Strange Tales from the Tortoise Gateway
Miles Bernard
Ever been kicked by a dying old man who used to be a high-ranking military official? The young child fell to the floor in a crumpled heap. He could smell the bleach and disinfectant.
‘Get off the floor, you snivelling piece of scum. Come on, stand up and face me.’
It took a few seconds to get his breath back. That blow had winded him badly. Grandfather was being particularly difficult today. It wasn’t grandfather’s fault. According to the doctors, grandfather’s condition was diminishing, whatever that meant. It was strange, though, how sudden acts of violence only occurred when his parents were absent.
‘Pick yourself up boy! You won’t get far in this life if you can’t take a good beating every so often. It will do you some good, won’t it boy?’ He was waiting for a response. The boy was scared stiff, upset and angry. ‘Don’t whimper. If it’s one thing that I can’t stand, it’s whimperers. You wouldn’t last a minute in my unit. We’d soon break you into shape.’
My grandfather was a great man. The use of the past tense ‘was’ is essential, compared to a few years past – a quiet, composed and serene man with great epic stories from his time in the Forces. But now, now he’s turned into a monster, an angry and hateful creature. How can I possibly still love him for what he has become and the way he treats me…?
‘What’s the matter with you? Cat got your tongue?’ His words spat with venomous disdain. Panic and confusion rippled through my thoughts, ‘I was wondering, sir…,’ (be nice to him, be positive).
‘What?’ he gawked.
‘I was wondering when and if you could possibly have a home visit for a weekend with mother and father?’ The tone of optimistic compassion didn’t wash with the old man one bit. The noise he uttered from his twisted throat was a mix between a choking gulp and a snorting, gasped laugh, ‘Your mother and father? Don’t make me laugh. They’re a joke. The whole thing’s a sham. Open your eyes, boy. Open your eyes.’
His loud voice had caught the attention of an orderly. She kindly popped her permed yellow head around the door, with only barely enough room for it to fit through. Then she uttered the immortal mantra of the health service, even when you’re dying, ‘Everythin’ al’rite?’ The patient momentarily acted like a completely different person, ‘Fine, thanks, love.’ He even winked and so did she back. I was shocked, lost for words, then she departed, and then I realized I had taken my eye off grandfather for a second. He took advantage of the moment and promptly smashed me over the back of the head with the 1976 revised edition of the Guinness Book of Records. He shouted, as once again I fell helplessly to the floor, ‘A palpable hit, see. You were not ready, but I will train you. But, first, tell me about your tortoise.’
Outside the ward, the consultant was speaking with the next of kin. ‘His condition remains stable for the time being,’ the consultant had a mop of blonde hair and, naturally, being a scientist, he wore heavy, rimmed spectacles.
‘How long do you think he’s got, Doctor?’ asked the middle aged man, slightly rotund, but smartly turned out.
‘It’s hard to say in these matters. The cerebellum has been bombarded with theta radiation, and that is a surprise.’
The woman quickly asked, ‘Is it? How Doctor?’
That was his cue. ‘Well, theta radiation doesn’t occur naturally on the face of this planet. I’d like to know how my patient absorbed such a lethal dose.’ He expected the family to know a possible connection.
‘I’m sorry, it could have been something from his army days.’
The doctor nodded thoughtfully, ‘God, I’m clever,’ he thought. ‘Did your father ever work near nuclear material, probably a lot of it and over a long period of time?’ At first they didn’t respond. ‘God, I am clever,’ he thought, though not so sure of himself this time.
The couple, Adrian and Kate, decided their next course of action would be a dialogue with father concerning his death sentence from theta radiation. They entered his bay, and, to their surprise, saw their son was lying on the floor, tied up with rope secured around his wrists twice, then back down to the ankles, gagged, and father was absent. The doctor assessed the empty bed, ‘That’s not right. Something is missing,’ he thought. ‘My God, I’d better act, otherwise the civvies might panic’. He concluded, ‘It seems your father has absconded, and without permission. Naughty, naughty,’ the doctor smiled. Adrian and Kate did not. ‘Sorry, being a military family, I thought… Never mind. Matron!’ he called out loudly.
*************************************
‘My name is Dearborne. Yes, that’s right, Dearborne, with an ‘e’ on the end. The name is in honour of a military commander who fought in an Asian Brush conflict. It sounds horrible. My master tells me much. I am his loyal servant and he feeds me. Lettuce – you can’t beat it, nature at its best. Something like lettuce doesn’t happen by chance, but other things do. I’ve seen a lot. I’m Dearborne – I’m a tortoise who loves life and has a good helping of get up and go. And another thing which is quite interesting is that I and other species of the great superior creaturedom can understand human speech in every aspect, and also any language, something that our migratory cousins have observed that some of you humans have a problem with when it comes to crossing borders: “Can you direct me to the railway station, blah, blah, blah.”
*************************************
Adrian undid the ropes that bound his son. He pulled the gag from his mouth, ‘Jay, are you alright?’ he asked nervously.
‘Yes, I’m fine,’ his son didn’t look injured. Adrian was relieved, but he had to find out what had transpired and where his father had gone.
‘What happened? Did your grandfather say where he was going?’
His son wasn’t sure he would believe him. ‘He said he wanted to meet Dearborne, my tortoise.’ He was right, his father didn’t believe him at first.
The grandfather was on the run. His attire? – hospital issue, soiled pyjamas. He was quite conspicuous as his full catheter bag spilled over a group of small school children cautiously waiting at a zebra crossing. The crazed figure showed no fear as he stumbled headlong into oncoming traffic, catheter flowing freely. The grandfather’s head tilted skyward, like he was mentally receiving some directing signal. He must go on…he knew where he had to be, with the one and only Dearborne.
Onlookers watched. Some were shocked, perplexed; some were worried for the poor soul. Some thought it was a prank, scanning the other side of the street for the camera crew. The animals and creatures, what there are in a built-up suburban area, were all talking, but their voices went unheard by the man’s ears, even though he was capable of hearing their words, and they knew it, too. His mind was occupied with sustaining the link, grasping on the voice that he could hear. It was Dearborne, the tortoise, who would show him the way to leave this world. It didn’t make sense – his awareness and cognitive mind, in the usual ways, had ceased functioning weeks ago, a deterioration of the mind. All that remained was the transfer point, the bridge from this world to the next.
Meanwhile, in the garden, a curiosity had presented itself. The tortoise gazed incredulously at the open catch on the outer door of his home. ‘That was very careless of the master. Anything could happen with an open door.’ Dearborne’s words were immediately responded to by a garden sparrow on the fence, ‘Accidents do happen,’ the bird’s head twitched, ‘Hang on, I can hear Jeremy calling.’ Then he was off skyward.
‘Well, I’m a sensible sort. You don’t get to be my age without being sensible. Well, there was that time in the Bahamas…’ Dearborne pondered the unlocked catch. He must act quickly, like the wind, which for him was quite a task. Carried on the wind, his winged associate hurtled back into the garden at break-feather speed, skimming precariously over the rooftops. He had to alert his friend. ‘Dearborne!’ he called. The tortoise heard the cry and looked skyward. There was Patrick the sparrow coming right at him at a very fast rate. He pondered, ‘If Patrick hits the mesh on the door it could hurt him badly, but if the door is open, then it’s a soft landing.’ Dearborne nudged the unlocked outer hatch with his head. It swung open just enough and in time for Patrick to perform an emergency landing among the hay and lettuce leaves. He chirped loudly on impact. After he finally stopped moving, after a tumbling routine, he seemed bewildered and relieved, ‘Reverse thrust was never my thing’ he said confidently. But before Patrick could utter another word, a huge human hand reached in, its grasp wrapped around the tortoise’s shell. Patrick cried out his name. Dearborne couldn’t believe what was happening. His startled expression said it all – some tortoises are big on facial expressions. Another face presented itself. It looked at Dearborne, and Dearborne did his best to look right back, ‘I can stare you out any day’ he confidently thought. He didn’t have the nerve to say it, even if the man could understand him.
‘I know you can hear me Dearborne, and I can hear you.’ The tortoise swallowed desperately but remained silent, just in case. He thought, this person could be mad, or… Then he realized that this person wasn’t breathing. Dearborne understood. The human hand around his body remained firm but not hard. Dearborne focused, then he spoke, ‘Can I help you?’ A relieved expression spread across the human’s face, ending with a smile. The man, what was left of the old man, was functioning on the remnants of his life. He only had one question: ‘Is there an answer?’ he asked. Dearborne did his utmost to smile, ‘Oh, yes, but before I can tell you, you must put me down, just over there, on the grass.’ The man complied. He executed the manoeuvre as carefully as possible. Dearborne pondered as the seconds ticked by, ‘Probably a carry-over from his past life,’ the man was being extremely delicate. After what seemed an eternity, the grass felt good beneath his pads, ‘Thank you for not dropping me,’ said Dearborne. The man slumped to his knees, ‘You are my salvation. Besides, I crosstrained in munitions disposal. You had to have a very steady hand.’
‘I noticed that,’ replied Dearborne.
‘What’s going to happen to me? You speak the Word, are you God? Are you spirit taking animal form?’
‘Nearly. You are almost about to die, but don’t worry, the energy, the soul, the chi, the fire within, call it what you will, it lives on by the act of transmigration.’
The man thought, and then asked, ‘Where does my soul go?’
‘It goes into what you would call a member of the great and varied animal kingdom all around us.’
The expression on the man’s face dropped. Dearborne’s concern grew.
‘So, you’re telling me I’m going to be reborn?’
If the tortoise had had eyebrows like humans, he would have raised them right then. ‘Call it that if you like,’ suggested Dearborne, trying to avoid an argument.
‘As an animal…’ The man appeared to be thinking or locked stone dead in neuron failure. Dearborne began to worry, ‘It’s taking its time,’ he thought anxiously, even though he knew he needn’t worry about the inevitable for his own sake, the man’s sake, and that of all the rest. Dearborne knew the answer, ‘But it’s strange how life today affects the individual. Some say, like Harriet the owl, that it’s always been this way, but being a tortoise, I’m not so sure.’
‘Do I have a choice what form I come back in?’ the man asked.
‘Come back?’ answered Dearborne, confused, then realizing what he had meant. ‘Your actions in this life determine your next form. That’s how it works,’ Dearborne smiled. The man looked increasingly concerned. ‘Don’t worry, I’m sure you’ve done many a good deed, and we all learn from our mistakes if we’re wise. I’ve been really sensible this time around. I have quite high hopes for my next incarnation, probably an albatross. That’s Patrick and his stories, flights of fancy, you know.’ Dearborne did his utmost not to smirk, it would be inappropriate.
The man tried to pull himself up, ‘“Unhappy the land that hath no heroes,” that’s what my father used to say. That’s why I joined the Forces, but what we did bad things, terrible things.’ The pain remained etched across his face.
‘Bad things happen, but were you ultimately responsible?’ asked the tortoise.
The man thought, a very difficult process in his stage of brain life, ‘No, not as such,’ he answered desperately.
‘But is blood on your hands?’ asked Dearborne forcefully, as forcefully as a tortoise could. The question hung in the air.
The man pondered then pushed out the answer, ‘No.’ Relief floated across his face.
On Dearborne’s hutch, two golden windmills on sticks, which the master had placed there, began to move. The one on the right moved clockwise, the one on the left moved counter clockwise. The man’s gaze focused on the motion.
‘It’s time,’ announced Dearborne, as the man slumped to the ground. Dearborne muttered, ‘A pigeon,’ and as he spoke, a bird flew by, a pigeon of course. ‘They do spend a lot of time around war memorials,’ muttered the tortoise. The two windmills began to slow, then from down the passage he could hear his master’s and the parents’ calls. Dearborne looked skyward, ‘Life goes on, and in the end, it goes on again. Maybe I’ll be a penguin next time, that’s what I’d like, try to do some good in Greenland?’ He smiled.