The Point of Vanishing

by Maryka Biaggio

  “I don’t. He’s been wretched.”

  “You can’t count on him. You shouldn’t.”

  “I hate him. He’s nothing to me.”

  Her mother dropped her gaze and pinched the bridge of her nose. She snapped her head up and held Barbara’s gaze. “Then why did you try to kill yourself?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Don’t be this way, Bar. If Tane and his friend hadn’t rowed out to you, you would’ve drowned. I was there. I saw it all. You scared me and everybody else.”

  “I wouldn’t have drowned.”

  “Please don’t lie to me. I’m your mother.”

  Her mother was the reason her father wasn’t coming back. It was her father she needed now, not her mother. He was her muse and guide. She flared her nostrils and steeled her gaze. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Look, you’re 15; you have your whole life ahead of you. You can’t let your father ruin your future.”

  “But he has. Both of you have.”

  Her mother scooted off the bed and knelt by her side. “Promise me you’ll not allow your selfish father to control your life like this. Please, Bar. Promise me you’ll never do anything like that again.”

  She hated this haranguing. Her mother didn’t understand. She’d not wanted to leave Tahiti. Her parents had ruined it for her. “All right, I won’t. Now leave me alone.”

  “You’re promising, then?”

  “Yes, I said I am.”

  “Thank God.” Her mother stood and looked down on her. “And as soon as we earn enough money for passage, we’re going back to the States. These islands aren’t good for you.”

  “How can you say that?”

  “You’re deluding yourself if you think you can live like a native. You’re not a native. You’re an American. With college and promise ahead of you.”

  “I don’t care about any of that anymore.”

  “You’re just not yourself now—after the shock of your father’s letter and your fever. In time you’ll care again. You’ll see.”

  ✭

  During their four days at sea, Barbara pretended she’d taken her mother’s message to heart. She even allowed her mother to prod her to fill up at meals. What else could she do? And the fresh sea air and rest did restore her color. But when they arrived in Tonga’s port town of Nuku’alofa, she found she had neither the inclination nor energy to explore this new island.

  They rented a grass hut among coconut and banana trees. Her mother scheduled a meeting with the American student she’d heard about, Richard Howe, and returned to the hut with a thesis written in expansive hand, its sentences often crawling into the margins.

  Her mother announced: “He’s a serious young man. His typewriter died, and he’ll pay us reasonably well to type his thesis.”

  “What’s it about?”

  “Modern Education in the Tongan Islands.”

  “He’s reforming the natives?”

  “Please don’t start with the noble savage talk.”

  Barbara said nothing. She had other things on her mind. She’d been rearranging her papers and had come across the letter from her father. She’d tucked it away with her abandoned sketches in an envelope labeled “Discards.” She hated him.

  “You must help with typing. It’ll do you good.”

  “You start and tell me about it.”

  Her mother set up her typewriter and rolled in a fresh sheet of paper. Over dinner, she said, “It’s fascinating material. Especially some of the background about the islanders’ folkways. And I need your help.”

  “I don’t know if I can concentrate.”

  “Please try, dear. You can start in the middle. And take your time. We’ll add the page numbers later.”

  Out of boredom more than anything else, Barbara relented. For days she sat alongside her mother and rattled off pages, mostly in the afternoons when it was too hot for outings or when the steamy rains of the season kept them indoors. That’s how she learned about Tonga’s traditional healers. And that they had ways to chase away evil spirits.

  The next morning, on their walk to the beach, Barbara told her mother, “I’d like to meet this Richard Howe. Can we visit him?”

  “I don’t see why not. We can give him a progress report.”

  “And talk to him about his research.”

  “I’m so pleased you’ve got your curiosity back, Bar.”

  ✭

  Richard Howe was a sickly young man—skinny and pasty-faced—who lived in a musty apartment on the edge of town. Barbara wondered how he’d managed his seven months here with all the tropical sun and, now, the heavy rains. The day after she met him, Barbara returned to his apartment for a private conversation.

  “This paragraph,” she pointed it out on the page. “Mother says it’s a little vague.”

  “Hmm,” he said, studying it. “Yes, I see what she means. Let me do some rewriting. Can you wait?”

  “Yes.”

  He sat down at his flimsy desk and bent over the paper, scribbling away.

  Barbara wandered around his apartment, pausing at the windowsill he’d decorated with shells. She picked one up and examined it. “Tell me, Richard, do you know any traditional healers?”

  “I’ve met a few. There are different kinds.”

  “What about the ones who chase away evil spirits?”

  “Them,” he said absently, “they treat what’s called fakamahaki.”

  “I’d like to meet one.”

  Richard scratched away with his pencil for a moment. “Doing some research of your own?”

  “Not really. I’m just terribly curious about their practices.”

  “I suppose I can ask around. Is your mother interested, too?”

  “No. She’s a regular heathen when it comes to Polynesian traditions.”

  “Does she know you wish to meet with a healer?”

  “I’ll be telling her.”

  ✭

  “Barbara,” said Richard with a flap of his hand, “this is Malohi. I have told him of your interest. He speaks no English, so his granddaughter will translate. She is Teyah.”

  Teyah served them white drinks from a tray and lifted her glass toward them. “Welcome to my grandfather’s home.”

  Barbara sipped the thick concoction—she guessed it was coconut milk flavored with vanilla. “Thank you,” she said, nodding to Teyah and her grandfather. “I’m honored to meet you.”

  The four of them settled around a lowlying wood table in the middle of a grass hut. Malohi, a stooped man with skin sagging from his arms and face, seated himself cross-legged opposite Barbara. Richard sat next to Barbara, and Teyah sat beside her grandfather. They made a motley group, dressed in varied garb, with skin colors ranging from nearly white to weathered brown. Richard wore a collared cotton shirt and belted trousers, Barbara a simple yellow dress sewn in the West Indies, Teyah a modern Western sundress, and Malohi a flowing white lava lava.

  Richard, who had a rudimentary grasp of the native language, spoke to Teyah, who then turned to Barbara. “You wish to learn about expelling evil spirits?”

  “Yes. Can your grandfather tell me: If a man who has led a good life suddenly does something dishonorable, might it be because an evil spirit possesses him?”

  Teyah translated for her grandfather, who crinkled his face into a thoughtful pose. After a moment, he spoke, keeping his eyes latched on Barbara.

  The daughter explained his words. “He says it’s possible. He must know more before he can say.”

  Barbara swallowed. She balked at disclosing her father’s deeds in front of Richard. Her mother would never discuss such personal matters with a stranger. But she’d come this far, and she’d imagined she might need to disclose some of the awful details.

  “My father, who had been quite happy with our family, met a very young woman. Suddenly he wanted to divorce my mother. He forgot my birthday, which he’d never done before, and he even lost his job beca
use of his disgraceful behavior.” Barbara pulled in her lower lip. That ought to be enough to give him an idea of her father’s conduct.

  The words were again translated back and forth before Teyah asked, “This father, he does not live here?”

  “No, he lives in the United States.”

  It did not take many words for Teyah to give her grandfather’s response. “He cannot say about someone who lives so far away. He does not have such powers.”

  Barbara nodded. She’d expected too much. Perhaps she could try a different tack. “Let’s say this woman has cast a spell over him. Is there anything I can do to rid him of it?”

  Teyah conveyed her question, and Malohi pursed his wrinkled lips a moment before speaking to his granddaughter.

  Teyah paused as if thinking how best to render her grandfather’s message. “He says he cannot see into this man’s heart. Only someone who understands his heart can know who possesses it.”

  “So, there’s nothing I can do?”

  The exchange that followed contained far more words than Barbara had uttered. At one point, Teyah asked, “Have you spoken to your father about his wishes?”

  “We’ve exchanged letters. Or I should say I have sent him many letters since he left the family a year ago, and he has written only one to me. He says he wants to stay with this woman.”

  Again, the back and forth between Teyah and Malohi went on a few minutes.

  Finally, Teyah turned to her again. “My grandfather says you must look into your own heart. Only there can you find the answer to your sorrow.”

  That was about as helpful as Dr. Lowry’s advice—to understand her reaction to her father’s conduct. As if she wasn’t already steeped in that. She asked Teyah to thank Malohi for his wisdom, though she didn’t expect to benefit from it.

  Her mother would have chided her for even believing a healer might somehow help. She’d assured Richard she’d tell her mother of the encounter, which she planned to do that evening.

  But when she returned from her shopping errands that afternoon, her mother snapped, “Get in here and sit down.”

  Barbara plopped down at their table and looked over their typewriters and papers at her mother.

  Her mother stared at her, all pucker-faced. “I know you visited a healer without telling me. About chasing away your father’s evil spirits.”

  “So? It did no harm. I don’t see why you’re so upset.”

  “You have to give up this obsession with your father. It only hurts you.”

  “I don’t care anymore.”

  “You don’t act like it. It’s time I told you some things about your father.” Her mother pulled a chair out and sat, screeching its legs up to the table. “You should know the whole truth about your father. Painful as it may be.”

  “Humph,” Barbara said. “What more can there be? He’s neglecting his family.”

  “There was another woman. Before Margaret Whipple. A poet that he took up with when you were about seven.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “He admitted it to me. They’d been writing to each other, and she wanted to meet him.”

  “And did they meet?”

  “I told him it wouldn’t be proper, that he shouldn’t have kept their correspondence a secret, that a faithful husband doesn’t do such things. So he said he wouldn’t see her. But now I wonder. Look how long he deceived us about Margaret Whipple.”

  “He’s a complete dastard. Is that what you want me to think?”

  Her mother’s shoulders heaved up and down. “Ours isn’t the first family he spurned.”

  Barbara studied her mother. “What do you mean?”

  “He was married before he met me.” Her mother smoothed a palm over her forehead. “His first wife died in childbirth. But the baby lived.”

  “He has another child?”

  “Yes, a daughter named Grace. She’s three years older than you.”

  Barbara asked, “Where is she?”

  “Living with your Grandma Follett in Attleboro.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “We couldn’t decide how to tell you, and your father thought it best to keep the two families separate.”

  “Then you both lied to me.”

  “Yes, we did. And I’m not proud of it.” Her mother flicked aside the tresses flopping over her face. “Your father saw very little of Grace while she was growing up. What kind of man would turn his back on a child like that?”

  “What’s she like?” Barbara asked.

  Her mother told her what she knew about Grace—how much Grace admired and missed her father, how her Grandma Follett never visited because she was tied up raising Grace.

  “I want you to know,” her mother said, “how he behaved all these years—all the time you thought he was the most wonderful father a daughter could have.”

  “Well, I don’t think that anymore.”

  “Then I hope you won’t let him spoil your future. Look what he’s done to Grace—the poor girl has had to settle for crumbs all these years.”

  Barbara couldn’t listen to any more of this. She pushed her chair back and stood up. “I’m going for a swim.”

  “Not without me, you’re not.”

  “Honestly, do you have to watch my every move?”

  “Yes, this sneaking around has gotten out of hand. As soon as we finish Richard’s manuscript, we’re leaving for Hawaii. From there, we’ll return to the States. And that’s final.”

  God, her mother was exasperating. Always telling her what to do. Always watching her. One of these days, she’d just up and leave. Somehow, someday, she’d be free.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  HELEN

  Tonga, May 1929

  May 21, 1929

  Dear Anne,

  So much has happened, and I’ve often thought of writing to you, but between nursing Barbara back to health and earning our keep in Tonga, there simply wasn’t time.

  The worst has happened. Barbara completely broke down from the strain of a full year’s agony. It’s almost impossible to fathom—Barbara, who has always been so vital and exuberant, falling apart. But her father managed to utterly smash her spirit. Just after her birthday, she received a brash and reckless letter from him that plunged her into despair. Someday I’ll tell you all about it, but not in a letter.

  As if that wasn’t bad enough, she then contracted some exotic disease that left her in bed for three weeks. She’s finally recovering from her fever and regaining her physical health. But she’s turned morose and irrational. I’m so worried about her. She’s at that time of life when she needs a father’s guiding hand. But given Wilson’s reprehensible conduct, he’s the last person to supply that.

  We’re living from hand to mouth down here. But I refuse to subject my daughter to abject poverty on top of emotional anguish. So, I’m working on several projects at once. And I must do so with little help from Barbara, though if I could get her interested in writing again, I believe it’d be good for her.

  I wish I could count on Wilson to send money, but he’s altogether undependable. How he can press me for divorce and say he’ll provide for the family when he shows no inclination to do so at present is beyond me. The fact is he needs my skills managing money and day-to-day affairs as much as I need his brilliance and savoir-faire. And the girls need him, too. I still hold out hope that he’ll come to his senses or circumstances will force him to do so. Is that foolish of me?

  I long to see my sweet Sabra, and I’m sorry you can’t journey here with her. I do understand, but it’s hard to think of Sabra growing up without me. How I long to brush her hair and smother her in hugs. Thank you so much for offering to take her to Sunapee this summer. It’ll furnish her world with a sense of continuity, for she loves splashing in the lake waters there and marauding around the woods with your boys.

  In a few weeks, we’ll depart for Honolulu and begin the homeward trek, which I face with a mix of regret and resignation. I can’
t say as I’m ready to be back in the States, but I worry more about Barbara than myself. Now she’s insisting we find a square-rigger for at least part of the journey. It’s such a struggle keeping her head out of the clouds.

  I have no idea what to expect when we return to New Haven. Will I be forced to move to New York and find work so I can support not just Barbara and Sabra, but Wilson as well? He’s hiding out in Maine writing a novel when he ought to take up his responsibility as a man and find a real job. I wonder how long he can keep up this pipe dream of his and how long that girl will play along with a man who shows no penchant to pursue a stable income. Honestly, has she no mother or father to knock some reason into her? At least you and Oxford have kept up communications with him. That tells me he hasn’t completely severed connections with our friends and his past.

  I won’t be able to post again until we arrive in Honolulu, so I send you, Oxford, and the boys

  All my love,

  Helen

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  BARBARA AT FIFTEEN

  Honolulu to the Pacific Seas, May 1929

  Nine months ago, when they’d first conceived this voyage, Barbara had envisioned travel by tall ship. Instead, they’d traversed all 20,000 miles—from New Haven to the Caribbean to the South Pacific—by plodding steamer. But now, in the Honolulu harbor, like an apparition from her dreams, stood the Vigilant, a gallant five-masted schooner.

  The ship’s tall masts lilted in the afternoon breeze, casting quivering shadows over the dock. Watery troughs sparkled and lapped at her hull. Was it possible she’d found the ship she longed for, the cure for her heartache? She squinted at the crisscrossing masts and booms backlit by the afternoon sun. “Is it real, Mother?”

  Her mother stood beside her on the wooden dock. “Yes. And I know what you’re thinking.”

  “Can’t we just ask?”

  “I suppose, but I don’t see what good it’ll do.”

  “Ahoy, up there,” Barbara called, waving to a crewman striding the deck.

  He turned and waved back.

  Barbara cupped her hands into a megaphone. “Is your captain aboard?”

  “No. What is it you want?”