Liner

by James Barlow

  There was no sign of any quay, for it was around a bed in the river and two and a half miles distant.

  Miss Wearne leaned on the rail and was thrilled by this impressive landscape of forests and mountains, fishing boats, huts and buffalo seen in the distance, and by the hand waved in acknowledgement by a fisherman. In seconds she had seen at least thirty things of interest not mentioned in any geography book used in the school.

  There was a tendency among elderly people to be slightly aggressive in anxiety, to be first in activities, to insist on being there, taking part, obtaining the best seat, a good table, a porthole. It was a form of apprehension: I’m still here, take notice of me. I am not deaf or incapacitated yet. Miss Wearne had been as guilty as the next in this, in terms of her illness, but today she was up and about because the sea was calm and she was excited by sheer pleasure. Her keenness was shared by most passengers, although they had groaned at Miss Wearne’s table when a steward officer at dinner last night had said breakfast would be at six, but now Miss Wearne was hungry and ate with appetite.

  It was surprising how much confusion could arise if the ship’s routine was interrupted or altered. Breakfast was chaos, something approaching panic, a rather shameful exhibition of haste, greed and selfishness by passengers sitting at unfamiliar tables. (It was what was called ‘an open sitting’ and Miss Wearne learned to dread them.) And then those passengers going ashore were told to assemble in the Aegean Lounge, and at every junction Miss Wearne found the ship’s crew or the cabaret entertainers directing her to it. A metal shutter now inexplicably blocked the way she normally returned from the dining room to her cabin and so she had to walk to the other end of Metaxas Deck to descend and fetch her camera.

  Then, in the Aegean Lounge, there was some confusion as to whether she was going on Tour A, B or C; she didn’t know, a lot of passengers didn’t know, and she had to identify it as ‘the three-dollar one.’ She was thereupon issued a triangular green sticker. ‘Just like a lot of merino sheep,’ a woman said to her. And certainly there seemed to be more chaos and pandemonium at this small island than at a major port.

  Miss Wearne did not wish to foist herself onto Debbie Vertigan. The girl had been very kind. She had walked up and down the Parade Deck with Miss Wearne. She had fetched library books and bouillon. On any day when Miss Wearne felt like eating lunch on deck, Debbie had insisted on queuing for it while Miss Wearne sat in a deck chair. She had bought stamps to save Miss Wearne becoming exhausted waiting at the Purser’s Office, and lemonade to spare Miss Wearne the unfamiliar terror of entering a bar. And scarcely one of these favours had been requested; nor did the girl know of her illness. Debbie was simply thoughtful. ‘What a very charming girl your companion is,’ a lady had observed to Miss Wearne only yesterday, and quite some minutes had passed before Miss Wearne realized in shock that the lady had presumed Debbie was a paid companion.

  But in a crowd of four hundred Debbie now waved and called out, ‘I’ve saved you a seat,’ and Miss Wearne was glad of a little rest before venturing ashore.

  She noticed with relief that Debbie also wore a green sticker. The girl in fact made no attempt to seek out anyone else and Miss Wearne, while not attaching herself to Debbie, couldn’t resist staying near.

  ‘Do you know how to load a camera?’ she asked.

  It was something that had been worrying her since the day she’d bought the camera. She knew absolutely nothing about lenses or focusing; she’d never owned a camera before in her life. But Debbie knew . . .

  Edgar stood on the stage and called for silence.

  ‘We’re going to sing,’ he announces.

  Someone shouted, ‘When do we go ashore?’

  ‘There’s a little old Indonesian proverb which says ‘Never go ashore until your stomach is empty.’’

  The passengers groaned.

  There was much consultation, coming and going, and then Edgar told them all. ‘The Indonesians are checking. Only another hour and a half. We set the clocks wrong,’ he admitted.

  Behind him a ship’s clock was behaving oddly and had begun to accelerate. It went around until it showed five past six.

  The passengers laughed until the entertainments officer said, ‘It shouldn’t happen to a dog, but it has. It’s now six in the morning. You poor things got up at four!’

  He sat down at a piano. Edgar and some of the cabaret company began to sing.

  ‘What shall I play next?’ he then asked.

  Like the English, the Australians and New Zealanders in times of crisis dismissed all the current pop music and reverted to the old tunes belonging to war. They sand ‘Lily of Lagoona’ and ‘Pack Up Your Troubles’ as if another conflict had begun.

  Forty minutes passed and then they were asked to assemble on the port side of Metaxas Deck, the ones with green stickers leaving the lounge first.

  The passengers ignored this instruction and stampeded; Miss Wearne was crushed and alarmed.

  Alongside the Areopagus were two small Indonesian gunboats, already packed with passengers and villainous, perplexed sailors.

  Miss Wearne was pushed across to a gunboat and sat precariously on the swivel seat of a 20mm cannon. This gunboat filled up until it was so crowded that people were likely to fall overboard if they moved a foot.

  Miss Wearne realized that it was more than just hot. It was like a furnace, and already the Australians, who lived in high average temperatures, wilted under this, and began to sweat as they’d never sweated before in their lives. The moisture poured down their faces, their ears and necks; it soaked their armpits and chests and saturated their hair. Clean shirts and frocks crumpled, showed great wet stains. It was all very embarrassing and uncomfortable, and this was before seven in the morning, local time.

  Miss Wearne felt it a little less than others who were fatter or had thicker blood. As the gunboat moved away from the Areopagus she took photographs of the liner and the volcanic mountains. Eileen would be impressed. They were a long way from the suburbia of Melbourne now.

  The gunboat chugged around the bend of the estuary to a small harbour. Crowds awaited its passengers, for the town of Den Pasar had been given the day off for this occasion. Miss Wearne had heard strange tinny music and voices speaking through public address systems. She saw crowds of children and traders waiting, a line of small buses, and young men in military and paramilitary uniforms rushing to and fro, more excited than their visitors.

  It was quite difficult for her to get ashore, down a series of planks, but ship’s crew and Indonesians knee deep in water, assisted her. She was conscious, as she stood in the tremendous heat among girls, children and old men who wanted to sell her baskets, batik cloth and ornaments, of how shapeless her fellow passengers were in comparison with the people here. As white as slugs and sweating and stumbling and already more concerned about heat. She saw Muriel, Ada, Iris and their husbands, with straw hats on, saturated around their shoulders and breasts in sweat, vulgar and red-faced, coarse and ungracious in their behaviour toward these people, and was for a moment ashamed of Australia.

  There were twenty dancers to greet them – beautiful girls dressed in glittering goldleaf and crowns of fresh frangipani flowers. They leaned and gyrated and used their hands and elbows in the ritual of the dance, and their expressionless, rather solemn pretty faces did not sweat. The passengers stood awkwardly, not knowing what to do, photographed them and walked on to the buses.

  One of the officials striding around with a hand-carried megaphone was a small attractive Indonesian girl. She wore a dark green military uniform and hat, but did not seem bothered by the heat. She was ruthlessly efficient on behalf of the passengers.

  They had travelled only a few miles from the harbour when the small bus broke down. The twenty passengers cheered doubtfully. Miss Wearne was now hot and had a great urge to take off her wig and sc
ratch her head before immersing it in cold water. She felt sleepy and some of the desire to see temples and dancing had worn off.

  This proved to be true of the other passengers, with the possible exception of Debbie. The efficient Indonesian guide produced another bus within five minutes and they continued the round of old temples, museums and an art gallery on the beach. But the priorities were altered. First priority was now given to obtaining a cold drink, preferably beer. Some way after that came green for bargains, and last of all the desire to see mountains and buildings and photograph them.

  As fast as the passengers poured liquid into their mouths it burst out of their pores. They saw with interest wood carvings, sacred monkeys, buffalo and temples; they haggled with street traders who were surprisingly inoffensive and not particularly insistent. They closed their eyes as the bus was driven in a manner reckless even by Australian standards.

  They sat in the full glare of the late morning sun – the passengers in earlier buses had taken all the covered area – and watched a dance that apparently went on for hours. The Legong dance was performed by individual girls, dressed in dazzling gold and vivid colours, accompanied by a complete gamelan orchestra playing at once vigorously and then suddenly languourous. The girls were totally absorbed in the dance, the slow but complicated movements of hands, fingers and ankles, the turn of the head and sway of the body, all of which had meaning in terms of giants and marital fidelity and the eternal struggle between good and evil. The musicians, however, stared with frank interest at the tourists and some grinned.

  It was impossible to break away; it would have been offensive, so the twenty of them watched with decreasing artistic enthusiasm and increasing thirst and discomfort. Their visible discomposure and sweating were scarcely alleviated by the flapping of newspapers and fans.

  After forty minutes they began to trickle ignominiously away and stood in a cemetery in the shade of trees, not able to care whether they’d been churlish or not, or if they had been offensive toward a ceremonial divertissement rehearsed for many hours – as it obviously would have to be – on their behalf. Australians were the world’s worst adherents of the theory of tipping, but now they looked guiltily for someone to tip. Surprisingly, there was no one.

  The young Indonesian woman announced, ‘We will go to the famous hotel’ – there were sighs of relief – ‘but first we will visit the art gallery and shop.’

  The gallery was cool and the carvings and pictures excellent. The passengers haggled and enjoyed themselves.

  Miss Wearne wandered around the large air-conditioned hotel until she found a bathroom. She then took off her wig and scratched her head shamelessly and bathed it in cold water and felt cooler.

  She sat under an immense tree and was brought a bottle of cold orange liquid from the freezer.

  ‘Locally bottled,’ the waiter informed her.

  She didn’t know what it was, but couldn’t bear not to drink it instantly. It had a strange taste, rather bitter, but was cold and satisfying. Further, it took away tiredness. Miss Wearne had a second bottle of this remarkable fluid, which in fact was beer . . .

  They returned to the Areopagus in a small motorboat so crowded that it was necessary for everyone to stand still and cling to a rail. The water was choppy and some people felt rather ill. The smell of engine oil and smoke discomforted others.

  Miss Wearne stood facing Ada, Muriel, Iris, Harry and the other two men. They had been on a different tour and were grumbling. Ada looked very pale and had a headache.

  If they were to be believed, they had been swindled. They discussed earnestly the exact amounts spent. They all had faces glistening with sweat and clothes dark with the fluid of themselves.

  ‘Aren’t you enjoying yourselves?’ Miss Wearne asked loudly.

  They were devastated. Nothing could have been so humiliating as to be seen not enjoying themselves.

  ‘Oh, sure,’ Iris said, modifying their mortification. ‘You’ve got to be smart, though, to outwit these beggars. Ada got clipped ten dollars for this wooden pig and its split.’

  Miss Wearne claimed recklessly, ‘You didn’t do very well; I got this camera for fifteen dollars.’

  She had in fact paid forty dollars for it in Melbourne.

  ‘Is that all?’ asked Iris in shock, ruining Harry’s observation that ‘Hong Kong’s the place for cameras.’

  Miss Wearne had the satisfaction of hearing one of them whisper, ‘She’s not as daft as she looks,’ and another hiss in envy, ‘Fifteen dollars! I wonder where?’

  The boat went around the stern of the Areopagus. ‘Oh, look at that,’ said Debbie.

  There was haggling going on at the stern of the Areopagus, and the crew were paying in kind, throwing out food for the men and women on the frail catamarans. Tins of jam, chickens, jars of pickle. Miss Wearne saw a fisherman stare at a triangular piece of cheese wrapped in tinfoil and then take a bite at it with the metal foil still on . . .

  The boat bobbed up and down by the Areopagus’ gangway and some of the passengers were nervous about leaping across the gap despite the two sailors standing ready to catch them, who shouted, ‘Jump!’

  Iris jumped and fell on the gangway screeching. Her mouth was seen to be bleeding when she stood up.

  Miss Wearne was contemptuous. Debbie asked anxiously ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘Jump, of course,’ answered Miss Wearne, and when she did she was saved from toppling backwards by the two sailors.

  She would normally have been terrified and had to be lifted bodily. But today, for the first time in her life, Miss Wearne was unashamedly tight.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Marion Burston relaxed full length in a deck chair not long after eight thirty in the morning. She knew that if she did not occupy a chair very soon after breakfast the people who went to the second breakfast sitting would fill every chair until noon.

  A woman sat down in the next deck chair. She was armed with a library book, knitting, stationery, and a large handbag, but Marion was aware that she wanted to talk.

  The woman was older than Marion and carried herself with a slight attitude of gravity, of personage: she would not, her posture suggested, tell you who she was because on this voyage she wanted to meet all sorts of people not normally encountered.

  She had silver-gray hair and a face that suggested kindness and sympathy, and she wore tortoiseshell glasses. She was well but not ostentatiously dressed; it was only if one looked at anything she wore or carried rather closely that wealth and good taste were automatically suggested.

  ‘It’s so hot,’ she commented. ‘Even this early in the day I’m glad to put my feet up.’

  Marion responded, ‘So am I’ and felt self-consciously that she had been clumsy.

  ‘You’re English, aren’t you?’ the woman said. ‘I can tell. Those lovely children. So polite, I’ve noticed. Artistic. You’ve got artistic children, I feel sure. Different faces from the Australians. The English have integrity,’ she affirmed, probably out of date by thirty years, but using the word deliberately. ‘I find my fellow Australians so vulgar. I was so embarrassed in Bali yesterday, so coarse and ungracious, they were, and talking to the – coloured – people as if they’d been in Australian . . . ’

  ‘I thought the dancers were beautiful,’ said Marion, not to be drawn into discussion about the Australians. ‘It was such an unspoilt place. And people were saying to my husband that it ought to be developed. Leave it alone, I say.’

  ‘Oh, I couldn’t agree more,’ the older woman said. ‘It reminded me a little of Nepal. I was therefore ten years before Tom, my husband, died. We women used to go into the hills for the hot weather. Poor Tom had to stay down there, so hot and tiresome, and he looked so ill each time he came . . . I remember we went by horse to see Mount Everest at sunrise. Very dangerous tracks and old
emaciated horses. We stood there, about eight of us, and there was nothing but cloud. And suddenly it lifted and there was Everest, so fantastically beautiful, my dear, that one wanted to die. There was in fact a plaque with the names of people who’d thrown themselves over the cliff edge, overcome by such a spectacle. Unspoilt, undeveloped, as you so rightly say . . . My companion in the cabin felt Bali ought to have facilities, whatever they may be . . .

  The old lady laughed, chiding herself gently, and proceeded: ‘It’s really so amusing. I suppose I shouldn’t gossip. I don’t really know her, you see – I’ve no idea where she comes from – but as we’d been introduced some months ago I took enormous trouble to get into the same cabin and sit at the same table. And it’s very disappointing because she’s so rude to the staff and so complaining; and I can’ see how to get away from her at all . . . But its fun isn’t it? And nice to get away. You must be glad to have the children with you – so educational for them. To be honest, I’ve come away because I think my children – who are grown up, of course – take me for granted. It will make me appreciated when I get back . . . Besides, why should they have all my money?’

  There was a brief silence and then the lady concluded, ‘I’ve had such lovely letters since I left, so it shows I may be right, don’t you feel? But I’m talking too much. Do tell me about yourself. Where are you going? Back to England, I fear. Well, I don’t blame you. Such a nice green country . . . ’

  And suddenly, shakily, Marion began to unburden and confess, to share misery with this warm-hearted stranger.

  ‘We’re going home. It’s not that we don’t like Australia, although I suppose the edge of the Nullarbor Plain isn’t exactly Kew Gardens! Only . . . you see . . . Mike . . . nearly killed someone. And it’s got on our nerves.’