by Peter Watt
Jacob frowned at the aristocratic looking Australian. ‘Thank you for your help, Mr Arrowsmith,’ he replied and turned his back on the man in disgust.
When they left the Arrowsmith mansion Gerhardt suddenly remembered his letter to Papua. Now that he was safe with the Americans and had Ilsa back, there had been no need to send it. But what would happen when Erika’s brother received the letter and read its contents? He reassured himself it would not matter as he and Ilsa would be well and truly on their way across the Pacific Ocean to their new home in the United States of America. Even if this Jack Kelly – if he was still alive after all these years – did learn that he was the real father of Ilsa, there was little he could do.
THIRTY-EIGHT
It was mid morning when Fuji ordered the anchor to be dropped in the picturesque bay. O’Leary scanned the shoreline and noted the layout of buildings. He had the semblance of a plan but knew that he required a reconnaissance to ensure that all went smoothly. ‘You think that you could go ashore and have a look around without anyone getting suspicious?’ he asked the Japanese sailor.
‘They would not suspect me,’ Fuji said. ‘I can ask them if they have any fuel to spare for the boat.’
‘Good. Take one of the boys with you.’
There was nothing else to do until Fuji returned with his report. The Irishman went below to break out the guns.
The Erika Sarah glided to a stop beside the wharf in Port Moresby behind a Burns Philp steamer. Lukas was at the helm and Jack leapt onto the wharf to tie the ropes. When they were secured Lukas cut the engine and Jack helped his passengers disembark. Last to leave was Victoria. Jack held out his hand to her to assist as she climbed onto the wharf. Her hand felt soft and warm in his and for a moment he felt the pain of losing her from his life.
‘What are you planning to do now?’ she asked as they stood together.
‘Try and rustle up another charter or some cargo work,’ Jack said.
‘I mean what are you going to do today?’
‘We’ll leave the boat here and travel back to Paul’s place in his truck.’
Victoria glanced away so Jack would not see her expression of disappointment. She had hoped that he might stay around until she caught her boat south to Australia. ‘I guess we should make our farewells now then,’ she said.
Jack held out his hand. ‘It was a pleasure knowing you, Miss Duvall,’ he said. ‘I know all will go well for you.’
‘Is that it?’ Victoria glared. ‘A brief handshake and the best of wishes?’
‘What else could there be?’ Jack asked with just a hint of pain in his voice. ‘You are a lady destined for important things back in your world of concrete and tall buildings. Me? Well, you have seen my world.’
‘I suppose you are right,’ Victoria sighed. ‘Well, I’ll be seeing you, Jack.’ She turned and walked down the wharf into the crowd of natives and Europeans.
Jack watched her leave. Never before had he felt so alone. He wanted to stop her reaching the end of the wharf, but he wasn’t sure enough that she would want to explore what they may have felt about each other.
‘Dad?’ Jack was hardly aware that Lukas was now standing beside him. ‘Are you okay?’
‘Yeah, I’m okay,’ Jack sighed. ‘Why shouldn’t I be?’
‘Just asking,’ Lukas said with a shrug. ‘I was under the impression that you were a bit keen onVictoria.’
Jack glanced at his son. ‘Put it this way, son,’ he said. ‘If we ever rename the Erika Sarah we can call her the Victoria Sarah. Maybe that answers your question.’
Lukas wanted to comfort his father but knew this was not the time. ‘Uncle Paul is going into town to pick up the truck. He says that he can finish up with Joe for you.’
‘That would be good,’ Jack said. Victoria was now out of sight and out of his life. ‘Maybe his brother-in-law from Germany has arrived while we have been at sea.’
Jack could not bring himself to mention Erika’s name. He had not thought about her until now. A woman he had grown to know and feel so strongly about had just left his life and another he had once loved and lost was possibly in Moresby at the moment. Life certainly had a way of weaving complicated knots.
‘Uncle Paul said he was going to ask the shipping clerk if Mr Stahl and his wife had arrived while he was out picking up the truck,’ Lukas said. ‘In the meantime, I’ll grab a few things off the lugger to take to the plantation. It will be great to see Aunt Karin again.’
‘Yeah,’ Jack replied hollowly. ‘Should be one hell of a day.’
Fuji was met on the beach by Dademo who had watched the unfamiliar schooner enter the bay. When he recognised the young Japanese sailor he greeted him with a grudging, wary familiarity. The violent incident on the beach some months earlier was still fresh in his memory.
‘Why are you here?’ Dademo asked as he helped bring the dinghy onto the sand. ‘And whose boat is that out in the bay?’
As Fuji climbed out of the dinghy, Dademo eyed his companion with suspicion. From the stranger’s appearance he was likely from the Dutch side of New Guinea. He was a surly, evil looking character who carried a curved knife in his belt. The man said nothing but returned Dademo’s appraisal with an expression of contempt. The stranger was at least half-European and it was obvious to Dademo that he looked down on people of full blood as inferior. Fuji did not bother to introduce his companion.
‘Mr Mann up at the house?’ he asked, ignoring Dademo’s questions. ‘I am low on fuel for the schooner’s engine. Thought he might have some spare for sale.’
‘Master Paul not here,’ Dademo replied. ‘Only his missus.’
Fuji looked sharply at the plantation boss boy. ‘Where is Mr Mann?’ he asked.
‘Gone with Mr Jack Kelly on a trip up the Fly River with some movie people,’ Dademo replied as the three men walked up the beach towards the house. ‘Not sure when he will be back but it should be pretty soon.’
‘So it’s only you and Mrs Mann looking after things then,’ Fuji said casually, glancing around at the native labourers busy at work in the packing sheds and coconut groves. Too many questions might arouse the boss boy’s suspicions and he did not underestimate either Dademo’s intelligence or his loyalty. He also knew that asking about guests from Germany might arouse just enough suspicion to put Dademo on full alert. There were enough villagers working around the plantation armed with their traditional bows and arrows as well as steel axes and knives to make any operation risky if they turned on himself and his companion. They had not come armed with firearms. But he had enough information to take back to O’Leary.
Dademo arranged for a small drum of fuel and Fuji paid him. Bidding Dademo farewell, he took the drum down to the boat at the beach. Dademo watched the two men row back to the schooner anchored in the bay. He frowned and shook his head as he turned to walk back to the packing sheds. Maybe he was just being overcautious, but something about the Japanese sailor made his skin crawl. Dademo had never liked him. Fuji had a reputation for being a young man with a chip on his shoulder.
‘There was no mention of any visitors staying at the house,’ Fuji briefed O’Leary aboard the boat. ‘Just Mann’s wife.’
O’Leary stared in silence out the porthole.
‘What are you going to do?’ Fuji asked to break the silence.
‘We are going ashore tonight when the kanakas go back to their village,’ O’Leary growled. ‘I haven’t come this far not to find out whether that bloody former houseboy of Sen’s failed to mention visitors staying on the plantation. One way or the other I am not leaving here until I know.’
Fuji shrugged. He was disappointed that Karl was not around – he would have liked to finish him off before leaving for Japan. At least he would get ownership of the schooner as soon as the operation was over and they were safely back in Dutch territory.
Before leaving Port Moresby to drive to Paul’s plantation, Jack discovered that his friend Sen was no longer in Papua. The locals said tha
t he had sold up and travelled to Singapore with his family. Jack shook his head in his puzzlement. He knew that Sen was planning to re-establish himself in Singapore but was surprised that he had not passed on his farewells to Jack in some form or another.
Lukas had bundled together a few possessions from aboard and gave instructions to Malip to guard the boat while they were away for a day or two. The Papuan grinned a betel nut stained smile by way of acknowledging the responsibility he had thrust upon him. Mr Jack was generous in his pay and would receive good service in return.
Paul, Jack and the two boys drove out of Moresby just on sunset after a day of refurbishing the lugger and its supplies. Oblachinski had paid them in cash and the money was safely in the bank. Only Jack remained relatively silent on the noisy journey filled with talk and laughter as Paul’s truck jarred its way along the dirt track to the plantation. Paul hoped to be home around midnight and had spent some of his money on new dress material for Karin and Angelika. He swore to himself that this would be the last time he would be away from his wife’s side. He had missed her gentle touch and good cooking as much as he had missed lying beside her with his arms wrapped around her as they slept.
O’Leary and his men came ashore just before midnight. The four men each carried a rifle and only Fuji had remained behind to keep watch over the schooner. As Karl would not be ashore he did not mind staying out of whatever might occur, it was not his concern.
Karin had sat up late that night reading a novel. Normally she would have retired to bed around ten o’clock but the book had her hooked. Outside, she heard the dogs barking furiously and was annoyed to be disturbed by a visitor so late at night. Still, Dademo would deal with whoever it was; his quarters were less than fifty yards from the main house.
Dademo was indeed roused by the sound of the dogs. Springing from his camp stretcher he snatched the rifle leaning against the wall of the single room he occupied in the corner of a packing shed. He immediately suspected that the disturbance had something to do with Fuji’s boat, which at sunset had still been anchored in the bay. He found a hurricane lamp and lit the wick. When it flared he stepped warily into the dusty yard to peer into the night.
O’Leary saw the light flare as they approached the house from across the yard. ‘Bloody hell,’ he swore when he saw the outline of a rifle gripped by the shadowy figure holding the lantern.
‘Who is that?’ Dademo called nervously.
His answer was the explosive crack of a rifle. The bullet tore through his chest, just missing his heart. The lamp flew from his hand and the yard was once again in darkness except for the soft light from the house spilling onto the verandah.
Karin jumped in fright at the sound of the rifle shot but her instincts took over. She ran to the room where Paul kept the plantation firearms locked away, foraging frantically in a desk drawer for the key to the gun cabinet. But before she had the opportunity to retrieve one of the firearms she heard a shattering of glass. She swung in the direction of the noise to see a huge burly man standing in the doorway with a pistol in his hand pointed at her. Although Karin had never seen this man before, his first words revealed his identity, and the name increased her terror.
‘Me name’s Tim O’Leary, missus,’ he said. ‘And me and my men are not here to have a cup of tea. Where’s Gerhardt Stahl?’
Karin’s thoughts were in a whirl. The gun cabinet was so close and yet she knew she had no chance of opening it now. And there was Angelika only a room away in her bed. ‘Herr Stahl is not here,’ Karin croaked in fear. ‘And I think you should leave immediately, Mr O’Leary.’
O’Leary merely smiled and walked towards her. He had lowered the pistol and replaced it in a holster at his side. He knew that he would only be encumbered by it given what he was about to do. It had been a long time since he had a European woman and this one was very pretty. He waved away one of his men who had entered the room to see what he could loot while his comrades went through the house like a plague of locusts. Karin heard her daughter’s scream from the next room as one of the men burst in. She turned to the Irishman. ‘Please, I beg in the name of God that you leave my daughter,’ she pleaded. ‘Do anything you wish to me but by all that is sacred please don’t harm my daughter. She is only eleven years old.’
O’Leary frowned. ‘I didn’t know that you had a daughter,’ he sneered. ‘But in this country if she were a kanaka she is old enough to be married. So whatever my men have in mind is okay by me.’
In her desperation Karin slashed out at the burly man with her nails. But he was fast and ducked as he retaliated by slamming his fist into her face. As Karin’s world faded she did not remember anymore except Angelika screaming for her.
O’Leary was disappointed that she was unconscious. He preferred women to be awake and aware when he took them. At least the mission was not a complete waste of time. They would grab anything of value and leave before first light to sail back to Dutch territory. Needless to say he could not afford to leave any witnesses alive – young or old.
Dademo lay on the earth and felt the numbness throughout his whole body. He was having trouble breathing and when he attempted to move the pain came in an intensity that shocked him. The rifle lay somewhere in the dark. He could hear the screams coming from the house and was vaguely aware that he had seen at least four men enter. He must find the rifle then crawl over and kill the intruders. But he felt too weak to move and knew he was probably dying. The missus and little missus were in his care and Dademo knew about responsibility. In agony he began to drag himself on one elbow across the yard until he bumped into the reassuring metal and wood of his rifle. Unable to raise himself to his feet, he lay on his back with the rifle across his chest. Maybe his only hope was to shoot the men when they came out of the house. Whatever they were doing to the missus and little missus, he knew it was too late to stop them but at least he could avenge them. In the distance he thought he could hear the sound of a truck engine grinding and groaning. The sound grew and he knew it well. Dademo had one last idea. He pulled the trigger of the loaded rifle. Its sound was loud and with great effort he ejected the empty shell to reload another round. He fired a second time in the air.
Jack had been dozing in the front seat of the truck as it approached the plantation, but the distant cracking pop of the rifle brought him awake. It was a sound he knew all too well. ‘You hear that?’ he asked Paul, who was driving.
‘Hear what?’ Paul frowned.
A second shot. ‘I heard that,’ Paul said as he brought the truck to a stop.
‘We thought we heard a couple of shots,’ Karl called down into the cabin from the tray where he and Lukas were sitting.
Then there was a third shot, followed by the silence of the jungle.
‘Something is wrong,’ Paul said as he reached for his rifle jammed down the side of the seat. Jack grabbed for his own gun, but Lukas and Karl were unarmed, having left their firearms aboard the lugger.
‘What do you think is going on?’ Jack asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Paul answered as he grabbed a box of .303 cartridges from under the seat and tore the cardboard open. ‘But any shooting this time of night has to mean something bad.’
Jack took a handful of the brass cartridges from Paul and shoved them in his pocket. Both rifles had fully loaded magazines and spare rounds. Lukas and Karl jumped from the truck and stood with worried faces beside their fathers.
‘You two boys are to stay with the truck,’ Jack said without any invitation to argue. ‘We’ll go ahead on foot to have a look around. When it is clear we will come back.’
The boys reluctantly nodded and the two former soldiers moved quickly along the track towards the plantation. The night covered their approach and in the distance they could see the lights of the house through the trees.
O’Leary had also heard the shots. He had only succeeded in stripping away Karin’s nightdress as she slowly regained consciousness. ‘Go and see who the hell is firing off the rifle,’
he bellowed to his men in the adjoining room. He could hear their reluctant cessation of activities with the young girl. ‘And I mean all of you go, or I will shoot you myself if I come in there and you haven’t.’
The three men picked up their rifles and left the naked girl lying on her bed in a state of shock.
Jack and Paul had reached the edge of the bush opposite the house and taken up positions side by side in the dark. They had hardly positioned themselves when they saw the first of the Indonesians move cautiously through the front door of the main house with a rifle in his hands. No matter which way they looked at it, Paul and Jack knew that the man had to be a threat. Paul raised his rifle and slipped off the safety catch.
‘Not yet,’ Jack hissed. ‘We need to know if he is alone.’
Paul kept his finger on the trigger and the man in his sights. He knew Jack was right but every instinct in him screamed out to kill the armed stranger who had emerged from his house. The foresight of the rifle followed the indistinct outline of the man as he stepped off the verandah and moved stealthily across the yard. From the way he moved Jack guessed that he was hunting someone in the dark, but there was just enough light from the house to make the man a target for them.
‘Two more!’ Jack hissed again, and Paul glanced away from his target for a brief moment to see two more armed men emerge from the house to stand on the verandah. Jack raised his rifle to cover them.
The first to emerge from the house yelled something in an unfamiliar language and his comment brought a burst of nervous laughter from the two men on the verandah. Paul’s eye was trained on the man in the yard, trying to ascertain what had caught his attention. He cursed the lights of the house that prevented him gaining his night vision, but by looking from the corner of his eye he could vaguely make out a shape lying in the yard. When the shape moved he knew it was Dademo. Only Dademo knew about the three shot signal for emergencies. As the intruder raised his rifle Paul guessed that Dademo must still be alive. Paul fired and his aim was true, the intruder screaming as the heavy calibre bullet tore through his body.
