Читать книгу Bird of Paradise - Rosemary Esmonde Peterswald - Страница 9

Outside Jackson Airport Merryn watched the Holden pull into the curb in front of the terminal. The young soldier jumped from behind the driver’s seat and held the back door open. He was dressed in the same green uniform as Jake—except where Jake wore highly polished shoes and long green socks, he was wearing only sandals on his feet.

‘This is Merryn,’ Jake said to him.

The soldier’s smile was brilliant, his white teeth unstained.

‘Phillip’s from Buka Island, ‘Jake went on, ‘at the top of Bougainville.’

‘Ah,’ is all Merryn could think of to say. Yet at the same time, she wondered why Phillip would have been given such an English sounding name, when in fact, he was the blackest person she had ever seen.

In the time it took to place her handbag on the seat beside her, they had accelerated away from the curb and were heading into town. For some time they drove in silence—a silence so long that it became a matter of suspense to see who broke it.

Had Phillip been told about her? Merryn wondered.

‘I’ve got you a room at the Bottom Pub in town,’ Jake eventually said, without turning his head. ‘I thought we could have dinner there tonight. It has a good view of the harbour with a breeze from the water, more so at night making it easier to sleep.’

This reminded Merryn of how hot she was. Wiping her face with the edge of her scarf, she noticed makeup coming off on the fabric. She turned it the other way to hide the stain. ‘Thank you,’ she said detachedly. But what was the point of having dinner with him? Surely he was only doing it out of duty.

She stared idly over the dry dusty roads—to the fibro houses with louvered windows perched on sunbaked lawns and relieved only by colourful hibiscus bushes, frangipani trees, and clapped out cars. A little further on appeared to be more affluent with bigger houses, greener lawns, and superior cars. Walking each side of the road were heaps of Pacific Islanders in all shapes and sizes and various forms of dress. A few bare-breasted meris were wearing grass skirts, but mostly they favoured floral meri dresses, a sort of Mother Hubbard with puffed sleeves. Some had multicoloured string bags, which she knew were called bilums, hanging from their heads. The men, like those at the airport, wore brightly dyed lap laps or cotton shorts and T-shirts; others had bizarre things hanging from their ears.

Most of the children had runny noses and protruding stomachs. Yet one little boy, cleaner and better dressed than the others, carried what looked like a school bag of books, perhaps dreaming of a future way beyond the imaginings of his parents. Further on, a young girl, nearly as black as Phillip and with her hair in braids, was wearing a miniskirt and carried a transistor radio to her ear. The old and the new, Merryn thought. Tradition versus progress!

She would have liked to talk to Jake about what she saw. That’s how she always imagined it would be. Jake excitedly pointing everything out, telling her what the things hanging from the men’s ears meant. Why some of the people were so much blacker than others. Why some had blond hair. Was it peroxide or were they albinos? He would know Moresby so well, this being his second time here.

Jake finally broke the silence. ‘How’s your mother?’ he asked, giving a small cough.

Merryn shut her eyes. Her mother adored Jake, despite her horror when they’d moved in together just before Jake went on his tour of duty to Vietnam, predicting the burning fires of hell for Merryn. ‘What would your father have said,’ she berated, stabbing her finger at her eldest daughter, ‘living in sin like that?’

But that was then. Now she more or less blamed Merryn, suggesting that if she hadn’t been so obsessive about becoming a pilot none of this would have happened. She could remember one of the last conversations they’d had—and could hear it all in her mind like a tape.

‘Are you sure you’re doing the right thing?’ her mother asked.

Merryn shrugged ‘No. I’m not sure it’s the right thing. But it’s the only thing.’

‘Well, don’t go if you’re not sure.’

‘It’s too late now. I’ve relet the unit, sold the car, and paid for my flight.’

‘Well, if you change your mind, you can come and stay with me,’ her mother went on in a worried voice.

Merryn had gazed around the dark living room of the two- story federation home, where her mother had lived on her own since Merryn had convinced her to finally sell the old homestead at Wattle Creek. Merryn couldn’t envisage being part of the chintz covered chairs, Waterford crystal, and heavy Irish furniture for the rest of her life, much as she loved it.

‘Thanks, Mum,’ she said with determination, ‘but I’ve made up my mind. I can’t let Barty Harman down. Not many airline operators are prepared to give a woman a go. And at the end of the day, despite what you feel, flying’s what I want to do more than anything else, particularly now. I’ve no other choice than to go to Moresby and get my hours up... even,’ she added softly, ‘if Jake’s there too. As you well know, it’s the only place that will have me.’

‘Well, I’m sure when he sees you again he’ll realise what a mistake he’s made,’ her mother said confidently, ‘but if it doesn’t work out...well...there’s always here.’

‘I’ll make it work out,’ she assured her mother, attempting to reassure herself.

Secretly, Merryn had her own doubts. However, she gave a smile that was meant to ease her mother’s mind. ‘I’ll be all right—you’ll see.’

Yet as she sat in the car with Phillip driving, she wasn’t at all sure she would be all right.

‘Your mother?’ Jake asked.

Merryn turned her eyes from the desiccated dusty road outside the car window. She had no idea it would be this dry. She’d expected the heat, but not the dust. It was as if rain had never fallen on this parched land, scattered with litter and teeming with locals seemingly idling to nowhere.

‘Yes, I heard,’ she said, pursing her lips tightly. Looking over at him, she tapped her finger on the ashtray. ‘She’s fine... sends her love. Thinks we’ll sort it out...all some kind of misunderstanding or such...’

‘Oh...’

Yes, well...’ She broke off, feeling the salty sting of tears threaten her eyes. Her eyebrows gathered, and she studied the back of Phillip’s head. Such tight hair!

She glanced out the window again and then back at Jake. She wasn’t sure which emotion was winning inside her head. Loss? Hatred? Humiliation?

Yet what had thrown her the most was the huge rush of pure want that travelled her body when she first saw him at the airport. Somehow she’d imagined the anger she was feeling would kill that desire. It had only made it worse, even now.

In awkward silence, they drove on—up and down hills skirting through small neighbourhoods, some more well to do than others, and on to where the road ran along the beach. On any other day, Merryn would have asked Phillip to stop the car so she could stroll barefoot on the long stretch of white sand and dip her toes in the sparkling water. As it was, only a short time later the beach fell behind, and Phillip turned the car right into Moresby’s main street. In the middle of the road, a policeman in full blue uniform with long white gloves, contrasting to the blackness of his skin, stood on a podium under a huge clock directing the traffic. At the end of the street and opposite the tower on the Burns Philip store, Phillip pulled the car into the curb.

If this were Singapore, the Bottom Pub would no doubt be an establishment where only the genteel partook of long lunches and high teas. Being Moresby, however, it was more of a frontier pub, where Saturday elevens at the bar turned into twilight happy hours followed by a rowdy counter meal. Built of weatherboard, its white paintwork peeling, dark trim bubbling, it fell away in the back from brick foundations.

Deep flower-filled verandas, covered in huge yellow buttercups of an allemande vine, wrapped around two sides. It reminded Merryn of the old ‘Queenslander’ in the outback ranges, owned by a relation of her mother’s, where they had spent their first Christmas in Australia after arriving on the P&O ocean liner from Ireland. Without warning, she was assaulted with memories of the scorching sun blinking a final farewell, before sliding behind the barren sunburnt hills, the adults drinking beer on the veranda whilst Merryn and her sister, Amy, swam with the ducks in the water hole. So different from the white Christmases they’d known in Tipperary, when they would go to Mass in the pony and trap and then sit by the roaring fire in the front room at Derrybawn, their home on Lough Derg, with the early morning light filtering through the vast bay window as she and Amy opened their presents excitedly whilst her parents sipped on hot toddies. Afterward, all rugged up in their Aron pullovers and thick woollen scarves, they’d trudge through the snow to the edge of the lake and skate on the glistening ice.

‘Here we are,’ Jake said, snapping her back to where she sat in the army car. ‘It’s better inside. The rooms are big, and the dining room’s not so bad.’

Merryn actually liked the outside of the pub too, but said nothing, just smiling weakly at Phillip when he pulled the door open for her. He smiled back, and as she read his smile, she knew he knew. He feels sorry for me, she thought. How awful.

Jake ushered her up onto the veranda and through the front door. Inside it was dimmer and cooler, with dark oak panelling.

Although it was shabby, chairs with tattered covers, torn Oriental rugs on the stained timber floor, it had a certain atmosphere, a strange blend of the exotic and neglect. Arrows up on the walls pointed to the veranda, the dining room, and a bar that was raucous with drinkers, even at this hour.

A young woman with long dark hair tied in a chignon and wearing a blue cashmere cardigan, which amazed Merryn in this heat, sat behind a high counter checking something in a ledger. She looked up when Jake approached, giving him a broard smile.

‘There should be a booking for Merryn O’Neill,’ he said.

‘Yep, sure is,’ the girl identified as Jo on her nametag beamed. ‘I’ve been expecting you. The plane was on time then? Some of the blighters get in hours late...days even.’ She lifted her tall miniskirted body off a cane stool and turned her smile on Merryn. ‘Bet you’re finding the heat the pits.’

‘It’s certainly humid all right.’

‘You get used to it, though. Soon you’ll be wearing a cardie like me.’ She slid a large key, tied to a speckled clamshell, over the counter. ‘Anyway,’ she explained, with a sweep of her hand towards a swinging door, ‘I’ve given you the big room on the top floor. It’s got a whopper of a fan and not a bad view of the harbour.’

She described it with such pride that Merryn felt sure it must be their very best room. ‘Thank you, it sounds great,’ she said, leaning forward to pick up the key.

‘My pleasure,’ Jo said cheerily. ‘Enjoy your stay.’

Jake bent down for Merryn’s case, and together they walked through the foyer towards the door. Outside, a wooden staircase led to the top floor. At the end of a long veranda, he put the key in the door of number eight. Holding it back, he let Merryn move through to a large room with louvered windows overlooking Fairfax Harbour. The heavy fan, rotating from the ceiling above two wicker chairs, made it cooler than outside. An orange Chenille bedspread covered the large white wrought iron bed. On the stained timber floor was a seagrass mat in the centre, and hanging in deep folds above the bed was an enormous mosquito net. A carved wooden hat stand stood in front of the window, its arms spread like the branches of a burnt tree.

Jake dropped Merryn’s suitcase on one of the chairs. ‘Why don’t you have a rest this afternoon?’ he said. ‘I’ll come back later. Say six.’ He turned around and gave her a hesitant smile. ‘We can talk then.’

Silence. Merryn looked at him long and hard. It may have been the heat that caused his face to flush, but she doubted it. Talk of what? Had it not all been said? In his letters. On the phone. She moved to her suitcase and with a small key undid the lock. ‘Till six then,’ she finally said, without turning.

He waited for her to continue, but she didn’t, merely playing absently with the key in her hand. He moved to the door. ‘We’ll have a drink on the veranda—and then dinner in the dining room. Okay?’ He didn’t open the door. He just stood there, one hand on the knob. Another tense silence wove its way between them. It was as though he wasn’t sure whether to leave or not.

When Merryn didn’t say anything, he opened the door and walked through.

After he had gone, feeling surprisingly cold, Merryn turned the fan off, stepped to the window, and fiddled with the louvres. A light breeze came up from the water, billowing the curtains into the room. She imagined Jake driving back to Karu Barracks. Would he be talking to Phillip? What of? Her? Maybe they would be laughing.

Unable to get this image out of her mind, she went to her bag and took out a few clothes, laying them on the back of the chair. Then she decided she’d like a shower. A tattered information sheet by her bed told her the bathroom was off the veranda. She edged out the door to where a few dead pot plants clung defiantly to pock-marked veranda posts and a skinny tabby cat lay spread eagled in a circle of shade. About halfway along, she found the bathroom built out over a modern extension. A little while later, after locking the bathroom door, she decided against a shower after all. Instead she ran the cold tap into the chipped bath. Immersed in the cool water, she relished the calmness it brought to her body.

The late afternoon shadows had shifted, and the cat moved to another slither of shade when she walked back along the veranda to her room. From her suitcase, Merryn took out the Casuarina Tree, Somerset Maugham’s book of short stories. She plumped up the pillows and lay on the bed, but finding it difficult to concentrate, she placed the book on the cane bedside table. A few minutes later, she closed her eyes and soon she was drifting in and out of sleep, her mind taking her back to the orchard at Koonya, and the first time she had met Jake. Was it seeing him again in his uniform, the one Prue had hated so much? What it stood for?

It had been the end of a long week, and the pickers were in the apple sheds with a blustery wind rattling the corrugated iron roof. Flames from a makeshift fire in a disused kero drum cast shadowy feathers on the timber apple boxes lined up on the far side. In a corner, another drum made a good sausage sizzle with the aroma of burnt sausages and caramelized onions filling the air. In the middle of the floor, hay bales were haphazardly thrown in a square.

With her face to the darting flames and sitting on one of the bales, Merryn nursed a cold beer in her hand. Not used to drinking, she’d taken only two sips in the last half hour; however, to appear sociable, she had accepted a bottle earlier on from Prue. Wearing a red skirt, a white cotton blouse, and with her long auburn hair tied back in a ponytail, she was sitting next to two apple pickers from Western Australia.

Elvis, alternated with Slim Dusty, blared from a small transistor radio on a shelf above the apple grader in the corner. A few of the group were bopping in the centre of the shed. Huddled in the corner in deep conversation with Prue Hawkins was Jean Paul, an apple picker on a working holiday from France. Over on the far side, where during the day the apples were pushed along a mechanical conveyor belt, graded, and then packed into wooden boxes, Jake Hawkins and Sid Browne stood summing up the scene.

Merryn had been up in the orchard picking late Gravensteins when they arrived in Sid’s old Chevrolet earlier in the week. From the moment she met him, it was obvious to Merryn that Jake and Prue were out of a different pod. For where Jake was tall and blond, Prue, with her deep suntan and long jet black hair, free from the dreadlocks of a few days ago now tied back with a piece of twine, looked almost as though she had what Merryn’s mother would call ‘a touch of the tar brush’ in there somewhere.

Merryn wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting Prue’s brother to be like, but Jake wasn’t it. For a second, she thought Sid must have been her brother, with the same dark hair and smoldering grey eyes and the way Prue jumped down from her ladder and enfolded him in a huge bear hug when they arrived up the orchard.

Jake had stood back a bit before stepping forward and brushing his sister’s cheek with a half kiss. Straightaway Merryn felt the tension in the air.

‘How are you, Jake?’ Prue asked, standing back and looking him in the eye. ‘Congrats on joining up. Big brother in the army, eh? How about that for the boys!’

The way she had said it had an edge; Merryn could see Jake flush. Feeling sorry for him and trying to diffuse the situation, she moved forward introducing herself. When he took the hand she held out, it was obvious Jake was grateful, for he gave her a beaming smile, a smile like no other she had seen in her life. Tan skin dimpling, blue eyes creasing in the corners. It was as if his whole face was hit by a shaft of bright light. The only smile she had seen come close to it was her father’s.

Unwittingly, Merryn found that she was blushing. She hated the way she blushed, often at the most inappropriate times. Standing up in class stumbling over an answer to a question she knew well. Telling the priest she had sinned since her last confession, when she hadn’t. Well, a few bad thoughts never hurt anyone. She’d even blushed bright red when the yummy fellow in their local butcher at Muswellbrook, ten miles along the dirt road from Wattle Creek, had asked her what she wanted to buy. Sausages or steak? After that she had to go to a different butcher miles out of her way.

‘Welcome to Koonya,’ she said a little too loudly, putting on a bright smile. ‘Prue’s told me about you.’

Jake gave his sister a quizzical glance. ‘Has she now? Well, I hope it wasn’t all bad?’

A beat of silence followed. Merryn’s eyes were on his, and then she dropped his hand, stepped back, and looked away, leaning down to pick a rotten apple off the ground. Throwing it across the way to a row of Cox’s Orange Pippins, she shook her head.

‘No. Of course not. Just that you were coming.’

Sitting on the hay bale in the packing shed that night with the wind still howling outside, she watched one of the apple pickers from Western Australia grab a sausage off the sizzle and place it in a bread roll. Thinking of getting something to eat herself, she turned around and found herself looking up into Sid’s slightly bloodshot eyes. Without her realizing, he’d crossed the floor and was standing before her, hand outstretched.

He gave a lopsided grin and bent down to where she sat. ‘How about a dance?’ he asked. ‘I’m no Fred Astair, but we could give it a try.’

Merryn threw her head back and laughed out loud. ‘Well, luckily for you I’m no Ginger Rogers. But I’d love to.’

Fortunately, it was Elvis that blared forth from the transistor— easier to dance to than Slim Dusty.

Five minutes later, they were slowly moving to ‘Wooden Heart’ when she saw Jake Hawkins tap Sid on the shoulder. Merryn’s heart threw a little wobbly, and on cue her face began to burn.

‘May I?’ Jake asked.

‘Do you mind?’ said Sid, trying to brush him off jovially. ‘We’ve only just got into the swing of things.’

‘I know,’ Jake said with a grin, and then gestured across the room, ‘but Prue’s on her own. We can’t have a wallflower in our midst, can we now? And I don’t reckon her wayward brother’s the sort of dance partner she has in mind.’

Sid followed Jake’s gaze and realised he was right. Sitting by herself, no sign of the Frenchman in sight, her hair gleaming in the soft glow of the hurricane lanterns hanging from the rafters, Prue was perched on a pile of apple pallets on the far side of the shed. Lifting her eyes beneath thick lashes, she saw Sid looking in her direction. She raised her empty glass in the air and hurled him a wicked beam.

‘Well. Okay...if you insist,’ Sid said cheerfully, moving away to let Jake take over. And without so much as a backward glance, he slid across the timber floor to where Prue was waiting.

‘Poor bloke,’ Jake said when he was gone. ‘She has him wrapped around her little finger, and there’s not a damn thing he can do about it. She’ll be the ruination of him. He adores her, and I honestly don’t think she could give a hoot. He’s the third of my mates whose heart she’s shattered.’

‘Oh,’ Merryn said, raising an eyebrow. ‘Is she that bad?’

Jake’s face broke into the smile she saw when she first met him. ‘Yes, she is...but what’s say we forget about them. It’s us I’m more interested in.’ He made a mock bow, and Merryn’s heart skipped another beat. ‘May I have the pleasure of dancing with the prettiest girl in the apple sheds?’ He pulled her close as though she may make a run for it, but that was the furthest thing from Merryn’s mind.

Later, when she was lying in bed, she remembered how they danced. How she nestled her head against his warm chest—the smell of him. His laughing eyes when he said how lovely she looked. How he undid the ribbon holding her ponytail, whispering in her ear that the glow from the lanterns played on her hair like sun on a field of corn.

She remembered, too, her moment of falling in love. How a shiver rose from her groin and rippled through her body. She remembered his gentle eyes and found it hard to imagine him as a soldier.

There had been boyfriends before, but this was unlike anything she had ever known.

Even after such a short time, she was aware of that. She was in love, head over heels, totally and completely in love.