Harry St Clair: Rogue or Doctor?

by Fiona McArthur

  ‘When was the last eruption?’ She asked the question without looking at him. She didn’t have to turn to know he was right there. Her sensory receptors had warned her.

  ‘Nineteen ninety-four. One of the earlier ones swallowed the temple at Kintamani village. The western slopes are closed at the moment. The seismological institute thinks there’s risk of further eruptions. Pity. It’s a great walk to the rim for sunrise.’

  Bonnie looked through the window into the restaurant at the rice and crêpes waiting, very strange morning tea on offer, and glanced at the view again. ‘What’s the lava like up close?

  ‘Hard and black. I rode across the whole field on a motorbike years ago and it was like jagged corrugated iron. The locals use it for building and you can see the areas where the lava’s been quarried.’

  As a guide he was knowledgeable, though distracting from the view, enthusiastic about local history, just not good at being consistently relaxing, and she couldn’t see much of the yoga student this morning.

  Then again, maybe it wasn’t his fault because half an hour later, when she followed the others back to the bus and climbed in, it was Harry’s leg alongside hers that she was waiting for. In fact, she could feel little waves of anticipation building as she sat down.

  Disappointingly, this time they didn’t touch. Interesting and a little unacceptable, and she wasn’t quite sure how he managed it. As an experiment she allowed her knee to accidentally knock against his while she looked out the window and there was no doubt he shifted further away.

  Definite reversal of the forces of attraction. She’d blotted her copybook somehow. Maybe it was the crack about pregnancy.

  On her recent history of foot-in-mouth moments he’d probably lost a car full of children too. She sighed and then shrugged. This was why she didn’t get involved with men. Too complicated and distracting. It was a beautiful day and she was going to enjoy it if it killed her. She smiled to herself. Or him.

  Wayan, their guide, had spent the last five minutes of travel explaining about luwak coffee and the main export for the plantation they were about to visit, but Bonnie had faded out.

  So when the bus trundled into a dusty car park alongside other decrepit buses all shaded by overhanging trees and vines, she wondered if this was where the bike ride started.

  She was thinking about the last man she’d fallen for and how that whole fiasco had poisoned her life. How, foolishly, she’d thought they’d planned the whole wedding thing, the first two years of saving, agreed on children, she’d put her savings with his for the deposit on their dream home.

  She’d come home shattered from nursing her gran, vaguely aware she hadn’t paid much attention to him for the last hard few weeks, and when she had come back for the comfort he’d promised—he’d been gone, along with her money. Not that she’d cared about that at that point.

  ‘And it’s the most expensive coffee in the world.’

  Well, she couldn’t afford that. Bonnie zoned in again and followed Wayan through the overhanging forest, listening as he identified coffee in various stages, tree types and fruit, aware of Harry at her shoulder not saying anything.

  Finally they came to the cage where the luwak slept, incarcerated. Bonnie looked at Harry and whispered, ‘What the heck is a luwak?’ Harry gestured to Wayan and smiled and she tried to catch up.

  ‘We leave them for one day in the cage,’ Wayan told them, ‘and then set them free again. It is only so you can see the actual animal. Asian palm civets—also known as luwaks here—normally sleep and hide at the time people visit the plantation.’

  They all stared into the dark cage and tried to see the small furry animal, which looked a little like a cat-faced possum or smaller mongoose.

  She whispered to Harry, ‘I don’t get it. How does it make coffee?’

  He tilted his head and studied her genuine bafflement. A slow smile curved his lips. ‘You weren’t listening.’

  ‘I might have missed a bit.’ She shrugged.

  Harry tilted his head and she could feel his scrutiny. Could feel the heat in her cheeks at his amusement. He was laughing at her—not with her—and she didn’t like it.

  ‘He’s been talking about it for the last ten minutes.’

  ‘So?’ She held out her hands, frustrated by his teasing. ‘Tell me now.’

  Harry grinned. ‘Luwaks are an alternative to conventional coffee processing. They process the beans internally.’ He grinned again as she shrugged and shook her head, obviously not getting it. ‘You don’t pick the beans off the trees—you follow the luwaks around with a shovel.’

  ‘They poo it?’ Bonnie blinked. ‘You’re kidding me?’

  Harry laughed out loud and suddenly the rapport between them was back in full force. ‘I kid you not.’

  He patted her shoulder. ‘You get to try some soon. Luwaks only choose to eat the very best coffee beans, and they have a great internal processing unit that still leaves the coffee bean whole when they’re.’ he paused and grinned again ‘… finished with it.’

  Bonnie shook her head. ‘No way.’ When had they discussed this? Had Wayan said that in the bus? How would this be the most expensive coffee in the world?

  ‘They wash the beans,’ Harry said blandly, but she could see the unholy amusement in his eyes. Just looking at him made her smile and boosted her fragile self-esteem that Jeremy had injured so badly. That was the point when she should have run away.

  Bonnie screwed up her face and Harry laughed out loud. ‘Double dare you.’

  Drink second-hand coffee beans? ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘In the States it sells for more than a hundred bucks a pound. Not something you’ll have a lot of chance to try again.’

  True. But who’d want to? She followed Harry through to the coffee tables, where the rest of the group were ordering their coffee, and before she knew it she was sitting beside Harry with a steaming cup of black brew in front of her.

  And everyone else seemed to be tasting it. Ew.

  She looked around again and the Portuguese girls were chatting up the chefs as they sipped, and everyone still looked happy with their experience.

  She was the only one not drinking. Even Harry had his cup.

  Bonnie took a cautious sip. ‘It tastes a bit like mocha.’

  Harry raised his eyebrows. ‘Is that what that is?’

  He could tease. She put her cup down. ‘Well, at least I tried it.’

  Harry gave up his short-lived attempt to keep his distance with her. She delighted him with her honesty. She couldn’t hide a single thought with those straightforward eyes of hers. Talk about windows to the soul. They telegraphed every thought and emotion like a green neon sign. Scary, and despite her antsy, prickly little exterior he could feel the need to protect her from the world like a growing seed inside him.

  Hopefully that little weed of concern for her would die from lack of sunlight when she flew away. But for the moment he could give in to these crazy feelings because she’d only be there for a few days and he had no plans.

  He could feel the chuckle in his chest as she manfully swallowed the coffee she didn’t want. He reached across the table and scooped her hand into his, and she let her fingers lie there. It felt good to have her warm and protected by him. He tried not to see the grin of Wayan, who’d never seen Harry so circumspect with a young woman in all the time he’d known him.

  Bonnie couldn’t remember the last time she’d held hands with a man. Her fiancé hadn’t been into handholding and it had almost been worth a taste of kopi luwak coffee for the buzz of feeling a situation she hadn’t tried before.

  Like she belonged with Harry for this minute anyway. She was having a holiday fling, almost. Good grief. Her girlfriends in Darwin would be whooping with joy.

  ‘Come on, the bus is leaving, you can leave the last bit. We get to find our bikes now and the real fun begins.’ They held hands all the way to the bus and it felt ‘nice’.

  Back on the bus, this time
his hip returned to rest against hers again and their knees bumped companion-ably together as the bus ground down the hill. It was as good as she’d remembered and she smiled secretly at her own reflection in the window.

  The village that housed the bikes seemed deserted but Harry chose for her the least battered pushbike, no doubt drawing on his experience of bike fallibility, and the tread on the narrow tyres at least looked new.

  ‘Have a little pedal around here while everyone gets their bike,’ he said, and she climbed on with a nervous grimace. It had been years and she fought the tremble in her knees as she took off.

  At least she could touch the ground easily. The Portuguese girl had a death wobble until Harry stopped her and put her seat down for safety. Bonnie liked it that he cared.

  Between Harry and the Balinese guides, everyone had their bikes set to go within ten minutes, bottles of water were handed out and then the lead rider took off with all his less confident ducklings behind him. Everyone except Harry and the fitness instructor rode stiffly. Bonnie and Harry brought up the rear, which seemed to set them apart in their own world.

  The descent started out gradual. A bit like the way she’d little by little become relaxed around Harry, though he’d become slightly anxious when she’d nearly steered her bike into an unexpected drain at the side of the road.

  ‘That ditch would have swallowed you. Stay nearer the centre,’ Harry pleaded as she veered his way again suddenly to avert another catastrophe.

  From then on he positioned his bike to keep her out of the gutter.

  ‘Whew.’ She took her hand off the handle to dry her sweaty palms on her used-to-be-white trousers. ‘How embarrassing it would be to wipe out in the first kilometre.’

  ‘Or worse,’ he muttered, and glanced across at her. ‘You can’t just choose an orthopaedic surgeon here, you know.’

  Bonnie laughed. ‘I missed the hole. Nothing to worry about.’ In fact, she felt remarkably relaxed now that the initial wobbles had disappeared.

  The sun was shining, the road had the occasional country vehicle, but most of the time it was just the bike riders, fields and villages as they sailed past.

  Harry pointed out features of different village temples, family buildings and the census plaques on top of the entry arches, which Bonnie had never noticed before.

  ‘So each census tag has how many sons and their families, and how many adults and children live in the family compound.’

  Bonnie slowed as they peddled past the entrance to another family compound and this time she could make out the little strokes denoting the family members. ‘Cool. So there’s five children in that compound.’

  ‘Yep.’ He looked quite pleased she was interested but it was no hardship. She found the insight into Balinese culture fascinating. And it was also attractive that Harry wanted to share his own interest with her.

  Too many things were attractive about him. ‘You care about these people, don’t you? You’re not just interested in them out of curiosity.’

  He nodded. ‘Of course. I’ve spent a lot of time here and anyone who does that comes to appreciate Bali and her people.’

  ‘So why don’t you work here?’

  ‘I do a bit.’ He didn’t enlarge on it. Instead he said, ‘My friend was born in a village near here. Sometimes the kids run out to wave as we ride by. They’ll hold their hands out for a high five. It can give you a fright.’

  The rest of the bike riders had stopped up ahead. There was a generalised wobble as they all put their feet down and Bonnie was no exception. She glanced at Harry’s face as he tried to hide his grin. ‘Don’t even think about laughing.’

  She pretended to frown at him and he held up his hands as if to say, ‘Never.’

  ‘We’ll go through the village here, and then later on you’ll be able to recognise the layout and functions of the buildings and compounds we still have to go past.’

  She glanced down the discreet dirt track between the buildings and couldn’t help feeling a little uncomfortable at the invasion of privacy. There seemed to be people at work in each section but none of them appeared fazed by the intrusion.

  The whole compound looked sparse and basic. Not a place that was used to luxuries she took for granted every day. Happy children ran up and down with shrieks of merriment and a young father smiled at them as he plaited strips of thin bamboo with his tiny son.

  Bonnie lowered her voice and leant closer to Harry. ‘So what do they do for wages here?’

  ‘Bamboo production.’ He pointed to the huge stand of thick bamboo that grew at the bottom of the street. ‘Dewi, here, is a skilled plaiter and his sheets of bamboo matting are used for the internal ceilings of most types of buildings. When you go back to your hotel you’ll notice that the roof in your bedroom is made up of this plaited bamboo. It’ll be from a village like this. Dewi’s work is much sought after.’

  Bonnie smiled at the young Balinese man and she couldn’t help her wider grin when she realised his son was trying to plait a smaller version of his father’s work. His little face was screwed up in concentration as he laboriously weaved.

  The father spoke in Balinese and Harry laughed and answered him, then turned to Bonnie. ‘He said his son looks perfect now but he’ll get sick of it soon and start to cause mischief.’

  ‘Where’s his mother?’

  Harry pointed to a covered work area ahead. ‘She’s stripping the bamboo with his grandmother, further down. Each villager does part of the process, from the man beside the bamboo who harvests to those that split it in half then quarters and pass it on to the next section, who keep thinning it down until Dewi has workable strips to weave with.’

  They moved past the sections, the tourists snapping pictures and watching the villagers work, and all the time Harry spoke to the villagers in their own language, smiling and greeting them by name.

  It was interesting to Bonnie how the people they met hailed Harry, patted him on the back, called out to him, considering he seemed transient, and she wondered if he ever thought of when he would leave and get on with his life.

  But why should she care? She could feel a creeping sense of evangelistic purpose to save Harry’s working soul and she stamped it down.

  Stop it. He’d not thank her for it and it was none of her business. He was just a man she’d met. But a place inside her ached for the occasional glimpse of the caring, lost soul he tried to hide. She pulled her thoughts away and concentrated on village life.

  She admired the one cow the family owned, the eldest son’s pride and joy and, according to Harry, a huge investment. The cow chewed placidly and stared at them from a private sheltered bale, a long-lashed, happy cow, living in Utopia.

  Pigs snorted in muddy pens and chickens darted underfoot, chased by a red-combed rooster, and Harry told her the wives cared for the other animals while the husbands cared for the cow.

  Consistently, it seemed Harry picked up on her interest when the guide spoke of traditions and when he mentioned the ceremonies each family was responsible for.

  Harry enlarged on the subject after Wayan had moved on. ‘The cost of a burial sometimes take years for a family to save for—it can cost the same as their one cow. But the family are happy to ensure their relation is cremated with a full and proper celebration.

  She looked around at the bare compound. ‘What if the family can’t afford a funeral when someone dies?’

  ‘The person is temporarily buried, maybe a year or two, and exhumed when they can afford it. Or sometimes when another family is having a funeral they share the costs with several families who have members to bury. But it’s a necessary expenditure for ancestor status.’

  Harry waved at another man and as he stopped to talk Bonnie caught the eye of a young pregnant woman sitting quietly in the doorway of a building, slicing ginger.

  There was something about the way she held her neck stiffly that attracted Bonnie’s attention and she drifted over to say hello.

  The young woman peel
ed the grey root swiftly and surely but every few minutes her face changed and she glanced down at her stomach. When she looked up she must have seen the concern in Bonnie’s eyes because she shook her head as if to say it was nothing.

  Bonnie allowed her own glance to drift down and tried to estimate the gestation of the pregnancy. Nearly full term, that was for sure, but not a big baby. Harry wandered off to talk to the Portuguese couple and Bonnie edged towards the doorway.

  ‘Hello. I’m Bonnie. I’m afraid I don’t speak much Balinese.’

  ‘I am Mardi.’ The young woman’s voice was very soft and to Bonnie’s relief quietly confident with her English. ‘I worked in a restaurant before I married my husband and speak good English.’

  ‘You’re very clever. My Indonesian is bad apart from hello and good morning.’ She smiled. ‘Is your baby giving you pains?’

  Mardi glanced down at her stomach with a gentle smile. ‘A little. But he is not due until next month. It has happened for a little while each day this last week so I’m hoping my belly will go soon to sleep.’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  JUDGING from the changing expressions on the young woman’s face, Bonnie doubted these pains would go away.

  Bonnie waited for the strain to ease from Mardi’s face again. Pretty decent contraction, she thought. When it had gone she said, ‘Maybe she or he has decided to come today.’

  Mardi looked down at the brown dust beneath her feet. ‘Not today. My husband is away working to save money. We cannot afford the midwife yet.’

  Bonnie wasn’t sure how that worked when nature didn’t play the game. ‘What about the hospital?’

  Calmly Mardi shook her head and her thick black hair barely moved in the coiled bun. ‘The hospital costs are even greater.’ She grimaced again and Bonnie frowned.

  ‘Looks like labour to me,’ Bonnie muttered under her breath. She’d seen quite a few. ‘Have the pains been this close and strong before?’