Sun in Splendour

by JH Fletcher

  From the house, the sound of turmoil, the crash and smash of doors and overturned furniture as the search went on.

  When they discover we’re not in the house, Eugénie thought, they will look further. They’re convinced we’re here somewhere. They will keep looking until they find us.

  Let them find us, then. She thought about it some more. Rather let’s give them a run for their money, she told herself. She turned to Aline, and laughed.

  ‘What an adventure!’

  Aline wished only to be in bed. She said nothing, but Eugénie would not permit herself to despair.

  ‘We shall go into the woods. We may even see a fox, if we’re lucky.’

  Before the child could object, she grabbed her by the hand, Marie cradled in her other arm. She clambered over the broken wall and tracked wet footprints through the dewy grass towards the woodland that lay like a cloud a short distance away.

  The trees swooped, branches barely visible against the dark sky, yet black and threatening for all that. Shadows like giants, big enough to conceal monsters. That could spring, at any moment. That could rend, with glittering teeth.

  Aline in tears. ‘I’m frightened. I want to go back.’ But, afraid to know, she did not ask what was happening in the house.

  Eugénie heard her own reasonable voice as she tried to console the child. ‘We can’t go back, at the moment. But we’ll look after each other, shan’t we? And Marie? We shall be safe. And may see lots of interesting things …’

  Thinking, Damn them, damn them.

  An owl called nearby but Aline, unconsoled, shut ears and eyes, trying to hide from terror. They saw no fox, but might have scented one.

  It grew lighter. Still the men had not gone. In the pre-dawn greyness, Eugénie saw dark figures emerge from the house and go into the stables. A few minutes and they came out again, looking this way and that. One of them went into the pasture, strode purposefully towards the broken wall that the growing light had no doubt revealed to him.

  Thank God we didn’t stay there, Eugénie thought. Terror once again engulfed her as she saw what, until then, she had not seen. Across the grass, clearly visible in the dawn, the track of her footprints through the wet grass tethered her like a rope to the place she had left. He had only to look over the hedge …

  She waited.

  The man came to the cave-like hole. He stooped and probed and eventually walked on. Paused again. Body flat on the wet ground, feeling the dew’s drenching ice, she watched as he looked around him, gave up and walked back to the house.

  Drained, she lowered her face into the grass. An hour later Yvette came looking for her.

  ‘When I saw him go over to the wall, I was so frightened. Then, when he came back without you, I knew you must have hidden in the woods. How clever of you to think of it! We told them you’d already left. They didn’t believe us to begin with, but they couldn’t prove anything.’ She laughed, enjoying herself. ‘They were so cross when they left, but who cares? You’ll be safe now.’

  But to Eugénie and Aline, perhaps even to Marie, safety, so often promised, now existed only in dreams.

  13

  They left three days later. In all that time, neither Eugénie nor the children moved outside the house. She could not even say goodbye to her parents.

  ‘They’re bound to be watching. I daren’t risk it.’

  Once they were safely out of the way, Yvette would call on them, give them their daughter’s love. Which, too late, Eugénie discovered she truly felt, despite everything. Perhaps those damned apaches have achieved something, after all, she thought. They have brought us together again.

  They left in the dark, riding softly, keeping to the grass verge until they were away from the town. By daylight they were clear, but Jean, who knew the country well, stuck to the side lanes.

  ‘Don’t want the bastards catching us at this stage.’

  The police had done more than restore her affection for her parents. Whatever the Desgranges family might have thought about her fears before, no-one had any doubts about them now. Jean’s relatives, a married couple in their fifties, were surly, silent; no-one would ever know what they were thinking. Around the stone-built house, its suspicious windows shuttered against trust, the countryside was as surly as the people: in all directions there was only the marshes inundated twice daily by the tide, the plaintive whistle of water birds, a rutted track that dipped and lurched westwards through banks of reeds. No other house; no other person.

  From Eugénie’s point of view it was ideal, yet her nerves remained as taut as harp strings. Now, if the police came, there would be no woodland to conceal them. Yet for two days there was no trouble. The days were warm, the air heavy with the buzzing of insects. Hosts of butterflies flew in gaudy clouds about them. Aline, who once would have chased them, exulting in their brilliance, sat still. She had lost the habit or expectation of joy. Marie, infected by the atmosphere of tension, wailed petulantly, without reason. Eugénie waited, counting the hours.

  After two days, news. The ship had arrived. She wouldn’t hang around long, Jean warned. By nightfall she’d be gone. They must leave at once.

  ‘What about the tide?’

  ‘Just right.’

  Once again they got ready to leave a refuge that for a few days had been home. Once again Eugénie thanked people who had helped her, with little reason for doing so. She offered money; they accepted it without thanks or comment, a taciturn couple silent to the last.

  They saddled up and rode down the meandering track towards the sea and the causeway that would take them over the tidal flats to the island.

  They had been riding for half an hour when they heard the distant drumming of hooves. Jean, in the lead, reined in and stared down the track ahead of them. The country was more open here and Eugénie could just make out the figures of three horsemen heading fast towards them.

  Jean turned in his saddle. ‘Quick!’

  And plunged off the track into the reeds. Eugénie followed, skirting pools of rust-coloured water and reeds that slashed like whips. After twenty metres Jean reined in. Eugénie, panting, stopped beside him. He put his forefinger to his lips.

  ‘Listen …’

  She waited, hearing the hooves drawing rapidly nearer. Distorted by the reeds, the sound echoed about them and then, as rapidly, faded.

  ‘Who was it?’

  ‘At first I wasn’t sure. Then I saw their cross-belts.’

  Soldiers.

  ‘We’d best wait a minute. I only saw three. There may be more.’

  ‘Where were they going?’

  ‘Only one place they could be going. The track ends at my uncle’s place. Somehow they’ve found out where you were staying.’

  They waited another ten minutes, then pushed on.

  ‘I don’t like it,’ Jean said. ‘I’d sooner give them another hour, but we daren’t wait or the tide will cut us off. It’s going to be touch and go, as it is.’

  Touch and go it was. The reed beds thinned as they rounded a basalt cliff, black and forbidding, and came to a strip of open country, part land, part water, with rock pools choked with weed and an overpowering smell of salt and the sea. In the middle of the strip, a causeway of massive stones, shining with emerald weed, pointed its finger at the island, perhaps three kilometres out in the ocean. On either side of the causeway, a wall of frothing water marked the return of the tide.

  Jean reined in his mount.

  ‘It’ll be closer than I like, but we’ve got no choice.’

  ‘How long have we got?’ asked Eugénie.

  ‘Ten or twelve minutes. Fifteen at the most. But, if we don’t go, we’ll be stuck here for hours, which means you’ll miss the boat. Those bastards will be sure to find you before the next one.’

  ‘And if the tide catches us, we’ll drown.’

  ‘That’s right.’

  He was leaving the decision to her. Fair enough; it was her neck, after all, and her children’s necks.

&nb
sp; She set her jaw and stared at Jean. ‘What are we waiting for, then?’ And set heels to her horse.

  The first thing she discovered was that they could go nowhere near the speed she had expected. The causeway was ice-slippery; try to drive her mount too fast and they would be down.

  Take too long over the crossing, on the other hand, and they would drown.

  During the early stages, she kept her eyes mainly on the causeway, guiding the horse as well as she could between matted heaps of weed. Every few minutes she glanced up to check the state of the tide. At first the line of breakers seemed not to advance at all, and her spirits rose. No need to worry; they would make it easily.

  Then, when they were halfway across, things changed. Now, each time she looked, the sea was closer. First a half kilometre, then a hundred metres, then fifty. The waves’ boiling concussion made the causeway shudder. She remembered Yvette’s warning.

  Comes in so fast …

  No need to urge the horse forward; it was already going as fast as it could. Faster, perhaps, as panic took hold. Ears back, hooves skating on the wet rocks, it clattered down the causeway towards the island that suddenly seemed very far away.

  Now there was another problem. Eugénie had warned Jean that she wasn’t much of a horsewoman; with Aline mounted in front of her, Marie in the shawl about her neck, the frightened animal threatening to take charge, she pitched to and fro in the saddle, terrified she was going to come off at any moment. Given the speed of the incoming tide, that would be the finish of them all. She gritted her teeth, hung on as well as she could and prayed frantically, while island and safety drew slowly closer.

  The tide was drawing closer, too. Already spurts of foam were wetting the causeway. Again she stared at the island. It was still half a kilometre away and staring would bring it no nearer. Only movement would do that. They were certainly moving, but the water was over the causeway now, the breakers smashing in ruin on either side of them. The horse baulked as a wave broke right in front of its legs. For a terrifying moment, Eugénie expected it to rear. Instead it whinnied, put its head down and ran, with Eugénie clinging with hands and feet.

  Even now it might be too late. Another wave broke, then another, bursting over them, drenching them with spray. It was too much. Aline, who had been so good for so long, began screaming, a shrill and endless screech that set her mother’s teeth on edge.

  ‘Nearly there, now,’ she told her. ‘Nearly there …’

  With the retreating wave swirling about the horse’s legs, she did not know if she believed it herself.

  A hundred metres to go. Fifty. Another torrent of water sluiced about them. The horse staggered but somehow regained its footing. Twenty metres.

  A huge breaker, bigger by far than any she’d seen, reared far above their heads. She was no longer looking where they were going; instead stared, mesmerised, at the great wave. Its crestcurled, white with froth, there was froth all down its face, its voice was loud and terrible as it began to break in a cascade of foam. No way could they hope to survive it. No way.

  The sound of the hooves changed from a clatter to a hollow drumming. Behind them, the huge wave burst in a welter of spewed water as the horse left the causeway and, with Jean galloping alongside, raced up the slope onto the island.

  Safe.

  It was a feeling she had looked forward to so much. No longer to have the hot breath of terror down her neck. Terror of the unknown: the fear that Alain might not be safe, the gathering conviction that he was most definitely not safe; that, on the contrary, he was dead, murdered; that she would never see him again; that she and the children would have to begin their lives once more without him. Then terror of the unknown had been replaced by terror of the known. The soldiers questioning, trying to track her down; the sentry at the roadblock; the gendarmes on her father’s doorstep; the knowledge that, all the time, pursuit was drawing closer. Finally, terror of the future, the expectation that at any minute someone would look at her and name her fugitive, traitor, candidate for execution. That she would feel a hand upon her shoulder. That the sea would cut them off from their last hope of refuge; that death, inexorable and unavoidable, was never more than inches away.

  And now to be safe …

  Eugénie longed to climb out of the saddle, lie upon the salt-scorched turf and let the stress drain out of her. Only to discover that, even now, terror might not be vanquished after all, that everything might still come to nothing.

  ‘We can’t stop,’ Jean urged. ‘The boat won’t wait.’

  If the vessel sailed without them, all their suffering would have been in vain.

  Aline was still screaming, and Marie had started to wail in sympathy. It was suddenly too much to bear. Her eyes filled up, she thought how the world was too harsh a place, how she could go no further, would have to give up, give up now.

  She closed her eyes tight against the scalding tears. She breathed deeply, once, twice. Head hanging, spirits in ribbons, somehow she rode on.

  The ship was huge, almost filling the walled harbour. Goods were being unloaded. What looked like a family — man, woman and two children — all well-dressed, waited at the foot of the gangway as Jean and Eugénie rode their horses down the jetty. She watched them, thinking how they, too, looked as though they had been living with fear. There was no time to talk or even to think. A sailor, blue-clad, was gesturing at the strangers to go aboard. As she watched, they did so, a man staggering behind them under the weight of their luggage.

  ‘Hurry and get your ticket …’

  ‘Where do I go?’

  ‘In there.’ Jean gestured at a wooden hut, its door propped open against the wind.

  He accompanied her inside. A man sat at a rickety table. Beneath a battered top hat, a thin, pock-marked face looked up at her.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I want to book a passage.’

  ‘Two of you?’

  ‘No. Myself and two children. This gentleman is not coming.’

  The man said, ‘There is a new regulation.’ He picked up a printed sheet and looked at it, as though to remind himself what it said. ‘We are required to ask whether you are aware of any reason why the authorities may wish to question you.’

  The blood stood still in her veins. ‘I don’t know,’ she said.

  ‘No,’ Jean said.

  The man looked at them both, eyes wide. ‘Are you from Paris?’

  Again Jean answered. ‘From Nantes.’

  He picked up another piece of paper, on which was written a list of names.

  ‘Your name?’

  ‘Eugénie Desgranges,’ Jean said, giving her no chance to speak.

  The man glanced down the list. Paused. Again the wide-eyed stare. ‘Eugénie —’

  ‘Desgranges.’

  ‘From Nantes?’

  ‘From Nantes.’

  ‘Not Paris?’ The man seemed to ponder, then shrugged. ‘Very well.’ He took up the purse containing the money that Eugénie had carried with her all this time. He spilled the coins across the surface of the desk and began to count them. One by one, they disappeared first into his cupped hand, then into the open drawer of the table.

  ‘Yourself and two children?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He nodded, wrote something in a ledger, pushed some of the coins back across the table. ‘Your change.’

  Eugénie stared. ‘Is that all?’ She remembered Yvette’s father warning that they would charge what they thought she could afford. Well, she couldn’t afford this. ‘That seems an awful lot for a passage to England.’

  The man looked up at her, his eyes no longer sceptical but startled. ‘England? Is that where you want to go?’

  ‘Isn’t that where the ship’s going?’

  He smiled with what seemed genuine amusement. ‘No, it most certainly is not.’

  ‘Where is it going, then?’

  ‘To Australia.’

  PART II

  RENEWAL

  ‘Life. Endless renewal
. A circle, on and on forever.’

  — Pieter Wolmarans (Keepers of the House)

  Alan

  There is a dinner tonight. The Australian Antarctic Society. I would prefer to give it a miss, but that is out of the question; I am the President, after all. Normally I enjoy catching up with old colleagues who, like myself, have put their toes and fingers into the frostbite firing line in search of … what?

  The Antarctic is a wonderful place. Vast, remote, beautiful, terrible, most of it devoid of life of any kind. The epithets fill the page. Even today, much of it is unexplored. An enormous quantity of valuable scientific data comes out of its icy fastness, and it is certainly true that Mawson, perhaps more than any other of the great early adventurers, regarded his expeditions as primarily scientific in nature. But did Shackleton, Scott, Amundsen go south in pursuit of scientific knowledge? When Cherry-Garrard set out on what he later called the worst journey in the world, was it primarily in the interests of science? I don’t think so. For them, as for myself, I believe it was because, as Mallory said of Everest, the challenge was there.

  In my case, in the case of nearly everyone I knew, the answer was unequivocal. We set out upon our southerly journeys for adventure, to find out something about ourselves — even, perhaps, to draw closer to the mystery of truth. What is truth? as Pilate is supposed to have asked. The wilderness has always been a place where people have gone to find the answer.

  It is different nowadays. So many months’ service at so many dollars a week, so much to be set aside for superannuation, for health benefits, for this and for that. Now, no doubt, they will find a way to pin a GST tag to it, too. Well, the world changes. Perhaps there are benefits in the endless expansion of the bureaucracy, of the grey power of those whom, had we the choice, we would not trust with as much as a biscuit. The endless, mindless choking of initiative, of the individual. Benefits? Perhaps.

  People think of adventurers as a tiny handful of madmen — and women — in love with the unknown. They’re wrong; there are far more of us than that. I have often thought that leaving one place to go to another, vastly different from the first, must have something of that same sense of seeking about it.