Into the World

by Stephanie Parkyn

  The excitement of walking in this strange land had lessened with each painful step. At first she breathed its novelty, delighting in the strange scents and sounds. It felt good to set out on solid earth, to feel the living forest growing all around her. Sunlight glinted through the leaves of the tall eucalyptus and she squinted into the sparking light. It reminded her of crystal chandeliers. The tall trees began to take on the appearance of towering ballroom pillars and the voluminous tree ferns became the spreading skirts of dancing women. She felt dizzy, seeing flapping feathers and fans. It was how she had imagined her return to Versailles would be when Hébert had seduced her with his flattery at the ball. This same feeling of excitement, of setting forth on an adventure. She had not thought of the danger. She had wanted to see inside the palace and walk its gilded halls. All through her childhood, the palace had glimmered, golden and untouchable.

  In reality, her introduction to the palace was not glamorous. Each morning, Marie-Louise opened a window and aimed the contents of a chamber-pot at a shallow drain running through the raked gravel below. Hébert had found her a place not as a companion, but as a chambermaid to Marguerite de Noailles. She emptied pots, swept ashes and gossiped with the servants of the courtiers in the urine-doused stairwells.

  From the palace windows, she could see out along the avenues of the gardens to the woods beyond. She could see the bosques she once played in as a child. Far below her, the gardeners trimmed the trees into tight shapes, tucking their roots into clay pots. The men looked so small from her attic window, so insignificant. She watched them on their knees, clipping the lawns so that not one blade of grass was out of place. If she had seen her father from this height, perhaps he would not have seemed so terrifying.

  She had become the eyes and ears for the revolution as Hébert had asked her to be, but in her first months at the palace she had not even seen the King.

  ‘But what do you want me to do?’ she demanded of Hébert when they met secretly in the streets of Versailles.

  ‘Be patient, my sweet cuckoo,’ he had said, lifting her chin with the tip of his finger. ‘Your time will come.’

  ‘Stand back!’ Mérite called to Girardin, snapping her out of the past.

  A long black snake glided in front of her boot. Terror pinned her to the forest floor. The snake wound itself through the leaves, like a piece of rope that had come to life, able to propel itself without legs or wings. It reared up to look at her.

  Mérite aimed his pistol and fired.

  ‘What have you done?’ Labillardière bashed through the undergrowth. The snake’s body had been ripped apart by the blast. ‘Imbecile! A needless death that provides neither opportunity for scientific inquiry nor contributes to our dinner.’

  ‘It was a snake,’ offered Mérite, as though this was sufficient explanation.

  She stared at the pieces of the snake, her own legs losing rigidity. She squatted down. One careless step in this land could kill a person. The strips of fallen leaves and bark scattered over the forest floor could camouflage any number of malevolent creatures.

  Félix took her elbow and helped her to her feet. Labillardière led them out of the trees and down into a wide, flat marsh. She was relieved to be out of the tight, dense forest. The grasses looked soft and inviting, and copper-coloured butterflies danced around her legs. But as she pushed through the waving grasses, she felt the sharp, pointed barbs pierce the cotton of her trousers. Here, too, nothing was as harmless as it seemed.

  At the edge of the marsh a large lake appeared before her. Clouds scudded across its surface as if the sky had turned upon itself. Gratefully, she cupped a handful of the clear water, but when she slurped it into her mouth it was warm and salty. She spat it out. Not even the water could be trusted.

  ‘How far are we from the garden?’ Félix called out to Labillardière.

  Labillardière consulted his compass and looked up at the sinking sun. ‘If we follow the edge of this lagoon we should find fresh water,’ he answered obliquely. ‘We can camp there for the night.’

  Girardin let her head fall forwards. The day’s march had begun to take its toll and now she would have to spend a night out under the stars, unprotected from the beasts lurking in these black forests. Her temper had made her foolish. She should’ve returned to the ship. The General would be furious with her.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Mérite said. ‘We will be safe.’

  She thought of Riche.

  Later that evening, huddled around a fire built to ward off the cold night, Girardin began to shake. They had walked along the edge of the lagoon for several more hours before they found a rivulet and finally camped beneath the shelter of the trees. They ate foraged oysters and ship’s biscuit toasted on the fire to singe the weevils. She lay down with her head resting on her pack, not caring if she crushed their prized specimens. Her hip dug into the earth as she turned her back to the warmth of the fire. She hadn’t brought a coat or a blanket. Kermadec was right: the naturalists could not be trusted. Even a simple visit to a garden became an ordeal. She shivered. The voices of the men murmured behind her. The fire crackled and spat. Finally, exhaustion claimed her.

  Sometime later she woke to the urgent pressure of her bladder. She heard snoring, and rose, stiff and aching. It was dark and the fire had died away to embers. As she moved through the forest, the dry twigs and leaves cracked under her feet. She stepped cautiously, seeing snakes slithering in the shadows out of the corner of her eye. When she turned her head, they disappeared, and she realised they existed only in the fever of her imagination. The urge to pee trumped her hallucination and she squatted among the bracken. The relief was immediate. She breathed out, long and loud. Her head tilted back and she looked up to the boughs of the tall trees above her. They reached out to each other, like bare arms glowing in the moonlight. For a moment, she was filled with stillness and peace. Beneath their embrace she felt insulated from the world.

  Back at the campsite, she lay down alongside the softly snoring men.

  In the morning, when she woke to the scent of wood smoke and the hazy mauve light of dawn, Félix and Labillardière were gone.

  Chapter 43

  ‘MÉRITE!’ GIRARDIN SHOOK HIS SHOULDER.

  He grumbled and rolled away from her.

  ‘They’ve left us!’

  Mérite raised his head to scan the campsite. ‘They do this. Get up and go off botanising at the peep of dawn. They’ll be back, expecting us to have a fire going and breakfast ready.’ He let his head drop again.

  She crouched beside the grey embers of the fire. The invisible birds screeched above her. The trees that had seemed to shelter her in the night now exposed their bare trunks to the morning light, like shanks of bone protruding from meat.

  Behind her the branches cracked and shook. She whirled about. Some animal from the lagoon was crashing through the undergrowth. Girardin had barely time to kick Mérite’s leg before Félix and Labillardière blundered into the campsite.

  Félix rummaged through Mérite’s belongings and pulled out his pistol.

  ‘A party of savages,’ Labillardière explained.

  Mérite scrambled to his feet.

  ‘About one hundred of them!’ cried Félix, hastily ramming a bullet and powder into the muzzle. ‘Armed with spears.’

  ‘Possibly a group of forty,’ Labillardière amended. ‘Mostly fishing. But with only this pruning hook to defend ourselves, we thought it prudent to retreat and avail ourselves of your flintlock.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ Girardin breathed.

  ‘Of course we’re sure—they’re following us!’ Félix said, aiming the pistol at a nearby tree.

  ‘Nonsense, we were careful not to let them see us.’

  ‘How long have we got?’

  The gun in Félix’s hand boomed and a patch of dirt leaped into the air.

  ‘Give me that! Do you want to scare them off?’ Labillardière snatched the pistol from Félix.

  ‘Yes, that’s exactly wh
at I want to do!’

  ‘Be calm, everyone, we cannot lose this opportunity to communicate with the inhabitants.’

  All three turned to Labillardière. ‘What?’

  ‘We must return to the lagoon.’

  ‘He’s insane,’ Félix cried. ‘Ignore him. Let him go and be slaughtered. The General has said we are to avoid any incidents that might end badly for them or us. It’s in the King’s orders, apparently.’

  ‘We are also on a scientific expedition,’ Labillardière argued. ‘We are here to observe, to learn, to record our interactions.’

  ‘I’m here to grow vegetables!’

  ‘The gardener wishes to return to his patch,’ Labillardière sneered. ‘Those who wish to join him are free to do so. But might I remind you all that I carry the only compass. And my path is back to the lagoon.’ Labillardière stowed the pistol at his hip and pushed through the grasses at the edge of the clearing.

  Girardin had a sour, metallic taste in her mouth. She glanced at Mérite, who shrugged in return. They followed Labillardière as he picked a path through the shrubs. She could hear Félix muttering curses as he followed behind. The grasses poked at her legs and caught around her ankles. She tripped and stumbled into Labillardière, who had come to a halt in front of her. A group of naked men stood before them.

  Her mouth fell open in astonishment.

  Behind the men were women and children. So many children! The children peeked out from behind the adults, staring in wide-eyed wonder. It had been so long since she had seen a child, and now she remembered the boy on the street in Tenerife, playing with the ball and cup. That seemed an age ago. She crouched down slowly, unable to stop herself smiling at the children.

  The people of Van Diemen’s Land were the strangest she had ever seen. She counted seven adult men and eight women. All were naked. The nakedness of the men did not disturb her as much as that of the women. The women astounded Girardin. They had no modesty, made no attempt to cover their sagging breasts and private parts. Instead, animal skins, like the kangarou, were draped across their shoulders or rolled around their middles. The women had shaved heads, like hers, and the men had rubbed orange clay into their hair, which hung clumped and matted around their faces.

  ‘Félix,’ Labillardière said as the gardener joined them, ‘time to put the tea on. We have company.’

  Labillardière reached slowly into his pack and she saw the native men grow tense. They murmured to one another. Cautiously, he pulled out a piece of ship’s biscuit and advanced to the eldest man of the group, taking a bite first and then holding it out to him. She held her breath. Hesitantly, the native man took it and nibbled at the edge. When Labillardière stuck out his hand in greeting, the elder clasped it in return, stooping forwards and then taking his left leg and extending it back beyond his body. Girardin and Mérite exchanged astonished glances. When the old man straightened up again, his face was lit with a pleasing smile.

  The children ran towards them. Girardin was soon surrounded by them. They giggled as they touched her clothes and stroked her skin. She resisted the urge to wrap them in her arms.

  A small boy aged perhaps nine or ten offered Girardin a string of whelks that he wore tied around his head. She had never seen shells so beautiful. They were tiny and pale, but iridescent, so they glowed purple and green as she turned them over in her palm. They sparkled like the phosphorescence on the sea. This would be a perfect gift for her son. She imagined tying them around Rémi’s head as this boy had done, like a crown. She beamed at the boy, sorry she could not tell him how much this strand of shells meant to her. In return, she tugged the red kerchief from her neck and knotted it around the crown of his head. He gave her a look of such joy that tears spilled shamelessly onto her cheeks. He ran off, calling to his friends, and she tied the string of whelks around her neck, feeling the points of the shells prickle her skin.

  Labillardière invited the party to the campsite, where they boiled water for tea and offered sago to their guests. Girardin had never seen the naturalist look so hospitable. He began to pull off layers of clothes and rifled through the packs, generously offering shirts, both his and Félix’s, to the natives. A young woman examined herself in a brocaded waistcoat in much the same manner that a European gentleman might if he were trying on a waistcoat at a tailor’s.

  A group of girls had climbed a tree and crouched in the limbs above. Labillardière called up to them. ‘Trade,’ he said, dangling a pair of pantaloons at a girl with a kangarou skin draped across her shoulders.

  The girl promptly leaped from the tree and ran away into the woods.

  Her relatives called to her, gesturing for her to return, seemingly embarrassed by the girl’s refusal. The skin must signify something important for her, Girardin thought, for she was the only one of the young girls wearing such a thing. Labillardière did not understand. He called out to her again. Girardin wished he would leave it be. Only the women were wearing skins like that, tied like slings across their breasts. Girardin felt a sudden lurch. Perhaps that was how they kept their babies close.

  The adults pleaded with the girl, calling her out from the forest. To Girardin’s surprise, the girl reappeared, and with good grace exchanged the skin for the trousers. The cotton pants dangled uselessly in her hands.

  Labillardière mimed the action of putting on his trousers, but the girl still looked confused. The adults and older children gathered to watch in silent consideration. Girardin felt her nervousness return. It seemed a poor trade. The kangarou skin had been so important to the girl. Everyone seemed to be holding their breath. A misunderstanding now could still be fatal.

  ‘May we help you to dress?’ Labillardière enquired of the girl, taking the trousers from her hand and gesturing for Félix to attend.

  The girl stood facing Félix and gently placed her hands on his shoulders to steady herself. She lifted one foot and waited. Félix looked embarrassed. He cast his eyes about to anywhere other than the naked girl leaning against him. Labillardière quickly knelt and rolled the trouser leg, muttering apologies as he eased her leg into the garment. The girl understood and stepped down, raising her other leg and submitting herself fully to Labillardière’s attempts to dress her. She was so vulnerable and yet so trusting; Girardin swallowed hard against the lump in her throat.

  After a while the women begin to gather up the children. With sadness, Girardin searched among the children for the little boy who wore her kerchief on his head. She waved to him and he warbled back with a luminescent smile of strong white teeth. As they filed off into the forest, a child tripped and began to wail. A man picked up the child and consoled it with gentle caresses, kissing the child’s tears away. It shocked her to see a man treat a child with such tenderness, to be unconcerned that his actions might make him seem as soft as a woman.

  One by one, the women and children and then the men disappeared back into the forest. Silence descended quickly and completely.

  Girardin felt light-headed. She looked at Félix; he was smiling and humming softly to himself. Labillardière was grinning as he packed up the campsite. The children had made them all happy. For those brief moments, she had felt joy. She was dizzy with the warmth of it, and surprised that she was capable of feeling such lightness once again.

  Suddenly a young man came back through the trees brandishing a spear twice the length of a man. Her breath caught in her throat. She had a vision of Ventenat’s beetles, each one stuck through the middle. She put her hands to her stomach. Silently, the men had retrieved their weapons from the forest and now surrounded them. Beside her, the naturalists stood still and quiet. Mérite reached for the pistol hanging from Labillardière’s belt.

  Labillardière put out a hand to stall him.

  The boy with the spear came up to Girardin and took her hand. His skin was nutmeg brown but he had rubbed charcoal all over his body as if to darken himself further. She saw the vein at his wrist throbbing as strongly as her own. On his shoulders, raised welts were
carved vertically into his skin. He tugged her hand, urging her to follow him. She cast a frightened glance at Félix. But the young man at her side smiled and briefly their eyes met. For a moment she shared the gaze of this otherworldly boy. Gently, he pulled her arm again and she followed him.

  As the party moved off, the savages hurried ahead to clear bracken and fallen branches from the path. They held back vegetation to let them all pass unscratched, despite the fact their own naked skin was exposed to the sharp sticks and barbs. Girardin found this solicitous treatment startling. Labillardière protested, but the natives ignored him. The boy beside her guided her down a slope, taking her elbow to support her.

  ‘What is the meaning of this?’ she asked. ‘They treat us like royalty.’

  ‘They treat us like invalids,’ Labillardière said, shaking off the offer of assistance to climb over a log.

  After they had walked for some time, one of the men gestured at Girardin to sit. ‘Medi, medi.’

  She sank down gratefully. Mérite sat beside her. ‘Do you think we are the first white people these savages have seen?’ he asked.

  She leaned against the base of a tree, watching the boy with the spear dig pieces of ship’s biscuit from his teeth. She had wondered the same.

  ‘Tangara,’ the natives said a few minutes later, urging them upright.

  In this way they had continued for half a day. Every hour they were forced to rest.

  Mérite turned and whispered to Girardin, ‘They are leading us somewhere.’

  She looked at the sharpened spear of the long-limbed youth beside her. He smiled back at her.

  Labillardière consulted his compass and turned towards a rough path, but the savages halted him and urged him down another. Mérite nudged Girardin and caught her eye meaningfully.