Adventures of the Red Towel

I gave Dad a red towel for his birthday recently because his red towel was stolen by a prisoner who ran through our yard naked when I was 8yrs old ...  (basically, Dad has everything he could need, so it was an opportunity to give a gift with a memory attached…)

When I was little we always had a random mix of towels, whether it was a cultural thing I don’t know; I did note that our Kiwi neighbours’ towels DID match each other. Not ours. We weren’t really  “Kiwi” for a while, if ever..

Mum, being from Kiribati was of the view that “a towel, is a towel, is a towel”, and Dad; though from England, kind of had the same view come to think of it...?

Anyway, our eclectic collection included a red towel (it was definitely orange in my opinion; but poms call anything near red ‘red’, so red it was) 

I believe it originated from England and was one of the possessions Dad brought to the marriage, they didn’t have much. 

A strongly English cultural practise - Dad would - and encouraged us to also - use the same towel for a week, and hang it in the ‘airing cupboard' between uses (hot water cupboard). If his towel was missing any morning he would ask around with a semi-irritated tone “who’s taken my towel?”  

Often, “who’s taken the red towel?”

Our family had two stints in Honiara, Solomon Islands with Dad’s work as an accountant; and at one stage we lived on the ridge of a valley, at the bottom of which, a kilometre or two along, was a prison.  Uniquely juxtaposed; it was right beside the exquisite, tropical Honiara Botanical Gardens, it always perplexed me that from the main road down there one had to pass the prison in order to enter the Gardens! An entrance seemingly inducing anxiety, expected to be followed by relaxation..?  Maybe to highlight the contrast and therefore raise the value of the experience of the gardens..? Perhaps it was to keep the area balanced, to prevent home owners from bragging? Who knows.

As it so happened, one day we heard breaking news over the radio: the prisoners had busted a large hole in the wall of said prison-beside-Botanic-Gardens-in-the-valley-below-our-house; and, incredibly, every single prisoner (over 300) had managed to scurry through the hole and were now at large. Wow. Ok. Nice. 

To say that the neighbourhood were all rather anxious going to sleep that night was an understatement. 

We, however, were not tooo concerned as Dad reminded me, all our windows were barred and our entire property gated and surrounded by fencing, areas were topped with barbed wire. But it was not the most comfortable feeling either way. 

The red towel had travelled with us to the Solomons from NZ, and Dad would hang it - and any towel in use - on our outdoor covered line, as we had no hot-water-cupboard and it was warm enough outdoors every night. 

This particular week was the red towel’s-turn, and it was hanging on our outside line night after night. 

The following morning we became immediately aware that there were a number of police cars in the street, and a scene next door. 

The father next door was a work colleague of Dad’s and his family were close friends of ours. As is common in the islands, they had a number of relatives living with them. In this case, young women between 16-20years, and these young ladies all slept in one room. 

One of them, Margot; had, as we soon learnt; woken in the night to find a man standing at their bedroom doorway, stark naked. You may have guessed where he had come from.

One can only conclude that this ‘starved’ young man thought he’d hit the jackpot discovering this room full of young ladies & figured rousing them from their slumber to his fabulous naked self was a great introduction, and that ‘roused’ would obviously quickly become ‘aroused’... I mean, makes sense?!?!

Margot, on edge already due to the radio announcement, immediately came to her senses and declared in a raspy but loud whisper “Prisoner!”

The whole roomful, also sleeping restlessly, woke in a commotion, promptly followed by the rest of the household. 

The hopeful visitor suddenly became rather UNhopeful, and realising his plans were thwarted and that he was out of options saw nothing for it but to leap out of the nearest louvred window. 

Fortunately (unfortunately?), he didn’t do himself major harm... naked man, GLASS, panicked leap... are you wincing too?

…So there we all were the following morning, standing outside that chosen exit-window of his, hearing the story over and over again from Margot, with unabating interest. A forensic team of sorts was examining his abandoned clothing, confirming it was indeed that of an inmate.

The shards of glass were finger-print-dusted and the younger children and I stood nearby and discussed quite soberly how, our fingerprints may show up there, and what implications might that hold for us? Could we potentially be sent to prison in his place? It seemed viable for 7-10 year olds. 

We also giggled over the fact that the fleeing man must’ve remained naked, where was he now, was he still running naked? The thought amused us all. 

It wasn’t until many hours later that it dawned on my Dad “well that will be what happened to the red towel!” 

He had, on auto-pilot, gone outside that morning to retrieve his towel off the verandah line to re-use it that morning, and it was MISSING. My sister and I had managed to dodge accusations in the distraction of the police presence. A small breach in the fence between ours and the neighbour’s property was concluded to be the point of entry. 

News travels lightning-quickly in the islands and intell came back to us that day that a man was seen running through a neighbouring village, clad only in an orange towel... (I felt rather smug, “I knew it was orange”)

It felt very exciting and quite special to now somehow be connected with this peculiar crime. 

So what happened about the mass escape? Well, another benefit of living on a contained island (there are a lot of down sides too), is that every prisoner was KNOWN TO BE a prisoner by anyone he came into contact with, and within 48 or so hours, every last fugitive was rounded up and returned to the prison, our friend in the red towel included we could only assume. The prison wall was repaired and fortified… And that was that.

As an adult I do now wonder about other aspects of that event ...

Did the stress of the event have lasting effects on the young lady disturbed in her sleep? Or on the other girls?

What was the punishment for all those adventurous prisoners? 

Where are they now, is their great escape a story they re-tell to their grandchildren? Or something to be ashamed of, a failure of sorts?

One who could certainly tell a tale remained and remains silent, mute... The Red Towel.