“Nothing ventured, nothing gained. If they don't let us in we can always ask for Mr Bandi. So let's try it.”
Jalli led Jack over to the desk indicated by the official. A young woman sat reading what looked like a novel. No-one else it seemed had forgotten their passes. But she looked up as Jalli addressed her.
“We've come without our ID and the man over there directed us here.”
“Press the fingers of your right hand on this plate,” she stated.
“Like this?” The woman nodded.
Jalli did as she was asked. “Now your thumb.”
“Perfect ⦠oh, you're a life member! You should have said. No charge then.” Jalli did her best to hold back the amazement she felt.
“Now you sir.” Jalli took Jack's hand and directed him to the plate. Jack had never had Wanulkan ID. Clearly this devise was connected to some central computer and would show him up as unregistered.
“Confirmed,” said the girl. “Life membership. I'll issue you with day passes. If you've lost the life membership passes then ring the number on the back and they'll replace them.”
“Thank you,” said Jalli. “Excuse me, can you tell me where I can find Mr Bandi.”
“Yes. He's in today. He might be in the park with a group, but his office is through that door into the park and then turn left. It's right next to the coffee shop. You can't miss it.”
“Thank you. Thank you very much,” said Jack in his best Wanulkan. The woman didn't seem to register his odd accent. She probably thought it went with his blindness. (Jack always said that being odd in one way meant they allowed him to be odd in everything else. It might be annoying, but if used to advantage, it was sometimes helpful!) The girl became engrossed in her book again as they took their day passes and continued through into the park. Mr Bandi's office was easily identifiable. Apparently he was responsible for organising group bookings and tours. Jalli took Jack by the hand and pushed open the door. Then she saw him. He was older but hadn't changed a lot in the essentials. He appeared to have altered much less than the city!
“Mr Bandi,” said Jalli timidly.
He looked up from his desk.
“Can I⦠it can't be! Jallaxanya Rarga?” Jalli smiled. “My, you haven't changed a bit! Wow, it's so good to see you!” Coming from behind his desk he took her hand. It's been so long! Where have you been? How are you? You look fantastic! And this is your boyfriend, er⦔
“Jack.”
“Jack, yes, of course.”
“He's my husband now. Has been for more than twenty years!”
“Never! Has it been that long?” Then turning to Jack he said with concern, “What about your eyes? Can you see at all?”
“Nothing at all. Quite useless,” said Jack lightly. “I have put the brain to other uses.”
“I'm sorry about that⦠they instituted a lot of security after you left⦠here in Parmanda Park, I mean. I have never quite forgiven myself⦔
“Mr Bandi,” broke in Jack quickly. “We have decided the past is the past and there will be no regrets â and that includes you!”
“You are so sensible. You are right. So what brings you here now?”
“It's just a short visit. But we wanted to see you. And come back here to this park.”
“Well you've found me and the park in the same place. Do you want me to take you round â unless you want to go off by yourselves of course?”
“No. We'd like having you with us,” said Jalli. “I have so much to catch up on.”
“Just give me five minutes. I'll see you by that red post over there.” Mr Bandi pointed to a group of benches beyond a sturdy wooden route indicator.
“I'll just go to the loo, Jack,” said Jalli.
“Will you be alright?” Jack looked concerned.
“Jack, I know I promised to not let go of you, but I didn't think that would include taking you into the ladies! I'll be OK. I'm sure it's safe in there with all these people.” She led Jack to the entrance of the gents. “Excuse me,” she said to a kind looking elderly gentleman. “Can you conduct my husband into the toilets? He's blind. All you need to do is direct him to the cubicle door.” She had done this many times.
Jalli was waiting for Jack as he emerged. They went over to the red post and were soon joined by Mr Bandi.
“I don't have a group for a couple of hours so now is a good time!” he declared. “Which way do you want to go? The park hasn't changed much.”
“Take us back to⦠where it happened. Can you do that?” asked Jalli.
“Of course⦠but⦔
“I'm sure,” said Jalli in a firm voice.
***
They walked down through the hollow where Mr Bandi had been flattened by Jack the day before the attack.
“Do you remember Jack knocking you over here?” asked Jalli.
“Never forgotten it. Felt so foolish at the time.”
“I know where we are, then,” said Jack. “I can picture it.”
“It hasn't changed much,” said Jalli. “And Maik Musula, do you remember him?”
“I do indeed. Strange man. He was banned from the park. But not long after you left â a couple of years I guess â he got married.”
“Married?”
“Yes. They have eight children. I've taught some of them.”
“Eight kids! His wife must like him then.”
“I guess she can't get away from him!” smiled Mr. Bandi. “But, yes, they seem happy enough. He was always a one girl man, if I recall correctly.”
“She must have âinteresting eyes',” laughed Jalli. “What does she see in him, I wonder?”
“Some girls,” explained Mr Bandi, “seem to like their men utterly obsessed with them.”
“But not if they are insane!”
“Well, we're all different. What constitutes insanity anyway? I've been told I am a bit insane at times.”
“You. You're the most sensible and lovely teacher I ever had!”
“Yes. But, don't forget you like biology too. You enjoy the creepy crawlies whereas some people can't stand them.
My
wife has to be special. Not every woman will put up with dead insects in her bedroom.”
“Dead insects?” asked Jack.
“My specimens.”
“I never knew you were married,” said Jalli.
“Oh I wasn't when you were here. I got married about fifteen years ago. You know my wife.”
“Do I?”
“Yes. Do you remember the literature teacher, Miss Pammy Falminta?”
“Yes. I think so. I didn't have her myself. She wore short skirts and some of the boys pretended to fall over and tried to take naughty pictures. One got caught! But she's much younger than you.”
“She is. I think it was my maturity that attracted her.”
“You mean you didn't try and take pictures up her skirt in the staff room.”
“Quite the opposite. It was I who dealt with the boy who did. She thought I was such a gentleman. We went out for a drink and, well the rest is history. You must come back to our house. We have a little girl. She's nine now. I⦠we⦠called her Jallaxanya.”
“A beautiful name!” said Jack.
“I am so happy for you!” declared Jalli and planted a big kiss on Mr. Bandi's cheek.
“Steady on! Someone might rush out and knock me down.”
Jack laughed.
Jalli breathed in the fresh Raikan air. A hint of ripening ibon was drifting in from the surrounding fields. She looked across the clearing. “It's there⦠over there. That's the way to the hive where⦠it happened,” breathed Jalli. “What happened to those parmandas? I never asked â I was too engrossed in my own troubles.”
“Oh, they rebuilt the hive.”
“So, we can't
all
go there,
together
,” remarked Jack.
“The rules were changed after what happened to you and the problems that led up to it. At first they wouldn't allow anyone to go alone without a qualified park ranger. Now we even allow small groups and, because we never go too close and we're always still and quiet, the parmandas have got used to it. They seem to know the park rangers will keep them safe.”
“The parmandas haven't ever gone for anyone else?” asked Jack.
“Never. What happened then was very rare. But it wouldn't be if we damaged their hives.”
“So we can all go up there? Together?” asked Jalli.
“We can.”
“Let's go,” said Jalli. Jack detected the quaver in his wife's voice. There was both fear and determination. Holding her hand he also detected doubt and urgent excitement. She gripped him tightly and pulled him forward. Jack was not afraid. He had not been all those years ago. He was angry. He had this overwhelming need to protect his Jalli. It was the sense of failure all those years ago that came back to him. Despite more than twenty years of Jalli telling him otherwise, he still felt he had failed her.
They reached the spot and Mr Bandi beckoned to them to keep quiet.
Jack heard it first and squeezed Jalli's hand. The parmandas were active inside the hive. They listened for several minutes. Jack detected a subtle change in their tone. Jack put his arm around Jalli and held her.
“I think they're going to display,” he murmured into her ear.
Then Jalli heard it too. After some minutes, few at first and then more and more insects emerged from the hive and began flying upwards and outwards. Others came from the trees and bushes to join them. Soon they were swirling and diving, swooping and dancing.
“Wow!” whispered Jalli. She felt Jack pull her close and then tense. He had detected another slight change in the sound that emanated from the swarm. They were spiralling down towards the hive. Then, with a crescendo of sound that was really loud, they suddenly disappeared, each insect knowing exactly which of the three entrances belonged to it. As they moved across each other they made a sound like a slurp and then it all ended suddenly with a plop.
Then there was silence, and all they were aware of was the calling of a bird in the distant woodland.
“Wow!” exclaimed Jalli again, quietly. Mr Bandi exhaled, “Best I've ever seen. And I've seen quite a few.”
“They were waiting for us,” said Jalli. “This was for
us
. They put this on for
us
. I know they did!”
“They were fantastic,” said Jack as they walked back to the centre.
“It's a pity you couldn't see them,” sighed Mr Bandi.
“No. But hearing them was fantastic enough.”
“You knew what they were doing before it happened,” said Jalli. “I could feel it.”
“I could sense them. There is a really special smell. It's sort of sweet, like a flower, only more delicate. It increases when they are about to come out or go back in. You must have smelled it. It was really powerful at the end.”
“I guess so,” said Mr Bandi. “I've never really thought about it.”
“Jack can sense things with an intensity that sighted people often miss,” said Jalli. “You knew exactly what I was feeling up there didn't you?”
“Well, sort of. It was all mixed up. You're glad you went though, aren't you?”
“I am. Those parmandas, they wanted to give me a
good
time. They wanted to heal my memory.”
“They know you love them,” said Mr Bandi.
“Oh, I do! They, Jack and me. We were all victims.”
“And now you are bound up in the dance of love,” said Mr Bandi.
“The Trinity,” said Jack, “God. That's what Christianity says about God on Earth. It's a divine dance of love. And God suffers when we suffer.”
“And he rejoices and dances with us when we are set free!” exclaimed Jalli.
“Free,” echoed Jack, his sightless eyes streaming with tears. Jalli saying they were
all
victims had struck a chord deep down. As victims they were bound together in something even more profound than the all-consuming delight they had experienced as young lovers. Love is something that underlies all existence and suffering is part of it. She who loves, suffers. That's why Jesus had to die. The force of that verse that was so often said or pasted outside of churches in Jack's England hit him. What was it: “God loved the whole of the world so much that he sent his Son to die for us,” or something like that. And then Jesus rose up and joined in the dance of the Trinity taking everyone with him.
“Jack,” it was Jalli, “will you now forgive yourself?”
“Forgive myself?”
“That you let me down. You see when you came to rescue me, you loved me so much. You might not have overcome that man physically, but you towered over him spiritually and emotionally. He wanted me because he was empty, but because you did what you did he went away even more empty. He even knew the parmandas were on our side. If he had looked back he would have seen me bending over you. Perhaps no-one had ever bent over him and loved him. Poor man. Even the parmandas hated him. He had absolutely nothing. And I and you and the parmandas, we know we are loved, for ever.”
“Caught up in the divine dance,” said Jack.
“You two are such an inspiration. A breath of fresh air,” said Bandi.
“Sorry, Mr Bandi. But this time is special to us.”
“No need to be sorry. I'm privileged. You were decidedly my favourite student, but don't tell the rest that.”
“And you were definitely Jalli's favourite teacher,” said Jack. “You should really hear about all the things she has been doing in Woodglade.”
“I would love to. You must come to my house this evening and meet Pammy.”
“And Jallaxanya. We'd love that.”
“What time are we thinking of going home?” asked Jack.
“Oh. Not today. I told the kids â on the note â not to expect us.”
“But we need to check in somewhere if we're going to stay overnight.”
“You must stay with us. We have a spare room.”
“But Mr Bandi. You haven't asked your wife.”