Читать книгу Once, Two Islands - Dawn Garisch - Страница 17

Chapter Eleven

The end of each year heralded highlights of island life: this was the time of the sheep shearing and the potato harvest, the Hunt and the Summer Solstice Masked Ball, Christmas and then New Year – busy times for both the doctor and Minister Kohler. As December approached, the minister’s sermons would become longer and longer. His congregation fidgeted under his stern gaze as he wheezed out his warnings of the peril that lay in wait for the soul indulging in activities traceable to pagan rituals and heathen practices.

“Desire and restraint,” he announced, “quarrel over our every waking moment, they fight over the weakest part of what makes us human! Consider, ladies and gentlemen, the situation in the Garden of Eden.” He loved the pauses in his sermons: the abyss of quiet like a cliff edge that launched his words towards God for His blessing, then allowed the meaning to parachute down onto the field of upturned faces. “Eve and Adam and the serpent all succumbed to desire in the full knowledge of their sin!” He watched for a sign of the impact of his words, praying for assistance in this thankless task. “Consider too: Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane! He desired to live! He feared death! He appealed to God: ‘Take this cup away from me!’ Yet he was the Son of God, and despite his fear, despite his desire, he practised restraint and submission, saying: ‘Thy will, not mine.’” He leaned right over the pulpit for emphasis as he said this, looking down on his pitiful flock in the corrugated landscape of the pews. Often, of late, he had considered going back to the mainland. He felt weakened by the daily labour of his mission, an eternal pushing of a boulder uphill. Yet this was his restraint: God had lashed him to this cross, this place.

Minister Kohler rocked back on his heels, gripping the edge of the pulpit, and contemplated the beams that held the thatch roof of the church in place. “And so, as we near the time when we celebrate the anniversary of the coming of Christ to the earth, let us be mindful of the choices we make. Choices to obey God’s mighty will – or to follow our own corrupt one.” He never went as far as to name the Hunt and the Masked Ball; everyone knew what he was referring to, and for the following month few in the village could look him in the eye. Nothing was going to dissuade the majority from these observances – surely God knew that they were only a bit of revelry, which never got so out of hand that a prayer or two wouldn’t rectify matters? Only Fabio Bagonata, who lived in perpetual dread of the end of the world, would shout “Amen!” with enthusiasm at the end of the minister’s service, and avoided the temptations of the Hunt and the Ball each year by going fishing.

The build-up started with the sheep shearing and the potato harvest. The potatoes were said to be the best in the world, and the portion that was earmarked for export had to be bagged, and the wool carded and spun in time for the departure of the December ship. This same vessel brought to the island post and gifts and books and supplies, as well as occasional locals returning from the mainland, and island teenagers returning from boarding school for the summer holidays, full of stories to savour of life away from an island existence.

Officer Dorado Bardelli was the first to know the expected time of arrival of a ship, as she was in contact with the captain by radio. Sometimes a ship would arrive during the night, and the children would wake early and run down to the harbour, where the bay beyond accommodated the large and imposing ship, too big by far to fit into the small fishing harbour. The best was when it arrived in the day and the weather was good. Mrs Mobara would let the children out of school to climb up the black volcanic slopes of the mountain to the lookout point, trying to be the first to see the speck on the horizon that would slowly grow into a huge ship carrying dreams from far away.

As soon as someone had spotted the vessel, the children would run down to the harbour, hearts racing, to see how the bow thrusters brought the ship to a halt out in the bay, and how the huge anchors fore and aft were released with a splash into the water. They crowded onto the end of the breakwater, barely heeding their mothers’ shouts to them to be careful. The barge, run by Frank Bardelli, would set out for the ship, coming alongside to receive the cargo hauled from the holds by the ship’s crane and swung out over the barge in nets and containers. Then the barge would ferry the precious items into the harbour, where the process would be repeated with the cranes onshore.

In her office, Officer Dorado Bardelli, who doubled up as the customs official, would oversee the issuing of the goods the islanders had ordered. Some things could be opened straight away and savoured, others had to wait for the Summer Solstice Ball or Christmas or birthdays, when they would provide a further surge of pleasure. Fabio Bagonata always received one of the largest parcels: all his spare earnings went on tinned goods, which he stacked in his increasingly cramped cottage in preparation for the end of the world.

By night, half the islanders would be drunk, getting into fights and throwing up their imported wine and food over their new shoes. The year after Sophia was sent into exile, Mr Bacon – as the villagers called Giorgio Bagonata, the shopkeeper, the fourth person on the island rich enough to order a vehicle – mistook two poles for a road, rendering the car undrivable and plunging half the island homes into darkness. It took two days for David Peters to get over his hangover sufficiently to get the electrical circuits sorted out, and three weeks for Mr Bacon’s broken nose, rearranged by the steering wheel and then pushed back into place by the bemused doctor, to heal, but it took two months until the next ship brought a new radiator, bonnet and fender to fix his vehicle. In the meantime, it stood forlornly at the back of his shop – a reminder to the whole community never to overdo it, reflected the doctor.

The night after the ship came in, yet other islanders plunged into the intoxicating worlds of books, music, art. Liesa Pelani, who had discovered a love of painting, would open new boxes of watercolours and enamels, Mannie Mobara would caress his new guitar like a lover, Martha Schoones would fall into the arms of the latest prize-winning novel and Elijah Mobara, who spent his spare hours combing the island for driftwood, would set to work with a new set of chisels.

The next day was the day of the Hunt. Years ago, someone had made the mistake of importing to the island a breed of cattle that had a tendency to be excitable; a number had got loose, disappearing into parts of the island that were barely accessible, breeding and going wild. Catching them was near impossible, and if the islanders went out and shot a few, it was difficult to get the large carcasses down the steep mountain paths and back to the village. But the December ship also happened to be a research vessel with a helicopter on board, and the mayor had an informal arrangement with the captain: in exchange for one carcass, some world-class crayfish and five crates of island-brewed spirits, the captain would assist the islanders by airlifting the cattle carcasses down to the village for the Summer Solstice Ball.

First the cattle had to be shot; but the day after the ship came in, there were few able to aim straight. The women would mutter prayers and shake their heads as the men lurched off, fish and crayfish nets forgotten, in search of larger prey. One year, Ricardo Bagonata got shot in the leg when Frank Bardelli mistook him for a heifer; another year, a wild bull gored Lucien Peters while he was trying to remember how to release the safety catch on his rifle. Both injured parties had to be airlifted to the hospital.

Once the cattle carcasses had descended from the heavens and been deposited in the square in front of the community hall, everybody fell in. While some helped Nelson Peters prepare for the feast, butchering and soaking the beef in huge tubs of marinade, others laboured to load the frozen fish, crayfish and potatoes destined for the world markets onto the ship, which sailed the following day. Because the time of the arrival of the ship and therefore the day of the Hunt was uncertain, the islanders always held the Summer Solstice Ball three days after the ship’s arrival, whether it was the true solstice or not. Great fires were made in the square, both for atmosphere and for cooking. It was understood that if anyone was in the jail cell, they would be let out for the occasion, and any hospital patients were wrapped up and wheeled out under the night sky, some even on oxygen. The cleaning tables from the fish factory were carried out and laden with bowls of salads, and breads, and nuts and fruits brought from the mainland. Jojo Schoones’s hi-fi was cranked up until the volume of the music competed successfully with the noise of the generator, and young and old joined in to celebrate after two months of hard work: eating, dancing, singing, flirting.

There was only one rule. Everyone, from great-grandparents to great-grandchildren, was required to wear a mask. Some spent the whole year making their masks spectacular, not only in an attempt to win a prize, but also because they needed to believe they could spend one night each year incognito on this island where everyone knew practically everything about everyone else – even though you could easily hear it was Cyn Peters’s high staccato laugh, or spot at a glance Elijah Mobara’s loping gait or Mr Bacon’s potbelly. Masks allowed for some abandon. As a result, an unusually high proportion of the islanders had their birthdays nine months later, in September – another busy month for the doctor – and the fathers of September babies would look closely at their offspring, trying to discern familiar features.

* * *

Dorado Bardelli glued the last few strands of dried seaweed onto her papier-mâché mask. She was pleased by how she had managed to crimp and plaster the forehead and cheeks the previous night into a fierce, rugged face with heavy brows. The seaweed created a ragged beard, adding to the effect. But she was annoyed with herself for having left it so late: there was a danger of the glue not drying adequately by the evening. She placed the mask next to the crown, then started on the trident, fixing a parabola of wire to one end of a broom handle to create the fork, then padding it by winding strips of sea-green cloth around it. Clarence knew what she would be wearing; they would find each other in the throng that night, and he would surreptitiously cup her buttock in his hand and press himself against her. Later they would find a way to be alone; they would wash up together in a delicious, cocooned island moment. For a while she could pretend it was just the two of them, marooned in each others’ arms, falling into paradise.

She glanced at the clock. She was almost late for work: signing out the goods for export, calculating the export duty and harbour tax, and stamping the crew’s passports. She was meeting with Clarence at two to discuss the adequacy of the fire extinguishers in the co-op; their attention to business would be punctuated by their hands brushing occasionally in anticipation. Her days were organised around these moments, these brief encounters that made her thrill with a painful pleasure.

By two-thirty he had not arrived. This was unusual. Dorado sent Absalom Pelani’s youngest son, Harry, to look for him; he came panting back to say that the mayor had last been seen in his boat early that morning, heading off in the direction of Impossible. Something tightened in Dorado’s chest; what on earth was he doing? Some time ago, Clarence had taken to going fishing: something he had come to late in life, a solitary pleasure he insisted on despite Dorado’s concerns for his safety. But today was one of the busiest days of the year, what with the ship in and the preparations for the Ball; the mayor should be available to be consulted about any attendant problems. Dorado went outside and felt how the wind was picking up and swinging round from the south, scrubbing the surface of the sea into a corrugated washboard, feeding her own turbulence. She locked up the police station and went to check herself. Clarence’s boat was not in the boat shed. She went to Jerome Peters, Clarence’s elder son, for help. The factory was closing early. The ship had been loaded in record time, and men and women were hurrying home to wash and change for the festivities ahead. Jerome checked with his mother; it transpired she was unaware that her husband had gone off in his boat.

Dorado prepared the police launch for the search with a double dread. In living memory, there had been three occasions when men had gone missing at sea – but none had been found. Also, why had he not told her of his plans?

Jerome and his brother Nelson came with her. The launch ploughed through the ruck and chop, heading for Dead Man’s Cove on Impossible, where the fish were so plentiful they almost jumped into the boat. By the time they reached the cove, the sky was heavy with grey constellations of cloud, and visibility was becoming poor. There was no sign of Clarence’s boat, so they put in at the landing beach and went to interrogate Sophia, her young son crawling at her feet. Three hours later, when they could not get Sophia to admit she had seen Clarence or knew his whereabouts, they were forced to sleep over in the fishermen’s cottages.

* * *

Nelson lay in the darkness listening to his brother’s breathing, his body tight and cold, his father lost, perhaps forever. This woman Sophia had something to do with it, he knew; he remembered his father’s scratched face on his return after he had escorted her into exile.

Jerome thought this idea far-fetched. “He should never have gone out alone,” he said, raising his voice above the wind’s whine.

“The sea was calm enough most of the day,” Nelson pointed out, wanting his wife’s warm arms around him, angry with his brother for not seeing the obvious.

“You also don’t know the sea, Nelson. It’s not only storms can wreck you.”

Nelson did not sleep much that night, not having brought his tablets with him, and with his father’s ghost already sitting on his chest, whispering disparaging comments in his ear. The past could not be changed; certain memories stood solid and immutable, set in stone amidst the flux and wash of vague recollections. Certain events called him back, back, pulling his attention away from sleep, from life itself, refusing to let him go despite his best efforts to put them behind him and not look back. He was Lot’s wife turned to salt, mesmerised, punished, pointless.

Had he pushed his father? He gasped at this notion, this mad idea sprung from the dark, ambushing his brain. Had he been a good enough son? His father leaving, always leaving, since he could remember. He had not managed to make him stay, even for his mother’s sake; he could not bring her relief by staying with her himself, then or now. He had to make it up to her somehow.

The trapped fish of his thoughts revolved without respite in the dark bowl of his skull.

For Dorado, too, there was no chance of rest. The walls of the cottage were false shelter; she needed to feel the rip of the wind on her taut skin, she needed the tumult of weather to wrench the horror and grief from her mouth. Most of the night she was out on the cliff, her body wired and waiting, trying to pick up any trace of hope in the salt air; then plunging into despair like drowning, wanting to throw herself off the earth and down to Neptune’s feet, joining her Clarence in one last act of immersion. But perhaps, perhaps he wasn’t drowned. After all, he’d recently come to an agreement with Minister Kohler about the last gravesite at the church, claiming it for himself so as not to lie one day in the stony, cold cemetery near the sheep pastures. Clarence would’ve hated the thought of his flesh soaking off his bones in the freezing deep, his remains dancing to the tug of shark bites with the cold eyes of fish watching. It just wasn’t possible. She had to know the truth, she had to stay alive until she’d found out what had happened.

Those moments when the wind tore the mist to woolly shreds, allowing glimpses of Ergo, she could see the lights of the village, where the Ball was in full swing. Or was it? She had radioed back to Mannie, who was doing duty at the station in her absence, reporting that they were safe but marooned by weather. The villagers would all know by now about the disappearance of their mayor. How could he do this, on the day of their celebration of life?

The following day, the weather had abated sufficiently for the three to continue their search. They found nothing: no boat, no body, nothing. When they arrived back on Ergo with the news, there were those who were dazed; there were those who made the sign to ward off evil, silently vowing not to voyage near Impossible again. Minister Kohler was tempted to say something about God’s timing at the memorial service held four days later around the absent mayor’s gravesite, but found that God had stopped his tongue; instead, to his surprise and embarrassment, he wept.