smiles.
Â
What happens next I too am watching, I am a spectator of my own behaviour, opening the rucksack and taking things out and throwing them. Words are coming from my mouth too, also plucked out and thrown, incoherent and mismatched, their trajectories colliding, you think I enjoy walking with you I donât I donât enjoy it you can walk on your own from now on youâre alone do you hear me how can you treat me here take this youâll need this and this and this, throwing the gas canisters, the bed-roll, knives and forks, toilet rolls, tins of food, and this and this and this.
Â
The objects fly and hit the ground and bounce. Reiner watches them with an amused detachment, oh dear look at all this madness how unfortunate. He doesnât move. He appears to have been awaiting this moment from the outset, although the truth is probably that itâs the last thing he expects.
Â
Then the frenzy is finished, he closes his pack and picks it up, he starts to walk away. It is difficult to believe that heâs doing this, part of him wants to be recalled, so when he hears Reinerâs voice he stops.
Â
Hey.
Â
He turns. Reiner is walking towards him. If he offers one word of apology, if he concedes even the smallest humility, then I will relent. But Reiner is too rigid and too proud. Though what he does do is somehow even stranger.
Â
Here, he says. Youâll need this.
Â
He is holding out a fifty rand note.
Â
He has no money of his own, not a single cent, but in his fury was prepared to walk away penniless, and even now he hesitates. But then his hand comes out, he takes the money, this is a bitter farewell.
Â
Goodbye.
Â
Goodbye.
Â
Or maybe there are no goodbyes, nothing spoken, yes it is more likely that way, the last glance passes between them and they turn their backs on each other. He starts to walk in a direction he hopes, judging by the sun and his instinct, is east. When he comes to the top of the ridge he looks back and Reiner has gathered all the objects and bits and pieces together and is going in the other direction, west. So they walk away from each other in the high mountains one morning, watched by the children in the grass.
Â
Â
Â
Â
Â
I n half an hour he starts to feel regret. He acted passionately, he didnât think, it wasnât fair to abandon somebody like that. But immediately answering voices clamour, what else should you have done, he deserved to be abandoned. He stops and sits and thinks, holding his head in his hands. He tries to consider his options. But what point is there, even if he tries to catch up with Reiner there is no way of knowing where he is in these mountains, and if he does find him how likely is it that this fight can be resolved. He knows in his bones that Reiner does not forgive.
Â
So he shoulders his pack and goes on, walking faster and more lightly now than he has in days. He continues to head east, trying to get back to Semonkong. Whenever he comes to a settlement of any kind, a shop or a village, he stops and asks, and there is invariably somebody who knows the way. At one place a serene young man in blue overalls insists on coming along to be his guide, walking for miles next to him, not talking, just smiling shyly whenever he is asked something. He leads him to the mouth of a ravine that cuts down through the mountains. There is a footpath descending and he points, this way Semonkong, smiling and bobbing his head.
Â
There is no money to give him, only the fifty rand note, but the young man doesnât seem to expect payment, he accepts a handshake happily and watches the strange traveller depart. The walls of rock mount up on either side, the ravine seems empty of people, but a little way on a shepherd, invisible high up above somewhere, starts calling to him, the same phrases heâs heard before, learned by rote at school, hello hello how are you. He looks but can see
Â
What happens next I too am watching, I am a spectator of my own behaviour, opening the rucksack and taking things out and throwing them. Words are coming from my mouth too, also plucked out and thrown, incoherent and mismatched, their trajectories colliding, you think I enjoy walking with you I donât I donât enjoy it you can walk on your own from now on youâre alone do you hear me how can you treat me here take this youâll need this and this and this, throwing the gas canisters, the bed-roll, knives and forks, toilet rolls, tins of food, and this and this and this.
Â
The objects fly and hit the ground and bounce. Reiner watches them with an amused detachment, oh dear look at all this madness how unfortunate. He doesnât move. He appears to have been awaiting this moment from the outset, although the truth is probably that itâs the last thing he expects.
Â
Then the frenzy is finished, he closes his pack and picks it up, he starts to walk away. It is difficult to believe that heâs doing this, part of him wants to be recalled, so when he hears Reinerâs voice he stops.
Â
Hey.
Â
He turns. Reiner is walking towards him. If he offers one word of apology, if he concedes even the smallest humility, then I will relent. But Reiner is too rigid and too proud. Though what he does do is somehow even stranger.
Â
Here, he says. Youâll need this.
Â
He is holding out a fifty rand note.
Â
He has no money of his own, not a single cent, but in his fury was prepared to walk away penniless, and even now he hesitates. But then his hand comes out, he takes the money, this is a bitter farewell.
Â
Goodbye.
Â
Goodbye.
Â
Or maybe there are no goodbyes, nothing spoken, yes it is more likely that way, the last glance passes between them and they turn their backs on each other. He starts to walk in a direction he hopes, judging by the sun and his instinct, is east. When he comes to the top of the ridge he looks back and Reiner has gathered all the objects and bits and pieces together and is going in the other direction, west. So they walk away from each other in the high mountains one morning, watched by the children in the grass.
Â
Â
Â
Â
Â
I n half an hour he starts to feel regret. He acted passionately, he didnât think, it wasnât fair to abandon somebody like that. But immediately answering voices clamour, what else should you have done, he deserved to be abandoned. He stops and sits and thinks, holding his head in his hands. He tries to consider his options. But what point is there, even if he tries to catch up with Reiner there is no way of knowing where he is in these mountains, and if he does find him how likely is it that this fight can be resolved. He knows in his bones that Reiner does not forgive.
Â
So he shoulders his pack and goes on, walking faster and more lightly now than he has in days. He continues to head east, trying to get back to Semonkong. Whenever he comes to a settlement of any kind, a shop or a village, he stops and asks, and there is invariably somebody who knows the way. At one place a serene young man in blue overalls insists on coming along to be his guide, walking for miles next to him, not talking, just smiling shyly whenever he is asked something. He leads him to the mouth of a ravine that cuts down through the mountains. There is a footpath descending and he points, this way Semonkong, smiling and bobbing his head.
Â
There is no money to give him, only the fifty rand note, but the young man doesnât seem to expect payment, he accepts a handshake happily and watches the strange traveller depart. The walls of rock mount up on either side, the ravine seems empty of people, but a little way on a shepherd, invisible high up above somewhere, starts calling to him, the same phrases heâs heard before, learned by rote at school, hello hello how are you. He looks but can see
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