Marina Lewycka - Two Caravans

“Yes, yes. Also we eating fish.”

“You must have vitamin. Otherwise you will be getting diseases of poor nutrition. Lemon is good. Here, on your right. Not expensive. After you cook fish you squeeze some drops.”

He takes a lemon.

“And you need roughage to establish a good bowel habit. You must eat vegetable.”

“We eating plenty carrot. Every day carrot.”

“Carrot is a first-class source of roughage and essential vitamin A. Make sure you wash it good.”

“Thank you, lady, for your advice.” He tries not to stare too obviously at the appealing brown bulge at the top of her sari. Really, plump women can be rather sexy.

“You know in this town is too many poor people eating bad diet. Drunken sailors. Out-of-work miners. She”-she points to the picture of the lady in the blue hat above the counter-“is perfect example of how with good diet you will ripen into old age.”

He learns from the Indian shopkeeper that here too, not far away, there were once coal mines, which closed after the great strike of 1984. Now he understands why this town has a feel of the Donbas about it. Although he was only five years old, he remembers vividly the solemnity with which his parents donated their gold wedding rings to buy food for the British miners. What happened to all that money? The Ukrainian miners could certainly do with it now.

“I am looking for man named Vulk. Gangster type. Dressed up in black.”

The shopkeeper shakes her head. “In this town now is too much gangster. But I am pleased to say none of it has ever come into this shop, for if it did I would chase it away.”

“And one Ukrainian girl. Long dark hair. Very…” Very what? Is she pretty? Is she beautiful? “Very…Ukrainian.”

“Ah, Ukrainian girls also we have plenty. Every night you see them on street and on beach making sex for money.”

“Not this girl.”

The shopkeeper smiles diplomatically, and he leaves the shop in a foul mood.

Back at the pier he is surprised to find Emanuel surrounded by a small crowd, and at the heart of the crowd is Vitaly. Vitaly grabs Andriy by both hands, and embraces him like a brother, elbowing Emanuel out of the way.

“My friend. Good you are here. We have excellent business opportunity. Good work. Good money. You will be rich. You will return to Ukraina millionaire.”

Andriy disentangles himself from Vitaly’s embrace.

“What is this opportunity?”

“In factory. Twenty kilometres only. Good work good money. All these people”-he waves his arm to include the dozen or so unsuccessful fishermen he has recruited-“can have good employment. You and Emanuel also. Twenty pound an hour for you. Supervisor rate. You have transport. You bring caravan, put all inside, take to factory.”

He must have read the doubt on Andriy’s face.

“I give you money for petrol.”

Still Andriy hesitates.

“And transport. How much you want?” He pulls a wad of notes out of his pocket. They are all twenties.

“But I have only Ukrainian licence. To take so many people maybe I need special licence.”

“Is no problem. Only if vehicles is with seats for more than eight people you need passenger licence. Now all modern transport is without seats.”

This seems an odd arrangement.

“The caravan is not here.”

“No problem. You fetch it. We will wait here.”

By the time Andriy and Emanuel have returned with the caravan, the crowd has grown. Vitaly climbs into the front of the Land Rover beside Andriy, with Dog at their feet. Emanuel and three other passengers sit in the back, and some fourteen hopefuls squeeze themselves into the caravan. Those that cannot fit onto the bunks sit on the floor hugging their knees. Andriy notices that the Bulgarian lad and his friends are among them. He waits until Vitaly has peeled off five twenty-pound notes from his wad and handed them over before he will even turn the engine on.

It is money well earned, for with such a weight on board, the caravan bucks and swerves all over the place and he has a job keeping it on the road. He has to drive mostly in first gear, with one-hundred-per-cent concentration, to avoid overturning on a bend. They have been driving like this for almost an hour, down roads which are becoming increasingly narrow and difficult, before at last Vitaly directs him down a lane with a sign saying Buttercup Meadow Farmfresh Poultry and a picture of a little blond-haired girl, holding a bunch of buttercups in her hand and clasping a fluffy brown chicken to her chest, with a slogan beneath: Partnership in Poultry . It all looks very nice.

But as they approach the entrance, a scene of wild commotion unfolds before them. What’s going on here? The iron gates are open and police in riot gear are holding back a screaming battling mob which is surging towards them, while a flock of crazed chickens is running round and round the yard squawking and flapping frenziedly.

“What is this, Vitaly? Where have you brought us?”

He puts the Land Rover into first and starts to nose his way forward through the gate. Suddenly he hears a high terrifying howl and a wild Chinese man wearing blood-spattered clothes and wielding a knife bursts through the police cordon and hurls himself onto the bonnet of the Land Rover, chicken feet spewing out of his pockets.

Who is this man? What does he want? His mad black eyes meet Andriy’s for a moment through the windscreen, his mouth jabbering urgently, then two policemen throw themselves on top of him and drag him struggling away. By the gate, two more policemen are wrestling with a big blond man wearing shorts, forcing his arms up behind him and bundling him into a van. This is definitely not a good situation.

“Why does this Chinese want to kill us? What is all this police, Vitaly?”

“Is OK. Police on our side.”

“But why police is here? What is going on?”

“All is because of troublemakers. Lazy Chineses refusing work. Police defend you right to work. We will show them good Ukrainian-type work. Good work, good money, eh, friend?”

Andriy is beginning to feel uncomfortable. To drive the overloaded caravan through this throng with all these police watching, when he is perhaps an outlaw on the run, and definitely has no passenger licence, and still has that five-bullet gun hidden in his backpack-is this a good idea? But it’s not just that holding him back, it’s something his father had said that had stuck in his memory, repeating the words of the visionary blind man of Sheffield in his speech all those years ago. He’s trying to recall-it was something about solidarity, the essential fellow-feeling of man-his father had drummed it into him-something about self-respect. Be a man-is this what he meant? That there are some things a man should not do, not for any amount of money?

He puts the Land Rover into reverse and starts to inch backwards.

“No, no. Go on! Go forward!” Vitaly jumps up in his seat waving his hands, and inadvertently steps on Dog’s tail. Dog lets out a yelp, leaps from the Land Rover and, drawn by a powerful smell of chicken, dives into the melee.

“Dog! Come back!” Andriy hits the brakes. “Come here! This chicken is not for eating!”

But Dog, seeing the challenge of the situation, wants to show them his true colours, and weaving in and out of the crowd with a few courteous woofs he soon has the chickens neatly rounded up in a corner of the yard, where they stand looking a bit surprised and clucking obediently.

Suddenly there is a bloodcurdling shriek and a small fierce figure, petite but voluptuous, breaks out of the crowd and hurtles towards them, arms flailing.

“Yola!” cries Andriy. “What you doing here?”

“I want home to Poland! This place is hell! All is cheating and lies!”