One Big Damn Puzzler

by John Harding

  WILLIAM HARDT STOOD on the landing beach and watched what looked and sounded like an angry black insect make a pass overhead along the shore, bank sharply at the far end of the bay and turn back. It went to the other end of the bay and repeated the manoeuvre. Once the pilot of the chopper had taken a good look at the beach, the machine hovered right above William for a moment or two, then began to descend.

  The natives scattered as the whirlwind from the chopper’s blades stirred up a dust storm of sand. There were a few screams from children and teenagers. Only the adult islanders remembered choppers from the last time the Americans had been here. Considering that, it’s surprising they weren’t the ones to scream.

  Right-left-left-right went William’s molars. He was exceedingly nervous. It felt strange being back on the island. He’d arrived on the monthly plane three days earlier so as to check that all his compensation claimants would be ready to give evidence and to go through their testimony with them.

  Managua had greeted him with an air of disappointment. The old man had evidently hoped never to see him again; that William would have heeded the pleas he and Lucy had made to leave the island alone. He had remained stone-faced even when William presented his gift. A copy of the Penguin Hamlet.

  ‘You’ll have the missing pages,’ William prompted.

  ‘Is not be necessary for always have everything,’ was the old man’s haughty reply. ‘Sometimes is be better for you is be without.’

  William felt this was a dig about the whole compensation issue and sidestepped it. ‘Well, aren’t you even going to look at those two pages?’ he said. ‘You must be dying to know what’s in them.’

  Managua flexed his shoulders in a nonchalant way that seemed to suggest he couldn’t even be bothered with a full shrug. Nevertheless he began to flick through the pages of the book. He quickly found what he was looking for and studied the text intently. He turned the page. A couple of minutes elapsed.

  ‘Well?’ said William.

  Managua continued reading. He turned back to the previous page, read for a minute or so and then turned the page forward again. Finally he slammed the book shut.

  ‘Is it what you expected?’ asked William.

  ‘Is be less than I is expect. Is not answer big damn puzzler at all. I is see I is must work that one out for self.’

  ‘But at least you have the missing scene. That’s something. It must be wonderful to see it at last and find out what happens.’

  ‘Is be interesting. But if I is be honest way Shakespeare is do death of Polonius is not impress me. I is prefer way I is do.’

  He put the book under his arm and began to walk away from the landing beach. William was about to start after him when he remembered his bag. He’d almost forgotten. There was no Tigua to carry it for him this time. The sudden realization hit him hard; his heart felt heavier than the bag and only partly because, learning from experience, he’d packed it much lighter than last time. He struggled after Managua.

  The older man turned and shot him an apologetic look. ‘You is must not worry I is not thank you. Is be taboo for thank someone for gift. Is not be because I is not be glad for see they two pages.’

  ‘That’s OK, don’t worry about it.’

  ‘I is not worry,’ said Managua. ‘You is be one who is do that.’

  If Managua had been disappointed by his gift, the first person William had encountered, Tr’boa, who had met him in the boat, had been equally crestfallen at William’s arriving empty-handed.

  After greeting William fondly his first question had been, ‘You is bring dollars, gwanga?’

  He’d looked very downcast when William had said no, that was still a long way off, that he was here to meet a US government lawyer and a doctor who were going to examine the evidence.

  ‘Besides,’ said William, ‘you have all your limbs. You’re not due any compensation.’

  ‘I is know that,’ said Tr’boa, ‘but my uncle is lose foot and he is go buy me plenty thing. Baseball hat, computer game, dune buggy. Plenty other thing too, but I is forget what they is be.’

  William’s own first disappointment came from seeing Lintoa. If Lintoa had been a real woman, other women might have said bitchily – sowily the islanders would have put it – that she had let herself go. He was wearing the recovered red dress, the one that Tigua had so coveted, but it was now badly in need of a wash and torn around the top of the zip at the back. The hem hung down three quarters of the way around. His nail polish was chipped. An attempt at lipstick had left his mouth a grotesque scarlet gash.

  ‘I is know what you is think,’ he said as he watched William appraising him. ‘You is say youself, Lintoa is look one big damn mess. Well, I is not care. I is only be girl for three moons more, then I is can choose. For talk true, I is only stay girl for respect for Tigua; no-one is much mind if I is break custom now. All customs and taboos is start for go now.’

  William found that while this was an exaggeration, a bit of bravado on Lintoa’s part, there was nevertheless a kernel of truth in it. Take Pilua for instance. She had, as agreed before he left, moved into Managua’s house, together with Perlua. It seemed that not only had hardly anyone protested and suggested she remain an outcast, the other women had positively embraced her back into village society and made her one of their number.

  When William expressed his surprise about her easy integration to Managua, over a pipe of kassa outside his hut that night, the old man could manage only a weary sigh. ‘What you is expect, gwanga? Is come for pass what I is tell you. They is see Perlua. She is be white. They is know she mamu is be rape by three white men. Is be hard for continue think is not be fug-a-fug is make babies. This is why I is beg you is not go look for Pilua.’

  William knew the old man was right. Things hadn’t broken up yet, but you could see the way they were going. If men made babies then everything was different. Property, what there was of it, no longer accrued to women. Why would you give yams to your sister’s children any more? Why not concentrate your efforts on your own, now that you knew they were your own?

  He could see it wasn’t a big step from this kind of thinking to questioning all the customs and taboos. Once the cornerstone of belief was gone, it wouldn’t be that long before the rest came tumbling down.

  ‘First strong wind,’ was how Managua put it.

  William’s second disappointment had been even greater. Lucy. In his mind’s eye, even though she hadn’t answered any of the letters he’d sent during the year since he’d left, letters that he had no way of knowing had ever been delivered, he’d hoped she’d be waiting for him at the landing beach. She wasn’t there.

  He knew it had been an idealized image. He didn’t even know if she was still on the island. Why would she be? Her project would be finished by now. It was the first thing he asked Lintoa. The she-boy shook his big head and said, ‘Sure, she is be here, same as always, but she is tell me I is must not talk with you ’bout she.’

  It was the same when he spoke to Managua. The old man refused to discuss her, only saying, when William asked why she was still there, ‘She is have she reason, but is not be for me for say; you is must ask she.’

  Next day, after the shitting beach, where his dump attracted a record number of sightseers, apparently because it had been the object of much theory and debate during his absence and had acquired an almost legendary mystique among the natives, he hurried along the shore to Lucy’s house.

  It had an empty look about it. The shutters were closed and there was no Caruso sailing out on the morning breeze, no sound at all save the mournful sighs of the waves as they flopped exhausted onto the beach after their long journey.

  He went up the steps to the door and tapped gently with his knuckles. He listened. Nothing stirred within. He rapped again, louder this time. Still nothing. The third time he banged as hard as he could. The whole house shuddered. But once it had gotten over its fright it sank back into stillness. Nobody home, its silence proclaimed.

 
William took a turn around the veranda that ran all the way round the house. Even his footsteps had a hollow, empty ring. All the windows were shuttered. It was like when you arrived for the first weekend of the summer at the Hardts’ old beach house after it had been closed up all winter. The place always seemed to be waiting for someone to come live in it.

  Back at the door, William pressed his face against it. He could make out little through the gaps between the lengths of bamboo. He could see only narrow strips of the interior, which gave nothing away, so he moved from one to the next, building up a picture of a tidy, empty room, devoid of beer cans, make-up paraphernalia or any sign of recent habitation. He pressed his mouth to the gap.

  ‘Come out, come out, wherever you are!’ he called. ‘Or I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow your house down!’ The silent response to this mocked his feeble attempt at levity.

  William took another turn around the porch and rapped the door once more. Nothing. He considered waiting in case Lucy had simply gone out for a short time and might soon return but then he thought, where would she go? She hadn’t been in the village. Besides, the house had that closed-up empty look. There was only one conclusion. She’d abandoned her home to avoid him.

  Anyway, he had work to do. He didn’t have time to linger here.

  Just as William hadn’t confessed his OCD to Lucy, she hadn’t been candid with him. She hadn’t admitted to the murder of her mother. She hadn’t explained the submarine drill for dealing with unexpected visitors to her childhood home. If she had, he’d have known that right now Lucy was hiding. She’d been looking for him through a gap in the shutters ever since first light. When she spotted him coming along the beach, she watched him until he was close enough for her to see his habitual worried expression and that was enough to make her want to run out to him and fold her arms around him and make him feel safe. Somehow she resisted the urge and instead fastened the door and rolled under her bed. There was no way anyone peeping in could see her there.

  It was a fairly risky strategy, especially on an island where the fauna included the green shoestring. You never knew what might be lurking under a bed in these latitudes. But Lucy hadn’t even thought to check and if she had, it would have been half-hearted. She cared less about the putative risk of a fatal snakebite than she did about being confronted by this man who was destroying a civilization she had journeyed halfway round the world to document and had come to love as her home. Besides, she wasn’t a checker. And it wasn’t as if she were without a weapon under the bed. She had the biscuit tin which held his letters, all but the first two which she’d burned because she hadn’t wanted to risk having his return address. Then, after the night of the floating babies she started keeping them. It seemed only right; who knew how long Lucy would be able to stay on the island? Her baby might grow up somewhere else where they believed in physiological paternity and want to know about the American she had slept with. Of course, Lucy hadn’t taken the biscuit tin under the bed because she thought it would be useful for flattening a green shoestring – her home held far better objects for the killing of snakes – but because in the event of William Hardt forcing an entry and searching the house, she didn’t want him finding she had kept his correspondence.

  Lucy had given the baby to Lamua to look after while William was here. As everyone who has ever tried to hide from an unwanted visitor knows, the one thing you can’t stop is a baby crying. Lucy had felt some guilt about this. She said it didn’t seem right to hide William’s child from him. But Lamua had pointed out that the baby was nothing to do with William. It had come across from Tuma and chosen Lucy as its mother. Mostly, Lamua clung to the old beliefs and preferred not to think about Perlua being the daughter of three white Americans. Trying to reconcile Perlua and floating babies had made other islanders as confused about reproduction as William’s sister Ruth had been all those years ago when she fretted about the mobility of sperm.

  Lucy was comforted by Lamua’s words. It was true. Her child had been born on the island, where a father was not required to make a baby. What did the baby have to do with William? So she hid herself and the baby’s existence from him. She had sworn everyone to secrecy and if William heard crying coming from Purnu’s hut, then Lamua could just pop out and show him her own baby boy.

  Now, William had to try to put the mystery of Lucy’s whereabouts out of his mind and concentrate on his work. He watched as the helicopter landed, ungainly as a heron, one wheel hitting the ground before the other. A door opened and two figures emerged, ducking under the rotor blades. One had a slouch hat he was holding tight on his head against the draught from the rotors. William could see only his mouth and that he was talking intently. The other man was plump, bareheaded and older. You could tell that from his grey beard.

  The helicopter blades slowed and its engine cut out. The two men came towards William. The older man lifted his head and proffered a weak smile. The man in the hat didn’t even look up at William but just carried on talking. Soon they were close enough for William to hear.

  ‘So what am I supposed to do, turn her down? Man, she was big, and I have to admit, I like ’em big. “Come back to my place,” she said. Oh, man, she was rubbing these big tits in my face and I’m telling you I about pole-vaulted out a that bar, oh yes. Anyway . . .’

  At this point his downcast eyes caught sight of William’s shoes and he stopped talking. He lifted his head and took off his hat, revealing a shock of red hair. He stared wide-eyed at William.

  ‘I don’t believe it! It can’t be . . . I come halfway across the world and . . . it is! It really is you! Wanker!’

  William flinched as he heard the word. He was too stunned to even say hello. Sandy Beach didn’t notice but turned to the other man and said, ‘It’s what we called him at prep school. And Harvard. It’s a British term for a compulsive masturbator. He had a fearsome reputation for self-abuse. None better. Wanker, I mean, William Hardt, I’d like you to meet Dr Gold.’ They shook hands.

  ‘Sandy – you – you’re the lawyer representing the US army?’ stuttered William. His tongue would hardly work. He didn’t seem to have enough brainpower to take this one in, that the man he’d been waiting for, would have to cross swords with, was the person who’d alternately bored him and driven him mad for a considerable part of his childhood.

  ‘That’s right. Prepare to get your butt kicked, my old friend. Legally speaking, that is.’ Beach could have been talking about a game of chess. An image of the chequerboard linoleum in the beach-house bathroom popped into William’s brain. How he wished he could retreat into that room and do some serious lateral bending right now.

  William looked anxiously at the doctor. He was desperate to explain to the man that he wasn’t Sandy Beach’s friend. Instead he took the man’s bag from his hand, a simple gesture he hoped would point in the same direction. Then he reached out for Sandy Beach’s bag, but before he could get hold of it Tr’boa was there and had grabbed it.

  ‘Is be OK, gwanga,’ he said to William. ‘You is leave for me. I is carry.’ The three white men stood and watched Tr’boa struggle up the path towards the village. As the Americans began to follow, Beach turned to William and said, ‘Didn’t take them long to get your number.’

  William was mystified. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘What he called you. Gwanga. I’m no linguist but you don’t have to be a genius to figure out what that word means.’

  It took William a moment to understand. When he did, he thought how typical of Beach that after only a few minutes on the island he had managed to turn what William had come to regard as the islanders’ term of affection for him into his hated former nickname.

  He was brought out of his reverie by Beach’s weasel face thrusting itself into his own. ‘Well, do you?’

  ‘Do I what?’ said William.

  ‘I knew you weren’t listening. You never hear what anybody is saying when you’re doing that business with your eyes. I asked which is the best hotel
on the island?’

  ‘Well,’ said William, deadpan, ‘I always put up at the Captain Cook.’

  FIFTY-EIGHT

  ‘WELL, THIS IS quite something, isn’t it?’ said Sandy Beach. They were squatting side by side on the shitting beach. Dr Gold had modestly positioned himself some twenty feet or so away, whence came the constipated grunts of an overweight man who wasn’t getting enough fibre in his diet.

  It sure is, thought William. I’m on the beach with Sandy Beach!

  ‘Who’d ever have thought it, all those years ago,’ continued Beach, ‘that the two of us would be together here today, sitting on a beach.’

  Or rather, shitting on a beach, William almost said but stopped himself just in time. Only someone crass and vulgar would think that was amusing.

  ‘Or rather, shitting on a beach,’ said Sandy Beach.

  William groaned aloud, he just couldn’t help it, but the way Beach immediately echoed it you could tell he hadn’t realized it was a comment upon his sense of humour but had assumed instead that it was a vocal aid to defecation, a cousin to the tennis player’s grunt assist on a service.

  The enthusiasm of Beach’s groan said it all. You could tell from that one elongated syllable that he had taken to the idea of alfresco communal shitting with gusto. He had no embarrassment, something William put down to the fact that merely being Sandy Beach was such an embarrassment in itself the man had long ago grown a skin any turtle would be proud of. Shitting in public couldn’t be any worse than being who he was.

  ‘Wow, I sure needed that,’ said Beach, pulling up his pants. He turned to inspect what he had produced and found a posse of natives also staring down at it. He had no idea they were using his dump as a control in a scientific inquiry into William’s. Whatever peculiarity they had detected in the latter could now be compared to another white man’s production to ascertain whether it was unique or universal in the developed world.

  Beach was entirely undismayed by the examination. ‘I wouldn’t get too close to that, guys,’ he said. ‘I had a fearsome red curry day before yesterday.’