When the Singing Stops

by Di Morrissey

  Pieter nodded. ‘I can see that. Actually I’m already getting some funding from a local outfit. A machinery spare parts company funnily enough. It’s run by a Colombian, Antonio Destra. Do you know him? He’s indicated there could be more investment down the track.’

  ‘I’ve met Antonio,’ said Madi evasively. ‘He’s a businessman. I can’t help wondering what he would expect from such an investment.’

  ‘He made a completely unsolicited offer. Maybe there are more companies willing to be so generous,’ mused Pieter.

  ‘I’ll set up a meeting with Connor,’ she said firmly. Then giving Lester, Xavier and Pieter a big smile, added, ‘Anyway, count me in. I’m with you guys!’

  Lester nodded sagely, quite believing her. ‘Well now yo spent time with de village, we go back to work, eh?’

  Two days later, Madi was settled back into her routine at Lester’s camp. They worked independently, sometimes not speaking for hours, then as one would make a small find, they’d stop, examine it and discuss it in detail, then return to their panning, sluicing and digging. The sounds of the forest were familiar to Madi now. She knew when certain birds would appear, had seen a small agouti, rather like a large Australian bandicoot, and seen Lester stung by an electric eel when reaching into a crevice between rocks in the creek to test for gravel. It was a mild shock which soon wore off but Madi paid more attention to where she moved about the deeper patches of the tributary.

  At sunset she cooled off in the natural pool they used as a waterhole before putting on a clean shirt of Matthew’s which covered her arms because in the evening all manner of insects came to bite and cause itchy rashes.

  One morning while she was bathing in the waterhole she heard a motorboat come up their creek from the main river. Curious, she dressed, tied back her wet hair and walked back to the camp. Lester was down at the landing talking to two men. As they headed up the track, Madi shouted with delight when she realised it was Connor, with Sammy the storeman.

  Madi called out and seeing her, he rushed to sweep her up, swinging her in the air.

  ‘How did you find us? You didn’t say you were going to come up!’

  ‘I’ve missed you.’ He kissed her. ‘If Lester hadn’t left contact details about the store, I wouldn’t have got here. Thanks to Sammy, here I am.’

  ‘Dis be great. Come, come to de camp,’ said Lester.

  While Lester brewed coffee and talked to Sammy, Madi showed Connor the camp. ‘Well, it’s certainly rustic,’ he said.

  She demonstrated her panning technique and explained the procedure of digging up the gravel, washing it through the torn box then through the pans.

  ‘And do you do this all day?’ he asked. ‘It’s hard work.’ He tried not to sound as surprised as he felt. He listened to the enthusiasm in Madi’s voice and her excitement as she produced their finds to date. Connor stared at the tiny glittering stones. ‘I guess it must be a thrill to find one . . . even a tiny one.’

  ‘You want to try panning? We’ve got spare battels,’ she said.

  ‘Yeah, well, I guess so. As I’m here.’ Madi gave him a penetrating look. ‘Just why did you come, Connor? I can’t believe you made this trek, took off from work and all, just because you missed me!’

  Connor staggered, clutching his heart. ‘Oh, you wound me, madam! Of course I missed you. In fact it shocked me a bit that I did miss you so much.’ He gave an embarrassed grin.

  ‘You haven’t come on some mission from Matt to drag me back to civilisation?’ she said suspiciously.

  ‘You don’t want to come back yet? It’s been nearly two weeks, Madi.’

  ‘No, I don’t, Connor. It’s not just the experience of being here, which is wonderful, or the fun of slogging away to find a stone or two—and I pull my weight,’ she added. ‘But I’m learning so much. I’ve just spent two days in an Amerindian village . . . it was fantastic, even if it was because I was stung by a scorpion . . .’

  ‘What! Are you all right?’

  ‘Of course . . . but listen, Connor . . . I met Pieter again. Remember he was at the falls. I want you to talk to him.’

  ‘What about?’ asked Connor who didn’t particularly want to troop around meeting some fellow Madi had befriended in the jungle. He was weary after the trip upriver or more specially the night spent at Sammy’s shop and the amount of rum they’d consumed.

  ‘Pieter’s an ethnobotanist . . .’

  ‘The Dutchman, the plant gentleman. I know him,’ said Sammy who knew all the business of the river and around the settlements.

  ‘He’s looking at investment into the uses of forest plants for medicines and indeed the whole future of where the Amerindians are going with development of rainforest products.’

  ‘Sounds interesting,’ said Connor, sounding not the least bit interested.

  Madi realised this was not the time to get Connor on side. ‘When we go back to Georgetown we’ll have to look up Pieter and Xavier.’

  A flicker of interest showed on Connor’s face for a moment. ‘He’s in cahoots with the Amerindian leader? I suppose that makes sense.’

  They finished morning tea and Sammy headed back down the river. Connor rubbed his head. ‘Gawd, that man can drink and talk and eat. So, what’s the plan? Let’s go for a swim so I can clear my head.’

  Connor followed Madi to her tent. ‘I must say, Madi, you seem to have been leading a pretty social life up here.’

  She laughed. ‘You go for days in the quiet routine then you have a bit of madness. Breaks the monotony.’

  ‘And you haven’t been bored?’ Connor threw his rucksack down and reached for her.

  ‘Bored? No way. I’m having the time of my life!’

  ‘Didn’t you miss me . . . just a little bit?’ He held her to him and licked her ears and kissed her long and hard.

  They drew apart and Madi grinned. ‘Well . . . I s’pose I did . . .’ she teased. She sat on the mattress hugging her knees as Connor pulled off his T-shirt and shorts and began rummaging in his pack for a swimsuit.

  ‘Connor, the times I missed you most . . . were those moments when I stopped and thought, God this is so beautiful . . . I’m so lucky to be here . . . this is so fascinating . . . and wished you and Matt could share it.’

  ‘Weren’t there times when you had the absolute hots for my body?’

  ‘Oh, Connor!’ she laughed and threw her pillow at him. ‘Yes, I did think that on occasion! Come on, let’s cool off . . . you need it!’

  Lester left them to themselves as they wallowed in the swimming hole. ‘So how have you and Lester got on? He hasn’t made a pass, argued with you or got fed up with you yet?’

  Madi glared at him. ‘No, to all of that. And I don’t appreciate you saying such things. Lester has been fantastic. He’s a good friend.’

  ‘I apologise. Out of line. It’s just that I’ve been going crazy down there. I don’t know what you’ve done to me, Madi. I’ve felt like the missus left behind while the boss goes off to war and adventure.’

  Madi laughed but it struck her once again that he seemed to have missed her far more than she had him. He had been the one left behind while she was having all the fun and she had been so swept up in this incredible experience she hadn’t actually missed him. ‘I was looking forward to getting back and seeing you and telling you all about it. I thought you’d be so wrapped up in your job and all the intrigues that you’d barely think of me. But I am glad you’re here. Really glad.’

  The day passed as Lester and Madi fell into their routine and taught Connor how to pan. At first he found the sieve, half-filled with gravel, heavy to swish round and round so the weightiest bits settled in the centre. But Madi showed him how to do it in the water so the river took the weight of the pan until it was nearly empty and then came the final hopeful search for gems or gold left behind. As he crouched at the water’s edge, arms aching, eyes glued to the residue in the pan, he had to admit Madi was tenacious. He wouldn’t have thought many women would stick at
this sort of work all day, day after day.

  They stopped for a simple lunch, cassava bread brought back from the village wrapped up like a tortilla and stuffed with tinned meat and pickled vegetables, then Lester announced it was siesta time.

  He retreated to his hammock discreetly hung some distance from Madi’s tent where Connor headed with Madi.

  ‘If we’re going to “nap” in there we’d better get a couple of buckets of water from the creek,’ advised Madi.

  ‘What are you planning to do with them, cool my ardour?’

  ‘No,’ she laughed. ‘Pour them over the outside of the canvas so it runs down the sides but doesn’t soak through. The breeze blows across the dampness and cools us off.’

  ‘Just like our Coolgardie safe. Don’t forget I’m a West Australian,’ laughed Connor.

  They made love under the canvas in a steamy tangle of wet bodies and passionate energy, then lay back exhausted.

  ‘Connor, I’m going outside to my hammock under the tree.’ Madi wrapped a sarong about her and quickly fell asleep in her soft shaded cradle, while Connor tossed about on the mattress in the tent feeling mildly put out that she hadn’t wanted to stay and cuddle him.

  But during the afternoon as the three of them worked at the river, Connor turned to Madi and remarked, ‘You know, I can see how this would get you in. Every minute you think you’re going to hit the jackpot,’ he grinned.

  ‘And suddenly you find several years have passed,’ said Madi. ‘It’s the pork-knocker’s disease.’

  The only sounds were those of the shovel grating on gravel in the pit, the rattle of the stones in the box, the trickle of water, the scratching shake of the grit in the pans, the call of a bird echoing across the river. It seemed to Madi it must have been just the same in Gwen’s day. Gwen had moved all over the Mazaruni River, shifting to various camps with Major Blake and their team. Madi glanced at Connor crouched doggedly over the pan at the water’s edge, wearing one of Lester’s old hats. He looked a far cry from the elegant city banker image he would have projected in London, New York or Sydney.

  She chuckled to herself and turned back to lift the bucket of gravel and tip it into the sluice box when Connor suddenly straightened up giving a shout. ‘I’ve found one!’ He rushed towards Madi, a huge grin splitting his face. ‘I’ve found one!’

  Madi and Lester both hoped it wasn’t a false alarm, they hadn’t explained the crystals and quartz that were found here as well.

  His eyes were glued to the pan as he ran and Madi called out in alarm, ‘Connor, look where you’re going, don’t trip, for God’s sake!’

  The three of them came together and peered into the pan. There at the bottom along with bits of gravel, there was no mistaking the shimmering, glittering sparkle of a diamond.

  ‘It be a clear one . . . not opaque, dat good!’

  Madi lifted it out of the pan and put it in her palm. ‘Look at the colour . . . it’s pale pink . . . a rose pink . . . Oh, Connor,’ she smiled at him. ‘It’s a beauty.’

  Connor seemed to be in shock and couldn’t lift his eyes away from the stone that appeared as brilliant as a laser light.

  ‘Man dat be over de carat,’ declared Lester. ‘Where yo dig him from?’

  ‘I just decided to stick the shovel in the edge under that tree,’ said Connor talking fast and excitedly. ‘There were roots but I got under them to the gravel like you said. My God . . . I can’t believe it.’

  ‘Yo is a lucky man . . . on de first day. Dis be a good omen. Dis one make a beeyootiful ring,’ sang Lester.

  ‘Oh, I mean, what’s the protocol here. Who owns this?’ asked Connor. ‘It’s your claim.’

  Lester shrugged. ‘Finders be keepers. Yo is supposed to pay a commission . . . so de drinks be on yo!’

  Madi thought of Lester’s little boy. She’d speak to Connor later, but she didn’t want to spoil his elation.

  ‘Drinks! That’s right, I lugged two bottles of champagne all the way from Georgetown. Tonight we can really celebrate!’

  Lester and Madi continued to dig around where Connor had found the stone and Lester found two smaller diamonds of great clarity and coloured a pale canary yellow. ‘Dese be good,’ he said with satisfaction. ‘But de rose one . . . dey be scarce.’

  At sunset as they freshened up in the swimming hole, Madi explained to Connor the reason Lester was here was to try to make money to send his boy to a good school.

  ‘But Madi, I want that stone to go in a ring . . . for you,’ he said, disappointment in his voice.

  ‘That’s sweet of you, Connor. Tell you what, why don’t you sell the diamond and give the money to Lester and you can get me something else. Just something small, a token of Guyana.’

  ‘You’re right, I guess,’ he said. ‘About Lester needing the money. But I wanted to give you something special.’

  Connor realised with a pang that Madi hadn’t even considered the fact that a diamond ring was the first step towards a lifelong commitment between two people.

  ‘It can be special . . . do you know what I’d love? I don’t know if they make them, if they don’t they should . . . it’d be a fantastic souvenir,’ she said.

  ‘What? You know there’s nothing to buy here except gaudy gold Indian necklaces, slave bangles or little gold maps of Guyana as pendants. I looked for a present for you,’ he admitted.

  ‘A gold frog,’ said Madi. ‘A little gold frog like a brooch, or a pendant. That would be special.’

  ‘Indeed it would. That’s a great idea. Okay, my darling . . . consider it done. Have you still got your other frog, that wooden thing?’

  ‘That wooden thing as you call it, is always with me. It’s my lucky charm.’

  By the third day Connor was part of their routine and enjoying himself immensely. He and Lester had gone out hunting as the early morning mist wreathed through the trees which Lester described as ‘de secret fires o’ de forest spirits’. They’d shot a bush hog after a wild and energetic chase, which they’d carried back to camp lashed to a pole. Connor described the event with such elation that Lester winked at Madi. ‘Yo gonna give up dat city job and be a pork-knocker, eh?’ asked Lester. ‘Yo got de lucky touch, dat for sure.’

  ‘This is satisfying work,’ admitted Connor. ‘You work physically hard and you’ve got something to show for it even if you haven’t found anything. At the end of the day, you’ve moved a great pile of dirt,’ he grinned.

  ‘You feel you’ve earned a tot of rum at sunset, eh,’ added Madi.

  ‘So when yo gonna go back to dat other job den?’ asked Lester, voicing what Madi had also been wondering.

  Connor didn’t look at Madi. ‘Actually, I’ve taken leave. Haven’t had a decent break for over a year. I’m on holidays.’

  Madi straightened up and stared at him in amazement. ‘So what are you going to do, fly off to Barbados . . . go back to Australia . . . ?’

  He stopped and stared at her with a small smile. ‘I thought I’d hang out with you for a bit.’

  Madi was pleased and touched but she was slightly hesitant about the idea. She hoped he wasn’t reading anything more into their relationship than what they currently shared . . . that of friends and lovers. ‘It isn’t exactly sitting under a palm tree sort of holiday,’ she said.

  ‘Well, heck man. Yo know what yo two should do?’ said Lester beaming at them. ‘Tomorrow yo should go up to Ladies’ Hair Falls. Take de boat up de river, den it maybe a two-hour hike . . . but really pretty and den you come to a cliff and de falls.’

  ‘A picnic . . . a day off, that sounds great,’ said Madi.

  ‘I’ll go along with that,’ agreed Connor.

  By mid-morning the next day Madi and Connor had entered a world of their own. Sitting in Lester’s little aluminium dinghy, they weaved up the glassy river. Lester had told them only a few holdings had been worked up here and it seemed to be a remote area. The thicket of forest leaned over the river and at the sound of their motor, soft grey and white he
rons and pink-tipped cranes lifted off from the tops of trees, and little spotted sandpipers trilled a piping alarm while the rich blue-black flash of kingfishers broke the surface of the water as they lunged for dragonflies.

  The solid curtain of green jungle was splashed with blossoms and vines of golden russet, scarlet and white. The air felt clean and clear, a breeze kept the humidity at bay. Occasionally a monkey screeched, alerting the creatures of the deep forest that strangers approached.

  ‘I wonder how long since anyone has been up here. I feel like we’re the first explorers,’ said Connor softly. ‘It’s quite beautiful.’

  Madi nodded and smiled, glad Connor was discovering what had captivated her so strongly.

  ‘Now you understand why I like it here so much.’

  ‘I guess so. But you have to go back some time, Madi.’

  She lifted a hand to halt him. ‘Let’s enjoy today and not think past that.’

  They found the landmarks described by Lester and pulled into a natural clearing on a small stretch of clear shallow water. They secured the boat and hoisted on their backpacks and, following the needle of Lester’s small compass, headed through the lightly timbered landscape.

  ‘I suppose there’re snakes around here,’ said Connor.

  ‘Bound to be. I’ve yet to see the deadly bushmaster. I’m assuming they’ll hear us coming and go away,’ said Madi cheerfully.

  But as they stopped to admire a delicate cluster of orchids on a tree trunk, Madi stiffened and nudged Connor, pointing to a low branch. Sunning itself there was a long slender snake. ‘Look, you manifested that, talking about snakes,’ whispered Madi, not taking her eyes off the beautiful creature. It was the bright green of fresh shoots and along its sides were stripes of deepest blue. It had china blue eyes and, as it lifted its head, showed a creamy underbelly. ‘What a beauty,’ said Connor.

  ‘Poisonous, though. You can tell by its arrow-shaped head.’