by Morris West
‘And this time,’ said Thorkild grimly, ‘we’ll plan and build for permanence. It’s clear we’re going to be here for a long time yet.’
‘But I thought …’ Jenny blurted out the words and then stopped in mid-sentence. The others sat silent, attentive only to their food.
‘Yes, Jenny?’
‘Nothing.’
‘As I was saying,’ Thorkild went on calmly. ‘We’ll need to build more comfortably and permanently. The big boat will take a long time to finish. I did discuss with some of you – and it is clear that they have discussed it with others – the possibility of sending out the small boat, with a picked crew, to get our sick people back to civilization and send a rescue party for the rest of us. This project obviously does not recommend itself to you. My wife, for example, may be seriously ill; but she simply refuses to go, because she feels the community needs her, and she cannot take the responsibility for breaking up family groups. This is her decision. I disagree with it. I cannot change it. Peter Lorillard also is ailing; but without facilities neither an adequate diagnosis nor adequate treatment can be offered to him. He would be prepared to risk a rescue bid; but he would in no way insist on it. I, too, would be prepared to risk it, even single-handed; but it has been made clear to me that the community has claims on me which it is not prepared to waive. So, that question is closed; and we are back to our normal life here …’ No one spoke. He went on in the same detached fashion. ‘I’d suggest we floor the houses this time, frame them more strongly, make gable roofs with thicker thatch and provide more space for family groups. If it finally appears that Peter Lorillard is suffering from filariasis which is a parasitic disease carried by mosquitoes, then I am going to insist that we make different arrangements for farming the terrace. We’ll take short turns working up there, and then retire to the shore where the sea-breezes keep the mosquitoes away …’
‘May I ask a question, Chief?’ It was Ellen Ching who spoke, crisp and detached as always.
‘Certainly.’
‘It’s for your wife. Sally, what is the prognosis for a case of filariasis?’
‘Prolonged exposure and continued deposit of the parasites causes permanent blocking of lymph glands and ultimately the swollen condition which is called elephantiasis. The patient becomes permanently debilitated and disabled.’
‘And in the case of cancer of the breast?’
‘Without mastectomy and post-operative treatment, death.’
‘Thank you. A question for you, Chief. What are the chances of a small boat with a skilled crew making a safe arrival?’
‘With a skilled crew, much better than fifty-fifty.’
‘Thank you. That’s all I wanted to know.’
‘Since we’re not all present,’ said Gunnar Thorkild firmly, ‘I don’t think we should discuss that question any further.’
‘I agree.’ Ellen Ching was precise and persistent. ‘But we do have a council appointed to represent our views to the chief and offer him advice. I think it’s time the council started doing its job…In these circumstances it’s shameful to expect one man to carry the can for all of us.’
‘We’ve lost one member,’ Briggs reminded them. ‘Charlie Kamakau.’
‘We’ll co-opt another,’ said Ellen Ching. ‘And since all this can only embarrass Sally and the Chief I suggest we defer it until tomorrow. I’ll go up to the terrace and talk with Peter Lorillard and Martha. Then we’ll arrange a full meeting. Agreed?’
‘Hold it!’ Thorkild scrambled slowly to his feet. ‘Boys and girls, one and all. Let me tell you something. I’m tired! I’ve nursed your sick and buried your dead and showed you how to catch fish, build houses, eat, sleep and swing your partners. And now, I’m so damn tired, you could stop the world and toss me off and I wouldn’t give a hoot in hell. So now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to take a walk with my wife.’
He pulled Sally to her feet and left them, shocked and gape-mouthed, staring at each other across the fire-pit.
They walked down to the far end of the beach, picking their way cautiously over fallen trees and torn palm fronds and tangled roots and all the detritus of the storm. They found a dry rock and perched themselves on it, looking out over the waste of white water to the scatter of stars and galaxies. Sally said lightly:
‘How long did you work on your speech, Professor?’
‘No time at all. It came straight from the heart.’
‘It sounded to me like another of your political pieces …’
‘It was a long night and a long day; and I’m human too.’
‘Then why did you have to bring me into the argument?’
‘Because, like it or not, you’re a large part of the argument.’
‘It wasn’t fair.’
‘So you tell me what’s fair, sweetheart! They’ll sleep dry and fed tonight because I drove ’em! They’ll talk their heads off because I made sure they’d have leisure to do it, while I’m too damned tired even to spit.’
‘Gunnar?’
‘What?’
‘That storm …’
‘Yes?’
‘If we’d been out at sea, you and I, in the small boat, would we have survived?’
‘We could have, yes.’
‘If it had been Willy or Peter instead of you?’
‘Yes, again.’
‘Can you imagine what it must have been like out there tonight?’
‘I know what it was like. I’ve been there, more than once.’
‘And you’d still want me to go?’
‘Want it? No. Send you, yes. Because you’d still have a chance, a ticket in the lottery. Stay here and you’ve got no hope, no chance at all.’
‘But I’ve still got some life with you.’
‘And death at my hands afterwards.’
‘Is that what you’re afraid of Gunnar? Would you rather it were the sea that sent me off, than you, my lover, my husband? Would that be easier for you?’
‘No. One way I’d know you had left, loving me. The other, even if you survived and were cured, I’d never be sure. You might hate me for the rest of my days; but still …’
‘What?’
‘If you were alive and well, I think I could bear it.’
‘You were such a light man once. I loved you that way. Now, I hardly seem to know you.’
‘Because I care so much?’
‘Because you care too much. None of us is that precious.’
‘You are, to me.’
‘But suppose I want the other way; the easy, quiet way, the pin-prick while I sleep and the long, quiet darkness. What then? You gave Carl what he wanted. Would you refuse it to me?’
‘You refused it to Charlie Kamakau. You said, and I remember it very clearly, “I won’t do it because I swore to cure, not to harm.”’
‘That was Charlie’s life. This is mine. I dispose of it as I wish.’
‘No, you’re asking me to dispose of it.’
‘Because, don’t you see, we’re one person…It may never happen. All I want to know is that if it does, we’re agreed. Then I can live quietly and happily – very happily, my love! Gunnar, why are you fighting me so hard on this point?’
‘First, because you’re excluding all other possibilities; and I think that’s wrong.’
‘But if I choose to do that?’
‘Then we’re two people again, not one. Second reason: what you’re asking me to do has consequences for everyone else. Long consequences. I can’t measure them all; but I can’t commit to them as lightly as you think.’
‘I don’t care about other people. It’s me! My life! My body that suffers!’
‘And when you are gone, my sweet – however you go – I am still here, people are still here, and the law and custom they live by still obtains. Look! If there is no other way of sparing you intolerable suffering, then, for me and for them a different situation exists. The essence of the act hasn’t changed; but the circumstances and the consequences have. The decision is ad h
oc, made under extremity. This way it’s a clear collusion; it’s precedent; it says, “Yes, a killing is arranged. Other killings can be arranged.” Don’t you see the enormity of that?’
‘All I can see…’ Her voice was like a winter wind, cold and distant. ‘I’ve asked you to promise me an act of love, if and when I need it. You’ve refused.’
‘I’ve offered you a chance of life. You’ve refused it. You make death a test of love!’
‘And you’ve failed the test. Goodnight Gunnar.’
‘I’ll walk you back – otherwise you’ll break a leg.’
‘I’d like to sleep alone tonight.’
‘Sorry, I can’t oblige you.’ Even in this extremity, he found still a hint of humour. ‘We’ve twelve people in four huts. You’ll have the women for company.’
As they passed the fire-pit he fell back to say goodnight to Molly Kaapu who was still there chatting to Ellen Ching and Franz Harsanyi. Molly gave him a long, searching look and asked, in the old language:
‘That shark still chasing you, Kaloni?’
‘It’s just bitten my arm off, Molly.’
Franz Harsanyi, the linguist, thought it was a joke and capped it with another.
‘So long as it didn’t get your hua hua you’re in good shape, Chief!’
‘We saved some whisky for you,’ said Ellen Ching. ‘You look as though you need it!’
11
Early next morning Ellen Ching went up, alone, to the terrace to speak with Lorillard and Martha Gilman and arrange for a meeting of the council. She hoped that they would agree to co-opt Willy Kuhio, so that the members would then comprise two women, Martha, Ellen, and three men, Franz, Adam Briggs and Willy. Thorkild made no comment on the proposal. He was determined that, henceforth, he would force them, by silence, to propose solutions for their own problems, leaving him free to dispose of matters in dispute and then only at their common instance.
Now that he had felt the full burden of command, seen all the strategies by which even friends and lovers sought to evade responsibility and reduce their personal risks at the expense of others, he was deeply disillusioned. He remembered vividly, as if it were yesterday, Flanagan sitting in his wheel-chair, shaking as if with the ague and thrusting the truth at him. ‘… The mana will come; but you’ll suffer from it. People will lean on you and you will fall under their weight. They will lift you up and you will try to flee them; but they will not let you escape. What you do then, God only knows. And you’ll die begging Him to tell you; or you’ll live begging Him to die, because the burden is intolerable …’
Flanagan’s prediction was fulfilled. The mana was not enough. The burden was intolerable. They would never, never let him escape it. But in one important particular, Flanagan was wrong. Gunnar Thorkild had no God to call on; the people, with the exception of Willy and Eva, had none either. They relied, as he did, on a tangle of traditions, legends, unexamined moralities, vague ethics, gut religion and confused philosophies. He himself had invoked them all and found them crumbled to powder in his hand, like cerecloths from an ancient tomb.
This was the real root of his quarrel with Sally. He had no certain standing ground to share with her, no authority to invoke, no interest that could, demonstrably, transcend her own, no dream, dogma or example that would give meaning to her suffering. He had failed her. He would in the end fail them all. He was an empty man. His island paradise was exactly what Franz Harsanyi had called it – a piece of dreck, fished up from the ocean floor.
While the others were erecting the new store-hut, he worked alone, squaring off fallen palm-trunks, grading and stacking them for use as beams and pillars for new dwelling places. This time, he thought, with bitter humour, there should be a chief’s house, separate from the rest, more imposing, so that the emptiness that dwelt in it might be less evident. There should be a platform in front, from which commands and edicts could be proclaimed, and judgement made to sound more pompous. He might even go back to ceremonial costume, a cloak and a head-dress of bird-feathers, a breast-plate of shells…As he toyed with these sardonic fantasies, Mark Gilman came calling in triumph:
‘I found it, Chief! I found it!’
‘What did you find, Mark?’
‘My paddle…I thought it had been washed away, but I found it over there.’
‘I’m glad. That’s a good omen!’
‘Chief…’
‘What?’
‘Last night, all through the storm, I kept asking myself what I would have done if I’d been caught outside in the open sea.’
‘And?’
‘I worked it out. The boat would still float. Even if it’s full of water, with people in it, it doesn’t sink. So, as long as you could stay with it, keep it from capsizing or turning turtle, you’d still survive, wouldn’t you?’
‘Sure. A craft like that is buoyant as a cork. It’s made for surfing the big rollers. In a confused sea, of course, you’ve got to keep working, paddling to keep her head up. If it’s a long blow you have to rest two and work two – although there’s precious little rest for anyone.’
‘That’s what I was getting to: the ones that are resting. If we had lashings or kick straps or something to hold them steady while they rested, would that make sense?’
‘It could, yes. Got any ideas?’
‘Some. I thought I’d ask you first.’
‘Go to it then. See what you can work out.’
‘Are we…are we really going to try for it, Chief?’
‘I don’t know, Mark. I’m waiting for the council to decide.’
‘Peter wants to try. My mother agrees with him. I’d like to go too.’
‘That’s all up to the council, Mark.’
‘Why are you leaving it to them? You never did before. You’re still the Chief, aren’t you?’
‘Yes. I’m still the Chief.’
‘Then why …?’
‘Sit down, Mark.’
They sat together on the fallen trunk and Thorkild laid out his answer, phrase by uncertain phrase.
‘It isn’t easy to explain, Mark. Remember what I told you on the way to the high place. A chief has to act, even though he’s not sure he’s doing the right thing…Well, so far, that’s what I’ve done. I’ve made mistakes; but the consequences haven’t been too disastrous…However, this decision is the biggest yet. Lives are involved; big risks. I’m tired. I’m confused – less certain of myself than I’ve ever been in my life. I want help. I need advice. It’s the council’s job to give it to me.’ He gave a small unsteady laugh and rumpled the boy’s hair. ‘I guess I need a bit more than that.’
‘What, Chief?’
‘The impossible, I’m afraid. Thunder and lightning and a voice out of the cloud saying “This is the law! This is right! Do it and you are saved!”…Even a human voice would help…Yes, I’d settle for one human voice that said “Believe and go forward.” Unfortunately people don’t act like that. They want signs and wonders and the right to kill the wonder-worker when he fails them.’
‘That’s not fair!’
‘It’s life, Mark.’
‘Why is Sally angry with you? She is, I can see it.’
‘That’s our business, Mark.’
‘So you’ve got no one.’
‘Let’s say I’m sailing single-handed for a while. Sometimes that’s necessary. Your mother had to do it for a long time. Never forget those old men on the mountain, Mark. They had to earn that place: the peace, the silence, the splendour…Run along now. They need help back there.’
‘Not yet!’ He stood up, set and stubborn, challenging Thorkild. ‘You told me I’d earned my place as a man.’
‘You have.’
‘Then I have a right to speak and be heard.’
‘The same as anyone else.’
‘Thanks: That’s all I wanted to know.’
‘Mark?’
‘Yes?’
‘Think well before you speak.’
‘I don’t have to think. I hear
d the voice. I know what it meant. I’ll get back to work.’
He strode off, holding the paddle before him like a banner. Thorkild stared after him, frowning. The boy was strange seed. He had had strange nurture. How would he spring up – a fighter armed and dangerous, or a twisted tree that twined its roots about the foundations of the temple and in the end, toppled it to ruin?
A short time after the boy had left, Jenny came, bringing fresh food and coconut milk for his midday meal. Everyone was eating on the run, she said. They wanted to have the store-hut finished by nightfall. Ellen Ching was back. Willy Kuhio had been co-opted to the council, which would meet tomorrow on the terrace, so as not to interrupt the work of reconstruction. The councillors would stay the night on the mountain and return on the following day to convey their recommendations to the chief and hold a full tribal meeting afterwards. They wanted to do things very formally this time. There were deep divisions of opinion. They wanted all to have the opportunity to represent their private views…If Thorkild didn’t mind she’d sit and share the meal with him. She’d brought enough for two. She’d like to talk to him, seriously. Why not? Everyone else did.
‘I know, Prof…They talk so much I could scream.’
‘It’s the tribal way, girl. Small island. Small people…every subject is talked dry.’
‘Even so! I was damned glad you sounded off last night. You were dead on your feet; but nobody seemed to notice.’
‘Relax, kid!’
‘Don’t call me kid! I’m a married woman, remember?’
‘I’m sorry. I keep thinking of the little girl I picked off Sunset Beach.’
‘I’m trying to forget her.’
‘What did you want to talk about?’
‘Adam and me.’
‘No!’
‘Adam and you then. He told me what happened. We had a blazing row about it.’
‘I heard.’
‘Everybody heard. That’s why you’ve got this crisis on your hands. Anyway, he said there was no way he’d go on this expedition. He was just married. He wanted to stay on the island. I told him that, if he didn’t at least put his name up, I’d never respect him again.’