THEY CAME FROM THE SEA (work in progress)

“Who were these people? The unknown. They came there at night, and departed in the morning.”

Victor Hugo

PETER GATES

The New Scotland Yard sign in front of the stainless steel clad office block of the Metropolitan Police HQ in London was revolving to the tune of pan flutes.

The white horse trotted to a halt in front of the entrance, revealing the rider to be none other than the senior Met Boss. And then he turned into Peter’s mother, as he would, in dreams, asking him in a stern voice whether he’d been feeding himself properly.

A colourful parrot flew past, screeching hellos and something about mateys and crackers and shiver me timbers…

…Peter woke up with a start. It was 3 a.m. and his phone was ringing. He knew they needed him at the station; a policeman was always on duty, even in his sleep. For the umpteenth time he cursed the day he was given this post, from the London Metropolitan Police to the Channel Islands, temporary, they’d said, assisting in correcting the discrepancies resulting in the national census.

And he had a feeling this call had to do with the newcomers.

“Peter Gates.”

“Sir, you’d better come in. They…”

Peter couldn’t believe his ears as the constable’s words poured in.

“They did…WHAT? “

The constable was about to repeat the whole story when Peter told him he’d be down in ten minutes.

……

THE NEWCOMERS

They came from the sea. That was the simplest way of putting it. The local police and coast guard officials, and sometimes the fishermen, found them, semiconscious, half-drowned, soaking wet, washed up to the beaches and the rocks, in groups of 2 to 3, sometimes up to 20, or 30. No sign of shipwrecks, no news of sinking boats in the area, or anywhere; yet these people kept coming, washed up on the shore.

Once the initial shock died down, they tried to explain who they were, and where they came from, shuddering beneath a first aid blanket. But most of them didn't speak any English at all, while some of them who did, claimed to be from places which didn't exist anymore.

No documents on them, only soaking wet clothes, and sometimes, the odd object which could mean anything and everything.

So that was that, then: they were stuck on the island, castaways, stuck until further notice. They were taken to the old summer resort, abandoned in the 80s, mostly bungalows, trailers, and tents. It was near Gorey Bay. Jersey States managed to register them as refugees with the International Red Cross and UNHCR, and London was glad to help with provisions as long as they stayed on the island and didn't attempt to immigrate to England. They seemed quite happy in the resort. No one tried to escape, no one ever filed complaints, no plots, no conspiracies.

Accepting with grace all aid, they slowly settled on the island. Much to the dismay of the islanders and the local celebrities and millionaires who had had an eye on that property and the International refugee camp clashed with their dollar sign flashing plans.

They decided to keep the name of the camp "Paradis Soleil".

....

As Peter Gates was picking up his car keys, the irony wasn't lost on him. He learnt to live with the biblical allusions of his name. The present circumstances only made him smile with bitterness.

Closer to Home than Most

...

A couple of the newcomers were clearly closer to home than most: there was the  Frenchman for instance, well, a man speaking fluent French and looking wistfully at Victor Hugo's books and an expert on onion soup and duck pate'. Normandy was about 20 miles off the Jersey coast, yet he shook his head when offered a passage or an interview with the French authorities.

His last known address was La Mer, the sea, that was all he remembered.

The other one, a temperamental Italian, flaying his hands about, always complaining about the local bars and correcting them that it's espresso not expresso, and often invoking the Madonna or his Mamma with palms pressed together moving up and down or shrugging his shoulders at every question. He too was offered a contact with the authorities in Italy, and he too said he had nowhere to go...Il mare, he pointed to the sea and then shrugged again.

A beautiful look of bliss came across his face whenever he saw a Jersey calf with bambi eyes, and he'd sometimes gaze at the sunset in a poetic way. He was often nervous when there was football on tv, but calmed down immediately after the match changing the subject to the pizza toppings on offer in the local pizzeria, and the sacrilege of it.

Peter Gates sent their photos to Italy and France respectively, and there was no reply. Nobody was looking for them, nobody knew who they were.

It was the same and worse, with the others.

....

Peter Gates noticed something strange, he had the photos of all the men from the day they were found on the shore, and he saw them almost every day. Some had been there for years, yet, their features remained the same, no trace of aging, no sign of anguish or displacement. They seemed children on a schooltrip, lost in their eternal innocence

 ....

It was the same, and worse, with the others. There were two people claiming to be from Chernobyl and a geiger counter was brought in to prove it, and sure enough, they were, well, radioactive. They liked making a show of the electrical buzz going off; the medical team on the island was taking the matter seriously and was monitoring their health closely in a separate bungalow. But they had no home to go back to.

Another special case: the members of the orchestra. Most of them were swept to the shore with pieces of their instruments, and spoke what appeared to be slavic languages. Former Yugoslavia, apparently, yet another lost cause as far as going back home was concerned. They were often bickering, fighting, sometimes fists flew and colourful gestures followed. They watched football and hummed music and quarelled over politics, drank a lot and made lots of pranks between them, but they were generally fine and resigned to the situation. The new independent countries on the Balkans apparently had other problems than missing orchestra members. So these musicians stayed in the resort too.

And then it was getting more colourful by the day: the Chinese acrobats, the Jamaican reggae band, the Peruvian hat makers, the Russian farmers, the Portuguese brewery workers, the Indian guru, the Greek cook and the Egyptian fortune teller...

Peter Gates had all their files on his desk. He didn't know where to start, and more to the point, he didn't know where or how to fit these people in the census forms. The volunteers sent to do the job were useless, there was a form filled by the Devil residing in the Devil's Hole, last name Milton, if the information scribbled down was to be trusted. Born 1666 too.

With a heavy sigh Peter looked at the other pile on his desk: the complaints by the islanders. He looked at the top file: last night the newcomers put Jersey cows into boats and towed them all the way to Guernsey then rowed them back to Jersey, so that they could practice the new idiom "till the cows come home". The farmers were not amused. It was getting late and he didn't even want to go over the other files. It can all wait until the morning. These people weren't going anywhere, and neither was he. So he might as well try and come up with a good plan.

-to be continued-