by Carlos Eyles
Ten dollars was agreed upon. Moses cut away a large portion and handed it to the Fijian who, in turn, gave him the money which he pocketed and bid a pleasant good day, turning the skiff back toward the island.
“Moses, you no longer surprise me but how in the hell did you know that boat needed a fish? You couldn’t possibly have seen anyone fishing from that distance.”
“I’m a fisherman. I know when a person desires a fish, eh.”
“Okay, but how did you know? This isn’t the first time you’ve pulled this sort of stunt.”
“It is the voice, eh.”
“What voice is that?”
“The voice that is always true.”
“And did it tell you that an Australian wanted a fish?”
Moses shrugged. “Of course. It was his need to buy and mine to sell, eh.”
Compton nervously laughed. “You know it wouldn’t surprise me at all if you began to levitate right here in the boat.”
“Levitate? What’s that?”
“You know, float up in the air, like an angel.”
“No, no Keli. I am only a man. I float on the water not on the air. A man knows very little. That is why he must listen to the voice. It is a simple thing, eh. No need to think.”
“We always get back to too much thinking, don’t we?”
Moses grinned and nodded. “Yes, and stay simple with a little bit of pride.”
Moses dropped Compton off at Orchid Beach and continued on to Taveuni, saying he would stop by on his way home.
After an overcast and soulless sunset, there began a hard rain. Compton ate dinner and quickly slipped under the netting, all the while anticipating the whine of Moses’ outboard. It did not come and he fell asleep to horrific scenes that played out on a dark and rain-swept sea, which consumed Moses and left Compton forever isolated on the beach. >
23
Under the weight of their early morning cargo, potbellied clouds labored across the smudge-stained sky. Rain fell intermittently and blue lizards awaiting the sun’s blissful warmth stood watch on indigo boulders drawn from the sea. The blue lizards were fat with black insects and the polychromatic birds were fat with lizards.
The birds flourished on Qamea because it was without mongoose or snake, which are notorious nest robbers. Unlike Qamea, Taveuni had very few birds for it was overrun with mongoose that were brought over to kill the rats in the cane fields, which ruined the cash crops. However, the mongoose is a creature of the day while the rat is nocturnal. Thus man compounded his problem, for he found himself relentlessly invaded by destructive carrion forces both night and day.
Man’s interference in the natural world of Qamea was limited to the snake-killing frogs that pounded out a bass line for the melodious song of the jungle birds. It seemed to Compton that the tradeoff for those musically inclined was that rare and wonderful exception to man’s meddlesome hand in his otherwise visionless tampering with the natural world.
By early afternoon Moses had not made an appearance and Compton was now genuinely concerned. Should he hail a passing fishing boat? Or attempt to walk across the jungle to Moses’ settlement? Or hope for the best and wait it out here? Perhaps it was the day that piqued his worry, for it cloaked itself in somber clothes of dark grays and blacks that brought to mind a funeral procession. Wrought iron clouds were lowering the boom on Taveuni, accompanied by searing spikes of lighting skewering the breadth of its shoreline.
He watched as a thick blanket of rain plodded across the strait. When it reached him in convulsive sheets, he removed his clothes and ran naked on the beach with arms spread, feeling buoyant as a child. Winded, he sat at the table enjoying his nakedness, the anxiety of Moses’ absence having lifted and his spirits filled with the energy of the storm.
It was late afternoon when Moses finally arrived, coming from the jungle, carrying pawpaw, cabbage and store supplies on his back in a bag.
“Bula Keli, Vinika vaka levu. Did you wonder where I have gone?”
“I was worried. I thought you might have broken down out on the water. The storm was pretty bad.”
“Keli, do not think, it makes worry. If my engine breaks I have the oars. I have rowed many times across the strait. The ocean doesn’t want to kill me, it treats me well. I caught fifteen fish on the way to Taveuni yesterday. My boat was filled with fish. When I got there a big fishing boat had beat me in and filled up everyone’s fish box. No one would buy. Terrible. So I strung four fish to a line and went into the village bar and said, ‘You should be feeding your children instead of drinking away your wages. Here is fresh fish for your families.’ I sold three strings in the bar. I went to the Indian store and traded the rest for fuel. He gave me a dollar forty a kilo for the fish, then charges me full price for the fuel. He cheats me but it come out in my favor. I met Esther at the store and stayed with her for dinner and sleep. In the morning I fish my way home before you wake, then work in the garden all day. It was a good day, plenty of rain, no sun.”
“The universe is always in order with you, isn’t it. When all around you is in chaos and the odds suddenly turn against you, you seem to always find a way through it.”
“That is the exciting thing of life, eh. Everyday is unlike the last. A new task must be done.”
“It doesn’t bother you that the Indian continues to cheat you? I am amazed it doesn’t undermine your willingness to trust the next person.”
“Each time is a new time, eh. Each man deserves a chance to be honest. I remember this fellow from the Genuine Village, he wanted to get married and build a bu He had nothing and needed plenty of money for all the things a family must have. The only way he knows is to dive for sea slugs. Plenty hard work. He loves his woman very much and wants a number one bure for her, so he works six months and brings up four hundred kilos of sea slugs. No one has ever seen this much sea slugs. They call him the Sea Slug Man for the rest of his life. He very famous for that. In Suva they will pay him nearly three thousand dollars for the sea slugs, a fortune that will last him until his children grow old. His best friend is going to Suva so he put the slugs in his hand, to make sure they get to Suva on the boat and to collect the money. It was a big job jes’ to load the slugs on the boat. Dead slugs are a terrible smell and worse to touch. His friend say he be back in a week with the money but he does not come back. The Sea Slug Man went to Suva but couldn’t find him. Three months later his friend came back to the village. He had been drunk and whoring for all that time. He bought an old motor scooter with the money he had left and give it to the Sea Slug Man as a wedding present.”
The idea of bringing a motor scooter to Qamea struck Compton as unbearably funny and he choked up with laughter. “Where could he ride it?”
“He couldn’t ride it. There are no roads, eh.”
Now Moses was laughing. “This man is no damn good, eh.”
“A motor scooter! What happened to it?”
“The fellow went to Taveuni and traded it for an ax.”
Moses and Compton convulsed with laughter, tears running down their cheeks.
“I should think the Sea Slug Man wanted to kill his friend,” said Compton, wiping the tears from his face.
“No, no,” corrected Moses. “He held no anger for him. He would have probably done the same thing himself. The village came together and they helped build a bure for him. Everyone knew that was not a good thing for the Sea Slug Man to have worked so hard to get all that money. That was his mistake, eh.”
24
High, thin clouds with vaporous wings flew across the morning sky where the budding sun blazed pale prisms on their feathered tips. Compton ate his daily ration of pawpaw down at the shoreline as the green hulled boat of Jokatama swung into view, overflowing with its brown skinned occupants.
“Bula, Io vinaka, Jokatama,” shouted Compton.
Boisterous greetings were returned as the boat pulled in as far as it could without having to use the pole. Compton sought out Sinaca and gave her a quick wave. She smiled shyly and re
turned an equally inconspicuous greeting. “Are you going for a dive?” asked Compton who, in his impatience, did not wait for Jokatama’s response. “May I come with you this morning.”
Though unaccustomed to such ill-mannered requests, Jokatama, after hesitating replied, “The current will change soon. If you swim with the current, we wait.”
“Fine,” agreed Compton. “I’ll see you on the point.”
He suited up and entered the water catching the current to the point where the empty boat, save for Jokatama and the boy, was waiting. The women were already at the edges of the finger reefs fishing and collecting shells and the men were in the water with their spears. However, in his quick search, Sinaca was nowhere to be found. He did notice that one of the spear fishermen was a woman wearing a blue print skirt and a white blouse similar to one Sinaca had on. She had pulled the rubber back in one motion, dropped down and let the spear fly. It hit the fish, killing it instantly. Retrieving the spear, she casually frog kicked to the surface. Compton had a clear look at her face and was certain the woman was Sinaca. He followed her to the boat where she deposited the fish, turned to him and flicked a smile. Before he could speak, she wheeled back into the water and left Compton staring up at Jokatama. After pleasantries, Jokatama announced that the tide would be chang
“Bula, Sinaca,” greeted Compton, facing her while treading water.
“Bula, Keli,” she replied softly, then shyly put her head back into the water and swam to the boat. Compton, at a momentary loss, cocked the gun and dove, more to avoid the stares of the others than to actually hunt. Upon her return he feigned continued interest in the hunt and swam slightly behind her as she dove the reef in search of fish. It quickly became apparent that Sinaca had exceptional skills with the spear. She moved like a sleek seal, exerting a minimum of energy yet covering the depths with a fluid grace that defied the fact she was without fins or a snorkel. On nearly every dive she found fish and never missed a shot.
At the tide change the tribe and the boat began to drift down the island on the current. In the course of thirty minutes Sinaca speared five fish. From all appearances she was the best diver of the lot, the men included, and Compton wondered why Moses had not mentioned her spear fishing skills or why she had not been spear fishing with the group on other occasions.
In addition to her skills with a spear, he was equally enchanted by the way her full dress would curl up high around her dark thighs on every descent and then on her ascent the way her white blouse, becoming transparent in the water, would cling to her breasts. Never had he witnessed a dance more erotic than the dives of Sinaca. In the fluid beckoning of her body language, he joined her, tentatively at first, feeling his way, mimicking her moves, then drawing close, soon finding a rhythm in the water that became a ballet as they pirouetted and plunged, soared and reclined around coral heads, in the unspoken communication of dance. With only a millimeter of water to separate them, belly to belly, he mirrored her every move, never taking his eyes from hers.
Beneath the sea, in Compton’s new home of homes, he had found a mermaid.
When they rested for a breath they did so like sleepy dolphins, turning slowly on the surface, touching lightly, dipping as if to cleanse, then falling again into the depths of their azure sky. The water became the conductor of their desires, for it crackled and sparked then vaporized in the heat of the dance.
They moved down the island a hundred yards from the nearest diver and in the silent sea Sinaca’s dives were deep. She glided on the slipstream of the current for long stretches. Compton would follow as she skimmed over tracts of white reef, banked off their edges and then rise as if to stall in flight, only to drop down again, spin and roll, and with every move he was there as if attached by some gossamer thread. He was in awe of her capacity to move about so fluently in the water. Were it not for the swim fins he could not possibly have stayed up with her. He came to her side and together they lifted over and through the reefs as carefree as sea lion pups. Their breath-holds were without thought and forgotten, lungs unaware of need. When they rose from the depths, he would pull her up with the thrust of his fins and she would let him, hand-in-hand, limp and trusting. Side-by-side they flew in the liquid sky, swept across a desert of sand and ascended over mountains of coral, in full mastery of the elements in weightless cavorting only eagles understood. She turned and faced him and they drifted as one, looking deep into the other’s eyes through the glass of goggle and mask. She grasped his hand and they dove to the base of a reef where there was a large opening to a cave. Entering it, they made a turn into an enormous underwater cavern that was illuminated by hieroglyphs of light that played through the perforated ceiling of coral. Floating upright, as if standing, above the white sand bottom that reflected the dappling light, Were it n leaned forward and brushed her lips across this mouth then turned and glided out of the cave to the surface.
For the moments they were together time had ceased for Compton and so, when the divers and the boat had caught up to them near the old campsite and intruded on their dance, it startled him as if being suddenly awakened from a dream. The tribe pulled the boat into shore and Sinaca joined the women to shuck the clams. Compton came ashore entranced, a man not yet awakened. Jokatama sat next to him and cheerfully asked the usual questions. “How is the beach?” and, “Qamea is beautiful, eh?” After a pause he asked in a decidedly somber tone, “How long you stay on Qamea?”
Compton replied that he wasn’t sure and had no immediate plans for the future. Jokatama’s brows knotted for a moment, then he stood and excused himself to attend other duties. After lunch Jokatama barked out a series of rambling orders to the clan and they acknowledged Compton with a smile and some said “Bula.” It was a long moment before he realized that Jokatama was taking him back to the Orchid Beach. Sinaca cast a quick look, then, as if she had revealed too much, lowering her head, not watching him leave. Jokatama was conspicuously silent on their return but Compton dismissed it, thinking the fishing probably wasn’t going well or he had some other clan associated problems on his mind. The parting was crisp but not unfriendly.
The following morning Moses brought pawpaw and his silence bore preoccupation. “I had a terrible dream last night,“ he revealed finally.
They sat at the table and Compton made tea. “What was it about?” he asked.
“I was cutting very big branches off a tree with a long chain saw and had to reach up high to get at this big one. The saw bound up on this branch and pulled out of my hands. It whipped around and fell out of the branch and hit me on the neck. Blood was coming out of my neck in a terrible way. My head was coming off and I called for my brother. He came and put my head back on. I woke up very frightened. My heart was pounding and I ask Mariah to rub my chest. Even now it make me shake.”
“That was a powerful dream, sounds like one of self-destruction.”
“I wasn’t sure what it meant but now that you say it, I know that’s it. After our talk the other night about the marijuana I went up and looked at my plants. They were so harmless but they frightened me. Now I shall tear them out and write a letter to the American and say I don’t want to do this. You are my brother, Keli. You put my head back on straight.”
“Well, for what it’s worth, I think you’re right to get rid of the plants. You had a powerful dream, Moses, very vivid. They say it’s rare for adults to have that sort of dream with blood and terror. Those demand our attention. You seem to have gotten the message.”
“Today I go and dig ‘em up and bury ‘em. If I don’t, those plants will tear my head from my body, eh.”
Compton shook his head in undisguised wonderment. “You always know what must be done. I can only wonder at the opportunities I’ve squandered to avoid disaster when my dreams were shouting at me.”
“What do you dream of, Keli?”
“Lately I’ve had sweet dreams of the sea. Full of flight and play, none with the clarity of your dream. I imagine only an uncluttered mind could produce
such a dream.”
Moses did not respond and after a moment Compton could no longer contain himself. “Jokatama and his crew were by here yesterday.”
Moses grinned conspiratorially. “Did you find many fish or did Sinaca’s beauty blind you to the job?”
“I didn’t look for fish. Sinaca was spearing fish. She was unbelievable in the water. As good as the men, better than the men.”
Moses set his cup of tea on the table and looked out to sea. He knows, reasoned Compton, who continued, “She is an excellent hunter. A pure joy to watch. She moves like a seal and spears more fish than any man. Why didn’t you tell me she was so good in the water?”
“I must say the truth now, Keli,” Moses paused. “I did not want you to fall in love with this girl.”
“Moses, I’m hardly in love with her. I confess, I can’t take my eyes off her.”
Moses continued to speak as if Compton hadn’t uttered a word. “She hunts like a man because she has made a bargain with the Sea God. That is why she swims in the water like a fish.”
“What are talking about?” Compton was beyond incredulous.
“Sinaca is not like other women in the villages. One day when she was still a girl, a boy give her a spear and she begin to dive for the fish. When the daughter of Jokatama brought a fish to the boat they thought she was lucky and they laughed. But everyday for three years she dived and soon she was as good as the men. Then the women of the village say that she had taken the kava and give it to the Sea God to make her good. After that her father take away the spear. He make her dive with the women, so the talk would stop and the people forget. But the women didn’t forget and now she is without a husband.”
“Are the men afraid of her, as well?”
“They are not afraid, but they are… not easy. Some think that the women might be right, that she was given the gift by the Sea God. There are some who do not go into the water at night unless Sinaca is in the bure with the women where they can watch her. Still, they say when she sleeps it is only her body and that her spirit is in the Sea God.”