The Pearler's Wife

by Roxane Dhand

  Maisie gave a disappointed sigh. ‘My parents are not demonstrative in that way, but I am sure they had my welfare at heart when they entrusted my care to Mrs Wallace.’

  ‘But coming to the Bay was not what you had dreamed of?’

  ‘No.’

  Jane looked at her. ‘Nor me. I have dreamed of many things in my life, but living in the Bay was never part of them. Life is what happens when one’s guard is down. Technically speaking, I am not a Miss, although I keep the title. It avoids questions.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘I have been married. My husband is no longer with me, but I have known real happiness and what it feels like.’

  Maisie felt the heat returning to her face. To be looked at so closely was unsettling and made her feel very young. She glanced at Jane and pressed her lips together, willing herself not to cry. Jane Locke understood the utter pain of abandonment, one of the most bruising of human emotions. Tears of self-pity stung Maisie’s eyes and ran, for once unchecked, down her cheeks.

  ‘Did your husband catch a fever and die?’

  ‘No. He is a bigamist.’

  Mr Truong’s voice clarioned from the kitchen. ‘You wanna order food, Mems?’

  ‘Just a moment, thank you,’ Jane called back.

  Maisie stared at her companion, her tears halted and her mouth hanging open. She blew her nose. ‘You said he died!’

  ‘No, I said he has gone from my life. Not at all the same thing. I discovered that he had quite the matrimonial career. I was wife number four. It is easy to commit bigamy given the paucity of centralised marriage records in Australia, I have learned. Frank moved around a lot and told lies on the certificate of marriage. He changed his name, his age and his occupation several times. He ought to have become a writer and told lies for a living. He’d have made a fortune.’

  ‘How did you find out?’

  ‘Wife number two tracked him down when we were living in Perth. We’d been “married” for two years. I have no idea about number one and number three.’

  Maisie straightened the cuffs of her blouse. ‘How then do you find yourself in the Bay?’

  Jane reached for the menu. ‘Let’s order our food and have lunch. That’s a very long story for another day.’

  Lightning danced in the sky, and clouds were advancing like a mini armada, sailing in shifting formations before battle began. The rain, which had been threatening for hours, began to cascade, hard and fast. Even so, the residents of the Bay were lucky with the typhoon’s water surge. The reef, which could exfoliate luggers like dead skin, shielded the town from the worst of the storm. Nonetheless, it smashed its way along the foreshore, wrenching sheltering boats from their moorings, hurtling them into the air and smashing the less robust ones to splinters.

  On the cliff edge, next to the lighthouse, an empty oil drum crashed against the side of the bungalow. It was pitch black outside, although barely past five o’clock.

  Maisie was not long returned from lunch with Jane and could hear Maitland shouting to Duc at the back of the house. She stood by the bottom verandah step, smoking a cigarette very fast and gripping the rail tight. It felt rough under her hand, like a callus. She blew the smelly evidence away in quick, angry puffs. She knew she needn’t have bothered with the deception, but the defiance felt like joy.

  ‘Get a bloody wriggle on, Duc. If we don’t get the shutters down, the wind will blow the roof off and you will have nowhere to park your skinny Chinese arse.’

  Captain Mason had already appeared for the nightly sousing of his insides and was also press-ganged into service.

  ‘Give me a hand, Shorty. Get round to the shutters on the other side of the house, or you’ll have no gin-god to worship here tomorrow night!’

  One by one, Maisie could hear the storm shutters crashing on the sills. There was nothing subtle about her husband and his friends. Maitland yelled over the wind, ‘Where the bloody hell are you, Maisie? Get that useless lubra of yours in here, quick smart. She needs to get to work and earn her bloody wages.’

  Maisie almost laughed at the irony. Marjorie was at that moment in town trying to win money, because the boss didn’t pay her any. She was marking a chiffa ticket with the signs that they hoped portrayed success in love and vengeance in enemies. They had struggled with the riddle and were going for the magic finger approach tonight: eeny, meeny, miny, moe.

  ‘What time do you think you’ll be back?’ Maisie had asked.

  ‘Don’t know exact time, Missus. Gubberment want us black-fellas back by six o’clock, but mebbe I go allonga my aunties.’

  Maisie knew that the whereabouts of the natives was never supervised. They were like the feral cats in town, tolerated to do a job. She would never snitch on her maid and neither would Duc. They had become an unlikely team, intent on protecting and helping one another.

  Heavy footsteps thumped down the verandah and voices forced her back into the shadows, the angle of the house shielding her from view.

  ‘Your luggers all safe, Shorty?’

  ‘Yes. We dragged them up to the creek.’

  ‘I sent one of my ancient ones out today.’

  Shorty laughed. ‘You’re a bloody maniac, Maitland!’

  ‘It’s what we agreed, Shorty. Sometimes you have to be hard-nosed and let them rot if they don’t pay their way.’

  ‘Let what rot?’ Maisie climbed up the steps and stopped at the drinks table. She sloshed a large glug of gin in a glass and plopped in some ice.

  ‘I’ve sent one of the old luggers out to test whether she’s seaworthy. Can’t decide whether it warrants the expense of a refit.’

  ‘In this weather?’ Maisie’s jaw dropped. ‘That’s insanity, Maitland! No boat could withstand this wind. I hope it’s well insured.’ She turned towards their guest. ‘And did you, Captain Mason, also send a lugger out with every prospect of a cyclone pending, knowing that the vessel was not sound?’

  Shorty stretched out in his chair. ‘When to send the boats out is always a gamble, Mrs Sinclair. We’re all heading out next week. Maitland is always ahead of the game. His instincts are famous. You should be proud that he has got a lugger out at this time of year. It’s a risk most of us wouldn’t be prepared to take. He’s got guts, your man.’

  Maitland settled himself in a recliner and nodded at Shorty Mason, his mouth twisted in a smirk as if at some secret joke.

  An ugly truth was dawning on Maisie – the lugger would have a crew. There was far more than an unseaworthy boat at risk. ‘And which crew, Maitland, have you sacrificed to the deep in this daring gamble of yours?’

  ‘I’m not a fool, Maisie. The one I can most easily and most cost-effectively afford to lose.’

  ‘Please don’t tell me you sent a diver out too?’

  ‘Of course. One of my Japs, and that English fellow, Cooper.’

  Maisie set down her glass with great care. Her hand was steady and her palm dry, but her stomach lurched with anxiety. She didn’t want to cause another lava flow to erupt from her husband, but she couldn’t let the comment go. ‘A hurricane is not a person, Maitland. It cannot be blamed. But the man who sends out innocent lives into its destructive centre most certainly can. I am struggling to understand what sort of human being could do that. Knowingly.’

  She picked up a magazine, her fingers strangling the spine. Her heart lurched as she thought of Coop – as tall as a Viking, eyes the colour of liquorice, and beautiful slim fingers she dreamed might one day touch her. She tugged at a loose thread on the chair back beside her and tried to stifle the tolling in her brain. You might never see him again. Round and round the words repeated themselves in her mind until her head began to ache.

  Maitland turned to Shorty Mason and jiggled his glass. ‘She’s wearing her angry-tiger face this evening,’ he sneered. ‘Want another drink, Shorty? You won’t be going anywhere in this weather. Might as well put on your drinking boots and make a night of it.’ He jerked his chin at her. ‘You can stay if you w
ant. It’s not as if you have a burning assignation anywhere else.’

  Maisie shook her head. ‘I’m prepared to assist you in every way I can, Maitland, for business purposes, but I am not going to remain here all evening and help you and your friend drink away our profits. If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I believe I’ll forgo supper and turn in with a book. I’m not in the mood for company.’

  The two captains raised themselves slightly from their seats then sank back to their drinks, shouting loudly at each other to make themselves heard above the maelstrom that was gaining momentum outside Maitland’s insulated fortress.

  Maisie’s bedroom was a furnace, sealed up tight at a smelting temperature of over a hundred and ten degrees. The heat was like her mother – an unrelenting, impenetrable force that would not back down. It was intolerably hot, and after a couple of hours of scrambling about among the sheets she resigned herself to the fact she would never sleep. She tried not to think of her old English bedroom in the tall London house and the fresh smell of laundry starch on her cool, expensive sheets; of her own quiet, private space with her treasured possessions all around her. Eventually, tormented with worry for William Cooper’s safety, she got out of bed and began to pace; back and forth, back and forth until her thoughts began to boil. Buccaneer Bay was far worse than the picture Mrs Wallace had painted for her, and she felt at that moment that if it was her punishment to live here with a sexually irresponsive husband (Doctor Shin’s diagnosis), she must have done something very bad in a previous life.

  The sea was running two or three times the height of the lugger.

  ‘Help me get this suit off, JB.’ Cooper turned to one of the deckhands. ‘Get the main sails down!’ he shouted. ‘Leave the foresail. If the wind picks up, I’ll try to run her back to the creek. Get your diving stuff off, Daike. You need to be able to move.’

  ‘Why you give orders? I number-one diver.’

  ‘Do you know how to sail a boat in a storm? Or do you just swagger about like a jerk telling everyone you’re as brave as a lion while all the time you bless the boat, the deck and the sea, before you consider yourself protected enough by your little superstitious rituals to set sail?’

  Daike would not look him in the eye, but Coop saw from the set of his jaw that he was a long way from happy.

  Within an hour, they hit the full force of the storm. Waves broke over the decks, slamming coils of anchor chain against the sides of the lockers. Squinty emerged from the cabin, clothes wringing wet, his face disfigured by fear. ‘What we do?’

  ‘Throw out storm anchors. We ride out willy-willy,’ Daike shouted back. He felt for his lucky charm through his shirt. ‘When it’s day to die, you die.’

  ‘No!’ Coop shouted against the wind, a look of scorn on his face. He didn’t buy into that fatalistic claptrap. The gusting wind sent him lurching sideways but his feet held fast, weighted down by his determination. He worked his way across the deck to the tiller, clinging to the rail of the boat. ‘Get all the rigging down and lighten the load. Just leave me the foresail. Cut the dingy and pumps loose and hack through the bulwarks with the tomahawks I saw in the cabin. If the water can flow across the decks, there’ll be less resistance when we try to surf the old girl back to the creek. Lash yourself to anything fixed down and hope like hell we make it.’

  Daike looked across at Coop, his hair dripping with water, and nodded to himself. One arm braced for support against the creaking boom of the mizzenmast, he began to empty his bladder off the stern of the lugger. ‘I piss on you, English boy. You no brave lion. You watch me. I show you what what on lugger boat!’ he shouted.

  ‘Stupid bugger,’ Coop muttered under his breath. He’s probably tossed some charm into the water to bless his pee.

  Without warning, the wind veered. Clouds whipped across the sky and dumped rain in stair rods over the Sharky’s deck. The lugger rolled and pitched as she fought to stay afloat. Coop grabbed at the tiller and spread his toes to steady himself against the swell. Daike was right; boots would have slipped on the water-washed deck. Coop dipped his head in private acknowledgement of the life-saving advice he’d been given.

  The stubborn Japanese still had his arm draped round the mast. He was too bloody-minded to heed Coop’s advice. He held on tight with both hands as they waited for the storm to reach its height.

  The circling wind caught hold of the boom and ripped Daike from his post. Coop ducked down to miss the swooping beam and saw it bowl the other diver aside like a skittle.

  A man overboard was not a common occurrence in pearling waters. The boat tore along, the accidental jib tugging the rudder in his hands.

  ‘Man overboard! Listen up! Daike’s overboard. He’s not attached to the boat. Point at him, all of you. Whatever happens, don’t take your eyes off him. Squinty, get the lifebelt and throw it to JB! JB, when we get close, chuck the belt at Daike and reel him in. Everyone else keeps pointing at him. If we lose sight of him, he’s a dead duck.’

  Daike was bouncing on the waves, his arms flailing helplessly by his sides as the wind and waves blew him further from the lugger. Coop saw his mouth open, shouting something, but his words were swept up to the clouds. Over and over he turned the lugger in a figure of eight, but waves humped up like rows of breaching whales and tore the rudder from his hands, driving the boat from its course. His eyes burned with salt spray and yet he continued to turn back towards the stricken diver, dodging the flying boom, hauling on the sheets, carving slow, laborious spirals.

  ‘Come on, Coop!’ JB shouted. ‘Come about again. I nearly had him that time.’

  Finally they came close enough. The exhausted crew pulled Daike in by the lifebelt, clutching him under the arms and heaving him onto the deck.

  Coop tore a strip from his shirt and wound it round his bloodied fingers.

  ‘Cookie, take him below and turn him on his side. Everyone else hold on tight. I’m going to run us back to the mangrove inlet we passed this morning. It might give us some shelter from this blow.’

  ‘Righto, but you one crazy, mad English fella,’ Squinty said.

  Coop clamped his swollen hands on the tiller and dragged the rudder from side to side, keeping the wind trapped inside the sail as the little boat battled through the galloping waves. If the sheet starts to flap, we’re in trouble. It became his mantra. Over and over he repeated the words, his bloodshot eyes staring alternately at the reef and the sail until he could barely focus.

  The crew had terrified eyes locked on him, as if keeping him in sight would keep them safe. He fastened his thoughts on the channel they had sailed up that morning. He knew it wasn’t that far. He was grateful then that Daike had doubted his ability to dive and that they hadn’t gone further through the reef-strewn Neptune’s Dairy. A long time after, he became conscious that the wind had eased and the towering peaks in front of him were no longer waves but trees.

  Wide-eyed, Daike emerged from the cabin and stared from one to the other of the crew as if he couldn’t believe he’d survived. ‘Why you come for me?’

  ‘You haven’t shown me where the shell is yet, you stupid, stubborn bugger!’ Coop shot back.

  Just before midnight, Maisie put on her white cotton kimono and tiptoed out of her bedroom in search of a glass of water.

  The drinking boots were still laced up tight on the verandah.

  ‘Warmed up the bed, Maisie, and come to get me?’ Captain Mason lurched from his chair and grabbed her from behind. He scrumpled up one of her breasts as if he were balling up a napkin, the twisted blue veins ugly on his hand as he squeezed hard through her robe. He swung her round and planted his gin-soaked lips upon hers in a crushing kiss.

  She jumped back from him, appalled. ‘What on earth do you think you’re doing, Captain Mason?’

  Shorty Mason was too drunk to be put off. He lunged at her and bared his teeth, his breath hot and rancid on her face, and puckered his lips for another assault. His face looked grey in the lamplight, and sweat ran down the sides of
his nose. She pulled back her head and tried to drag herself away but he held her fast, his hips slamming hard against her thigh.

  ‘Maitland!’ she cried. ‘Make him stop!’

  Maitland snorted and pointed at her with his pipe. ‘Don’t think you’re anything special, wife. He does it to all the women.’

  She wrenched herself free and fell hard on her knees, her face still fixed on her husband. Shorty Mason’s hips were drawn back, posed to thrust, his trousers straining at the groin. A shudder ran through her when she saw that her distress excited him. She scrambled to her feet and stood for a moment on rubbery legs, unable to move. Slowly she backed away towards the door, feeling for the furniture behind her, her skin prickly. She only realised when she reached her room and barricaded herself in that her teeth were chattering.

  Cooper limped the Sharky into a mangrove-lined creek to shelter from the cyclone while the sea raged beyond. It was obvious they wouldn’t be able to move until at least the next day, and then only if the lugger didn’t need any emergency patch-ups. The wind roared around them and rain whipped cruelly at their salt-chafed skin. The men set up a camp among the tree roots and sat huddled, ravaged by the assault. Cookie fed them on fish he found washed up along the high-water mark. There were hundreds of maimed birds thrown up on the mud as well, but no-one had the stomach to try them.

  Coop’s temporary bedroom was the small, low-ceilinged cabin with its blackened rafters of hard, dark wood through which no air could penetrate. The walls were dirtied by years of pipe soot, and cockroaches popped up through the flooring like a spring-loaded army. There was no porthole. It was a room without a view, and it could not have been less appealing.

  Although stifling inside, it was a better option than toughing it out on a mildewed blanket in the fetid swamp. JB had joined him in the cramped space. The rest of the crew was taking its chances with the sandflies, which hunted in relentless swarms. Their bites left suppurating lesions on ankles, forearms – anywhere tasty flesh was exposed. The wounds itched relentlessly and the temptation to scratch was maddening. Coop preferred to sweat.