The Fire Blossom

by Lark, Sarah

  “You can see the stars well enough from here,” Karl remarked. “Why would you have to go to the South Seas?”

  “They’re brighter there,” Ida said. “And there are different stars to see on the other side of the globe. But that isn’t all! The captain had another mission, a secret one. The scholars believed there was a new, completely unknown land on the other side of the world, and they wanted him to explore it. He took a biologist and a naturalist with him. Oh, you wouldn’t believe what kinds of strange creatures they discovered there! And how dangerous the journey was . . .”

  As Ida talked, her slender, work-roughened hands sketched wonders in the air. Karl observed with fascination and laughed with her in amazement as she described the gigantic jackrabbit-like animals that the natives of the new country called kangaroos, and the colorful fish that populated the enormous, incredibly beautiful but dangerous reefs that lay off the coast.

  Both of them lost track of time and felt miles away from the austere village that looked dull even in the brilliant autumn sunlight. Instead, they could feel their feet in the sand and see exotic landscapes in their minds’ eyes. With her words, Ida conjured snow-white beaches and palm trees that swayed gently in the wind.

  All at once, the sound of an approaching wagon drawn by a heavy draft horse brought Ida and Karl back to reality. It stopped next to them, and they leaped apart as they heard Jakob Lange’s deep, commanding voice.

  “Ida! What in God’s name are you doing here? I just scolded Anton for having improper suspicions about you. My daughter, I told him, does not dawdle after school, and certainly not with a boy who—”

  “She was only bringing me my notebook!” Karl said, risking Lange’s wrath. Ida herself made no attempt at self-defense. She lowered her eyes and bit her bottom lip repentantly. “Teacher’s orders,” Karl asserted.

  The excuse must have occurred to Ida, too, but under her father’s stern gaze, the normally spirited girl seemed paralyzed.

  “The teacher ordered my daughter to bring you your notebook?” Lange said. “You don’t even believe that yourself, Jensch! My son tells me that, as of today, your schooling is over. Why would you still need a notebook?”

  Lange leaned over the edge of the wagon and peered at the composition book, which was lying open atop the basket full of potatoes. He grimaced.

  “Not only are you a liar, but arrogant as well,” Lange said. “You display your grade for all to see, as though it could change anything about the position God gave you in this world. Shame on you, Karl Jensch!”

  Karl knew he should lower his eyes submissively. After all, Jakob Lange, too, provided jobs for the day laborers. It would be wise not to annoy him. But the boy couldn’t force himself to capitulate. Instead, he glared at the smith.

  “How do you know what God has planned for me?” he asked defiantly.

  Ida winced at his words. It was clear to Karl that she was terrified even when someone else challenged her father. Despite her higher social status, he felt pity for her.

  Jakob Lange didn’t deign to answer the day laborer’s son. He turned to his daughter again.

  “You, too, have many sins to ponder, Ida, while you work in the garden this afternoon,” he reprimanded. “Standing around and stealing time from the Lord—not to mention from the Brandmanns, who’ve paid for this boy’s work. He’s loitering here with his mouth hanging open instead of digging potatoes because of you, and of course I will let Peter Brandmann know that. Your pay will be docked accordingly, boy. Come now, Ida!”

  Ida didn’t even look at Karl anymore. With her eyes lowered, she climbed onto the wagon bed and sat down, letting her legs dangle over the edge. Karl thought it a strange posture for a girl, but then he realized what she was doing. As Jakob Lange set off, a little book fell out of the folds of Ida’s skirts: The Three Voyages of Captain Cook Round the World. Karl had only to pick it up. He hesitated for a moment, wondering if he should follow her and give it back. Maybe she’d dropped it by mistake. But then she looked up and winked at him.

  Chapter 2

  “Not her!” Priscilla said quickly, coming to the delicate honey-blonde child’s defense before the man’s eyes could rest on her for more than a split second. The young girl was making herself useful in the pub, wiping tables. It was late afternoon, and most of the whalers were still working on the new ship George Hempleman was building with their help when they weren’t hunting for whales. They would come into Barker’s Pub later, stinking of sweat and rendered blubber, thirsty for beer and whiskey and lusting for women. But by that time the girl wouldn’t be anywhere to be seen.

  The man had taken them by surprise. He was tall and thin and wore a threadbare black suit and a shirt with a special white collar. He seemed better groomed than the usual customers, and he expressed himself more eloquently. However, he showed just as few scruples as the rest when it came to choosing a playmate.

  “Whyever not?” he protested in his strangely high voice. “Mr. Barker said I could choose!”

  All of the whores had gathered in the rustic barroom when Barker called them, but the customer didn’t have many to choose from. There were only the feisty, bony Priscilla; the plump Noni; and the fragile blonde Suzanne. Suzanne had once been beautiful, but her apathy put off the men as much as the stench of whiskey and neglect that hung in the air around her. The young woman wore a peach-colored summer dress that was stiff with dirt. She never washed it, and never bathed herself either unless Priscilla and Noni forced her to. She stared into nothingness with empty eyes. She seemed not even to notice the customer. And of course she made no effort to protect her daughter from him.

  “She’s still too young!” Priscilla cried. “My God, you must be able to see that, Reverend Morton . . .”

  Her mouth twisted derisively as she addressed the man with his title, and then glared at Barker. The pub owner should have sent the child away himself!

  The girl looked up. Reverend. She knew the title had something to do with the church—Mrs. Hempleman had mentioned something like that. Of course, she normally talked about a pastor. Mrs. Hempleman spoke German and also preferred to be called Frau Hempleman. She spoke about the clergy with the greatest respect, and seemed to miss having a church nearby. At some point Mr. Hempleman had promised to find a reverend for her, but this man here didn’t seem like the answer to Linda Hempleman’s prayers. His gaze was just as lustful as any other man’s, which didn’t make him worthy of respect in the girl’s eyes. Nonetheless, upon his arrival he had defended his position to Barker with a curious logic: he had explained in an unctuous voice that he needed some relaxation before he imparted the will of God to the savages.

  The girl concluded that he must be a missionary. That was another word she had picked up from a discussion about Linda Hempleman’s longing for the comfort of a priest. Mr. Hempleman had hoped that a missionary would soon arrive to convert the Maori tribe that lived around Piraki Bay.

  “She’s not that young anymore,” Mr. Barker grumbled.

  The short, fat pub owner was the only person there aside from Suzanne who knew the girl’s real age. He had brought Suzanne and her child from Sydney to New Zealand. The mother had been lured by the promise of a new colony in a new country, and driven by her will to escape some kind of altercation in the dockyards of Botany Bay. The girl had only faint memories of fistfights, flying knives, and the fact that Barker had given up his pub in Australia and fled in panic with Suzanne. At some point, Priscilla and Noni had joined them. The girl remembered that it had been Priscilla who’d held her head when she’d succumbed to nausea aboard the ship.

  Barker squirmed with embarrassment. “She’ll be old enough soon, and then I’ll take her into service, Reverend. But until then . . .” He wouldn’t have protected the child of his own accord, but it was clear that he was afraid of Priscilla’s wrath. If she left him and found another whoremonger, his establishment would become even drearier than it already was.

  The reverend approached the girl
and peered at her more closely. He forced her to turn her delicate, oval-shaped face toward him. Her nut-brown eyes were huge . . . Sighing, the reverend rubbed his crotch. He liked the girl, but her childish features meant he wouldn’t be able to find an excuse to justify “relaxing” in her arms. He attempted a fatherly smile.

  “You’re a pretty thing, child. Will you tell me what name you have been christened with?”

  The girl shrugged. She had certainly never been christened, and she didn’t really know what that meant. A name . . . If Suzanne had been lucid enough during the girl’s birth to choose a name, then no one had made any effort to remember it. The only name that the girl answered to was “Kitten.” That was what the whores in Barker’s brothel in Sydney had called the neglected child who had meandered among them, because she reminded them of a tiny, hungry, mewling stray animal.

  “She’s stubborn,” Barker said apologetically to the reverend. “And probably a little slow-witted too. Her mother is completely deranged. But she’s docile and pleasant enough to look at . . .” He gestured at Suzanne, indicating that it was time for the man to make up his mind.

  The reverend finally left Kitten alone and chose Noni. She wasn’t much to look at, but neither was she as absent as Suzanne nor as feisty as Priscilla. Once chosen, the plump, red-haired Noni guided the man out to the whores’ quarters, a ramshackle shed constructed of whalebones and canvas. At Piraki Bay, whalebones often served as an alternative to wood. The whalers constructed their humble shelters with them, and the tables and chairs in the pub were made of them as well.

  The barroom was primitively constructed—four posts from the wood of newly cut, nonseasoned southern beeches with most of the bark still attached, from the forest above Piraki Bay. The rest was filled in with scrap wood left over from the construction of the Hemplemans’ house. Sheets of canvas completed the structure, offering only minimal protection from the weather. The wind whistled through the cracks and brought the stench of rotting whale carcasses from the beach to the carousing men and sullen whores. But at least the roof was waterproof.

  Kitten took a breath of relief as the reverend disappeared with Noni, and then seized the opportunity to escape from the room. Fortunately, Barker let her go without further discussion about the exact starting date of her new “job.” But of course she noticed that he was annoyed. He took out his anger on Priscilla.

  “That’s the last time!” he shouted at the gaunt, already aging whore, who stoically allowed his words to roll over her. “It’s the last time I let you undermine me when it comes to Suzanne’s brat! We’ve fed the kitten long enough. If I’d known how much she would cost me, I would have drowned her the day she was born. True, she’s pretty, and in time she’ll bring in some money. But if I remember right, it’s been nearly thirteen years since Suzanne whelped. And from what I hear, the girl has been bleeding for the last few months. That means she’s not too young anymore.”

  Kitten, who’d stopped in front of the pub to listen, gnawed on her lower lip. Priscilla had warned her not to let Mr. Barker find out that she’d started her menses. She had made a great effort to wash the rags in secret. Kitten wasn’t at all slow-witted, and had learned to stay out of Mr. Barker’s way over the years. But recently, Suzanne had betrayed her. She had found the rags and had begun to lament over them loudly. Shouting something about “Eve’s curse” and “a woman’s ill fortune.” Barker must have picked up on it. And now he’d make good on his threats and start to count Kitten among his “employees.”

  “Her time has come, Pris!” she heard Barker say from inside the pub. “We’ll do it when Hempleman catches something decent in his nets and the men have money in their pockets. But of course I’ll have to break her in first . . .”

  Kitten stiffened. What was he saying? He wanted to—fat old Barker wanted to be the first man to—

  “You?” Priscilla asked incredulously. In her voice, Kitten heard a completely new sound: jealousy.

  Kitten sighed. She knew Priscilla had something with Barker, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t understand what the woman saw in the blustering whoremonger. She probably hoped that one day he’d want to have her to himself, and would stop selling her to the whalers. Priscilla had once told Kitten that she hated the stench of whale oil and blood that clung to their bodies. She preferred Barker, who at the worst smelled of beer and rancid cooking fat.

  “You’d be stupid to give up such a good opportunity for making money,” Priscilla said. Her tone had changed again, and Kitten recognized the voice she used to get someone to do what she wanted.

  Barker laughed bawdily. “She won’t be ruined, darlin’,” he said. “I’ll be able to earn plenty on her when she’s finally tamed.”

  Priscilla snorted. “She’s already tame! She knows very well she has no other choice. She’s probably lusting for it already.”

  Kitten pursed her lips angrily. She had never wanted to be a whore, and Priscilla knew it. The prospect of ending up like Suzanne was terrifying, and Priscilla’s and Noni’s lives weren’t exactly exemplary either. Sure, they could survive and had enough to eat and drink—although they didn’t overdo the drinking part, only allowing themselves one or two whiskeys after work. In any case, they got by, and sometimes they even laughed together. Noni had a sweetheart who had promised to marry her once he was able to put aside a little money from whaling. And Priscilla had Barker.

  “Why go to the trouble?” the aging whore asked. “Or are you lusting for her?” The words came with a threat.

  Barker laughed again, and this time his voice sounded appeasing. “Lusting? You think such a skinny soup chicken would turn me on? You know I like big, strong women.”

  Kitten made an effort to block out the next set of noises she heard, which indicated that Priscilla and Barker were exchanging intimacies on the other side of the wall.

  “Then keep your hands off the child!” Priscilla finally said, scolding. “And don’t forget what you could earn with her! Some of the men would be very excited about the idea of being Kitten’s first.”

  Kitten heard Barker chuckle. “You could be right about that,” he agreed. “What do you think, Pris, how much can I charge? Double, or even triple the normal price? Or no, wait, I’ve got it. We could auction her off! That would be a show, I can tell you. Just like in the big clubs in England. We’ll make it exciting, put her on display . . . The men will only be allowed to look for the entire evening so they get hornier and hornier. She’ll need a decent frock.”

  Kitten turned away. She felt sick, and it wasn’t just from the stench of whale on the beach.

  An auction! And Priscilla hadn’t even argued; she had actually given Barker the idea. Kitten felt betrayed. Then again, Priscilla had never expressed any doubt about what Kitten’s fate would be. As long as she’d been a child, Priscilla had tried to protect her, and even now she obviously wanted to give her a few more months or even a few more years of grace. But in the end, Priscilla was obviously convinced: for a woman without family in this new, barely settled land, there was no honorable way to earn a living. She thought that, for Kitten, any other life was out of the question.

  “You’ll just have to make the best of it!” Priscilla had told her encouragingly whenever Kitten had protested about following in her mother’s footsteps. “It won’t be forever. After all, you’re very pretty, and you’ll surely soon find some man who’ll want to marry you. Just stay away from the whiskey, and be careful not to fall in love with the first man who looks at you a little bit kindly. Choose a man carefully. Choose one who is serious and saves his own money because he wants to amount to something. They’re selling land in the plains behind Port Victoria. With any luck, you could end up a farmer’s wife.”

  To Priscilla, life on a farm seemed something worth aiming for, but Kitten couldn’t imagine it. She had never even seen a farm—her world was limited to the area around the whaling station, and she never would have known that any other kind of home than the pub existed
, if it hadn’t been for Mrs. Hempleman.

  At the thought of her, Kitten felt better immediately. Maybe there was a way out of her predicament. George Hempleman was the founder and owner of the whaling station. Surely he would do something for her if his wife asked him to. Kitten would have to tell her what was going on. She sighed. She felt terrible about the idea of upsetting Linda Hempleman with such things, but she couldn’t think of any other option. It would be best to tell her as soon as possible, in order to get away from the pub. More men would soon be arriving.

  Kitten left the beach behind her and ducked into the twilight of the forest. Here, near the coast, there were nikau palms, wind-gnarled southern beeches, oleanders, and other kinds of trees and shrubs that Kitten didn’t know the names of. She liked the woods. The air here smelled fresher, the ground was still damp from the last rain, and the plants seemed to keep away the smell of rot. Kitten felt comforted. It was almost as though the trees could be her friends . . .

  She shook off her nonsensical thoughts and followed the path that led to the Hemplemans’. The ground rose steeply. George Hempleman had built his house above the narrow band of forest that ringed the bay and gradually gave way to a high meadow covered with tussock grass. His wooden house stood in the middle of the meadow, offering a beautiful view over the trees and beach to the sea, but far from the noise and stench of whaling. Hempleman was careful to have the whales pulled out of sight of his house to be butchered, and the pub and the whalers’ huts didn’t disturb Linda Hempleman’s view either, when she had the strength to walk out onto her terrace to get some fresh air.

  Unfortunately, she did so less often of late. Frau Hempleman was sick. She had a weak heart. She suffered repeatedly from heart attacks, after which she was confined to her bed for days. Mr. Hempleman constantly insisted that no one should upset his wife or tell her about any trouble at the station. At first, he had been annoyed by Kitten’s visits to his home, but Frau Hempleman never tired of telling him how happy the girl’s presence made her.