The Three Sirens

by Irving Wallace

  “They sleep, they dream of past and future, they speak amongst themselves, they complain to me—most of our people are not used to such restraint on their activity—and they amuse themselves playing our traditional games. Now, Miss Bleaska, I will show you our private rooms where I keep only seriously ill patients or contagious ones or those who—well, who are incurable. We have six small rooms here. I am happy to say only two are occupied. It is cooler back here, is it not?”

  Vaiuri pushed open the first cane door to disclose a narrow confined room, with a window, occupied by an emaciated older man stretched on a mat, snoring. “Tuberculosis, I believe,” said Vaiuri. “Once, he visited another island, and was exposed to it there.”

  They continued down the corridor to the door at the very end.

  “This case saddens me personally,” Vaiuri said, before entering. “Here is Uata, formerly one of our leading swimmers, a young man my age. We were once in the school together, had our manhood ceremonies in the same week, many years ago. Despite his physique, he suffered a severe weakness two months ago, and I took him here. From my reading, and my ability to read is very poor, I believe it to be a heart disease. Each time he rests, regains his strength, another attack puts him down. I do not think he will leave here alive.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Harriet, and her healthy heart went out to the other’s frail one, although she had not yet seen him. “Maybe it would be unwise to disturb him?”

  Vaiuri shook his head. “Not in the least. He will welcome company. You see, on The Three Sirens, the ailing are isolated from all visitors, an ancient tabu. Only those males of the Chief’s blood may visit one of their own. Uata’s father is a cousin to Chief Paoti, so some members of the family are permitted to come here. Yes, Uata will be pleased to have a visitor—” His eyes enjoyed some secret amusement. “—especially one of the other sex.” He added quickly, “In due time, I would appreciate your diagnosis.”

  He opened the door and went inside the tiny cubicle, and she followed him. Near the window, his back to them, a massive hulk, like a great piece of light mahogany, lay on a mat. At the sound of their entry, the patient, resembling a print of Milo of Crotona, rolled over and smiled up at his medical friend, then showed perplexity and interest at the sight of Harriet.

  “Uata,” said Vaiuri, “you have heard of the coming of the Americans to visit us? They are here. One of them is a medical practitioner more trained than I am. She will be with me the next month and a half. I want you to meet her.” Vaiuri stepped aside. “Uata, this is Miss Bleaska, from America.”

  She smiled. “I prefer to be Harriet, my given name, to both of you—” She saw the Goliath, shorn, yet struggling to sit up, determined to rise, despite his incapacity, and, almost as a reflex, she rushed to him, went to her knees, thrusting her hands against his shoulders. “No, you mustn’t! I want you as still as can be until I’ve had a chance to examine you. Lie down.” He tried to protest, then gave up with a sickly smile and a shrug. Harriet, her left arm around his broad shoulders, eased him to the mat. “There. That’s better.”

  “I am not so weak,” said Uata, from the floor.

  “I’m sure you’re not,” agreed Harriet, “but save the strength you have.” From her kneeling position, she had twisted toward Vaiuri. “I’d like to check him over right now, unless you have something else—?”

  “Excellent,” said Vaiuri. “I will bring the stethoscope and whatever else I can find.”

  When he had gone, Harriet turned to her patient. His liquid oval eyes had not left her, and feasted upon her still, and she felt unaccountably elated. His chest heaved several times, and she was concerned.

  “Are you having trouble breathing?” she wanted to know.

  “I am well,” he said.

  “I don’t know—” She placed the flat of her hand on his chest, and moved it down to the tight waist of his short breechclout, and sliding her hand under the band, lifted it from his stomach. “Does that make it easier.”

  “I am well,” he repeated. “Your coming gave me—” He searched for the word, then said, “Hiti ma’ue, which means—excitement.”

  She withdrew her hand. “Why should it?”

  “I have not been visited by a female in two months.” There was a fine point to make. “It is not that alone. You have sympathy. It is rare in the female. Yours came out and entered my soul.”

  “Thank you, Uata.” Her hand had already encircled his wrist. “Let me take your pulse.”

  After she had done so, trying not to frown, she lowered his hand, and realized that he was still staring at her.

  “Do I appear different to you?” she inquired.

  “Yes.”

  “Because of my dress—because I come from far away?”

  “No.”

  “Then why?”

  “You are not like other women I have seen and admired. You are not as fair in the bones and flesh, but your beauty is deep inside and so you will possess it forever.”

  As she listened, it was as if her breathing had been suspended. It had taken thousands of miles to find a man, so unlikely a man, so brutish of body, with the vision to dissolve The Mask and search beneath.

  She meant to tell him that he was a poet, to say something, but before she could speak, the door opened and Vaiuri returned with a tortoise-shell bowl of medical instruments.

  While Vaiuri stood aside, Harriet began a minute examination of Uata, pressing and probing as she questioned him about his spells of shortness of breath, and vertigo, and occasional double vision. She noted that his ankles were swollen, and learned how long they had been this way. She took up the stethoscope and put it first to his chest, and then to his spine, listening carefully.

  When she was done, she stood up and glanced at Vaiuri. “I have blood-pressure apparatus in my hut,” she said. “I also have Heparin—an anticoagulant—if we need it. And some diuretic drugs, if their use is indicated. I’d like to examine him again tomorrow.”

  “Absolutely,” said Vaiuri.

  He had placed the stethoscope in the bowl as he went out of the room, and Harriet was about to follow him, when Uata summoned her back from the door. Vaiuri had disappeared, and Harriet was once again alone with the patient.

  “You must never deceive me,” he said quietly. “I have lived my full life.”

  “One never knows until—”

  “You will not deceive me?”

  “No, Uata.”

  “I do not mind my condition,” he said. “What I mind is that the last of a good life should be wasted in isolation. You cannot know how much your coming here has given me joy. I was too lonely for the company of a woman. For me, women have been the whole pleasure of my life.”

  She wanted to reach out and comfort him, as he comforted her, but she checked herself. She wondered if she should tell him that she would try to get Maud to prevail upon the Chief to remove the tabu, so that he could receive his women and his last days would be spent with them. As she tried to form her plan, she heard someone enter, and her attention was diverted to the door.

  An attractive, dark-haired young native had come into the room, easily, familiarly, and Uata introduced her to his visitor and best friend, Moreturi, the Chief’s son. Briefly, the two men teased each other in English, and then suddenly Uata blurted a sentence in Polynesian to Moreturi. In response, Moreturi’s eyes shifted from his friend to Harriet, and she felt uncomfortable under the scrutiny of the two men. Uata had said something about her. She wondered what it was, but instead of inquiring, she hastily excused herself.

  In the large examination room, she found the intense medical practitioner pacing. To her surprise, he was smoking some kind of native cheroot.

  “Mr. Courtney tells me women in America smoke,” he said. “Will you have one of ours?”

  “Thank you, but if you don’t mind, I’ll have one of my own.”

  After she had the cigarette lighted, she saw that Vaiuri was waiting for her to speak.

  “It�
�s serious with him,” she said.

  “I was in fear of that,” Vaiuri said.

  “I’m not positive,” she added quickly. “I’m only a nurse, not a cardiac specialist. However, the symptoms of cardiovascular trouble are so evident, that I’m surprised he is alive today. I may know more after my next visit. I’m sure I’ll never be able to say specifically what kind of heart disease he is suffering from—it may be rheumatic heart disease or a degenerative disease or some congenital defect that’s caught up with him. I doubt if anything can be done, but I’ll try my best, I’ll try everything. I expect he will just go suddenly. Perhaps you should prepare his family.”

  “They await the worst. Already, they mourn.”

  She shook her head. “It’s too bad. He seems such a wonderful person.” She dropped her cigarette butt into a shell filled with water that already held discarded cigarette stubs. “Well, I’m glad you’ve made me welcome, Vaiuri, and I’m truly pleased to be here … Until tomorrow then.”

  He hurried to see her to the door, and bowed his head as she went outside. For some seconds, Harriet stood motionless in the shade beyond the infirmary, thinking of the patient and sorrowing for him. She started at the rattle of the door behind, heard footsteps, and Moreturi was beside her.

  “I thank you for helping my friend,” he said.

  On impulse, she retorted, “Maybe you will help me? Uata said something to you in your language, just before I left, and you both stared at me.”

  “Forgive us.”

  “Did he say something about me?”

  “Yes, but I do not know if—”

  “Please tell me.”

  Moreturi nodded. “Very well. He said in our tongue, ‘I would gladly die if once, before I go, I could tell a beautiful woman such as she, Here vau ia oe? “

  Harriet squinted at the Chief’s son. “Here vau ia oe?”

  “It means, ‘I love you.’ It has more meaning here than in your tongue.”

  “I understand.”

  “Are you offended?”

  “On the contrary, I—”

  Behind them, the door creaked. Vaiuri had put his head out inquisitively. “Is everything all right?”

  “Everything is fine,” Harriet called back. Then she had a second impulse. “Vaiuri—”

  “Yes?”

  “Instead of tomorrow, I’d like to come back tonight and complete the examination. I’m deeply concerned about Uata. I want to see what can be done.”

  “Please come,” said Vaiuri. “I am away tonight to a kin feast, but a boy will be here and expect you.”

  After Vaiuri had withdrawn, Moreturi regarded Harriet thoughtfully. “You think you can save my friend?”

  Harriet felt a brush of breeze on her cheeks, and with it came Maud’s words of the morning, to adhere to the truth, to “never, never lie to them.”

  “Save him?” Harriet heard herself say. “No, I don’t think I can. All I can do—anyone can do—well, it’s simply this—no human being should die alone.”

  With that, Harriet left Moreturi, and the shade, and went down the slope into the sun of the village compound. Lost in thought, ignoring the surreptitious interest her white uniform was generating, she passed over the stream. Then, coming to the decision that she must discuss Uata with Dr. Maud Hayden, and find out if Maud could intercede on her behalf and have the tabu against female visitors to the infirmary set aside, she quickened her step.

  She had not gone far when she heard her name. Stopping, she looked over her shoulder and saw Lisa Hackfeld, arm aloft, flagging her. As Harriet waited until the older woman had caught up, she realized that she had not seen the sponsor’s wife looking this way before.

  Lisa Hackfeld was, indeed, transformed. Gone was her spruce, immaculate, expensive, coiffured, manicured, girdled Beverly Hills bearing. Gone, too, her pudgy dolefulness. The Lisa linking her arm in Harriet’s was one who appeared to have survived a hurricane and exulted in the victory. Her blond hair was a torn bird’s nest, her face had lost its caked make-up and yet been made younger by the flushed excitement that hid the few furrows, her silk blouse was untidy, with two buttons missing in front and part of the garment tail dangling free.

  “Harriet,” she cried, “I’m bursting to tell someone—”

  Halting, comprehending that the nurse’s eyes had gone over her and widened, she paused to free her arm, and rapidly, with both hands, cupping her hair, fumbling at her blouse, she tried to bring some order to herself. “I must be a sight,” she mumbled. Then, in exasperation, she let go of herself. “What the hell, who gives a damn? I feel great, that’s all that counts.”

  “What happened?” Harriet wanted to know.

  “I’ve just had a ball, darling.” As they began to walk, Lisa continued to bubble over. “It’s unbelievable. I haven’t had as many kicks since I was Lisa Johnson in Omaha and going to my first dances. And the funny part is, I was depressed as the devil this morning. You probably couldn’t see it on me, but all the while I sat on that bench in that stuffy room listening to Maud, I kept thinking—what am I doing here? No privacy. No toilets. No lights. Not a single comfort. What a way to spend the summer. Who needs it? I could be down in our Costa Mesa place, having drinks with Lucy and Vivian—they’re friends of mine—and living it up, and here I am in this dreary hole. You know, after her little speech, I was on the verge of going up to Maud and telling her I was quitting and that I was going back with the Captain the next time he came and catch a plane from Tahiti for good old California.”

  The outpouring had made Lisa breathless, and as she tried to recover, Harriet asked, “What made you change your mind?”

  “The dancing, darling—wow!” She dug into her pockets, and then said, “I even lost my cigarettes. Can I borrow one?”

  As she accepted one, and the light, Lisa resumed her recital. “Even when that Courtney took me out to where they’re rehearsing for the festival, I didn’t want to go. I kept saying to myself, What am I letting myself in for at my age? And who gives a hoot about a bunch of undressed natives wriggling around in the sun? Anyway, our beachcomber friend kept saying it would be sport, so I pretended that it might be, and dragged along with him. We got to a clearing, fifteen minutes from the village, and there were about twenty of them, young men and women, getting together. Courtney turned me over to a snappy young woman, sort of the Katherine Dunham type, her name was Oviri. She runs the show. Well, she sat down on the grass with me, real friendly, I must say. She explained a little about festival week. That got me interested, I’ll tell you. Have you heard about it?”

  “Not much,” said Harriet. “Only what Maud told us about a big dance, and sporting events, and a nude beauty contest. Also, something about giving license to married couples—”

  “To everyone, that’s just it,” interrupted Lisa. “You know how it is back home. Before you’re married, you see a man who interests you, maybe in the street or in a store or across the room of a bar, but usually, you never meet him. I mean, you simply don’t. You meet only the people you’re introduced to and get to know. And after you’re married and become older—well, you wouldn’t know that yet, Harriet, but take my word—it gets worse, it just does, it’s gruesome, sad as hell. Lots of people have their cake and eat it. All kinds of furtive ratty cheating and infidelity goes on. I’m sure Cyrus has been unfaithful to me more than once, though I’ve never done that to him, I wouldn’t consider it. I mean it’s improper and dangerous and simply wrong. So you become older and older, a woman does, until you haven’t got a chance, and you sort of die bit by bit on the vine.”

  She was lost in reflection a moment, and Harriet waited. Walking, Lisa stared at the turf, and then she looked up.

  “I was just thinking—no, it’s not like dying on the vine—it’s like—well, you have only one life to live—and it lets out of you so gradually, like the air leaking out of a poorly tied balloon. There is nothing left. Do you understand, Harriet? All the while this is happening, you sometimes meet anothe
r man at a party or someplace and he thinks you’re still something and you think he is charming and sweet. And you wonder, you wish—well, you think—maybe here is someone who could tie the balloon, stop life escaping. You would be new to him. He would be new to you. Everything would be taut and fresh again, not doughy and old. When you’ve been married as long as I have, Harriet, you collect a lot of bruises and bumps along the way. Every time you go to bed with your husband, you take beneath the blanket the scars of every disagreement, every unreasonableness, every lousy day. You also take all you know of his weaknesses, his failures as a person, his attitudes toward his mother, his father, his brother, his ineptness with his first business partner, his stupidity about his son, the way he couldn’t hold liquor that night at the beach party, his childishness about getting into that club, his fears about colds and heights, his lack of grace at dancing and the way he can’t swim and his awful taste in pattern neckties. And you take under the blanket yourself, your oldness and being taken for granted and neglected, and you know he thinks about you, if he thinks about you at all, the way you do about him, all the scars. You forget the good parts. So sometimes you long for someone else—not variety or sex alone—but only to be new to someone and be with someone new. You can’t see their scars. They can’t see yours. But what happens when you find a candidate? Nothing happens. At least not with women like myself. We’re too conventional.”

  She seemed almost to have forgotten her companion, when suddenly, she looked at Harriet. “I guess I got off the track a little,” Lisa said, “but maybe not. Anyway, what I started to say is that right here on this island they’ve got it licked. The yearly festival is their safety valve. That’s where you’re recharged. According to this dance woman, in that one week any man or woman, married or unmarried, can approach any other person. For example, take a native married woman, maybe married ten or fifteen years. She is fascinated by someone else’s husband. She simply hands him some kind of token—I think a shell necklace—and if he wears it, it means he reciprocates her feeling. They can meet openly. If they want to sleep together, they do. If they only want each other’s company, fine, that’s it. After the festival is over, the wife goes back to her husband and life goes on. No recriminations. It’s tradition, perfectly healthy, acceptable to all. I think it’s great.”