Sundry Efforts
WHAT IF?
by Frank Swales
Are you haunted by the big "What if"? We've all faced it at some time in our lives. What if...I'd taken that job instead of this? What if...I'd left Jim for Reggie? What if.... Let me share my own peculiar "What if" with you. Peculiar, yes; and true, believe me.
South Africa's Lowveld is a beautiful land, subtropical and abundant in wildlife. My wife and I loved to explore the jungle trails, many of them overgrown and untrodden for years. One day, on one of these excursions into Tarzan's domain, we stopped to rest by the side of the Olifants River.
Barbara lay back and snuggled into a convenient hollow in the river bank, and I flopped onto the grass beside her. The day was hot and humid, and as we stretched out on the slope we basked in the knowledge that we were miles from the nearest Coca Cola kiosk and civilisation. It was an idyllic setting. The vines criss-crossed the trees above us like ship's rigging, and the shoulder-high elephant grass screened our little nook like a curtain. Mosquitoes buzzed and droned, trying to drown out the chirping of the cicadas.
Suddenly I was on my feet, the spell broken.
"What's wrong?" asked Barbara.
I scanned the dense elephant grass; it was motionless in the still air. But I was sure that I had seen something, and heard a rustling.
"It's a Peeping Tom, Barbara."
"Don't be daft. Probably a deer."
The rustling began again. It came from the depth of the dense undergrowth, while the top of the grass was undisturbed. Whatever was lurking nearby was bulky and squat. I turned to Barbara to suggest that we vacate the area promptly (or words to that effect!), when something long, dark and moving like a four-legged Sumo wrestler passed between us and, with a flick of its tail, slid over the river bank into the water. Some deer...some crocodile!
The encounter lasted only seconds, but the scene seemed frozen in time as the segmented reptile shunted between us like a goods train. I'm not quite sure what happened next.
In Barbara's version of the story I turned and shot up the river bank, slowed down only slightly by Barbara hanging on to my shorts. I still maintain that I never heard her cries for help, and I can't explain how my shorts got tangled around my knees. But one thing did become clear....
We discovered later that the `convenient hollow' which Barbara had been resting in was a crocodile slide, used by those armoured juggernauts to enter the water at a fair speed. If our intruder had used the slide on that occasion it would have taken my wife with it.
As I have remarked to her often since, wistfully, "Ah, Barbara, what if...?"
The End
© Frank Swales
