They talked about the Greenpeace ship and its implications and Min said she had asked Gerard and Yvonne what they thought. She understood that the policies of metropolitan France had little impact on their opinions. As long as the money flowed in, so be it. Robert said that as far as he knew New Caledonia was a very different place from Tahiti where the tests took place. They had nickel and indigenous Kanaks who had an up-hill struggle to get any sort of political recognition.
‘Your boyfriend is a good sailor,’ called one of the students as they dragged the canoe up on to the beach.
‘You need to be better teachers,’ laughed Min. ‘I’m giving you two out of ten.’
The boys waved good-naturedly and Robert said, ‘I think I can understand why you’re staying another year.’
Chapter 67
Since his marriage Yushi had reduced his English lessons and Min found that the regular arrangement with Yvonne was sufficient to fill up her week. Because Yushi was speaking English all the time at home he decided that he would study written English and that would depend on how much time he found to write. Min joked about his hectic home life and he admitted that having a wife kept him busy.
Soon after she arrived home one afternoon she heard a put-put sound and when she looked through the louvres there were both Yushi and Fanua, conjoined on the trusty little Yamaha. She went to the door and they waved cheerfully.
‘It’s great to see you two. How’re things?’
‘Fine. Fine. Are you busy?’
‘Just the usual. I like an excuse to stop marking.’ Min wondered if the visit had a specific purpose or was just a spontaneous gesture. She went to the cupboard for the whisky bottle but Yushi shook his head and explained that they had decided not to drink alcohol until after six o’clock.
‘It is only four o’clock,’ Fanua said primly.
‘We have exciting news - is the word correct?’ Yushi smiled confidently so Min ignored the question. Instead she quipped,
‘That was quick work.’
Yushi didn’t follow, but Fanua laughed.
‘It is not a baby. It’s a job.’
Yushi had heard about a tourism venture in Australia and they were looking for people who spoke Japanese and English to work there. The business was owned by Japanese and most of the tourists would probably come from Japan but there was an obvious need for interpreters. Fanua told Min that they were going to learn scuba diving and she wanted to become an instructor. Had they been offered a job?
‘No - we have to go for interview,’ said Yushi. ‘To Australia,’ he added enthusiastically.
Min said there would have to be a party soon because the end of the year was in sight and people would be leaving. She explained that she was staying on for another year but was thinking of going away during the Christmas break.
‘We want to have a party at our place when we come back - if we’ve got the job.’ Fanua sounded confident.
‘When do you leave for the interview?’
‘On Friday. We go through New Zealand. You can come with us.’ Min laughed
‘Fat chance.’
Yushi looked puzzled. Was “fat” good or bad?
‘Take your pick,’ Min teased, feeling a teeny bit mean. Sometimes these mini - moods swept over her for no reason and she would suddenly tire of explaining the idiosyncrasies of the language. An occupational hazard no doubt.
Min asked Fanua how her parents felt about her possibly going to live in Australia.
‘They are pleased but they’d like us to come back some time of course. They can come and have a holiday with us and that makes it easier. The climate would be warmer than in New Zealand too. When they visit my auntie there they often have to wear padded jackets and my mother feels extra fat.’ Fanua found the idea very amusing and Yushi said that perhaps “fat” is not so good.
‘Everybody’s going away and I will be the only person left of the people who came to our first party - do you remember Yushi?’
‘Yes - and I remember smoking outside.’ He looked at Fanua who gave him the thumbs up sign.
‘Dinah and Robert are probably going to Queensland and Polly and Jim are thinking of Hawai’i. Michael’s in Melbourne and now you’re off. Heigh-ho. Eturasi and Semese will be staying put I imagine, but it won’t be the same - they don’t throw parties.’
‘Is there anything we can bring back from our trip?’ asked Fanua, and
Yushi endorsed the idea.
‘Some duty-free whisky?’ he suggested.
‘That would be wonderful - I need a refill.’ Min thought to herself what nice people they were and she would miss them.
‘Say hello to old Enzed for me. It seems an age since I was there but I don’t suppose it’s changed. Except for that horrible thing in Auckland harbour - it must have upset everybody.’
Yushi bared his teeth and shook his head but said nothing and Min wished she hadn’t mentioned it again. The trouble was she had it on her mind most of the time.
When the put-put had died away and she tried to concentrate on her work, she found herself distracted by the prospect of the next year when most of her friends had moved. She would have to make some new ones among the expatriates who would no doubt be arriving in the new year, but somehow it would not be the same. She would be an old hand as Robert and Dinah had been for her. There was something she would call “seasoned” about the veterans of a year or two and it was a state between naïve and cynical. She hoped she had reached that point and would resist the onset of jaded misanthropy.
The telephone rang and jolted her from her reverie. It was her mother asking her to come home because she was worried about her father.
Chapter 68
The last few months of the year were going with depressing speed and Min hadn’t organised a holiday as she had wanted to. Her mother’s summons had destabilised her for a while until her father had rung to say that “Mother” had been worrying unnecessarily. When Min had sounded somewhat reluctant to down tools at such short notice her mother had reminded her that Charity Begins at Home which had made her bridle at the insinuation. Where was her home and was she doing charitable work? The word “home” particularly stuck in her craw and aroused old antipathies. First, she remembered how she had once overheard her father railing against her mother’s charity which rode roughshod over his feelings and foisted lame ducks on the household. Second, the idea that that place was still her home when she had married and briefly set up her own, reduced her to imminent tears.
‘You’ve only got one father,’ her mother had told her in a shaky voice. When Min had asked what exactly the doctor had said her mother became hysterical and told her she couldn’t talk to the doctor. This fear of doctors infuriated Min.
‘As I’ve said over and over - they’re human beings not bloody deities.’ Her father had poured oil on the troubled waters by promising Min that he would keep her posted and in return, she said that she would come home over the Christmas break. She booked a return ticket within days. Yushi and Fanua returned from Australia with the news that they had got the job and were leaving within a month and Dinah and Robert were preparing to leave too.
The farewell party at Yushi’s house gathered everyone together including Luatasi and Eturasi who seemed enthusiastic about Polly’s further exploration of the Polynesian Pacific. He had an old friend at the University of Hawai’i who would be a good contact and was an interesting scholar of Maori culture.
Robert had struck a sizeable problem with the immigration department and was tempted to air his grievance as cautionary entertainment but thought better of it because he didn’t want to spoil the genial spirit at what might be the last gathering of friends. Moreover it would probably embarrass Eturasi and Semese who could be put on the defensive. He hoped it would turn out to be a storm in a teacup and he would look back on the ludicrous situation and laugh.
In fact, when he had gone to get his exit visa for leaving the immigration officer sent t
o see the head of Customs. In all Robert’s time in the country he had never met this man and this was unusual in such a small bureaucracy.
Robert stood mystified while the official rustled through some papers until he found the document he was looking for. Without engaging in eye contact he asked Robert about a consignment of hard wood which had been sent to New Zealand in his name. Robert’s reaction was to hoot,
‘What?’ in a falsetto voice which elicited a brief glance from the officer. Then uninvited, he grabbed a chair and sat down heavily. Instead of answering, the man turned away and stared out of the window at the adjacent port as if to indicate that that was the scene of the crime. He twirled his pen meditatively and seemed to be waiting for Robert to succumb to silent pressure, while through his mind flashed the implications of not getting his clearance; he would possibly be trapped without Dinah who, fortunately for her had a different surname.
Finally he leant on the desk and asked what the evidence was for this unlikely state of affairs and was told that the customs department was informed of all the shipping business and the movements of goods.
‘Obviously,’ thought Robert, ‘but so what!’
‘If there were any truth in this preposterous suggestion why would I not have gone through official channels?’
‘I don’t know - you tell me!’
‘No - you tell me.’ Robert reminded himself that he must keep calm or he might incriminate himself further. It was a known tactic in some circles.
‘And where is this timber at the moment?’
The phlegmatic person still playing with his pen, shrugged.
‘On the way to New Zealand I suppose.’
Robert searched his memory for any time that he might have inadvertently incurred the wrath of someone further up the food chain, but nothing came to mind. Dinah might have some suggestions. The worst thing she said about him was that he was often a grumpy bugger. He was having trouble not resorting to that behaviour now, because the heat and the moving pen were making him feel sluggish.
‘I’ll have to speak to my lawyer and I’ll get back to you.’
He ushered himself out of the stifling room and into the steaming oven of a November day.
‘Jesus Fucking Christ,’ he muttered as the thought came to him that this could be a way of extorting money from him. His lawyer was a fiction and he had no idea where to find one.
He thought of his mate Ekeroma in the department and wondered if he would still be there. He might be able to shed light on what had brought this about. He felt as if he were being sucked into quicksand.
‘You’re joking,’ Ekeroma was incredulous but quietly amused. ‘Innocent till proven guilty,’ he intoned and Robert said,
‘But it’ll be their word against mine. And some shifty bastard might have used my name to export a consignment of rain forest timber. It’d be worth a lot of money.’
He humphed and rubbed his fingers over his creased forehead. And who was this “lawyer”?
‘I know one who should be able to help.’
Ekeroma picked up the telephone but before he dialled, Robert asked who it was and if they were any good.
‘Trust me.’
He managed to get through to someone and spoke in the local language for several minutes. Finally he noted down an address and telephone number and handed it to Robert saying that he had made an appointment for him the next morning.
Chapter 69
Dinah wasn’t home when Robert got there so he paced about trying to sort his thoughts into a logical order. But fury clouded his brain and all he could think of was that he might not get a clearance until he had paid someone somewhere or gone to court. He realised how little he knew of the judicial system here and whether bribes were standard practice. He had a hazy suspicion that there was a text as well as a sub text which might involve backhanders. He really had no experience of this part of society and all he knew was that his money was in the bank whenever he needed it and the mail got through. Any shortcomings like confiscation by customs, of parcels from overseas were simply examples of quaint local colour, so ,long as they weren’t your parcels.
He was slumped in a chair staring straight ahead when Dinah came around the side of the house after her long wayward trip home on the bus. She always had an anecdote to relate after this brush with public transport and she was feeling particularly buoyant after picking up her latest assignment results from the Post Office and perusing its comments on the bus. When she saw Robert, she immediately sensed that something was wrong; he didn’t stir and she thought he might be asleep. She sat quietly in a chair and looked at his drooping face. He slowly raised his eyes and said,
‘Behold the criminal.’
Dinah was speechless for some time after Robert described his visit to immigration and the proposed visit to the lawyer but suddenly she jumped up and said,
‘This is madness! Christ almighty - what’s going on?’
‘I’ve already enlisted Christ’s support but it won’t help - especially our sort of invocation.’
‘Look - I’m coming to the lawyer’s with you in the morning to hear what she’s got to say.’
‘At least you’re in the clear with your Aussie passport and a different name.’
‘Troo - but I can’t go off and leave you to face some awful music on your own.’
Robert sniggered mirthlessly and said he didn’t expect her to visit him in jail.
‘Let’s go out and get pissed. Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.’
Just as they were leaving, the phone rang and it was Min so Dinah gave her a brief résumé and asked her to join them in drowning their sorrows. Armed with wine and some pecans which she had wrenched from the zealous customs man, Min greeted Robert with a hug for the “accused”, as Dinah called him.
‘I think you need to call on the High Commission. After all, you’re part of the aid package aren’t you? They pay your salary don’t they?’
‘Sort of - but you know, this is the first time I’ve felt up against something I can’t handle. It feels like being in one of Kafka’s nightmare novels. Shit to the power of ten!’
They opened three bottles of wine and became more reckless as the night wore on. The pecans were hardly a buffer against the generous intake of alcohol and the only food left at the bar were some tiny airline peanut things. Absurdity began to take over and ideas of dark vengeance made them laugh raucously. Min had never seen Robert like this. It was as if a reservoir inside him had overflowed.
‘If you go to jail,’ slurred Min, ‘you could write a best seller or relate your memoirs at every dinner party for all time.’
She almost fell off her chair at the idea.
‘Let’s hope this is a monumental piece of bluff and in the end it will have sorted itself out miraculously,’ she added optimistically.
The bar people were closing and looking in the direction of the last patrons who were loud and banging the table. They had certainly downed a lot of wine and the entire stock of snacks. Dinah noticed that they were holding things up for the polite workers so she stood up and took hold of Robert’s arm.
‘Come on - we’ll need clear heads in the morning.’ She was worried that Robert would do something uncharacteristic, so desperate he seemed to feel.
Min gave him another hug and asked to be kept in the loop. She had forgotten to tell them that she had booked to go to New Zealand at Christmas. She had expected them to be gone by then of course.
The next morning when they met the lawyer they were both struck by her serene loveliness which was in contrast to their frazzlement. Dinah was glad that she had accompanied Robert because he could well be distracted, she thought to herself. The young woman was very business- like and got straight to the obvious question.
‘Were you shown a copy of the bill of lading for the timber with your name on it?’
Robert had to admit that it hadn’t occurred to him to ask for a copy of one of
those. How obvious. He felt incompetent and slightly embarrassed but Dinah came to his rescue and pointed out that he had been in shock. There was no comment from the cool professional and Robert felt even more inept. His confidence was well on the wane and when he was told to go to the immigration office again and this time to ask for specific evidence, he wasn’t sure that he could keep his cool. However he refused the lawyer’s offer to go with him and thought that a good night’s sleep might be all he needed. He had quite a hangover at this point but had no regrets about the mini bacchanal of the previous night. A lot of repressed sentiments had been aired in the safe company of intimate friends.
Chapter 70
The staff at the college were appreciative of Gerard’s morning teas and because the prices were very reasonable he usually sold out. He was discreet when he and Min negotiated a sale and she began to think that their intimacy had been a flash in the pan. Perhaps he had found a local woman who was more compliant and less talkative. After all, language was not an essential feature of coupling.
One afternoon however, when Min arrived home his van was parked outside the house but he was nowhere to be seen. Her imagination ran to thinking that his new amour lived nearby and he needed a decoy spot to park. She was vaguely puzzling this out when he came rushing up behind her as she unlocked her door and put his arms around her neck without a word. She called out as she turned around to see him laughing merrily at the joke which he was enjoying and which made her very angry.
‘What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing you importunate frog?’
she hissed in English.
‘I give you a nice surprise - non?’ he pouted theatrically as he let his arms go limp.
‘No - you gave me one helluva fright,’ she panted.
‘Let me feel your heart,’ he said in French as he tried to put his open hand over her chest. She slapped at it and went to the table to put her bag down. Then she turned to face the incorrigible visitor who stood at some distance smiling with false contrition and she laughed in spite of herself, mollified by the language. “Ton coeur” sounded so much more seductive than “your heart”.
Gerard, detecting the thaw he was counting on walked over and took her hand, kissing it with a great smack before leading her to her inhospitable couch. They sat down and he explained that Yvonne did not want him to go out at night now that he had completed his land transactions and the café was so busy these days that they were both needed all the time.
Another Throw of The Dice Page 23
