'Well, hello there. I didn't see you coming.'
'Hi. Boy what a mess!'
'It's not so bad. You're lucky. From what I hear some people lost their
entire roof, not to speak of all the damage to the crops.'
She nodded. 'I won't complain. Did anybody get hurt?'
He shook his head. 'Not seriously. Just minor scrapes and bruises.'
Linden surveyed the mangled steps and overhang. 'Do you know
someone who can fix this?'
He rubbed his muddy hands on the side of his jeans. 'Not
immediately. I checked. Everybody is busy right now. The roofs
obviously have priority. But we can get you a bamboo ladder so you
can at least get in and out of the place.' He surveyed the rubble
around him. 'First we'd better get that palm out of the way. I'll get an
axe and chop it into manageable pieces.'
She frowned. 'Are you sure we can't find someone to do that? You
have work to do. I don't like to take your time.'
He shrugged. 'It'll be a lot faster if I just do it. Besides, some hard
physical work will do .me good.' He grinned and flexed the muscles
of his back and shoulders. 'It might help me get rid of all the knots
from sleeping on the damn couch. The thing is only about three feet
too short.'
She looked pained. 'I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Please don't give me a guilt
complex.'
'All right. Make me another cup of coffee and we'll be even. Dry
yourself off first. There's another sarong in the closet in my bedroom.
Second shelf from the top. I'll be up in ten minutes.'
She flip-flopped back through the mud, the soaked sarong clinging to
her. She'd pay a small fortune to be able to get into her house and get
some decent clothes, or at least a bra and a shirt. She must look a
sight.
The mirror in the bathroom confirmed her suspicions. Her hair had
dried while she slept and looked wild and unkempt, sticking out in
weird waves and peaks. And now it was wet again from the rain. I
look like a madwoman, she thought, and couldn't control a chuckle.
If that didn't turn Justin off romantically, nothing would.
With Justin's brush she tried to make some order out of her unruly
mane, but it was a hopeless endeavour. There had to be a rubber band
somewhere, so she could at least tie it back. But short of digging
through his every drawer, she didn't find one any place. In the
kitchen she discovered a piece of pink raffia packing string. She tried
to tie it around her hair, but it wouldn't get a good grip and kept
sliding down as soon as she moved. Well, it had to do for the
moment.
She felt like an intruder looking in Justin's closet for a sarong. Not
that there was anything exciting to be seen there, but it seemed such
an indiscreet thing to do, even on invitation. Several sarongs were
right there next to a stack of coloured undershorts. On a shelf below
were some tee-shirts. Hesitating only for a moment, she picked up
the one from the top and looked at it. It was much too big for her, but
at least she wouldn't feel so naked. She pulled it over her head, tied
the sarong around her waist, pushed up the string in her hair, and set
off for the kitchen.
A few minutes later Justin came in, dripping wet, and sat down at the
small kitchen table which she'd just cleared of his breakfast dishes.
'I've got the axe,' he announced, drying his hair with a towel Linden
handed him.
She placed the coffee in front of him. 'Can I do something?'
He shook his head. 'It's not much of a job. I'm just going to chop the
thing in a few pieces so I can move it out of the way. It shouldn't take
very long.' He drank his coffee gratefully. 'What you can do, if you
wouldn't mind, is fix us some lunch in an hour or so. Ramayah didn't
show up this morning, so I expect she has problems of her own
today.'
'In an hour? What time is it?'
He glanced at his watch. 'Eleven-thirty almost.'
'Good heavens, I just got up.'
'You did seem to be sleeping peacefully.'
'You checked up on me?'
'Just peeked in for a moment before I left.'
'Hadn't you seen enough?' she asked, mildly mocking.
He shook his head solemnly, but his eyes were laughing. 'It's never
enough, don't you know that?'
She picked up the empty coffee cups and turned without answering.
'You have a beautiful body, Linden,' he said to her back.
'Shut up, Justin, I don't want to hear about it.'
'Very beautiful,' he persisted. 'I had a hard time keeping my hands off
you last night.' A slight pause. 'You didn't seem to mind. Even asked
me to stay.'
'You're a liar.'
'I'm not. Boy scout's honour.'
'I don't remember a thing.' She washed the coffee cups, gritting her
teeth.
'Who's a liar, sweet Linden?'
The cup handle snapped off in her hand. 'Damn,' she muttered. 'I
broke your cup. I'm sorry.'
He was standing behind her back and put his arms around her, taking
the cup out of her hand. She stiffened in his embrace.
'Let go of me, Justin.'
'You liked it last night. You were all soft, sweet and willing.'
'I had a belly full of whisky, what did you expect?'
'Not a belly full. Only one meagre shot.'
'Well, whatever.' It was hard to try and not move, to try and not feel
anything.
He kissed her neck. 'If one shot of whisky is all it takes, we could try
again tonight.'
'You can forget it. The rain has stopped, by the way. Why don't you
take your axe and work out your frustrations on the coconut palm?'
He straightened and released her. 'You really know how to make a
guy feel good,' he said sarcastically, and strode out of the kitchen.
'I try,' she said, smiling sweetly at his retreating back.
Linden positioned herself in front of the small Chinese temple and
examined the subject. The temple was on the other side of the village,
and she'd hired Faisal and his bicycle to transport her easel, stool and
paints. She'd watched him fearfully as he'd taken off with easel
balancing precariously on a small platform attached to the back of the
bike, wondering if the thing would fall off and break in half. It wasn't
collapsible, which didn't make it an easy object for moving around.
She'd been feeling better lately, less depressed. Maybe purging her
misery out on poor Justin's shirt front a few days ago had helped, she
didn't know. But painting the small temple seemed a good thing to
do. It certainly was cheerful enough with its red and gold paint and
colourful carved dragons that sat patiently on the roof waiting for
who knows what.
The sun was white and blinding, the sky an endless, brilliant blue.
Not a cloud to be seen anywhere. It was incredible that only
yesterday morning she'd woken to the ravishes of the worst storm
she'd ever seen. That same afternoon she was back in her house,
climbing a rickety bamboo ladder Justin had found for her.
Everything had been the way she had left it the night before. The
kitchen floor was wet, but had been quickly drie
d. A carpenter would
come tomorrow morning to build new steps and replace the
overhang. At least she had enough money to pay for the repairs from
the sale of her painting to the miserable Marinozzi.
With some quick strokes she drew the outline of the temple on the
canvas. It would be a challenge this, but she felt up to it today. She
worked with concentration for a long time, trying to ignore the
curious onlookers who came by now and then. The faint smell of
incense was in the air, even here, out in the open. Through the open
temple doors she could see the glimmer of the huge brass pot that
held the smoking joss sticks.
When she got tired, she stopped for a while, sitting down in the grass
in the shade of a clove tree. She'd brought coffee in a thermos and
she sipped it slowly, looking around. From where she sat now, the
angle was different, and with a sudden leap of excitement she noticed
the simple little church spire with its cross on top poking up into the
sky behind the ornately carved dragons on the temple roof.
'Perfect!' she said out loud. She jumped up, almost spilling the coffee,
and rushed back to her easel. From here she couldn't see the church
spire. If she moved in order to get the church into view, the temple
would be seen from a different angle. For an artist no problem. She
moved the easel, painted in the spire, leaving the temple the way it
was. After all this was not a photograph. Stepping back, she
examined her work, chewing at the end of her brush. It was good! It
still needed a lot of work, but she was getting there. She was filled
with elation. She wanted to go home and show Justin. Now, before it
was even finished.
As she stood there, scrutinising the painting, a momentous realisation
came to her. I want to show it to Justin, she'd thought. Not I wish
Waite could see this.'
For a moment she was overwhelmed by a strange mingling of
emotions—an utter sense of relief and a deep sorrow.
CHAPTER FIVE
JUSTIN was not at home. She couldn't believe it. He was always home
around this time. It was only half- past twelve. Normally he was at
his typewriter until one, then had lunch. She felt a deep
disappointment, out of all proportion, she knew.
'Where did he go,' she asked Ramayah, and the woman shrugged.
'He went out in his boat.'
Out in his boat. 'When will he come back?'
'Later this afternoon.'
Linden turned dejectedly and went home. Maybe he had writer's
block and had decided to clear his head out on the open water. Maybe
he'd gone to Penang— not that that would make much sense. They
were going there for Christmas in three days. She stood on her
verandah and peered out over the sea. At the horizon there were a
few boats, but they were all fishing trawlers. There wasn't a small
motor-boat in sight.
Shrugging, she went inside and had her lunch. Nazirah had made her
laksa, a sourish fish soup with rice noodles and vegetables, one of her
specialities. She had sprinkled on the top slices of an edible pink
flower that made the dish look beautiful and elegant.
After lunch Linden washed her hair, rinsing out the last of the mud,
wrote a letter to Liz and another to her sister. Then she picked up a
Wilbur Smith novel, soon losing herself in the story of pioneer life in
South Africa—gold mining, elephant hunting, family life in the
empty bush.
A loud knocking jerked her back to the present and she jumped up to
see who was there. The door was open to facilitate the movement of
air through the house and Mr Marinozzi stood in the doorway with a
sickly sweet smile on his unshaven face.
'Good afternoon.'
She did not smile back. 'Good afternoon. What can I do for you?'
His eyes slid over her body and a cold shiver ran down her spine. She
tossed her still-damp hair back over her shoulders and gave him a
stony look. He kept smiling, unperturbed and gestured at the temple
painting in the middle of the room. 'I see you are working on another
masterpiece.'
She nodded without replying.
'Do you have any others I could see?'
'I'm sorry, no.' She wasn't going to show him the ones she wasn't
happy with. She didn't really want the man in the house at all.
'None at all?'
She shook her head. 'No.'
'What about this one? How long will it take to finish?'
With a certainty beyond any doubt, she knew she didn't want him to
have the painting, not this one. 'It's not for sale.'
'Surely for the right price.. . .'
'Not for any price, Mr Marinozzi.'
'Well, think about it. Do you mind if I have a look at it when it's
finished?'
'Not in the least, but don't count on my changing my mind, Mr
Marinozzi. I won't.'
'We'll see.' He smiled indulgingly and she felt like slapping his
flabby, stubbly face. He was a man who was used to getting what he
wanted, she was quite sure. All he had to do was open his wallet.
Well, he wasn't buying her painting.
He left then, much to her relief. She went back to the verandah and
brushed her hair. She heard someone whistling and looking up she
saw Justin coming down the path towards her house, a package in his
hand.
'Come on up!' she called right before he rounded the house and
disappeared out of sight. A moment later she heard his steps on the
creaky floor boards of the living room, then they stopped. He was
looking at the painting, she realised and came hastily up out of her
chair and went inside.
He looked at her as she entered and by the expression on his face she
could tell he liked what he saw.
'That's going to be one hell of a painting,' he said.
She felt immensely happy with his praise. Then she noticed the small
frown and wondered what he was seeing.
'You know,' he said thoughtfully, 'I've walked by the temple a
hundred times and I never noticed the church behind it.'
'It isn't.'
'It isn't?'
'Not if you look at it from the road. You know the clove tree on the
right of the temple? I was sitting there when I noticed the church
spire above the temple roof. But the angle for painting the temple
from here was all wrong, so I took a few liberties, and voila.'
He nodded. 'Artistic licence. Very well employed, I must say.'
She curtsied. 'Thank you kindly, sir.'
He looked down on the package in his hand as if he had forgotten he
had it. 'For you,' he said, handing it to her.
'For me?' She took it, surprised. It was heavy and solid. She
unwrapped the paper, curious. 'Cheese! Cheddar!' She looked at him,
feeling more touched than she wanted to admit. 'Where did you get
it?'
'Penang.'
So that's what he'd been doing today. Half an hour to Telok Bahang.
Forty-five minutes or so from the wharf to George Town, to a
supermarket.
'You went all the way to George Town for a piece of cheese?' she
asked incredulously, and he laughed at her expression.
<
br /> 'No. I went to Batu Feringghi, to the Hotel Rasa Sayang. Had some
lunch in the coffee shop. When I was finished eating, this sweet
young thing asked me if I wanted anything else. I said yes, one pound
of cheddar cheese please. You should have seen her face.' He grinned
at the memory.
'Did she give it to you?'
'Eventually. The manager is a friend of mine, so it wasn't any
problem.'
'Thank you.' The cheese felt like a block of gold in her hand. 'That
was very thoughtful of you.' She looked away, suddenly embarrassed
by what she was feeling. 'Come, let's have some.'
They went into the kitchen, filled a woven bamboo tray with a knife,
plates, sliced mango and papaya and some crisp shrimp crackers left
over from lunch.
Linden examined the contents of the refrigerator. 'There's a ripe
avocado. Shall I cut that up too?'
'Sure. I'll go home and get a bottle of wine. I'll be right back.'
He returned with a bottle of Bordeaux and a small cassette player.
'Where did you get the wine?' she asked. 'The Rasa Sayang?'
He laughed. 'No. Once in a while I go to George Town and do some
shopping. This was left over from my last spree. I'm afraid I do not
own any wine glasses, though.'
'Neither do I.' She placed two water glasses on the tray. 'These will
do just fine. Even hold more.'
They carried the tray to the verandah and settled down to eat the
feast. Justin switched on the cassette player and the mellow sounds of
old jazz wafted into the air. He pulled out another cassette from his
pocket. 'Beethoven, if you prefer.'
'I like jazz. This is wonderful.' She sighed with delighted
contentment. 'Let's eat. I'm starving.' She tossed her hair back over
her shoulder and took knife to cheese.
'I checked on our reservations for Christmas,' he commented after the
first of their hunger was appeased. 'I sent a message last week, but
since I was there I thought I might as well check out our rooms.'
'Where? At the Rasa Sayang? Justin, you can't do that! It'll cost a
fortune!'
'I get a special discount. Besides, all my socks are getting full of
royalty money I'm not spending. What am I going to do when I run
out of socks?'
'You're crazy!'
'Don't look so worried. It's only two nights. It's hardly going to break
me.'
'Justin, that's not the point! I can't accept it. I want to pay for my own
Pelangi Haven Page 9