CHAPTERS 1- 3
The Brooding Hush
By James Penhaligon
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A Cornish Namibian Tale
Every morning Gao:na, the creator, thrusts up the sun in the east, bringing life to the world. Then each night //Gauwa, his arch enemy and death-bringer, snatches it over the lip of the western sky. When this great struggle ends, so will the world.
As I came through the desert, thus it was,
As I came through the desert: All was black,
In heaven no single star, on earth no track,
A brooding hush without a stir or note,
The air so thick it clotted in my throat;
Then some enormous things swooped past
with savage cries and clanking wings;
But I strode on; No hope could have no fear.
From: ‘City Of Dreadful Night’, by James Bysshe Vanolis Thomson, 1834-1882.
PROLOGUE
The /kãī, or Shining One, stooped to grasp the stone winking at him in the glittering brightness of the morning sun. It was a very beautiful one, bigger and lovelier than any other. And while he stared in fascination at the luminous quality of the stone, he saw he had fallen far behind the tribe. Looking hard at it to retain its image in his mind, he cast the strangely cold stone aside and hurried to rejoin his family and tribe. By the time he reached the bottom of the valley, he regretted casually casting the //kweisa-!kau, or Star-Stone away, but had to hurry his stride, for the tribe were already half a mile out into the deep soft sands between the peaks of !Xũmā and the high flat plains of !Njĩmāxka. One day, he would return.
Three thousand miles away, near a little cove on Mounts Bay in Cornwall, a smuggler is apprehended by the revenue men of George 111, King of England and Ireland.
ONE
From ‘Untold Mysteries Of The San’ by Sven Johannsen: Perhaps the most amazing thing about the !kung is their way of thinking collectively. It banishes every selfish impulse.
I’ll start with the here and now, because the incredible things which happen need to be told in their own time.
It’s a hot day, as usual. I’m going too fast. It’s not that I’m reckless. It’s the opposite. Short sharp fright is a painkiller against chronic malaise. So the trail of skyborne dust behind is a mile long, and extends as I press the accelerator down.
There aren’t many people out there who swap a psychiatric hospital for the freedom of the road, no matter how dusty. That’s the best thing, and I haven’t stopped celebrating.
I used to have no time for anything other than my profession. I was dedicated to my pursuit, blind to any alternative. When the shocking and life-changing burst unexpectedly on my head, I had no clue, nor instict, how to deal with it. I suppress my memories of what followed as much as possible. Use every kind of distraction. Do something, go somewhere, take risks. Anything to avoid reliving my nighmare. Sometimes it works, but not always.
Life-threatening illness isn’t on your agenda when you’re twenty six. So difficulty passing urine, and finding I have to go more often, is, I’m sure, just a urinary tract infection which will resolve. But it doesn’t.
