The Islands

by Di Morrissey

  ‘Darling, I don’t usually work on the deck. Shall we?’

  Catherine opened the driver’s door but Bradley took the keys from her. ‘I’ll drive.’

  They made small talk on the way home. He was vague about the specifics of their tour of duty, talked about the men, asked about news from home, enquired about her family and wanted to know about the Wives’ Club activities. Catherine found herself struggling to find things to say about her life while he’d been away.

  ‘It’s only three o’clock, I thought we’d go out for a sunset cocktail and I made a reservation for dinner.’ She knew he wasn’t going to take her to bed as soon as they got into the apartment. Bradley was not keen on making love in the daytime. But it seemed strange having him back. She’d gotten used to her own company, doing things as she wanted.

  ‘Sounds wonderful. I’ll unpack and then pop over to see the Commander. I have a few things to do at the Base, but I’ll be home and change in time for the sunset drinks. The Ilikai? Or the Royal Hawaiian?’

  ‘How about the Moana?’ said Catherine.

  ‘Of course. It is our spot, isn’t it.’

  Bradley rang her a short time later. ‘Jim and Julia are coming to dinner with us. Jim wants to go down to Chinatown to some authentic restaurant in the Hotel Street area. I said we’d meet them there after our drinks.’

  ‘Well, that sounds fun,’ said Catherine, thinking the location was rather adventuresome for the Bensens.

  Bradley ordered their cocktails at the Moana and they chatted about a new couple who’d arrived at the Base. ‘Nice pair. From Pennsylvania. He’s working with me so you’ll meet her at the Wives’ Club.’ Bradley, however, didn’t seem very interested in what Catherine had been doing. He didn’t ask about her photography or the fact that she was taking surfing lessons. As Bradley talked Catherine watched the waves and the people enjoying the sunset on the beach. One or two of the beach boys waved to her as they walked past with their boards.

  However by the time they finally found Wo Fats Restaurant in Chinatown, Bradley started to sound annoyed.

  ‘We’re going to be late. And I don’t like leaving the car in the street here. Too many unsavoury characters wandering around. We try to keep our enlisted men out of this area. A lot of the bars and clubs are off limits to them. They get into trouble.’

  His mood wasn’t improved when he found that the Bensens had invited two other men to join them, who were old friends of Jim’s from his home town. They were several drinks ahead of the others and this restaurant had been their idea.

  ‘We’ve been in Asia, we know the food. We’ll order and we all share,’ said one of the men waving the long menu.

  For once Bradley and Catherine were united in their opinion of the evening. The two men drank whisky while Jim and Bradley had beers and Catherine and Julia stuck to green tea. The men, Hank and Milton, were loud, told stories of their tour in ’Nam and made a lot of racist comments that began to rankle Catherine. Even Jim began to be embarrassed by their crassness. So while Hank and Milton debated over ordering dessert, Bradley asked for the tab.

  ‘What say we hit a bar or two? I know a few good ones around here,’ said Hank.

  ‘I don’t believe we’ll join you,’ said Bradley pulling money from his wallet and putting a generous amount on the table, which made Catherine realise how much he wanted to leave. Bradley was normally meticulous at dividing a shared bill.

  ‘Hey, Jim, ol’ buddy, you’re not going to chicken out on us, are you?’ demanded Milton.

  Jim glanced at Julia, who was tight lipped. ‘Thanks, guys, we’ll leave you to it. This has been great . . . really different food.’

  ‘You haven’t lived till you’ve explored the delights of Chinatown, buddy,’ grinned Milton.

  ‘We’ll leave you to it. Nice to meet you,’ said Bradley leading Catherine away from the table as Jim and Julia got up to leave.

  Bradley was unlocking the car when they heard raised voices. Their dining companions Milton and Hank were arguing with two Hawaiian boys.

  ‘Piss off, mokes,’ shouted Hank.

  Catherine saw one of the Hawaiians throw a punch and then Milton leapt at the other and a scuffle broke out.

  ‘Bradley, stop them,’ exclaimed Catherine.

  Jim and Julia quickly hurried over to Bradley and Catherine. ‘This could get ugly. We’d better get out of here,’ said Jim.

  ‘They’re your friends, can’t you stop them?’ asked Catherine as the fight now looked serious.

  ‘Those guys can take care of themselves,’ Jim replied. ‘I think the best course is to get you two ladies out of here before we get caught up in it.’

  ‘Jim, you look after Catherine and Julia and I’ll go back into Wo Fats and call the police. I’ll be as quick as I can.’

  Several people had come out of a bar and were shouting at the four men. It looked like several locals were ready to join in the brawl.

  ‘He’s got a knife!’ someone shouted.

  Bradley returned almost at once. ‘The police have already been called. We’ll all go in my car,’ he said as he started his engine. ‘We’ll get your car in the morning, Jim.’

  ‘If they’ve got knives, someone could really get hurt.’ Catherine cried.

  ‘Those two are pretty good fighters,’ said Jim shortly.

  ‘But you see why we have to keep our young hotheads out of this area. Those redneck mokes like to stir them up.’

  ‘I hate the way these Polynesians like to make trouble,’ said Bradley taking a side street to avoid the swelling crowd.

  ‘That’s a pretty sweeping statement,’ said Catherine curtly, wanting to add that it sounded racist.

  ‘Don’t protect them, Catherine. These people are not like your Hawaiian friends. These guys deliberately look for trouble.’

  ‘We shouldn’t have come downtown,’ said Julia.

  ‘The food was nice, even if we didn’t get much of a say in ordering,’ said Catherine.

  ‘They ordered too much. I’m sorry we included them in our nice reunion dinner,’ said Julia.

  Jim cut her short. ‘Well, they’re from home but I didn’t think that they would behave like that.’

  ‘Well, I guess the police will sort it out. What time do you want to pick up your car, Jim?’

  ‘That’s okay, Julia can run me down in hers.’ He laughed. ‘Well, not literally run me down . . . You’re not mad at me, are you, honey?’

  Julia laughed and took his hand, relieved the drama had passed. ‘I’m glad you’re back.’

  Back in their apartment Bradley dropped the car keys on the table. ‘That was all very distasteful. Such a rough area. I hope Jim’s car is all right; those Hawaiians could bash it up just for spite.’

  ‘Those two friends of Jim’s could have caused the fight, they were pretty sleazy.’

  ‘Why must you take the locals’ side before anyone else’s?’ asked Bradley in an exasperated voice. ‘You are so one-eyed about this small town, Catherine. Come on, I brought you a gift.’

  Catherine pretended to be mollified but she was angry at Jim and Bradley’s attitude. There was something about the two men Jim had brought along she didn’t like and it occurred to her that Jim could be a bit of a redneck himself.

  Bradley had brought her a pale pink angora cardigan embroidered with seed pearls and a gold charm bracelet with a heart on it. He promised to add to it on each special occasion.

  ‘I thought we could go for a drive, take a picnic, tomorrow,’ Catherine suggested.

  ‘Oh, honey, I’ll have to report to work tomorrow, but that’s a nice idea. Maybe on the weekend.’

  He made love to her and fell asleep on his side of the bed, contented that all was well in his world.

  Two days later Bradley came home looking very pleased with himself. He opened the bottle of champagne he’d brought.

  ‘Good news, Catherine.’

  ‘Oh. What are we celebrating?’ She reached for the glass he held out to h
er.

  ‘A promotion. I’ve been given a job in the Defense Department, attaché to Admiral Peters. I applied for this posting weeks ago but I didn’t tell you so it would be a surprise.’

  ‘Congratulations,’ said Catherine looking puzzled. ‘What exactly does the promotion mean? Will you be at sea?’

  ‘No, not anymore. It’s a desk job at the Pentagon. We move to Washington DC at the end of the month. I’ll be out of this town that doesn’t appreciate the US Navy, going to somewhere that does.’ He raised his glass. ‘Oops, oh dear, you’ve spilled your champagne. Here, let me refill it.’

  Catherine sat rigid as Bradley fussed with paper towels and topped up her glass. Numbly she clinked glasses and gave a tight smile, while inside her body every nerve end was screaming, no, no, no.

  Extract from The Biography of

  THE WATERMAN

  The jazz era passed the young man by. He stayed in the Islands but Hollywood still called him and he continued to work in the occasional movie. One new production was set in Alaska, where he was employed as a stuntman. The glaciers, wild country and stormy rapids were beautiful but treacherous. He became concerned at the inadequacy and lack of safety precautions being taken by the film’s producers.

  When they’d first arrived the young man had taken a small boat above the rapids to run a safety cable across the river with ropes hanging from it, so that if a boat capsized the occupants could grab one of the lines before they were swept downstream towards the rapids. However bad weather and endless minor problems put the production weeks behind schedule. With the delays the weather was warming, the snow melting. The young man warned the producers that the river would soon become as mad as a runaway train and even he, as the best swimmer, could not guarantee people’s safety.

  His advice was ignored; getting the film in the can was paramount.

  Inevitably, with the now explosive amount of water in the river, one of the boats with two stuntmen was swept away from shore. The men jumped, grasping at the cable over the river where they hung on desperately.

  The young man was summoned and with a rope around his waist, plunged into the glacial water, hauling himself along the cable to reach the exhausted men. But the force of water was too strong and the men were swept away in the violent rapids.

  Their deaths affected him greatly. He blamed himself and was angered at the cavalier attitude of the film company towards safety.

  The movie industry was changing. Sound had arrived but the young man was disillusioned and no longer wanted to be involved. When he returned to the Islands he found that everyone was affected by the Great Depression. Unemployment grew as workers from the sugar and pineapple plantations were laid off.

  For a while he lived simply, eating bread and fruit and surfing by day, but eventually he was forced to sell his collection of medals and trophies to survive. He refused to be saddened by the loss of his trophies. They were only symbols. His achievements were noted in the history books and in his memory, but he did keep one small medal – the first prize he ever won.

  Throughout the thirties, he continued with his board shaping and still inspired by the craft of the ancient Hawaiians, he used the old shapes and made hollow boards, drilling through the solid wood and covering the holes with a veneer to lighten the weight of the board. His next step was to form the board with hollow sections that made it lighter still.

  In a board-paddling race down the Ala Wai canal he broke every record several years running, but when there were complaints that he had an unfair advantage – though he made no secret of how his boards were constructed – he refused to race anymore and concentrated on building boards for anybody to use. He also designed boards to suit specific conditions at particular beaches as he knew the peculiarities of all the surfing beaches.

  He showed others what he was doing and the Duke built a board based on the old olo boards for himself. Very soon the paddleboard and hollow boards were appearing on beaches in other parts of the world. He didn’t make money from these designs, other than making a few custom boards on request, but, because of the demand for these, he set up a small production factory in Waikiki.

  Finding a fin from a damaged boat, he decided to experiment with fitting a fin to his board. He also tried attaching a sail and then a motor to create as light and as small a water machine as possible. While the fin became a big success, he couldn’t interest anyone in sailing a board with the wind, or speeding across waves with a motor.

  After the death of the two stuntmen in Alaska, he often thought about the need for making water safety a priority. He realised the value of the hollow paddleboard as a rescue craft, where one man could use it to support four or five people in trouble in the surf, or on a river or lake. He also designed floating safety rings and other devices and later rescue boards that could be left at remote beaches in case of an emergency.

  His interest in photography continued to grow. He photographed his boards, his friends, the surf scene and himself but wished he could capture his boards in action. So he designed a special waterproof case to go around his camera and paddling out in the surf, he photographed the beach boys trying his new boards.

  The waterman was now a well known figure on the beach and his name was known by board riders even in other parts of the world. But his own world remained Waikiki where he knew everyone by name and they him. And while he’d weathered the Depression and had buried himself in his surfing world, there was no escaping the dark clouds of war looming on the horizon. His island paradise was soon to become a focal point of the war in the Pacific.

  13

  BRADLEY LEFT AGAIN WITHIN days of arriving home with his news. He told Catherine he had to fly to Washington DC to talk to his new boss and find out what arrangements needed to be made about their housing. He assured her the whole move would be simple. They could put their Hawaiian furniture into storage and take just their personal things and then she’d have the fun of redecorating their new home.

  When Catherine had murmured that it seemed to be an expensive way of doing things, Bradley had airily informed her that one could rent whole furniture settings for a house, an apartment or even just a room right down to pictures and plants. Catherine was horrified. It seemed so impersonal. But Bradley explained that it was a very practical solution, especially if they were only to be there for a short tour of duty.

  After Bradley left, Catherine found the walls were closing in on her. She paced, counting the steps from the lanai to the front door. She drew deep breaths. But nothing, nothing, could take away the pain, or change the facts – she was leaving the Islands. Leaving her friends, Kiann’e, Lester, Aunty Lani and PJ.

  Why had Bradley made this decision without discussing it with her? Had someone said something to him about her spending time with PJ? But Catherine knew this was nonsense. Bradley had made the decision and assumed that she’d just go along with it. He was so dictatorial. Deep down she’d always known that this was so. Bradley made the decisions. He was always in charge and while he would explain what he planned to do, he never really asked her opinion. Consulting her was more a gesture of polite protocol after he’d made up his mind.

  She’d never argued with his intentions. He presented them in such a way that it would appear churlish to disagree. Or ill informed or silly. She’d been happy enough just going along because somewhere in her head she’d been told, or assumed, that she was very lucky to have a man who did everything for her, made all the decisions and ran their lives smoothly and efficiently. Why on earth would she complain? But the more she thought about her marriage to Bradley the more she felt as though she was suffocating.

  The first day she stayed alone, telling Lester she didn’t feel well. Kiann’e was too busy to go swimming. The second morning Catherine got up early and drove down to Mrs Hing’s for a just-baked custard malasada.

  ‘You’re up early. You’re my first customer of the day, you bring me luck. I put in an extra one for your husband, he like guava one – no charge,’
said Mrs Hing.

  Catherine thanked her and walked across to the boat harbour to sit and eat the warm custard-filled donut-like confection. The sun was just up and the water was mirror-smooth, reflecting the quietly nodding boats. Everything looked so sparkling. She ate both malasadas and walked back to the car feeling the first warmth of the sun, the slight breeze faintly rustling the palm fronds. She wondered what the surf was like this morning.

  This was how she liked to start each day. Moments of peace and calm, the knowledge she was in a beautiful and interesting place with friends and where she still had much to explore and learn. At the end of the day there were the stunning sunsets and the welcoming of another balmy tropical night. How could she leave this?

  She thought that Washington DC would have no redeeming features despite the points of interest Bradley had described. Other than Heatherbrae, no place could touch her soul like the Islands. How could she leave this place and live in dour, unfriendly Washington? She’d heard navy people talk about it and she knew that a tour of duty there would be a penance for her no matter how prestigious the job was for Bradley.

  The Base was quiet, no-one around and returning to the apartment, she felt smothered again. She had to get out into the air, be at the beach, get into the water, ride her board and feel the power of the wave taking her away, away . . . Catherine ran from the apartment, slamming the door.

  How could this be happening? She drove in a daze. A local man waved her on, giving her right of way with a smile. Everything was so familiar, so warm, from the sunshine to the friendly people.

  Catherine arrived at PJ’s house and knew at once he wasn’t there as ‘Woody’, his old panel van, was gone. There was no-one in the house to tell her which beach he’d gone to. It was often like that. Word somehow got around when the waves were up and at a remote and empty beach surfers would suddenly materialise. PJ would be one of them. She collected one of the boards that she’d used before, put it in her car and drove to find him.