by David Jurk
“It’s bin a while,” he said quietly. “Whit a sweit bee she is, sure enaw.” Then he set her gently down. “She’ll want tae be lookin' th' auld place ower.”
He turned back to us and motioned to a small table.
“Sit ye doon,” he said.
I sat and ran my hand over the surface, amazed at the joinery that had created it – detailed and intricate, it was a beautifully executed combination of seemingly random shaped pieces put together into a seamless whole with impeccable workmanship and a sense of color and grain matching that approached artistry. I looked up and saw him watching me, a smile playing over his face, his eyes bright.
“Driftwood,” he said, answering my unspoken question. “A wee hobby ay mine.”
“It’s stunning,” I said, and saw that he was pleased. “Where is your workshop?”
“It’s belaw,” he answered. “I’ve a scant few tools in th' cellar. Ah try tae dae a bit ay wark wi'.” Then, abruptly, he clapped his hands together.
“But noo, we need tae gie some lunch in ye! 'En I’ll shaw ye abit th' place.”
Aulani started to rise, intending to help, but he’d have none of it and insisted, with an amusing sternness, that she sit back down.
So, we sat obediently, watching as Charlie pulled bowls from an open shelf and large spoons from a drawer, filling the bowls with the steaming contents of the bubbling pot. He slammed them down before us with a flourish, along with wide slabs of crusty bread and what must’ve been at least a half-pound hunk of butter. Bidding us to begin, he filled a bowl for himself and brought it to the table, then as we sat waiting for him, he slapped his hand onto the table.
“Ah, blest,” he said. “Did ye need tae say words afair ye ate? Ah forgit 'at folks dae.”
I smiled at him. “We’re neither of us very religious.”
He grinned broadly. “That's auld Ah th' horn laddie,” he replied, pointing his pipe stem at me. “Dornt faa fur those fairy tales. They'll make a moose ay ye.” He paused, his eyes twinkling. “Noo tuck intae thes chowder, och aye, an' 'en I’ll shaw th' tois ay ye aroond thes brammer wee islain.”
For the next few minutes, all that could be heard in the room was the soft bubbling of the pot on the stove and the sounds of three people slurping the most delicious chowder I’d ever tasted. At one point, Charlie rose and returned with the pot in hand and ladled more chowder into our bowls, without a word of protest from either of us. On his way back to the stove, I saw him pull a small plate down, spoon a bit of chowder onto it, and set it on the floor for the cat, who was on it in seconds, tucking her tail around herself and going at it with rapacious vigor. Her rumbling purr was audible three meters away.
When we’d finished, Charlie rose to scoop up the plates and Aulani rose to help, but again he wouldn’t have it.
“Yoo're a guest, Lani,” he scolded her. “An' a guest willnae be daein' these dishes.”
He moved us over to an old leather couch and sat himself down in what must’ve been his normal sitting place, an old overstuffed leather lounger, angled north, before the incredible view. Taking out his pipe, he lit it and settled down with evident anticipation. Then for the next half hour, told us about himself.
He was there on Raoul serving as a representative of the New Zealand government, essentially a one-man meteorological research effort, tracking wind and waves and transmitting daily weather forecasts and surface charts by radio. He’d been on Raoul for twenty-seven years, since he was fifty years old.
It all sounded quaint to me, lovely but inefficient. In the modern era of instantaneous global internet and AI capability, why have a human here at all? It struck me as a simple automated service; a host of sensors broadcasting wirelessly to an AI program, then....
But there was no more global internet and no more sensors being built or maintained and no more AI software being written. And this job he’d wanted, and the remoteness that had made it necessary in the first place all those years ago, had saved his life.
I asked him if he’d been born in New Zealand, and he snorted.
“Lad,” he replied with a bit of fire, “I’m nae from that dafty place. I’m a bonnie weegie, born an’ bred.”
Aulani looked at me, eyebrows raised.
“I think that means he’s from Glasgow,” I told her.
He nodded at me and went on with his story. He’d come to New Zealand in his late forties after his mother had died. From what I could gather, his father been a drinker and had left them when Charlie was young.
“Blattered twenty-four a day, weren’t he?” Charlie said lightly. “Sae, when he’s dingied us, woods Ah gie a guid damn? Certainly nae.” He knocked the first pipe load of ashes out into a huge glass ashtray and began reloading. “We waur canty tae see his crease it th' duir noo, werenae we?”
It was like having science fiction read to you halfway through the story, not quite knowing what all the alien references were but enjoying the telling nonetheless.
“And you never married, Charlie?” Aulani asked.
His ruddy face turned redder yet, and he took several rapid puffs on the pipe, sending smoke swirling.
“Ach, lass,” he replied finally, “I’m nae gowk now. Wooldda wifie lit me be in a place loch thes? There’d bin nae peace, woods thaur?” He looked apologetically at her.
“Some might,” she said, smiling.
So, he’d come to New Zealand and found work in one of the coastal towns doing marine forecasting for commercial boats and recreational cruisers, and when he’d heard about an opening on Raoul, he took the position, sight unseen. He’d been here since – spending months at a time without seeing another human being. A supply ship appeared three or four times a year, offloading – as he put it – enough food to feed Scotland. He claimed to have accumulated a decade’s worth of canned goods, cured meats and “a wee bit o’ spirits.”
He finished the telling and paused to fill his pipe for the fourth time. Then he looked up at us, waving the pipe stem in the general direction of the two of us.
“Sae,” he asked, “which ay ye will teel yer tale?”
Aulani looked at me and smiled, and I launched into what I intended to be a quick summary of the events that had brought me half way around the world, brought my path and Aulani’s together and above all else, had left us both alive in this insanity. But of course, there was no brief way to tell it.
I tried to begin with Windswept’s launch in San Diego, but Aulani would have none of it, telling Charlie that the story started far earlier than the launch; that I’d built not only this lovely trimaran more than twelve meters long but also the kayak, Two Cherries. That prompted half an hour’s questioning on materials and techniques, so I repaid her in kind by telling him about the Samoan outrigger she’d stolen from Niue, pleased to see his eyes widen in recognition.
“Ur ye’ haverin’ me?” he sputtered. “Isnae 'at th' wee boat they gae tae th' governur?”
She glared at me, reddening, and nodded at Charlie. He roared his approval.
“Och, but that’s pure deid barry!”
She brightened at that, and we entertained another half hour of discussion over the design, wood and construction technique of Samoan outriggers, which Charlie apparently knew a great deal about, offering his dismissive contempt of the ‘modern’ technique of constructing them dugout fashion.
In time, we returned to the voyaging portion of the story, and I related the encounter with the ghost ship and my experiences on Kauai.
“There's mair ay 'at aw ower,” he said grimly. I’m nae certain what’s left.”
“How do you mean?” I asked.
“Ah hae a guid radio. I'll shaw ye later if yoo'd loch.” He nodded toward a small alcove tucked under the stairway.
“Anyway,” he continued, “when thes whole jobby started, I’m listenin' aren’t Ah, day an' nicht, an' there’s naethin' but doolally a' place. What Ah heard, weel, ye woods nae wish it oan yer most warst enemy. Burnin' folks alife fur god’s sake, ra
pin' kimmers an' bairns alike, aye? Pure madness an' evil, it was. An' almost waur, laddie – some evil bastards reit haur in NZ, scran an' water gettin' law, they radio it as if they’re official; claeem they’ve got a safe zain, jist brin' yoorselves an' yer folk an' life’ll be grain, won’t it? An' scared fowk waur flockin' tae them an' that’s jist th' end ay it 'en, wasnae it? Sheep strollin' intae th' den ay wolv, och aye.”
He saw the look on my face, I suppose, and stopped.
“Ye heard them, son? Was 'at whaur ye waur headin'?”
I hesitated, then slowly nodded. “I heard people on a cruising net talking about it, saying they knew of a sanctuary near Auckland.”
His face was stark with rage.
“Nae,” he said fiercely. “Ye cannae gang anywhaur near 'at place, neither ay ye. If onie ay those boak bastards ur alife, it willnae gang weel fur ye.”
“But why, Charlie? Why do you think it’s all a ruse?” I asked.
“Ah heard fowk, later,” he replied. “oan th’ radio; sayin’ 'at they'd gotten awa' frae th' place; said it was a terrible, evil hin'.”
“But,” I persisted. “Is there no chance at all that something there is legitimate? All the talk – there must be some truth to it.”
He hesitated, examining his pipe, turning it over in his hands before putting it back in his mouth and looking up at me.
“Laddie, it's nae easy tae ken in these times what's true an' what's nae true. But i'll teel ye this; thaur is evil it thaur, surely enaw.”
I looked at Aulani; her face was a mask.
“Auckland?” I asked.
Charlie shook his head. “Whit Ah hae heard is 'at it's gain, pure an' simple. Parts burnt loch a cinder. An' somethin' else, folks called it a moat aroond th' place. Gart nae sense tae me.”
He saw me watching Aulani. For someone living alone, he was very sensitive to nuances in other people.
“Yer fowk?” he asked her. She nodded.
“Lani, Ah hae naethin' fur ye but puir bark. It was the blacks, Ah heard, they went efter at first, th' Maori an' sic'. Thinkin' they waur th' ones carryin' it.” He stopped, sorrow etched in lines on his face.
“Aam dreadfully sorry, lass,” he said finally. “Thee's naught but evil thaur, an' that's a certain hin'.”
“All right, then,” she said quietly, and looked up at him. “Thank you for telling me straight out, Charlie. It’s no worse than what I’ve been imagining.”
“The whole world’s gain doolally, hasn’t it?” he said. “Surely, th' few alife yit, nae th' peely-wally, we’re th' whole ay th' human race noo, arenae we? We aw, th' lot o’ us, we got a decision tae make, don’t we? Dinnae hink nae mair o’ what’s behin' us, lass, ur ye’ll hae nothin’ nae mair afair ye.”
He was completely right of course – looking behind us, for either if us, was nothing but an exercise in endless sorrow. We were here, alive, and I’d begun to believe there must be some reason why. We wouldn’t find it looking behind us.
Then he stood abruptly and clapped his hands together. “Woods ye loch tae swatch aroond th' islain? It's a bonnie day!”
Aulani gave my hand a quick squeeze and stood.
“I’d love that,” she said. “I’d love to have you show us.”
He grinned and reached for his pipe and hat, and gathered up our sweaters. “Yer baith in fer a stoatin time, ye are!” he said as he handed them to us. Laughing as we slipped them on, he herded us out the door like children, directing us with jabs of his pipe stem around the south side of the house.
What I saw there brought me up short; a battered, but beautiful, old Land Rover. I knew a bit about them but didn’t recognize this model at all. It had to be pre-sixties, I thought, and looked at Charlie, who was watching me with evident delight, his pipe clenched in a broad, proud grin.
“What a beauty!” I said. “Is it a Series II?”
“Nae, laddie,” he replied, pulling the pipe from his mouth and jabbing the air enthusiastically toward the truck. “She’s a Series I. She was gart in 1951, an' a bonnie lass she is, och aye.”
He went quickly to the right-hand door, opened it and slid in the seat, looking back over his shoulder at us.
“Well, fer pity’s sake, crawl on in, will ye?” And he slammed the door.
Aulani and I looked at each other. I winked at her, and she smiled. We walked over to the passenger door and opened it. There was no back seat and the front was tiny; I hesitated.
“Gie in haur,” he bellowed at me. “Ur ye afraid ay squeezin' together?”
No, we weren’t.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
THE OLD BEAST probably put out all of forty horsepower, but it was the noisiest forty horsepower I’d ever heard. We didn’t talk, we screamed; even then it was difficult to be heard above the thunderous exhaust, the whining gearbox, and the rattling of the undercarriage. I doubt we managed to get much beyond fifty kilometers per hour, but after weeks aboard a sailboat, it seemed that we sped about at breakneck, impossible speed. I was pressed up tight against Aulani, who was jammed in turn against Charlie; the three of us taking up space meant for two.
It was also impossible not to laugh myself silly; it was the closest thing to a carnival ride I’d had in years. For his part, Charlie seemed to have gone mad, apparently intent on seeing how close he could come to killing us in this ancient truck of his, grinning wildly with his teeth clamped down so tight on the pipe stem I wondered how it didn’t snap off.
Occasionally, he took pity and pulled over and we’d stagger out, unbending our aching bodies as he pointed out some rock or ancient stone foundation, or recite some fact about the early occupants of the island – not that there’d been many, apparently. I was surprised to see that he kept a small flock of sheep, several goats – and even two cows. Were there chickens as well, I asked. Yes, he told me – he had a coop built against the house as a sort of lean-to – I was welcome to “tak’ a peek at th’ burds” if I liked.
He seemed intensely proud of the place; listening to him was like listening to someone who saw themselves as a caretaker of something meaningful, something irreplaceably valuable. Half his words flew over us without comprehension – both his accent and his Scottish colloquialisms and the noise of the truck contributing to the confusion. But there was no need to understand every word; his love of the island shone in his face and glowed in his eyes. His gestures were magnanimous, sweeping; he clearly thought the raw, windswept hills and sharp volcanic mountains were treasures – treasures for which he had been deeply fortunate enough to be named caretaker of.
The day had been brilliant with sunshine, and with it, the temperature had climbed pleasantly to a point that Aulani and I had shed our sweaters. But as the afternoon waned, the sea breeze from the southeast picked up and as we finally turned back toward the house, I felt her shivering against me and reached behind the seat where we’d stowed them and draped one over her shoulders. She huddled into it, drawing it tight around herself, and thanked me with a soft nudge of her elbow to my side, resting her head against my shoulder.
Back at the house as twilight fell, Charlie set about stoking the wood stove and within minutes Aulani and I stood gratefully in front of it, soaking up the heat that radiated from it. She was still shivering, and I instinctively put my arm around her shoulders and pulled her against me. And it came to me immediately – this so-familiar gesture I’d made so many times with Rachel, pulling her against me, hip-to-hip. But this wasn’t Rachel; the hair was different on my shoulder, the smell was different, the feel of the body under my arm was different.
And the sadness, the great darkness in me that was the Rachel sadness – where had it gone? The emptiness I felt when I thought of her was not what it had been; it felt more dreamlike than real and I puzzled over it. I tried to conjure her face and felt a wave of panic when it wouldn’t come to me immediately, when I had to forcefully construct it. She’s fading from me, I thought; I’m losing her.
“Owen?”
Star
tled, I looked down to see Aulani looking at me with concerned eyes. “Are you all right? she asked, and I realized how hard I was gripping her shoulder.
“Yes, sorry,” I whispered, taking my arm from around her.
We stood in awkward silence until Charlie’s booming voice called us to the little kitchen alcove to have crackers and smoked fish spread. I was famished, and apparently so was Aulani, because we raced each other to it as if we’d not eaten in weeks. And this simple act seemed to ease the awkwardness; when Charlie kicked two battered old stools toward us and motioned us to them with his pipe, we sat in the spreading warmth of the stove, knee to knee, chatting comfortably as we dug into the spread.
The crackers and fish spread were soon gone, and Charlie took dinner to the table, joining us after the plates were laid. Within a few minutes, the three of us were engrossed in what had quickly become a routine – little talking while the food was enjoyed; this time, a lamb stew so tender and succulent that even after blunting my appetite on the crackers and spread, I couldn’t slow down. Charlie interrupted his own focus on the lamb long enough to rise and take a splinter, set its tip ablaze from the stove, then light two oil lamps hanging from the timbers that held up the main beam of the house.
“Ah coods turn oan th' power but Ah loove th' lecht frae an oil lamp,” he said in explanation, as he sat back down.
“It’s lovely,” Aulani told him. “Such a soft, good light.” She glanced at me. “It reminds me of Windswept’s cabin, at night, when Owen puts on the little candle lantern. Just enough light to feel safe; there’s such a wonderful comfort to it.”
I was surprised; she’d never mentioned it. She was right, though – the light in here was reminiscent of the cabin. It felt strange, a bit, sitting in this cottage with her; this was new ground.
When we’d finished, Charlie again refused any help with dishes and Aulani and I settled onto the couch, relaxing and chatting about the day’s trip around the island, until he came and took his chair, his kitchen chores finished.
