by Ferenc Máté
“Too deep to anchor,” Nello murmured, looking over the side.
They edged toward the falls, where the sand formed a delta. When Nello saw bottom, he lifted the anchor shaft, raised his arm in a signal for Dugger to luff the sails, then, letting the anchor slide, fed the chain over the roller. He fed the chain out slowly so as not to disturb the stillness that hung over the land.
The anchor touched bottom and sent up a puff of sand.
The sails filled, the ketch crabbed. He let out chain until it hung in a lazy curve, then he wrapped it around the Samson post, and it snubbed as the anchor bit. The flukes dug in. The ketch stood still.
Kate, gazing at the waterfall, clung hard to Dugger’s arm. “My God,” she whispered. “Eden.”
A gentle land breeze tumbled from the canyon full of bird cries and fragrances: sweet, bitter, of ripe fruit and fresh flowers, and damp decay. A pack of wild horses broke out of a grove and trotted unhurriedly to the falls to drink. Then, one by one, they bolted along the shore, racing a cloud’s shadow that flew over the sea.
Dugger uncleated the halyards, and the sails slid with a flutter to the deck.
Aft of the ketch the sea swelled then curled, translucent and alive in the morning light. It broke in a low murmur along the rocky shore, a swoosh, then a thud, as if an enormous door were shutting behind them. To starboard a bird shrieked. They turned to look.
That’s when they saw that Guillaume had disappeared.
Book Four
The Land of Men
Chapter 26
Father Murphy opened one eye so that if anyone looked in he would seem wide awake while, with the other closed, he let himself believe he was still asleep. The sun gleamed between the bamboo sticks that served as his window and the sea breeze surged in through his open door, rippling the mosquito netting dangling from the fronds of the roof. Something rustled overhead and dry bits of frond drifted down and stuck to his sweaty face.
“Watch ye for ye know not when the master of the house cometh,” he quoted the Gospel of Saint Mark. “At even, or at midnight, or at the cock-crowing, or in the morning; lest coming suddenly He find you sleeping.” But the cock didn’t crow because weeks ago the villagers had, in a show of defiance, abandoned their village on the curved shore weeks ago, dragging in hasty anger their goods, pigs, cocks, and chickens past the gendarmerie, where Testard, Le Sous Gouverneur des Îsles Sud-Est stood pouring sweat, in his cap and crisp white tunic, ordering them to stay. They went on as if deaf, past the little fort, past the palm trunk painted white whose top had been hacked off and replaced by a sun-bleached flag of France, and they snaked in single file through the crack in the mountains inland, to who knows what shadow-filled deep valley in the jungle.
Father Murphy stayed behind, his flock reduced to two Chinamen, the Finn, and Testard and his eight French marines, but a week ago even the marines left the island for fear of an attack, and would only return once they mustered reinforcements. So there remained only Testard, who refused to leave his post; the listless beachcomber from Lapland they called the Finn, who had lost half a hand either to a shark or a sword fight, depending on how drunk he was when telling the story; and a couple of Chinamen who looked like death warmed over from holding their breaths while diving on the sunken reef for black pearls all day, and smoking opium in their hammocks under the banyan tree at night. Only one native stayed, Hapa, the old half-blind carver who had come down from Nuku Hiva to trade a bag of lead type he’d salvaged from a printing press at Taipevai to melt down into bullets. He traded it for the tall, straight trunk of a hau, which he now chiseled from sunrise to sunset, hollowing it out for his pirogue.
When he heard a voice he had never heard before, Father Murphy opened his other eye. The voice was a clear, school-learned French, but in such an urgent whisper that he could only be sure of two words, otage and dangereux. He heard Testard indignantly reply, Je suis tout seul. Qu’est-ce qu’on peut faire tout seul? At which the voice turned angry and called him a salaud, a weak wretch.
Father Murphy, straightening his nightshirt, hurried stealthily to the window. Under the shade of a drooping mango he saw the back of Testard, but the other man was hidden behind the trunk; only his white hand swung out once in exasperation. Then he must have left because Testard fell silent and, holding his black beard in search of comfort, turned and looked with apprehension out at the empty sea.
“This is the day which the Lord hath made,” Father Murphy called out piously from his door. “We will rejoice and be glad for it. Won’t we, Testard, you decrepit Frog heathen, who are without doubt the first in line for hell?”
“Memai. A haakoi!”—Come here. Hurry!—the sous gouverneur barked, trying to speak in English, but it came out Marquesan.
His eyes darted along the beach and he ran a hand through his beard, which he wore thick despite the heat to give some strength to his unassertive chin. “Do you see a boat out there? My eyes are inflamed today.”
“Your eyes are hung over today.” Father Murphy yawned. “No boat. Just old Hapa hacking at his log.”
“They must be anchored past the falls,” Testard said, regaining his composure.
“Who?”
“The pirates.”
“Pirates?”
“Yankee pirates. And an Irish woman pirate with them,” he said, poking a finger of accusation into Father Murphy’s chest.
“You still drunk, Testard?”
“Some respect please, mon cher père,” he retorted with authority. “I have received solid information. There is a ship of pirates anchored off this coast. Why did that crazy Baudichon take the platoon to Nuku Hiva when he should be here minding the garrison?”
“Because the governor ordered him to.”
“Quelle charogne,” Testard muttered. “He sends orders from Tahiti to a place he’s never seen a thousand kilometers away. And I’m left here alone to defend the fortress against a ship of cut-throats.”
Suddenly that notion appealed to him as heroic, and with firm, purposeful steps he marched along the beach toward the “fortress,” a stonewall flanking a courtyard, with a squat block-house set into the bluff. But as he walked past the abandoned village with its teetering poles, torn woven mats, sticks of bamboo, and palm fronds, his heart sank. What a place to die for, he thought. “He died defending nothing, in the middle of nowhere,” he quoted aloud his own tombstone. Then he added bitterly, “Died defending France, even though bloody France is a million kilometers away.” And he spat with disgust toward a big land crab patiently gnawing a fallen coconut. But prudence of habit overcame him. He picked up a stone, approached the crab, and crushed its shell. Then, with the long legs sawing madly, he carried it home for dinner.
THE BLUFF LOOMED DARK over the ketch. They stood silent, gazing in disbelief at the empty sea, where there was no trace of Guillaume either alive or dead. In an attempt he knew to be futile from the start, Dugger went below and checked Guillaume’s cabin. It was empty. His bundle of notes was gone, as was his canvas pack. The cabin itself was left neat and tidy; even the bedding was folded thoughtfully on the bunk, as if a grateful houseguest wanted to leave as little trouble for his host as he could.
Dugger was saddened, though not by the loss of the gold, nor the loss of a protector in these alien islands; it was, rather, the fact that Guillaume had left no note, no goodbye, no explanation. As if the last three weeks at sea had meant nothing at all.
On deck, Kate was folding the sails in even slabs, Nello hung in the ratlines with binoculars in hand, studying the shore, and Darina stood on the aft deck finishing her morning prayers.
Nello climbed down and came aft.
“Better this way,” Dugger said. “All that gold would have sunk us.”
“Even half,” Nello added.
“Even one ton,” Dugger said.
“There’s nothing I want to buy here anyway,” Kate said, and she punched the folded sail.
“What good is gold anyway?” Darina said, but
her voice bore no conviction.
“Did he leave a note?” Kate asked, adding, “Of course he didn’t,” before Dugger could reply.
“What would he have said?” Darina asked. “I betray and lie. Goodbye?”
“There’s a kind of fortress beyond the knoll,” Nello said. “I could only see the roof.” Then he looked at them one by one and said, “You look like you just found out there’s no Easter Bunny.”
“Bloody Guillaume,” Dugger growled.
“We’ll find him,” Nello said. “Where can he go? It’s an island.”
“But he knows it and we don’t.”
“But we do know he’s a secret agent. That puts everyone on this island on our side.”
“Except those in the fortress. The ones with all the guns. ”
“Come on, Cappy. Where’s your optimism?”
Dugger climbed the ratlines. “Guillaume took it,” he said.
FATHER MURPHY WENT down to the creek to wash himself of night sweat. Pirates, he mused, wouldn’t that be just the sight for sore eyes? New faces. White faces. And an Irish lass, at that. Oh, to have her here in the shade of a banyan tree tipping a pint, reminiscing about the fine bays of County Cork or the lovely views around the Ring of Kerry. Or talk about how John Redmond fought the Brits. Or even Synge, who’ll burn in hell for a Protestant, but was nevertheless a fair-to-middling poet. Then they would have another pint and sing, “I’ll take you home again, Kathleen, /Across the ocean wide . . .” Oh, a pint.
From among the stones where the water slowed and warmed, he cupped handfuls of water over his face, back; and shoulders; then, looking around, sure that no one could see, he stepped out of his nightshirt and sat in a pool to his waist. Feeling more awake, he thought, Calm thyself, Murphy. Just say your morning prayers and forget about Irish lasses. Remember what Father McWhir taught you in seminary: “If you have a roving eye, it’s no use having the other fixed on heaven.” And forget about the pints. Heed your father who always said, “Drink is the curse of the land. It makes you fight with your friends and shoot at your neighbor.” Then he stood up, dried himself, and, looking toward the fortress, murmured, “And it makes you miss him.”
On the way to his hut, he crossed himself, poked at a ripe mango with a stick, cut it open with a sharp stone, and ate the fibrous pulp while saying softly, ‘”I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth.” Then he pulled two bananas off a stalk below the fortress and ate as he prayed and banged on the door. He called loudly, “Testard . . .” but there came no reply. He banged again. “Did the pirates get you?”
He went around the back. Inside the walled yard some hens pecked the dust in the shade of what the locals called the “peeping palm.” Rooted in the bluff, the curved coconut palm leaned over the wall and into the fortress yard, its enormous fronds hanging high overhead. Before the marines came, Father Murphy recalled kids jumping off the cliff and swinging on a rope tied just below the fronds. They swung in great circles and long figure eights while those on the ground ran for their lives, screaming.
“Testard!”
No reply.
He turned and walked home, disappointed.
Chapter 27
There was smoothness in the man’s movements over the rough terrain as he edged under the shadows toward the waterfall and the ketch. He kept to the inside of the ledge where the runoff had deposited silt more gentle on his bare feet. Where the slope was too steep for trees, leaving the path exposed to the sun, he stopped. In the flickering shadow of a toa, his body, intricately tattooed from ankles to forehead, glowed a deep blue-green; only his pants, which came to mid-calf, set him off from the undergrowth. He leaned with both hands on his rifle, squatted, and watched the ketch.
Confusion filled his eyes, which, even squinting at the sea, were inviting and a rich blue. He thought the ketch beautiful and a sudden yearning came over him for a life from long ago. But as fast as it had come it was washed away by the knowledge that the ketch had doomed his plans. He saw the crew under the falls and thought, why did they have to arrive just now, when he could sense—with good reason—that victory was near; or if not a clear victory, at least a blow the French would never forget. It might have been enough to drive them from the islands. Or, on the other hand, bring down their boundless wrath. Either would be fine, he thought; either would be better than this slow and silent death.
But now the ketch and its crew stumbled into his way, with what powerful weapons he could not even guess. Whose side they would take, he had little doubt. The good thing was they seemed few, and one of them was a woman, and another as slight as one. Maybe they could be scared off before the frigate came. With a terrifying scheme.
Maybe we should do what the French did to us, he thought. So brilliant, so heartless: that torture of the cliff.
He studied the cliff, as high as ten men, its sheer, bulging face, and the fortress with its walled yard etched into its base. A single palm grew from a ledge just above the fortress walls, its curved trunk towering over the yard, its great fronds giving shade. And he remembered the day the French marines dragged Kiko, with his hands tied behind his back, up the goat trail to the cliff’s top.
They had rounded up the whole village in the twilight and made them stand along the shore and watch Kiko on the bluff. They stood him at the very edge and tied his feet with rope so he couldn’t even struggle. Then the commandant shouted so everyone could hear, “Who is the leader of the revolution? His name! Give me his name!”
But Kiko just smiled and stood as silent as a tiki. Two marines grabbed him, one on either side, lifted him up, held him horizontal, then swung him back and forth counting, Un . . . deux . . . trois, and then they threw him, headfirst, into the abyss. The women covered their eyes. Some screamed. The men stood in silent shame. Kiko flew without a sound and disappeared behind the fortress wall.
Then they led the next man, Karim, to the top. And he wouldn’t speak either, not even when they tied his hands, not even when they tied his feet, not even when they lifted him up, not until they counted, Un. He blurted a name then, just loud enough for the French to hear. But they threw him off the cliff anyway. And laughed out loud. And Karim screamed all the way down, even long after he vanished behind the wall, because the French had measured the length of rope around his ankles with precision, the rope whose other end they had tied to the great palm. So Karim screamed, dangling headfirst, swinging like a pendulum but in wild figure eights, his long hair sweeping the dirt floor of the yard.
So brilliant. So heartless. Diabolique.
Maybe we should do the thing with the rope, he thought. But something slightly different; a nasty little twist.
His gaze softened; his blue eyes filled with mischief. The viciousness of it completely slipped his mind.
ÉMILE TESTARD was born in 1894, to a well-to-do family of antique dealers in Touraine. His father believed in hard work. During Émile’s early school years, he had him cleaning bronze and silver with cyanide in a small back room kept closed to save on coal. The cyanide weakened his lungs for good. During his school years he was often ill and in bed. He read about fearless adventurers in exotic places and he dreamed. His mother gave him a book by Professor Ernest Darling, who, after two bouts with pneumonia, weighing only 80 pounds, too weak even to speak, was declared incurable. Tired of futile treatment, Darling sailed for Tahiti and withdrew into the wilderness, naked. He emerged after four months, in perfect health and weighing 160 pounds—and wrote a book.
Through his mother’s connections with the Colonial Department, Émile was accepted into the marines as a scribe second class with the idea of sending him to recover in the South Seas.
At the age of twenty-three he sailed for Tahiti. Within months, his health had somewhat improved and he became the governor’s assistant. Within two years he was named sous administrateur to the Marquesas Southern Group, made up of the lush volcanic islands of Hiva Oa, Tahuata, and Fatu Hiva, home to seventeen tribes with a total p
opulation of nine hundred. At Atuona on Hiva Oa, he was given a house made of planks with a kitchen and a bed. He spent his days acting as gendarme, and his nights drinking rum with Father Murphy and the Finn. And late at night by the light of smoldering candlenuts, Émile Testard wrote long letters of observation and advice to the governor in Papeete, fourteen hundred kilometers away. The letters were well thought out, beautifully written, and never mailed.
The first one began, Respected Governor and Kind Patron, and went on with unbridled gratitude, giving thanks for the unique opportunity. A passionate outburst followed. “I will never forget the evening you gathered us new arrivals to the Colonial Service in your garden, and had us, as a sort of warning, take turns reading aloud about Conrad’s Kurtz, the ivory trader of good intentions deranged by the jungle. By the middle of that night, we were all under its spell. My voice went dry as toward the end I read, “But his soul was mad. Being alone in the wilderness, it had looked within itself and, by Heavens I tell you, it had gone mad.”
I didn’t sleep that night. Or for some nights to come. I wanted to be Kurtz. But completely unlike him: I would hold on to my eternal soul. I promised myself that my last words on earth would not be, “The horror! The horror,” but, with all conviction, and deep satisfaction, “The beauty! The beauty.”
His last letter, begun weeks ago, was somber, but still optimistic. It lay unfinished on his table. It spoke of attracting responsible settlers with land grants, to increase the trade in copra, and fruit, and maybe even pearls; of better health and medicine for the natives decimated by disease and infertility brought on by that gift from beyond the sea, syphilis; of restoring the islands to their glorious and vibrant precolonial Garden-of-Eden splendor. By the time he wrote that letter, the population of the Southern Group had declined to below six hundred.
The letter concluded, We must not judge the Marquesans by our European ideals. At this moment they are in a period of transformation; abandoning little by little their savage morals and habits, to step onto the path of civilization. During this complete evolution, the indigènes must be watched very closely, like children. It would be advisable to employ, in their management, un mélange de douceur et de force, sweetness and power; to visit them often, to listen to their complaints and pleas, to punish them without abuse but also without weakness, and at last to protect them—like children. My children.