel all right’…And then it goes, ‘I smoke two joints in times of peace, and two in times of war. I smoke two joints before I smoke two joints, then I smoke two more.’ I can’t remember the rest.’ He shook his head.
‘No matter, dude,’ said Sammy. ‘You get the idea, Ricardo? I smoke a lot.’
‘Sounds like it.’
‘Uh-huh.’
Sammy had finished rolling the joint while Zeph had been singing. He lit it up and passed it straight to me. ‘That’s another thing about English dudes,’ he wheezed, smoke coming out of his mouth in short bursts. ‘You hang on to the joint for an age. Us Americans take a toke or two and pass it on.’
‘It’s true,’ I replied, sucking in.
I was going to apologize for the poor manners of my countrymen but I collapsed into a coughing fit.
‘Rickster!’ said Zeph, patting me on the back. ‘You gotta cough to get off.’
A couple of seconds later a blistering bolt of lightning crackled over the sea. After it was gone, Sammy said in an awestruck voice, ‘Most totally excellent, dude!’ Zeph quickly followed it up with, ‘Like, utterly outrageous, compadre!’
I opened my mouth, then hesitated. ‘Excellent, dude,’ I muttered thoughtfully.
‘Most excellent,’ Sammy repeated.
I groaned.
‘A problem, Ricardo?’
‘You’re winding me up.’
Sammy and Zeph looked at each other, then at me.
‘Winding you up?’
‘Having me on.’
Sammy frowned. ‘Speak in English, my man.’
‘This…Keanu Reeves thing. It’s a joke, right? You don’t really talk like that…do you?’
There was a brief silence, then Zeph swore. ‘We’re rumbled, Sammy.’
‘Yeah,’ Sammy replied. ‘We overplayed our hand.’
♦
They were Harvard students. Sammy was studying law, Zeph was studying Afro-American literature. Their surf act was a reaction to the condescending Europeans they kept meeting in Asia. ‘It’s a protest against bigotry,’ Zeph explained, pulling knots out of his tangled blond locks. ‘Europeans think all Americans are stupid, so we act stupid to confirm your prejudices. Then we reveal ourselves as intelligent, and by doing so, subvert the prejudice more effectively than we would with an immediate barrage of intellect – which only causes confusion and, ultimately, resentment.’
‘Really?’ I said, genuinely impressed. ‘That’s so elaborate.’
Zeph laughed. ‘No, not really. We just do it for fun.’
They had other acts they liked to do. Zeph’s favourite was the Surf Dude, but Sammy had another – he called it the Nigger Lover. As its name implies, it was a bit more risque than the Surf Dude.
‘One time I got punched doing the Nigger Lover,’ Sammy said, as he began to roll another joint. ‘Knocked flat on my fuckin’ back.’
I wasn’t at all surprised. The act involved Sammy starting violent arguments with total strangers, insisting that because there’s a country in Africa called Niger, all people from Niger were niggers – regardless of whether they were black or white.
‘Aren’t they called Nigerians?’ I asked, bristling slightly, despite knowing I was being suckered.
Sammy shook his head. ‘That’s what everyone says, but I don’t think so. Think about it. Nigeria is right below Niger. They border each other, so if they were both called Nigerians it would cause chaos.’
‘Well, I still doubt they’re called niggers.’
‘Oh sure. Me too. I only say it to make a point…Fuck knows what the point is, but…’ He drew on the joint and passed it on. ‘It’s like my grandad taught me. He was a colonel in the US Marines. Sammy, he’d say, the ends always justify the means. And you know what, Richard? He was right.’
I was about to disagree, but I realized he was winding me up again. Instead I replied, ‘You can’t make an omelette without breaking some eggs.’
Sammy smiled and turned to look at the sea.
‘That’s the boy,’ I thought I heard him say.
Lightning silhouetted the line of palm trees on the beach into a line of claws with pencil arms. The lizard scuttled out of my hand, startled by the flash.
‘That’s the kid.’
I frowned. ‘Sorry? What was that?’
He turned back, also frowning, but with the smile still not faded from his lips. ‘What was what?’
‘Didn’t you just say something?’
‘Nope.’
I looked at Zeph. ‘Didn’t you hear him say something?’
Zeph shrugged. ‘I was watching the lightning.’
‘Oh.’
Just the dope talking, I guessed.
♦
The rain continued as night fell. Étienne and Françoise stayed in their hut, and Zeph, Sammy and I stayed on the porch until we were too stoned to do anything but sit in silence, passing the odd comment between us if there was an impressive roll of thunder.
An hour or two after dark a tiny Thai woman came over to our porch from the restaurant, almost hidden under a giant beach parasol. She looked at the dope paraphernalia strewn about us with a wan smile, then handed Zeph a spare key to their room. I took that as my cue to crawl into bed. As I said good night, Sammy croaked, ‘Hey, nice meeting you. Catch you tomorrow, dude.’
He seemed to say it without a trace of irony. I couldn’t work out whether it was a continuation of his surfer joke or whether the grass had regressed his Harvard mind. It seemed too complicated to ask, so I said, ‘Sure,’ and shut the door behind me.
At around three in the morning I woke up for a short while, dry-mouthed, still high – and listened. I could hear cicadas, and waves sucking down the beach. The storm had blown itself out.
∨ The Beach ∧
11
Spaced Invaders
The next morning the sky was still clouded over. As I walked out on to the porch, scattered with rain-soaked joint butts, I had the bizarre sensation that I was back in England. There was a slight chill in the air and I could smell wet earth and leaves. Rubbing the sleep from my eyes, I padded over the cool sand to Étienne and Françoise’s hut. There was no answer, so I tried the restaurant and found them eating breakfast. I ordered a mango salad, thinking an exotic taste might compensate for the feeling of being at home, and sat down with them.
‘Who did you meet last night?’ said Étienne, as I pulled up a chair. ‘We saw you talking outside your room.’
‘We watched you from our window,’ Françoise added.
I pulled out a cigarette to kill time before breakfast arrived. ‘I met a couple of Americans. Zeph and Sammy.’
Françoise nodded. ‘Did you tell them about our beach?’
‘No.’ I lit up. ‘I didn’t.’
‘You shouldn’t tell people about our beach.’
‘I didn’t tell them.’
‘It should be a secret.’
I exhaled strongly. ‘And that’s why I didn’t tell them, Françoise.’
Étienne interrupted. ‘She was worried you might have…’ The sentence trailed off into a nervous smile.
‘It didn’t even cross my mind,’ I replied irritably, and stubbed out my cigarette hard.
It tasted like shit.
♦
When the mango salad arrived I made an effort to relax. I told them about how the Americans had fooled me with their surfer act last night. Françoise thought the story was extremely funny. Her laughter partially defused the tension and we began making plans for the day ahead.
We decided that we had to hire a boat. The normal tour agencies wouldn’t do because they’d be too organized, and we doubted we’d be able to slip away from their supervision. Instead we would need to find a fisherman who was unaware of or unconcerned about the rules on tourists in the marine park.