******
Rick and I left the girls to get their things together, and opened a beer each in the saloon while we waited for Henry to emerge from the wheelhouse.
“But you don’t have to work tomorrow!” We heard him say. “You can stay. Rick and Andy won’t mind.”
“We don’t mind!” Rick called up.
“Shut up, you two,” Henry threw back. “Can’t you see I’m busy?” He had certainly changed in two short days.
“No, Henry,” Mere replied in her quiet, unsure voice, but clear in the silence. “I have to go with Sai and Kini.”
If it had been either Sai or Kini, they would have stayed; but Mere didn’t have the self-confidence of those two; and she wouldn’t have known how to handle the three of us on her own.
Henry lost the argument.
Rick and I stood on the deck waving as Henry ferried the girls to shore. They didn’t want us to go back into Suva in the taxi with them, not wanting their families to know where they had been, or with whom they had spent the weekend. Rick had given Sai a ten-dollar note to pay for the taxi as they stepped down into the dinghy.
“But it should only be four dollars,” she said.
“The rest is for when the three of you come back next Saturday afternoon,” he replied, knowing that Sai finished at midday.
Henry’s eyes lit up. Mere was beginning to intrigue me. What did she have that enabled her to raise so much enthusiasm in a quiet lad like Henry?
“You know,” Henry said on his return. “If we head off to Wakaya first thing in the morning, we could probably locate von Luckner’s chest and be back here by Saturday. That would leave us the rest of the time to concentrate on the girls.”
It was too much for Rick and me. We both burst out laughing.
“Jesus!” Rick gasped. “She’s sure got you by the short and curlies.”
“Go to buggery,” was the bashful reply.
“No, mate,” I replied. “All joking aside. We stick to the original plan. So far nobody has asked us any leading questions. By now the yachties will think we’re just a bunch of guys having fun; and that’s the way we want it. We’ll spend the rest of the time around Suva, have the weekend with the girls, and then move off to Wakaya, looking like we’ve got all the time in the world, which we have.”
“Yeah, but.”
“No buts, Henry,” I replied. “It’ll probably take more than five days to get to the island and find the chest and get back here. What are we going to do if it is full of bloody sovereigns, or diamonds, or whatever you two think might be inside? What do we do then?”
There was no reply.
“We’d be buggering off back home,” I added. “That’s what we’d be doing. There’s no way I’d be staying around here with that sort of cargo on board. Somebody’s bound to see us diving around Wakaya and word would soon filter back here. It might take a week or so, but I still wouldn’t risk it.”
“Yeah,” Rick agreed. “You’re right; as bloody always.”
“Right, Henry,” I said. “Make up your mind. We wait around here and spend next weekend with the girls, or we motor around to Wakaya in the morning and head straight for home if we find the chest.”
“Sorry, guys,” he said. “I wasn’t really thinking.”
“Yes,” I added. “Like Rick just said. Mere’s got you by the short and curlies.”
It brought a grin to his face again and the mood was broken.
“Who’s having a beer then?” Rick asked.
******
“Okay,” Rick said when the beers were poured and we had tasted that first satisfying mouthful. “What are we going to do for the next five days?”
“I don’t know,” I replied. “Hang around here I suppose.”
“Hey, what about those other islands Kini was talking about?” Henry ventured.
She had mentioned two more small islands around the coast, totally uninhabited, where we could really be alone. I went up to the wheelhouse and got the chart again.
“That’s them,” Rick said. “Although don’t ask me to pronounce the bloody things.”
Leleuvia and Cagalai; about halfway around the coast to Wakaya. We could motor around in the morning and stay until Friday. It would give us a chance to do some quiet diving and test out the new equipment.
******
We anchored of Leleuvia for the next four days, doing plenty of diving and very little drinking; strengthening muscles that had become soft over the past few weeks. Nobody disturbed us, and the only boat to come close was a small wooden fishing boat, no cabin, about thirteen feet long. The two Indian fishermen waved and went on their way.
We saw two yachts: one a large schooner well out to sea; and the other a forty-footer that sailed past two days after we arrived, disappearing from view around the larger island two or three miles to the north of us – marked on the chart as Moturiki.
******
The following Friday evening found us back at the anchorage in the Bay of Islands, with Henry champing at the bit, bursting to get back to the Golden Dragon and see what he could find. Mere had brought a change in his opinion of coloured girls in general and Fijian girls in particular.
“What about Mere?” Rick asked. “If she’s there and sees you sniffing about for a bit of variety she won’t be happy. You could bugger things up for Andy and me.”
“She won’t be there without Sai and Kini. Kini’s on duty tonight, remember?”
“She’ll find out,” I said.
“How?”
“Just think back to the number of girls who came over to our table last Friday night and giggled with our three. They probably knew half the crumpet in that room. Mere would find out before midday tomorrow, and that’s for bloody certain.”
“Yeah,” Rick chipped in. “Can’t you wait another fifteen hours or so? They reckoned they’d be here shortly after midday tomorrow.”
“No, bugger it,” Henry replied. “I’m not sitting here twiddling my thumbs while all that talent’s going to waste.”
“Well, you can’t go to the Dragon,” Rick said.
“I’m not going to,” Henry replied, a gleam in his eye. “I’ll give that other place a try.”
“What other place?” I asked.
“La Tropicale.”
The name conjured up visions of swaying grass skirts and the rhythmic beat of wooden drums from Bora Bora, Tahiti, or some other exotic Polynesian territory: but I was willing to bet it wouldn’t be much different from the Golden Dragon.
Rick looked across at me, and I gave a shrug of resignation.
“Yeah, okay, mate,” he said finally. “But do us a favour. Keep away from the Dragon. And while you’re on your feet, pass that bottle of beer across.”
I had trouble getting to sleep that night. At first I kept thinking of Henry dancing breast to chest with some beautiful girl; and then worried that he might bring a couple of drunken tarts back to the trawler and we wouldn’t be able to get rid of them. I kept thinking that maybe Rick or I should have gone with him and kept him away from temptation, but by then it was too late, and I tossed and turned for the rest of the night.
But it wasn’t rough women that caused us most of the grief that followed.
Six
Henry was back in his own bunk behind the ladder when I awoke the next morning; and he was alone, which was one consolation; but the fo’c’sle stank of sweat and stale beer. He had collapsed on to his bunk fully dressed, even down to his shoes. I had never known him to do that before. We took pity on him and let him sleep for a few more hours before taking down a cup of strong black coffee. It was our turn to laugh.
“How was La Tropicale?” I asked. “Plenty of dusky maidens and grass skirts, knockers swirling in the warm night air?”
“Bloody waste of time,” he replied, bending down to untie a shoelace and thinking the better of it. “The place was full of tarts. Jesus, talk about rough! I walked through the doorway and some ugly bitch sidled up to me and grabbe
d me by the balls. Bloody hell!”
“Was there any talent there at all?” Rick asked.
“No.”
“Looks like we didn’t miss out on anything then, Andy.”
“No,” I replied, and turned back to Henry. “Well then?” I asked. “How the hell did you manage to finish up in a state like this?”
He raised his head up off his hands. “I met a couple of Indian guys and must have spent the whole evening drinking with them.” He paused for a moment. “I think they gave me a lift back to the Tradewinds. Christ only knows how I managed to get back here in the dinghy! Nice couple of guys. Can’t remember their names, though. Can’t remember much at all to tell you the truth.”
“What do you reckon, Rick,” I said. “Give him a hair of the dog?”
“Good God, no!” he laughed. “He’d be drunk after the first glass. I think he needs some fresh air. Come on, Henry, old son.” He grabbed him by the arm. “Let me give you a hand topside.”
We helped him stagger up the fo’c’sle steps and pushed him through the saloon doorway and down to the back deck.
“Thanks,” he said, his face paler than I had ever seen it.
“Now?” Rick asked, giving me a slight nod.
“Now,” I agreed, and before Henry could offer any resistance, we grabbed a leg and an arm each and tossed him over the side.
He surfaced, waving his arms wildly, coughing and spluttering, and cursing the pair of us; but it helped to cure the worst of his hangover; and after a shower and something to eat he looked almost human again.
Exactly at twelve-thirty Henry spotted the three girls stepping down on to the pontoon in front of the hotel. He had been sitting on top of the wheelhouse with his eyes glued to the binoculars for at least an hour, even though we knew that Kini couldn’t get away from the hospital until midday at the earliest.
He and Rick raced in with the dinghy to pick them up. It was only built for four, but five could squeeze in at a pinch. I still couldn’t understand how the six of us had managed to get out to the trawler after our night at the Golden Dragon without going into the drink.
I had the kettle boiled and cups arranged for coffee as they came alongside; but Henry had only one thing on his mind. Mere no sooner had both feet on the deck before he grabbed her by the wrist and hustled her up to the wheelhouse. He already had the two mattresses laid out. It seemed a bit rough to me, but Mere wasn’t in the least concerned, and it turned into a race between the two of them to see who could get through the doorway first.
Henry’s grinning face appeared for an instant as he slammed the sliding door shut, and then his head disappeared below the level of the window. Rick and I stared at each other, amazed at Henry’s change of character. Kini and Sai had hands over their mouths, bursting into a fit of the giggles. I looked at Rick again and then back at the two girls, both now gazing down at the deck, eyes averted.
“Why not?” I croaked at Rick, my throat having gone dry.
“Why not indeed!” he yelled as he steered Sai along the deck and into the saloon. I raced after them, but he beat me to the fo’c’sle with a second to spare.
“What about me?” I muttered in a hurt tone. We hadn’t thought the square of canvas would be needed before nightfall. It was still down in the storage locker. There was only going to be one couple enjoying the fruits of youth in the fo’c’sle.
“Not quick enough off the mark, old son!” Rick laughed from below. “Not quick enough.”
I turned to Kini. She smiled with that innocent air and stared down at her feet again. Those feet were getting more attention than I was. I tried to think where we could go. I wasn’t going to bed her down in the saloon, knowing that any one of the four might come trooping back unannounced. It only left the storage hold, which was out of the question, and the back deck, or up on top of the wheelhouse roof, both of which were a little too public for my liking. I stomped back out through the saloon doorway to the back deck, my frustration starting to get the better of me; and suddenly had this brilliant idea.
“Wait there!” I yelled to Kini, and raced back inside.
“Look out, Rick!” I cried. “I’m coming down.” There was a rapid repositioning of bodies as I jumped the last couple of feet down into the fo’c’sle.
“Christ, mate!” Rick pleaded. “Have a bit of couth for God’s sake!”
“Don’t worry,” I replied. “I’ll only be a second. You two can get back to your discussion of the advantages of steam over sail in a moment.”
I grabbed two blankets from the storage cupboard under Henry’s bunk and was back up the ladder before Rick had time to argue further.
Poor Kini. She looked from the blankets to the hard steel deck and shook her head.
“No,” I said. “Not here. Quick, climb down into the dinghy.” She still hung back. “No, not in there either,” I added. “Look, over there, on the island!”
And then she laughed and took my arm in both of hers.
We skimmed across to the tiny circular island, not more than fifteen feet wide and less than a hundred yards from the front of the hotel. I tied the dinghy to the blind side. The boys would be able to see the dinghy if they came out and looked, but nobody else could see us as we climbed the four or five feet up the steep rock face and slipped into the dense foliage, moving through the ginger and tropical plants growing right up to the abrupt edge. I pushed some of the greenery aside and laid out the two blankets, drawing her down to my side and holding her there for a moment, glancing up to a clear blue sky and the single coconut tree bearing nuts that looked ominously as though they might fall at any moment.
We turned our heads and looked out through the tangled undergrowth at the people sitting around the swimming pool, and at those on the decks of several of the yachts, sipping their gins and tonic no more than seventy yards from where we lay. Kini started to giggle again and I put my hand over her mouth until I could bend down to cover it with my own.
We helped each other with buttons and zippers, and carefully pushed clothing aside.
It was a sexual situation unlike any other I had ever experienced. We lay out in the open air, surrounded by nothing but a few shrubs and long grass, with fifty or more people out in front of us going about their normal Saturday afternoon’s entertainment, only eighty or ninety yards away. Without those few pieces of greenery we might have been presented as though on an open stage. We could see them as clear as day through gaps in the foliage, and I felt as though they could see us too, but even so, we continued enjoying the thrill and pleasure of each other’s bodies; and it seemed to add to the excitement.
When that first race of blood had been satisfied I lifted my head and looked again at the dreary people, and sniggered. Kini looked over her shoulder, shrieked as she spotted a woman pointing a camera our way, and then slapped me hard on the backside as I nuzzled into her neck.
I was certain the noise would have been heard and I risked another glimpse, but the photograph had been taken of the cute little island, and the elderly tourist was strolling back towards the pool.
We lay close together; Kini with her dark wiry head nestled into my shoulder, and watched a mynah bird swoop down and perch on the top of a ginger plant. He knew we were there, but he only wanted food, and very soon left when he saw that there was none.
I smiled down at her and kissed the top of her nose. The urgency had gone. Fingernails ran softly down the middle of my back and what before had been a rapid climb to momentary ecstasy was now a slow, deliberate ascent to pure heaven.
“Andrew?”
The whisper brought me back to the present.
“Yes?”
“We had better go back now.”
I nodded, kissed her lips tenderly once more, and reached for my shorts.
******
“Where the hell did you two get to?” Rick asked as he strolled out on deck, at least half an hour after we had returned.
“Nowhere,” I replied. “We’ve been sitting he
re waiting for you buggers to surface.”
“Don’t give me that! I heard the bloody outboard start up two minutes after you crashed down into the fo’c’sle and grabbed that blanket.”
“We were on our honeymoon,” I replied quietly.
“Wha.a.at!”
It was too much for Kini. She couldn’t keep a straight face and the shriek of laughter burst out.
“Honeymoon Island,” I said. “It’s what the locals call that small island over near the hotel. There’s only room for two, and it’s separated from you and Henry and your grunts and groans by four hundred yards of water. Great spot!”
“Smart bugger!” he tossed back over his shoulder as he walked to the stern and gazed across at the island.
“Up yours!” I yelled. “Come on, let’s have some lunch. I’m starving. Where’s Henry?”
“Still making a pig of himself.”
I stepped up to the wheelhouse door and thumped on it two or three times. “Come on, Henry! Time for food!”
There was silence for a good half minute and then the door slid to and one bloodshot eye peered out. It closed again, and five minutes later they both stepped down on to the back deck under our piercing stares.
Mere grabbed him possessively and stared back at us, her face frightened for the briefest of moments. Henry caught the questioning look in my eyes and turned her back around towards the wheelhouse, whispering something into her ear, sending her back inside in a hurry.
“What was that all about?” I asked, hoping like hell that she hadn’t overheard us talking and that Henry hadn’t told her about von Luckner’s chest.
“Er... nothing,” he stammered. “Nothing really.”
“Oh?”
“I was... ah... just telling her... ah... to... make some tea.”
“Oh?”
******
The rest of the day was spent in a civilized fashion lazing around the pool at the Tradewinds. The management didn’t mind us being there, gladly taking the money we spent on beer, hamburgers and the occasional bowl of hot chips.
Rick leaned back into the sun-lounge and gazed up towards the spread of white clouds building in the sky. “What say we go out to dinner?” he suggested.
The Stone Dog Page 8
