Blood Ties

by A. J. Quinnell

  “She’s quite a woman,” Jack said almost wistfully, and Cady smiled and agreed,

  “Yeah, she’s a hell of a lady.”

  They found Kirsty and Ramesh in the Yacht Club talking to a redheaded man in his mid-thirties.

  Cady had not met Ramesh before and Kirsty introduced them and then the other man as Bruce McDonald.

  When Jack had ordered a round of drinks he asked “Where’s Lani?”

  “Making lunch,” Kirsty answered. “And it’s going to be a treat. She found a little shop owned by a Chinese family and they had all the spices and stuff she needs. She went to the fish market and then chased Ramesh and me off the boat and told us not to come back till one o’clock.”

  Jack was impressed. “She’s a good lass that.” He literally licked his lips. “I haven’t had real Chinese food for years.” He turned to the red-headed man. “How’s the boat coming, Bruce?”

  “Slow but sure Jack-another couple of months.”

  Jack took a pull of his beer and said seriously, “Well keep a good eye on her lad.”

  To the others he explained, “Bruce is building his own boat in La Digue – that’s the small island next to Praslin. He’s building it for the third time because on the other two occasions some bastard burnt it just before it was finished.”

  “Why?” Cady asked.

  McDonald shrugged. “Who knows? I suppose someone has a grudge but I can’t think why.” He did not look particularly put out about it.

  “Can you join us for lunch?” Ramesh asked. “I’m sure there’s enough food.”

  McDonald declined with obvious regret. He had just come over to pick up some copper bolts and was returning on the Lady Esme in a few minutes.

  When he had left Kirsty said, “What a tragic thing to happen — and what perseverance. But surely on such a small island somebody must know who did it?”

  Jack said, “Kirsty, there are a thousand or so people on La Digue — and every one of them knows who did it. Just as we all know on Mahé and the other islands.”

  “Who?”

  Jack told the story,

  Bruce McDonald had been cruising the island a few years back as a crew member on a big French yacht. He had fallen in love with the place, especially La Digue, which was completely unspoilt, without even a guest house on it. A few months later a rich relative had died, leaving him a substantial inheritance. He immediately made his way back to the Seychelles and announced that he was going to live on La Digue and build his own fifty-foot schooner in the traditional way—using the local Takamaka, Causarina and Filao woods.

  The others listened raptly as Nelson explained how McDonald had gone to La Digue and rented some land right on the beach for a few rupees a year and built himself a little thatched-roof bungalow a few feet from the water and next to it a thatched roof on tall poles to act as a boatshed. Then he personally selected trees with the help of an old man who, in his seventy years, had built over a dozen schooners. With advice from the same old man he set to work sawing the planks by hand in the traditional way. He calculated that it would take him two years or so and he quickly settled into a routine: rising at dawn and working for three hours until it became too hot, then a swim and fishing for lunch and after lunch a siesta. Another swim and then three more hours work.

  He settled into the life of the island and became very popular. He was the only foreigner and as the islanders watched his dedication and determination they became very fond of him and strangely protective. He would drink with the men in the evenings at the little bar cum general store; at first usually whisky but later, as he became used to it, the locally produced ‘calou’, a toddy made from the fermented sap of the palm tree and which was deceptively sweet with a kick like a mule.

  The women used to cook for him, and the children would sit and watch him work and listen to his stories about far off places and cheerfully run errands.

  On Saturday nights there was a dance in the open-sided copra shed. It was the antithesis of sophistication: a dirt floor, a wind-up gramophone and a plank between two barrels for a bar. But they were evenings of fun and laughter. They taught him to do the sega — the swaying, seductive dance typical in the old French islands of the Indian Ocean. It was at these dances that McDonald discovered the reality of what he had been frequently told: the Seychellois virtually practise free love. Although all are Catholics, over fifty percent of the children are illegitimate. Under the old Code Napoleon laws which the British retained from the French, a child born out of wedlock – and if recognised by the father – enjoyed the same rights and privileges in law as a legitimate child. Jack explained that the islanders were extremely free and easy in this respect. If a young unmarried girl had a child it was usually cheerfully looked after by its maternal grandmother with no stigma attached.

  So McDonald discovered that he was living in paradise. His food, shelter and drink cost him almost nothing and at the dances on Saturday almost invariably a local beauty would give him a certain look while they danced the sega and later they would slip out to a quiet corner of the beach and make love before returning for more dancing and more calou. Of course, everyone knew where they had been, but nobody minded.

  He had the perfect life, embellished by the fact that in building the boat he retained a purpose. He felt he was the kind of man who needed a purpose.

  The two years passed quickly and the boat took shape and the time approached when he could soon install the engine and launch her into the clear water of La Passe bay. The islanders began preparations for a big feast. There would be ‘millionaires’ salad, made from the heart of a specially felled coconut tree, roast suckling pig, and the rarest of treats — a caille — a dish prepared from a huge turtle with rice and vegetables simmered for hours in the shell. Copious amounts of calou were collected in anticipation.

  And then tragedy. After the usual Saturday night of drinking, dancing and love-making McDonald had come running into the village just before dawn waking up the islanders with shouts of ‘fire!’

  His bungalow and boatshed were three hundred yards away and by the time the islanders had organised a human bucket chain from the sea it was too late. The boat was blazing from stem to stern and when the fire was finally out all that remained was the blackened skeleton of the strakes.

  The islanders were as heartbroken as McDonald. At first everyone assumed that it had been an accident but then the old boat builder examined the remains and announced that it had been deliberate. The fire had started in at least three different places and, from the speed of the fire and the condition of the charred wood, he declared that petrol or some other combustible had been used.

  The police investigated but drew a complete blank. They concluded that it may have been done by one of the young men, jealous of McDonald’s success with the local girls. The islanders were sceptical.

  In any event, after a week of mourning, McDonald announced that he would start again from scratch; and he did, and for two more years continued his idyllic life, barefooted and dressed only in a sarong.

  But this time the islanders were taking no chances. As the boat approached completion, and without telling McDonald, they organised a roster of young men to keep a nightly watch. Again the village prepared for the launching feast and again the boat burned down. But this time McDonald had been seen drunk and with tears in his eyes, dousing it from end to end with petrol and tossing the match.

  “He didn’t wanna leave!” Cady exclaimed, shaking his head in amazement.

  “Too right,” Jack answered. “Once the boat was finished and ready to go he’s the kind of man who feels that he should go — that’s what he was building it for.”

  “But what happened?” Ramesh asked. “Did they confront him with it?”

  Jack shook his head. “Oh no. They played out the charade. They consoled him and expressed admiration when he decided to rebuild again . . . After all, they like him and I suppose they understand him.”

  “It’s nice,” Kirsty sai
d thoughtfully. “I mean it’s a waste and everything . . . but it’s nice. Do you think he’ll just go on building boats and then burning them?”

  Jack shrugged. “Why not? He’s got enough money to live on — and to buy the wood. I guess he’ll eventually marry one of those girls and settle down and have a legitimate family — he’s already acknowledged paternity for two sons.” He glanced at his watch. “Come on, let’s get at that food!”

  Chapter 14

  The float dipped and Cady struck quickly. The rod arched and he started to reel in, peering forward into the crystal water. He saw the rainbow flash of colours while it was still several fathoms deep and he grunted in satisfaction. It was another parrot fish, and Joan White had told him that she particularly wanted parrot fish. She had lent him the rod an hour earlier and told him to find this rock about half a mile from the hotel and catch dinner for the hotel guests who numbered eight. She had waved a stern finger under his nose and told him not to fish within three hundred yards of the hotel.

  He reeled the line in to the trace, then reached down and picked up the long-handled net beside him. A minute later the fish was flapping in the wicker basket alongside three other parrot fish and two red hind. Cady calculated that there was around ten kilos in the basket and that was more than enough.

  He laid the rod down, but he did not get up. It was a very tranquil spot well below the coast road and far enough away to avoid the noise of the occasional car or Camion. In the distance he could just make out the low hills of Praslin and La Digue twenty odd miles away. He thought of the story of Bruce McDonald and decided that he could understand him; then he thought some more and ruefully concluded that he could not understand himself.

  He had always been attracted by older women. He did not consider physical beauty to be vitally important in a woman. Of course, it helped, but Cady had never been attracted to a woman solely by her beauty. There was no doubt that Kirsty had beauty enough to stand out but Cady discounted that as any reason why during the past days they had been drawing closer and closer together. Without thinking about it he had assumed that in the course of time they would become lovers. It seemed to be a natural, almost logical, progression. But their conversation in the hospital had put that into perspective and he was strangely relieved. She was now a friend. Not a prospective lover. Just a very good friend.

  At this moment he was puzzled by himself. That day, for the first time, he had a physical reaction brought about only by beauty. It had happened as he was stepping on to Manasa. Lani had come up through the companionway carrying a tray and, as she turned to look at him he literally froze with one foot on the deck and the other on the jetty. Kirsty, Ramesh and Jack were already on board and did not see his reaction. He had recovered quickly and tried to analyse it. He had worked in Indonesia and travelled to Hong Kong, Bangkok and Singapore and had seen many very beautiful Oriental girls but had never experienced this affect.

  Her own reaction to him had been exactly the opposite. She had visibly recoiled at the sight of his battered face, then recovered and put the tray on the table.

  The lunch had been superlative. Half a dozen different dishes, fish, vegetables, chicken and rice, all delicately flavoured. They ate with knives and forks, Lani explaining that although the shop had chopsticks it seemed silly to use them to eat off normal crockery. Cady asked if the shop had Chinese crockery. She nodded, but said that they were expensive.

  Immediately Cady had turned to Ramesh and said “I’m going to buy a set and present it to the boat. Food like this deserves it.”

  Ramesh looked down at his scratched plastic plate. “Thank you Cady, I accept with pleasure.”

  “There’s another thing,” Cady said firmly. “Kirsty tells me that you’re taking us with you free of charge. Well at that time she wasn’t sure if I was comin’. I can’t afford to pay fancy charter prices but I can pay somethin’ an I’m damn well gonna!”

  Ramesh smiled and shook his head. “It’s really not necessary. We were going that way anyway and I am relieved that you will be on board to help me with the engine. Is he not a good mechanic, Jack?”

  “Sure is,” Jack said through a mouthful of lemon chicken.

  “No matter,” Cady said. “If you won’t take a fee then I’m gonna pay to provision the boat and fill her up with fuel and cover any other running expenses en route.”

  “I’ll share it with you,” Kirsty interjected. But Cady shook his head.

  “No way. You hang on to your money; hell, I know we’re on vital business but this is some holiday for me. I love boats and the sea and fishin’.” He gestured at the laden table. “And as fine cookin’ as I had in my life . . . No way. A man could pay a fortune for a holiday like that-so at least I cover the expenses.”

  He had given Ramesh a mock hard look and Ramesh had looked at Nelson, who said, “It’s fair enough, Ramesh. Anyway the costs won’t be high. With the monsoon blowing steady you won’t need the engine much — and most of your food will come from the sea.”

  “All right,” Ramesh had acquiesced. “Thank you Cady.”

  A thought struck him. “Why don’t you and Kirsty move on board right away? It will save money and you can get used to the boat. Also it is close to the workshop.”

  They had discussed it and decided to stay one more night at the Northolme. Joan White had been kind to them and they did not want to upset her. Jack assured them that she would not mind but they decided to stay one more night anyway.

  After lunch Kirsty. Ramesh and Lani had gone off in the car sightseeing, while Cady and Jack went back to the workshop. When Jack ran him back to the hotel Kirsty had still not returned, so Joan White had sent him off fishing.

  Now he picked up the rod, net and basket and scrambled up the rocks to the road. A Camion went by and the passengers waved at him cheerfully.

  Back at the hotel he found Joan sitting in the kitchen reading a magazine. He put the basket in front of her and she peered into it approvingly.

  “Well done Cady. Fiona’s in the bar with Kirsty. Go and tell her to give you a large drink on the house.”

  On Manasa Ramesh sat on the stern sipping at a beer and watching the sunset in what had become an evening ritual. Nelson had told him that on very rare occasions, when atmospheric conditions were perfect, a vivid green band could be seen for a moment across the sky just as the sun dipped below the horizon. The islanders considered it lucky and the occasion to make a special wish. He had watched for it every evening. This time, although the sun made its usual spectacular exit, there was no green band.

  From below in the galley he could hear Lani preparing dinner and he marvelled at his good fortune. It also made him consider yet again why he had offered to take Kirsty on her quest. After all, during those days before the engine breakdown he had discovered the perfect existence with Lani. Now there would be four on the boat and even if everyone got on famously it would not be the same. Why had he done it? Certainly he was chivalrous by nature and her story had moved him, but he knew it was more than that. He knew that Kirsty Haywood had a strange effect on him and he was a little frightened to analyse it. She was attractive and intelligent and something more. That first night while she had told her story he had studied her face with its soft lines belying its strength and determination. He liked her accent, alien to his ears though it was. The way she moved her hands in expressive gestures as she talked. The quick and easy smile when something amused her.

  In spite of certain apprehensions he was looking forward to the coming voyage.

  Chapter 15

  “Hit the tit!”

  “No!” Ramesh shouted down the companionway. “You come and do it.”

  Jack’s muffled voice came again from the engine room, “Don’t be bloody silly-hit the tit!”

  “Absolutely not. That is for you to do.” Ramesh looked at Kirsty and Lani standing next to him and they both smiled and nodded. A few moments later Jack, shirtless and sweating, came panting up the companionway. For the past f
our hours with hardly a break he and Cady had been reassembling the engine. A charger had been borrowed and the battery topped up. The engine had been primed and now the big moment had arrived.

  Ramesh felt massive apprehension. Not for himself, although he prayed that it would start, but for Jack. Cady had told him that everything possible had been done but that engines could be ‘ornery bastards with minds of their own especially very old engines’. Ramesh wanted it to be Jack’s moment of victory and accomplishment and he willed the thing to respond. Jack looked at the three of them and sniffed. He had a bustling no-nonsense air about him but they could all sense his underlying tension.

  He wiped his face with a handkerchief and moved behind the wheel. With his thumb poised on the button he called down, “Ready?”

  “Yo!” Cady’s voice floated up, and Nelson pushed the button.

  Ramesh did not breathe as he heard the starting motor turn the engine three, four, five times.

  Nelson grunted, took his thumb off the button and edged up the throttle a notch; then he reapplied his thumb.

  Again the engine turned half a dozen times and Ramesh was in an agony of dread when on the seventh turn it coughed: once, twice and then roared into life.

  Amid shouts of applause a hugely grinning Nelson eased back the throttle and listened as the engine settled into a steady rhythm.

  They heard Cady’s war-whoop from below, then he shouted,

  “Smooth as a goddam baby’s goddam ass!”

  Ramesh pounded his hand exuberantly on Jack’s wet back and then Lani and Kirsty hugged and kissed him. He had a look of almost comical modesty on his face. He kept breaking into a grin and then forcing his lips back to a straight line.

  Dark blue smoke was drifting away from the exhaust under the counter and Jack noticed Ramesh’s look of concern.

  “Don’t worry,” he grinned. “It’s just blowing its nose. That will soon clear.”