by Lydia Syson
She beams loyally at Pa, who is talking in a low voice to the captain about the practical matters they will need to discuss – what the Esperanza will bring back here on her homeward voyage: bolts of cloth, all colours, more grass seed, and lead for bullets. Maybe even the first sheep. The hotel money would pay for that.
When he first set sail on the Pacific, Hawthorne tells Mr Peacock, his holds were packed with sandalwood and bêche-de-mer. Now it’s men he moves more often, from island to atoll to island: free men, he assures them, seeking new lives, dreaming of bounty. Rarely men returning. He looks about him, admiring all Mr Peacock has managed already, with ‘just a handful of girls’, if he may say. Billy scowls but Lizzie’s radiance grows, accidentally landing on the youngest Islander, who smiles back so directly that she looks away, confused.
Boys, Pa had said, echoing the whaler mate, all those months ago, and boys were what Lizzie had expected. Yet how could such a word – so slight – ever conjure the life and strength that stood before them now, the energy beneath oiled skin, the shoulders so broad and muscled they could lightly bear two or even three times any load she could ever hope to carry? Their faces are not long razored. No boys, thinks Lizzie. To be a man, in these parts, perhaps you need more than whiskers. To the captain and her father, would these fine young Islanders always be children?
‘This fellow will introduce you to your kanakas,’ says the captain. He does not know their names, thinks Lizzie. ‘You might not guess to look at him, but this one here’s a man of the cloth.’
Lizzie senses mockery. The one he thrusts forward is, like his companions, dressed neither in parson’s black nor the barkcloth of the islands, but in simple sailors’ slops. Flannel shirts, red and blue, loose breeches. Legs coppery-brown as burnished nutmeg, and just as God made them, which she knew would please Ma and disappoint Billy. No sign at all of drawing on their skins, no patterns in blue or black criss-crossing their calves. Their hair is short and straight and not quite black – sunshine reveals a ruddy glow. A yellow mass shines in their leader’s cupped hands, a pile which unloops into softly clicking swags of polished snail shells. Mrs Peacock bows her head, and the man steps forward and gently places a necklace around her neck. There is one for each of them, Billy included, and some to spare. The new arrival steps back smartly with a waiting air about him, but Ma knows what to do. She whispers to Queenie, who runs into the hut to return with an armful of woven palm-leaf hats, still green, six in all.
The Islanders approach Mrs Peacock, one by one, the ‘man of the cloth’ the last to receive his gift.
‘God bless you. My name is Solomona,’ he says with dignity. ‘We are all most pleased to meet you. This is my brother, Kalala, here is Iakopo, this Pineki, Vilipate and also Likatau.’
His hat is tiny. It was made for Gussie and it perches on the back of his head. The captain coughs and hides a smirk, and one of the watching sailors laughs out loud. Lizzie’s fury flares and she glares at him.
Kalala is the swimmer, she sees – a slightly shorter, scrawnier, younger version of his brother, with the same broad cheekbones. Also the same eyes, dark and shiny as newly scooped pawpaw seeds, but Kalala’s are more curious, less cautious. Lizzie notices grey grains of sand still stuck to his collarbone, and he feels her looking, and brushes them away. His understanding is greater than the rest, she guesses. Of English, but also other things. He sees Ada looking behind her, up to the high forest, though Solomona waits with hand outstretched to shake hers, and Pa frowns at her.
‘Ada,’ hisses Lizzie. ‘Come on. Never mind Albert now.’
‘How do you do?’ Solomona says five more times, shaking five more hands, each one smaller. Gussie takes his fingers gingerly, then, marvelling, reaches out the other hand to stroke his arm. She had all but forgotten that other people exist. The watching sailors melt like tar.
More gifts follow. Barkcloth, decorated in a patchwork of squares and lines in black and ochre, patterned like shells and leaves and starfish. Mr Peacock’s eyes widen greedily when he shows his wife the next package, and her voice is soft with joy.
‘Banana?’
‘Yes,’ agrees Solomona. ‘From our island. For your island.’ Knotty brown corms, briefly revealed and explained, then quickly covered against the sun.
‘You’ll like bananas,’ Queenie whispers to Gussie, self-importance swelling as the second-youngest Peacock basks in her superior knowledge and experience. ‘And look,’ she continues. ‘Look at the pretty chickens.’
Somewhere in the shade of her mind, Lizzie half remembers chickens just like these, birds safely cooped, angled heads pecking for grain. No more clambering on cliffs to steal the terns’ eggs, freckled and fishy, thinks Lizzie.
‘Oh, thank you. Thank you. We cannot express our gratitude enough for your bounteous gifts,’ Ma stammers.
‘Thank the Lord for all His bounty, for He is good,’ says Solomona.
‘So very good.’ Mrs Peacock is almost beyond speech. Ada begins to sniff. For Lizzie, it’s like a mist lifting. In the depths of toil and moil and heartbreak, she had only ever let herself see a little way ahead or behind, refusing to contemplate how close or how often they had teetered on the edge of nothingness. Now, witnessing Ma’s shaking hands – even Pa was unlike himself today, one moment here, the next his spirit wandering – Lizzie’s own faith in her parents is shaken too. In their very darkest times, Lizzie had always believed their assurances that all would be well, that because they had survived calamity before they would always do so. She had to. She was less sure now.
‘You really are a man of God?’ says Mr Peacock.
‘Certainly I am in the Fellowship of our Lord Jesus Christ. Two years I have trained to become a native teacher and pastor at the Institute on our island. With Mr Reverend from England, of the London Missionary Society.’
‘Ordained?’ says Mrs Peacock, blinking joyfully at this fresh news, half rising, as if she would take Solomona’s hands in hers.
‘Soon to be, I trust.’ A glimmer of pride suppressed, a hint of pain.
‘But we are not heathens to be saved,’ objects Mr Peacock, spikily. ‘Have you come to plough our land or save our souls?’
‘Hush, Joseph.’
‘Both, madam. Sir. I am a Gospel Ploughman, here to labour in the service of the Lord, and also to help you as best He sees fit. All our work on earth, we do in His name.’
‘And with His blessing on this wondrous day, I am quite certain. Oh, Joseph, is this not marvellous?’
Solomona has not finished. ‘When young men travel to other lands in search of work and betterment, they are exposed to many temptations, sir. But there will be no backsliding on this island, I can assure you.’ He lowers his eyes, backs away humbly.
‘Amen,’ says Mrs Peacock, recovering herself a little. Has she been too eager? ‘Solomona. We have been so long alone here, so very long. And today is Sunday. Perhaps you could lead us in prayers – a sermon even – this very evening? Joseph, will we have music too?’
Gussie and Queenie clap their hands ecstatically, and Billy cocks a hopeful ear. Dancing as well as hymns! But where’s Albert with the goat meat? They’re all asking. He should be back by now. Where is Albert? Courting trouble. Not one of the other children would like to be in his place when he finally returns.
Promises are made. In six months perhaps, eight at a stretch, the captain will be back with the work gang’s pay – bolts of fabric, bright cotton print for gowns, denim for dungarees. If everyone’s agreeable, he will return them to their island, leaving this one immeasurably improved. The months will fly. They shake hands, the captain of the ship and the captain of this island. Hawthorne mumbles some words about the baby to Mrs Peacock. An awkward business, to leave a lady in her condition, her time so close, but what choice has he? The men load the longboats with sweet potatoes and oranges and push them into the surf. The sailors sing. The children wave and cheer.
Ada looks after the departing crew with anguish. Lizzie sque
ezes her hand, guiltily, expecting that drag of parting – so like a shifting anchor – to pull at her own heart. But when she turns to see the semicircle of watchful Islanders, ready for instruction, her breast is deliciously feathered by the wingbeat of possibility. All they need is for Albert to get back with the meat, and their new life can begin.
10
GOODBYE, ESPERANZA. HER DISAPPEARING IS OUT OF sight. Is it always so? Well. You cannot watch for ever. When I look for the last time, the sea is only the sea once more, shifting, colouring – now more brass than silver – ready to swallow the sun. In the lower gardens between shore and houses, we fellows idle and toe the earth, filling our faces with air that tastes of grass and leaves and carries sap and blossom with it. Fresh, yet without home’s sweetness. I pull a weed from a row of beans – only one to pull – and crumble a pinch of soil between thumb and finger. Vilipate sniffs its richness, nods his head.
We are suddenly forgotten and our master leaves us here untended.
‘Solomona?’ I say, thinking to ask him why. But my brother, I see, is off balance still, mind-swaying, finding his new land-feet. I must take care not to knock against him with my doubting. Indeed, will guard him from more questions until he has means to answer them, just as he has always guarded me, more father than brother all my life.
On our voyage I grew to be a goer-between. The other fellows look to us both, a little, for we have served palagi many years, our mother too, and we know their ways and words, or so we thought. But Solomona has been raised somewhat more in our friends’ eyes. In his own too, I fear. He is now some special somebody, the preaching man, not anymore the Solomona who dived and fished and swam and dug and sowed with all of us from small times. Nor the new-married man, hands joined in church. Nor Pioneer, ready to take the Lord’s Word across the sea to heathen lands. Nor yet the new-widowed man, mourning, stranded, his boat-place taken by another, his future clouded, no longer serving the London Society. All that is past. We plough new furrows. We are his Mission and must look for Solomona’s guidance.
Thinking already of the Peacock wife’s request, he fishes up his Holy Bible from our sack, the Book in English, bran-span-new and sent from London. Mr Reverend gave it him before our departure. (Morocco-bound, he said.) Then Vika made parting garlands for our necks. Vika – my cousin, who is like a small sister to me since her mother was lost to sorrow – whispered as I bent my head that when we come home she will have the prettiest robe in Church, and I whisper yes she will.
The sun’s heat fades. My brother frowns. This volume is too creaky-new to fall open at the much-loved parts, the spots of study, and seeks to close itself. Solomona nods, as if a someone is speaking in his head, and his lips keep wording silently. He is testing sentences for strength before he is called to speak them loud, inking sounds into his head. My brother is a fellow who has always chased perfection. This is surely not the time to miss it, the first time he is called to lead prayer in English. He must win this new flock with his words, offer whatever comfort they are seeking.
Asking leave with upping eyebrows, Vilipate spreads his mat out on the grass, under a tree, and Luka joins him to wait and watch. Iakopo and Pineki sit down too, complaining of hunger, and soon after that they out with their strings, and while the time with swapping figures. Pineki makes a crab, and Iakopo a catch. He holds its criss-cross to me and my fingers play the fish for him. Waggle, waggle, I tease, and he knots me, hard. I whip my hand away, and try to pull the string but I am trapped and my finger swells and whitens. They pretend they cannot untie me, so I wrench off the cord and walk away. When their circle of string is straight and whole again, they start once more, facing each other, and step by step, together, use all their toes and teeth and fingers to make a house. Vilipate looks at it.
‘A house of string?’ he says (in our language, for he speaks no other yet). ‘It’s a real house we must start building. There is no place for us here yet. They are ill-prepared.’
‘Perhaps they did not believe we would come,’ I say. ‘We sent no word ahead. And something else seems wrong. I can’t tell what. We have to be patient.’
I am anxious to see this island, to know how we will live, and where, and when the palagi will set us to work, and what our work will be. How will matters lie with this father, Mr Peacock, a man like a grouper fish, his colour always changing? I thought this landfall would end all sudden tiltings, but our course alters quickly even here. This family is done with welcoming. Of a sudden they look through us like livestock. We see head-shaking and hear upped-voices. Something new fills out their minds. When they talk, they talk only to each other, mouths slit straight as mussel shells. We are told nothing. So we wait, at the edge of the huts, outside their circle.
Scattering, scurrying, the children look about and run pell-mell across the headland. They stare up at the forest, and scan its leaves, and run again to find a better view, all calling and calling at once. ‘Al-bert!’ one shouts, and then another: ‘Al-bert! Al-bert!’ Back and forth they go, like ants trapped in a flooded nest.
‘What have they lost?’ asks Pineki. ‘An animal?’
‘Albert! Albert! Albert!’ Plaintive cries, ever faster, ever higher. The tallest girl is all a-trimble-tremble, and the smallest holds her hand.
‘What is Al-bert?’ asks Iakopo. ‘A dog?’
I shrug.
They run up into the woods, and some return to the shore. The two dogs we have seen chase them back and forth, barking all the while. I do not think Albert is just another dog. Then they are back again, all the children, and the big girl is pleading with her father, weeping now. Still Mr and Mrs Peacock pay us no attention. Their eyes stir with a thing unseen, of which they cannot speak. The father man is angry with the girls. They are fussing, he says. He shouts so loud we cannot mistake his words. A fuss about nothing. Albert will come back. It’s not been so long. If Mrs P insists, yes, the father will go to find him himself, right away. Then they will see. No more fuss now, he says.
‘They have lost a son,’ says Solomona. ‘That is their problem. I hope it will not be ours.’
‘A small boy or a big boy?’ asks Vilipate.
‘I cannot be sure. He must be big to carry so much, but the sisters speak of him as if he is small.’
‘We can help them look,’ I say. If we find this son for them, it will be another gift, and we will be rewarded. But also I want to learn where we have cast ourselves, and consider how these coming months might be. In looking for the boy we can measure our task. The son’s finding will keep the mother calm and gentle. Birthing mothers must not be anxious. I know this from my own mother, who has helped half our village into this world.
‘Ask the father man,’ I say.
‘Call him Mr Peacock,’ Solomona tells me. ‘Respect him with his name.’
Solomona is still angry with me because I did not wait. On the ship. I was not obedient. I like my own way too much, he says. I lack humility. I risk growing proud.
‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Mr Peacock. Ask him how we can help. You are our elder here.’ I sit down on the mat, head bowed. Then I stand again, and follow Solomona to the mother and father. I do not want to argue. And I want to hear their words.
‘Hungry?’ barks Mr Peacock when we reach him, not letting Solomona speak. ‘You want to rest, prepare for the night?’ No hole for our reply, he turns to Mrs Peacock. ‘See? We have other priorities. Tell the girls to get some mutton-birds ready to eat tonight and tell them to stop this nonsense about Albert. I’ll go and fetch him and the damned goat meat now, if that’s what you want. I’ll find out what he’s playing at. If that boy listened, he might find it easier to follow orders.’
‘Joseph, please,’ says Mrs Peacock. ‘You know—’
‘I know what I told him to do. And he will remember well enough when I find him. Take care of our kanakas, Mrs P. They’re hungry and they’re tired.’
He walks away and up towards the forest behind the huts. The second girl, the one they call ‘Lizzi
e’, this girl hangs back a heartbeat, then runs after her father, and pulls at his sleeve. We watch her make him turn and listen. Quickly moving lips and hands and arms. Mrs Peacock watches too. He shakes his head. Keeps walking.
‘What did you say to him, Lizzie?’ asks the taller girl, when her sister returns, smaller, shrunken. ‘What did he say?’
‘I asked him not to be too hard on Albert. I reminded him his leg still hurts him. Perhaps that’s why he’s stayed with the carcass, I said. It doesn’t mean he hasn’t butchered it yet.’
‘And?’
‘Pa told me not to make excuses. He said we can have no shirkers here.’
Ada’s fists curl. ‘He won’t listen to us,’ she says. ‘He won’t even listen to you.’
‘Maybe he did listen,’ says Lizzie. ‘And he is right about shirkers.’
Their mother is quick to stop this kind of talk.
‘Enough, girls. They’ll both be back soon.’
Kindness comes again to her lips as she turns to us, holding open her hands, and at this moment I see something of Mrs Reverend.
‘I fear we are neglecting you, boys,’ says Mrs Peacock. ‘You have found us all at sixes and sevens. Now, let me see. Billy and Lizzie will help you with the tent. Tomorrow you can make a start on building your new dwelling.’
