Beyond the Coral Sea: Travels in the Old Empires of the South-West Pacific. Michael Moran
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beings who bring epidemics.’
‘Yes, but what do they do exactly? How do they catch you?’
‘They pounce from a high place and rip out your entrails, eyes and tongue. They snap your bones then they devour the rest of your corpse.’
Those inflamed, leaden eyes might well have witnessed such ghoulish instincts in action.
‘When does this happen?’
‘Usually when there’s a storm. If you smell shit when you’re fishing out at sea, watch out! Then the flying witches will attack by the squadron! They stink!’ he laughed out loud, but without conviction.
‘They’re objects of real terror to these people. It’s no joke because their powers are inherited, carried in their belly. Sometimes the spirit leaves them when they’re asleep and goes marauding.’
I tried to imagine a world where such beings were an everyday part of consciousness. The books of J. R. R. Tolkien approached such a phantasmagoria, but his cruelty was of a different order.
‘Sorcerers don’t have the power they did in the old days!’ and he looked dreamily out to sea.
The boys had begun diving for pebbles and shells.
‘Have you lived here long?’
‘Only about sixty years. I came here when I was five.’
‘Sixty years on tiny Samarai! I think I would have gone mad.’
‘Well, I did. I live over there now. On Ebuma.’
He pointed to a perfect tropical islet surrounded by glittering sand lying a couple of miles offshore.
‘It belongs to the Prime Minister. I’m just the caretaker. My name’s Ernie, by the way.’
I introduced myself … ‘Ebuma looks like everybody’s dream island.’
‘Why don’t you come over for a few weeks? We could talk. I could show you the fishing rats. They come down to the shore at night and dangle their tails in the water as bait. Small crabs catch hold and they whip it quickly round to their mouth and fasten onto the crab. Munch, munch!’
‘You’re having me on, Ernie!’
‘There are strange things around here all right. If you see a swordfish leaping out of the water and going crazy, they have a borer in the brain.’
‘What the hell is that?’
‘A sort of parasite drills into the sword and works its way up the shaft into the brain. The fish goes mad.’
‘What a place! Look, Ernie, I’m going to Kwato tomorrow, so I might call in on the way back.’
‘It’s up to you.’
I could not quite leave this mine of information without a last question.
‘A lot of interesting people came through Samarai, didn’t they? Malinowski, for instance.’
‘Oh, him. You know he used to take opium while he was on the Trobriands? Probably did here too. Hancock, was it Hancock? Can’t remember. Anyway, old Hancock told me about it. He was a little boy when the great man came here. Malinowski criticised him as being a spoilt brat in the famous diary. Payback.’ He chuckled.
‘Come over and see me for a couple of months. We can just eat and drink there … on the beach. I’m working on another boat at the slipway just over there. You could help. Want to earn a few kina?’1
A boy of about ten was running about behaving strangely, banging the walls of the warehouse with his head, laughing manically and fighting off a group of teenage tormentors. He seemed to have no control over his muscles and flopped about like a rag doll.
‘He’s a bit simple,’ Ernie answered my enquiring glance. Boys were leaping into the water in an endless circle.
‘May see you tomorrow then. Come over for a month.’ He wandered away towards the Ladua.
I was sitting on the edge of the wharf when suddenly I was struck from behind by the flailing fists of the disabled boy. He seemed to have gone completely mad and was making the constricted sounds many damaged people make. It became quite painful and I began to slip towards the water. Some of the local boys rescued me and used the incident to give him another beating. He disappeared round the corner of a shed squealing like an animal.
I crumpled in the shade against the gnarled bole of an ancient rosewood growing near a tiny beach. Fragile canoes with delicately lashed outriggers were drawn up amidst scattered coconuts stranded by the tide, the fibre of the husks trembling in the breeze. Women were leaving the market with bundles and launching their canoes to paddle to nearby hamlets. I drifted off to sleep under a blazing copper sky only to be woken by a lizard crawling down my neck. A mangy dog began timidly to sniff my boot as dusk softly enfolded the island in the wings of a giant moth.
The grass-paved street that led back to the guesthouse was dusted with pink and white frangipani rouged by the last light, the pink trunks of coconut palms leaning over a darkening sea. The lonely bell from the Anglican church marked the hour. Wallace was seated on his usual perch by the table playing patience.
‘So, you’re back. I thought you’d been eaten!’ and he laughed wickedly.
‘No, but I almost ended up under the wharf. That disabled boy tried to push me in.’
‘Oh, he’s harmless, a sweet child really. Tomorrow you go to Kwato. The pastor is coming in the morning to take you over.’
‘Great. Look, I’ve bought a few beers, Wallace. Let’s have one and you can tell me about that Englishman.’
‘Oh, him! Not much to tell.’ He grimaced as if I had prodded a painful injury.
‘He came to Samarai like they all do for a few days, but stayed on. He decided we could restore the guesthouse and went back to England to get the money. Work began and the scaffolding was put up. I built a dancing area in the traditional style.’
‘Yes, I saw it. Beautiful local carving on the posts and boards under the roof.’
‘Beautiful, yes. But I only used it once. He was an alcoholic and ran up debts everywhere.’
‘I had an Irish business partner like that. He drank all the profits.’
‘Well, then he left, disappeared into thin air taking what was left of the money with him. I had huge bills to pay. Electricity, workmen. It broke me.’ I began to understand why the whole building was surrounded by old, bleached scaffolding. Time had stopped for Wallace as it had for Mrs Havisham.
‘Did you tell the police?’ The moment I asked the question I realised it was ridiculous out here.
‘The police? They aren’t interested in things like that.’
‘Yes, but …’
‘He’s being sought in London. He’s thought to be in Thailand.’ The story had the faded, melancholic glamour of a sepia print.
‘He sounds a typical predator. Islands attract them.’
Dinah was preparing dinner and the table had been set with more bright green cordial and chicken, taro and pineapple. I poured a glass of pure, chilled rainwater.
‘Is there any local music?’ Mercifully, I had not heard any recorded music in the villages of East Cape, just distant garamut1 drumming. The silence was inspiring.
‘Oh, yes! Music! That’s what I should be playing during the dinner.’
Depression had caused him to forget the past pleasures of hosting guests. Standards had slipped following the Englishman’s betrayal years ago.
‘My