She Down There by Lynton Francois Burger

Author:Lynton Francois Burger
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Random House South Africa
Published: 2020-01-30T00:00:00+00:00

Klaas and his guests are following a creature that looks like a compressed hand with its bunched fingers extended. The diminutive reef cuttlefish is staying just out of reach with controlled jets. The cuttlefish slows, angles toward the reef. Hovers. It moves closer still, imperceptibly, pulsing a hundred shades of rust red. Klaas catches a glimpse of the little adapted tentacle as it eases out between the others. Oh yes! Then it flashes. A white chameleon tongue retracts, holding a tiny crab he hadn’t even seen was there. The squid turns, squirts off out of sight to enjoy its meal in peace. After acknowledging his divers’ delight, Klaas places two forefingers on his left palm to ask, How much air do you have? From their responses, he gauges there’s just enough time.

They reach an extensive flat area, coated with encrusting plate coral. Klaas points down to where it looks like someone has taken a red-hot poker and gouged random grooves. He can see they are a bit perplexed. He drops lower and, making eye contact with them, holds up his index and middle finger to his eyes to indicate ‘look’. And then with a pointed finger traces the outline of the crude stick figure etched into the coral. Uses the same fingers to indicate walking or running – he thinks of this one as ‘the running man’. But they still don’t get it. So he rolls his hand, touches his ear and points to the surface to indicate, I’ll explain when we get back to the boat. He loves these creations, which he’s come to call coralglyphs, because they’re reminiscent of Bushman rock engravings. The guidebook at the dive shop explains that they’re made by an Alpheus shrimp, near-transparent and no bigger than a fingernail. These diminutive farmers carve out crevices in the coral, and cultivate algae for themselves in the grooves. The rims of the crevasses are lined with tiny hydroids, which gives the glyphs a dot-drawing look – reminiscent of the Australian Aboriginal art in the book he’d studied in Malangatana’s studio. I should do something with these coralglyphs as well. He turns in the water to face the couple, gives them a bobbing two-thumbs-up to indicate that it’s time to rejoin the world up there.

They’re hanging in the water at five metres, their ascent safety stop, when they become aware of the whale song carrying clearly through the water. Klaas smiles and cups his hand to his ear. His divers nod enthusiastically. Must be stragglers. Most have left for the year. The calls grow louder and louder, so that Klaas is convinced they’ll appear out of the depths. He swivels around. Searches. A thunderous gurgle, a male humpback’s call, erupts, penetrates Klaas’s chest. His guests bring their hands to theirs. Again, it ripples, blasts. Makes every fibre of his being feel alive. When the call thunders once more, it is so much inside his chest, it tickles. He tries to produce a rumbling bass imitation, but it just produces giggles, so that water spills into his mouth and he splutters and coughs.

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