Igulgul was well down now. The Snake’s Head was black against a blazing sky. The beacon across the way now stood stark, a barred triangle against snowy cloud. The tide was running fast, hissing, gurgling, licking the rock with long silver tongues.
She rose to knees, struggled to feet, only to drop down again groaning. On hands and knees she went to the edge of the rock. The rock of the beacon was higher. Intervening was a lower stretch, already submerging. The creatures, despairing of keeping her, surged over her feet and legs. She had to tear them off, take refuge from them by sliding down into the weedy shallows below.
The shallows were where she found them. The floating weeds often meant bottomless holes into which she vanished, to emerge as a weedy monster herself, floundering to the succour of some projecting rock that as often was denied her scarcely before she had recovered breath through submergence by the relentless tide. Igulgul in his slow sliding down the sky watched her hideous progress, seemed to hang above the horizon to see it out.
She was almost across, was in the shadow of her goal, when a new sound came into the uproar of the waters and her breathing for her very life, a throbbing. She was in water to her neck, when a black form shot into view from behind the beacon rock, no further than fifty feet away. The Delacy launch, not crewed by one man, but half a dozen, all black men against the moon, all staring anywhere but where the Old One had her hidden. She called to them — with a croak. They went on, southward, following the reef — towing the lost dinghy. Igulgul got another glimpse of her through a split in the rock as she reached it, winked at her over the horizon, vanished, but left her enough light to climb by and to see, when she reached the top, the triangle of the beacon looking doubled against a silver cloud, like the Shield of David, the magic Magen David, and the steel rungs leading to the safety it offered — if only she had life left in her to make it, instead of like poor Lucy Snowball, who managed only half of it and so left half of herself for the sharks. The sharks were round already, as to be seen by the boomerangs of phosphorescence hurtling about the rock, perhaps only now having got the tank of that incentive to their monstrous living — blood, blood!
VII
The Mission ship, St Francis Xavier, had slipped her moorings when Father Glascock came aboard after early Mass, and was heading for home, that is for the islands called Prince Leopold, was running out with the tide and the mist the tide was bringing from the countless reaches it had sneaked into in the dark, mist now gilding with the rising Sun. Father Glascock, back in work-a-day khaki shirt and shorts, was standing by the foremast, watching the smoking water with its tide-lines of debris, the flotillas of migrant mangrove shoots, the islets of pumice that having come all the way down from the volcanoes of the Indies were heading back again. Perhaps, if true to his vocation, he was contemplating the Mystery so-called in which he had just taken part before the altar of his Hanged God, or if more the realist he seemed to be, was pondering the Inscrutable in the simple marvels before those intense blue eyes. Anyway, his attention was suddenly seized by commotion amongst his crew. He looked aft.
At the wheel was a blackman, wearing only a red loin-cloth, while others were attending the stowing of the dinghy just swung inboard; and Brother David, in blue overalls and wearing a Japanese officer’s cap, stood halfway in the companion of the engine-room, arms folded in dignified fashion, while evidently controlling his engine with prehensile toes. The engine was put-put-put-ing softly, leaving it mostly to the tide to give the vessel way. All eyes were staring directly ahead, in evident alarm. As he turned to look at what they saw, the ship swung hard astarboard, and the beat of the engine simultaneously increased. He had to swing contrarily. They had been approaching the beacon on the Rainbow Reef that would give them their heading straight out through the harbour’s mouth. Still a good hundred yards off, it was seen as a vague shape in the mist. He turned away from it, doubtless thinking that it was sudden realisation of their proximity to the reef that had caused the alarm, until he looked at them again and saw that although they had turned from the beacon they were still watching it and even more fearfully. Again he looked that way, this time to see the beacon struck by sunlight with momentary thinning of the mist about it. He stared at the vague shape it had become again almost instantly, then swung back towards the crew, bawling, ‘What was that there?’
The answer was a rolling away of dark eyes, not only from what had filled them with alarm but from his blue quiz. Coming aft, he demanded, ‘What’s matter you-lot?’
Heads drooped a little, while still eyes remained fixed on the golden mistiness ahead. He eyed them for a moment, then snapped, ‘Go about. I want to take a look-see at that beacon.’
The answer was a gasp, soft in expression, but expressive enough to one who knew it well: Eh look out!
He roared, ‘Go about, I said!’
Still no response, only that scared looking out to sea. He leapt to the wheel, snatched it from the helmsman, who cringed away. He spun it. As the ship yawed widely when broadside to the tide he yelled at David, ‘Engine!’
But David only gaped at him. When he repeated, angrily. ‘Give me more engine, man!’ David shook his head. The priest roared, ‘What’s got into you all?’ He left the wheel, to come leaping to the engine-room, leaned down past stiff-standing David, opened the throttle to make the engine fairly bellow from its exhaust. As he came up and headed back to the wheel he leered, crying mockingly, ‘Blackfeller business, eh? Old Tchamala. Call yourselves Christians!’
He snatched the wheel back from the helmsman who had taken it again. As the boy fell back, he muttered, ‘Properly no-goot bijnitch dat-one, Father.’
‘Balls!’ snapped the priest. ‘Bloody panganis. Ease off the engine a bit, David. I’m surprised at you, anyway. Half-speed!’
They were coming on the beacon diagonally. The mist was denser, so that it could scarcely be seen. Then suddenly the Sun broke through again. A glint of copper — of ivory! A gasp from everyone.
The figure hung from a brace of the alternating climbing-spikes, on one side by a knee hooked over, on the other by a wrist wrapped round with a loop of rag. The copper head hung drooped over the shoulder of the loose-hanging arm. The mist closed in again. As if in reaction to it, the beat of the engine fell. The goggling priest looked quickly at David, shouted, ‘What’re you doing?’
David, looking back with slant eyes rolling, called back quaveringly, ‘Dat’s devil, Father.’
The priest yelled, ‘You fool . . . give me way!’
The helmsman panted at Glascock’s side, ‘Dat Ol’Goomun Dibble from rock, Father.’ He jerked lips in the direction of the Garrison Point.
‘Pagans!’ roared the priest. ‘Open that throttle, David . . . or I’ll open your silly head with this boat-hook!’ He snatched the instrument from where it lay on the hatchway before him.
David turned away terrified, bobbed his foot down. The engine bellowed again. Above it Father Glascock roared, ‘There’s some white person up on that beacon. Now stand by your posts. If you’re frightened of devils, then pray to Jesus. Here, boy . . . take the wheel!’
With the boat-hook he went running forward. As he reached the bow the Sun struck again. He gasped, ‘Mother of God!’
Almost absently he sounded for depth as they nosed up to the beacon, his blue eyes never leaving the hanging female figure, revealed as they neared as much black and red with bruising and abrasion as ivory white. Likewise did engineer and helmsman perform their tasks. They were able to get right up to the beacon, so that the priest could grab it with his hook. As he did so, the eyes in the face above him opened, to stare down into his. Time was suspended in that moment, even for ship and tide, it seemed.
Then the copper head jerked up. The eyes swept over the ship. Hanging hands and feet came to life to grab for grips. The ship came to life. Glascock yelled for engine, for rope. As a boy came with the rope the priest yelled, ‘That canvas off the hatch, there.’ Then he looked up at the staring bloodstained fac
e, and asked in a strangely matter-of-fact tone, ‘Think you can climb down?’ Rifkah answered by lowering a grossly swollen foot to a lower rung, and a hand.
There was only a side view of her from here. When down she would have to turn right round to face the priest. Too much for such as he. He snapped at the blackboy, ‘Get aft!’ Then as she reached the bottom rung and let go with hands to grab the stay beside her, he raised the sheet of canvas to hand to her in such a way as to obscure his vision of her. It was delicacy wasted. She almost fell into the sea in stepping aboard, and lost the canvas. He caught her naked in his arms. Staggering aft with her, he shouted, ‘Get a blanket!’ He stopped at the forward cargo hatch, holding her till the boy came running with the blanket. Then, wrapping it about her, he laid her on the hatch. As she looked up at him, in the same matter-of-fact tone he said, ‘Hello . . . I know you.’
Her swollen lips moved. For a moment he looked into the eyes that, for all the bloodshot whites, still shone like jewels. Then, swinging to look around, he asked, ‘Is anybody else out here?’ He had to repeat the question before she answered with a shake of the head. He went on: ‘What happened . . . did you get wrecked in Delacy’s launch?’ Shake. ‘How’d you get out here, then?’ She struggled for speech, but could only swallow painfully and shake and shake her matted copper head. He stared at her for a while, then said, ‘Well . . . we’d better get you to the Hospital . . .’
At that she heaved up to sitting, croaking, ‘Nein!’
‘Eh . . . what’s wrong?’
She struggled again to speak, but could only shake her head, grasping his hand and looking at him with fear. ‘You don’t want to go to hospital?’ She shook her head hard. ‘But you’re badly knocked about . . .’ She interrupted by pulling at him, shaking her head, croaking.
‘Well . . . what d’you want me to do with you?’
She got it out with a gasp: ‘Tek bush . . .’
‘Take you to the bush?’ Nod. ‘Where?’ She could only goggle at him.
He asked, ‘What about Delacy . . . aren’t you going to marry him?’ Shake. ‘But you can. Monsignor Maryzic’s sorry for yesterday. He said he’ll marry you without baptism.’
She croaked, ‘No, no!’
‘You don’t want to get married.’
‘No.’
‘You want to go to Delacy?’
‘No, no.’ She was finding her voice, panted a whisper: ‘Tek . . . me . . . bush.’
‘Where?’
‘Any . . . place . . . any . . .’
‘But I can’t put you ashore in that state.’
‘Let . . . me . . . stay . . .’
‘On the ship?’ She nodded. ‘I’m going to my Mission.’
She clung to his hand. ‘Tek . . . tek . . . tek me.’
He stared. She whispered, ‘Pliss . . . goot . . . man.’
He stared still, then swallowed. ‘All right.’
The jewelled eyes flooded with tears. Still grasping the hand she sank back, pressed it to her lips. He tried to withdraw it. She caught it with the other, drenching it in tears. He turned from her to shout at the gaping crew, ‘Put on the Primus. Make some tea.’ Still she clung, while her body quivered to her sobbing. He shouted at the helmsman, ‘Take her to sea!’
VIII
That strange, strange Sunday, which had looked like being Clancy’s Wedding Day, even with no other ceremonial to initiate it than that of going to bed with the bride! Strange, strange day, which must have seemed to him to have no beginning and to be going to have no end! It saw him come back to the Vaisey-Delacy town house in the middle of the afternoon, exhausted from futile searching the harbour and its shores for his lost love.
The Japanese servant, Hanno, greeted him on arrival home, with the information that Monsignor Maryzic had phoned during the morning and left a message asking him to come to see him and bring New Missee. Clancy’s only response to the message was a grunt. Hanno, the perfect servant, seemed not to notice the haggard bloodshot eyes, the desperate mien. He simply asked was there anything the Master wanted. Clancy replied that he would have beer and sandwiches in the lounge. He ate those sandwiches as if he’d not eaten since the crab of the evening before — first feed of crab for her off whose ivory and copper loveliness the crabs themselves might now be feasting! It may have been something like that which, when he’d finished the sandwiches, made him go out to drink the beer on the front verandah, or rather to sip it, while he sat staring at the sea, the sea, the jade and silver flood, still flowing — in, or out? What did it matter? It was always flowing, except for a menacing moment, that moment of its turning, when it seemed to drag the whole world and its hopes back to where things had started or stopped or never begun. He was still seeing the sea when he fell asleep. That was plain from blink-blink-blinking of his too-tight-shut eyes, while all the rest of him sagged so utterly weary.
Yet so soundly did he sleep, that he did not hear even the arrival of the weekly mail plane, always a noisy business, since the crew seemed to know that most of the town was sleeping the booze off just about then and delighted in rousing them by doing a low turn over them before going in to land. Nor did he hear the footfalls of one coming to him with no show of stealth but rather, by expression of narrowed green eyes and tight-shut trap in freckled face, in frank hostility. The visitor was lanky Pat Hannaford, coming up from the direction of the Oil Tanks, as might be expected of one who would be making anything but a social call to a place like this. Clancy didn’t wake even when Pat came scraping up the stairs, stamping onto the verandah. Pat had to wake him, grating, ‘Hey!’
Clancy blinked up into the green eyes. Without waiting for him to wake fully, Pat demanded, ‘What the ’ell’s goin’ on?’
Clancy sat up, licking his lips.
‘Where is she?’
That woke Clancy. He caught his breath, then breathed, ‘I don’t know.’
‘Wha’ you mean you don’t know?’
‘I . . . I took her over to . . .’
Pat cut in: ‘Don’t try tellin’ me she’s at Rainbow Beach . . . ’cause I been there.’ Clancy blinked. Pat went on: ‘I been out in a launch with some mates. I went ashore behind Rainbow ’Ead, and along the back way to your joint. I see your launch pokin’ around . . . but didn’t think you’d be silly enough to have her out with you. So I go to see ’ow she’s doin’ and tell her the latest ’bout the arrangements for gettin’ her away. But she ain’t there. She ain’t been there. Now, where is she?’
Clancy panted, ‘She was there, but . . . but . . . but I don’t know where she is now.’ He reached for the bottle, poured the remains of it into the glass.
Pat leaned over him. ‘Now listen ’ere, mate . . . I want ’o know what’s goin’ on. You supposed to take her over there and hold her till we was ready to get her away.’
Clancy took a swig, grimaced his displeasure at the flatness and temperature of the beer, then said, ‘I did take her, too . . . yesterday afternoon . . .’
‘Then ’ow come them yeller women o’ yours reckons no one’s been there?’
‘I told ’em not to talk about it to anyone.’
‘’Bout what?’
Breathless, Clancy said, ‘She . . . she disappeared . . . last night.’
The green eyes opened wide. ‘What d’you mean . . . bolted?’
‘No . . . I’ll tell you. Sit down and have a beer.’ Clancy was eager now, as if to get something unpleasant off his chest.
‘I don’t want your bloody beer. I wan’ ’o know ’bout that girl. I’m responsible for her.’
But already Clancy had clapped his hands. Hanno may have been lurking in the hall with the loaded tray, so quickly was he there. He didn’t appear to notice Pat, who scowled at him. When he had gone, Pat growled, ‘Anybody here besides that Jap?’
‘No. Sit down. I want to explain how it happened.’
Pat complied ungraciously. Clancy gave his own version of what happened, blaming it all on the dogs and the Greeks, particularly
on the Greeks, one of whom, snooping, so Clancy suggested, must have panicked the girl. It didn’t seem to occur to Pat, listening intently, to ask why she’d had to seek protection from halfcastes. But perhaps, as seemed likely by the look of his narrow eyes and tight lips, he was holding it back for spitting out in full force when the story was told.
Clancy said the Greeks and the blacks hadn’t been much use in the search when at last he was able to embark on it, the former being silly drunk and the latter too scared of the reef by night. However, they’d quickly enough found the dinghy, on the rocks at the western point of the harbour’s mouth. In daylight they’d found the oars, one in a backwater behind Rainbow Head, the other in mangroves of a narrow swamp where she might have got through to the bush without leaving tracks. He told how she asked him to take her away somewhere she could live with the blacks, but without mentioning how the request had come about, that is following the breakdown of the plan to marry. He said nothing about his intention to marry the girl at all. He’d had blacks looking for tracks along the western shores since dawn, but without avail.
There was one interruption, when the phone in the hall rang. Clancy ignored it. However, Hanno, who answered it eventually, came out to say that it was the Monsignor ringing again. Clancy growled, ‘Tell him you can’t find me.’
When it was finished, Pat did spit out: ‘Nice bastard you were to trust her to!’
Clancy bridled, but meeting the blazing green eyes, looked hastily away — out to sea, to sea. Pat joined him in looking, with eyes now seeming to be searching. Pat broke the long silence that followed: ‘Bugger me if I can believe she’s dead . . . not after all she’s been through . . . with them Nazi bastards, and these bloody Federal Security Dicks.’
Poor Fellow My Country Page 164
