His forbears had left the known world of Britain and Ireland in the mid- nineteenth century when the industrial revolution and famine had changed the fabric of those societies. Dislocation, desperation - in many cases an intrepid drive for betterment - propelled cohorts of men, women and children to travel to the unknown and it was only now that he was meditating on these facts. He felt like a member of a new breed but one old enough to venture forth in its turn, to connect with what was in its recent origins, a stone-age society.
Such ruminations were interrupted by a soft knock on the screen door and he hauled himself off the bed to answer it. A thin leathery man was standing there with a green woven kit at his feet.
‘Hello - talofa,’ said Lucky blearily.
‘Talofa lava.’
Two missing teeth and a damaged eye immediately aroused Lucky’s sympathy disposing him to whatever business was on offer. The man bent down and pulled some carved objects from the kit. He held up for inspection an outrigger canoe with white markings on the hull, a small carved turtle with a removable shell, and two wooden masks minimally worked and charming. Lucky took one of the masks gently as if he were handling Sèvres china and he stroked the smooth tropical hardwood. He felt a quasi-religious impulse which astonished him and almost sacrilegiously, he asked the price. The old man said simply,
‘Books.’
‘Did you make these?’ asked Lucky realising that his question had not been understood.
‘Only samples.’
The very naivety of sending such an unprepossessing salesman on a marketing mission somehow charmed Lucky further and he was prepared to pay anything. The gaunt fellow took a dog-eared notebook out of a pouch slung over his shoulder and showed him a page where someone had written a pricelist and a required 10% deposit. He wrote his name and the address of the hospital in a space underneath and he went inside to get the money.
When he had paid the man he shook his hand and said ‘Very beautiful’, hoping it was understood. In reply to his question ‘When?’ the gap- toothed traveller just grinned, picked up his kit and walked off.
‘Perhaps that’s what you call casting your bread upon the water,’ Lucky said to himself as he went inside to get ready for his afternoon shift at the hospital.
Chapter 28
One of the first people that Min notified of her telephone number was Yushi. A couple of hours later she heard the familiar put-put stop outside the house and he came in with a big grin on his face. Min didn’t want to tell him of her illness in case he fled in fear of infection which she knew she no longer had; nor did she want to dampen his enthusiasm for whatever was making him so happy.
‘What’s the good news then?’
‘I getting married to my girlfriend.’
‘But that’s wonderful news - when?’
‘Soon’.
Min had the idea that she must keep her spatial distance but she would normally have responded with a hug to such an announcement. She wrung her hands in a futile little gesture instead and waited for Yushi to say more. He stood grinning expectantly so she said,
‘Have you told your parents?’
‘No of course not. They in Japan.’
It was clear that the details of the plan had to be prised out of him and she wondered if any big decisions had been made or if the news was hot off the press.
‘When did you propose?’ She had to explain the technical term.
‘Yesterday.’
‘It’s very exciting. Is your girlfriend excited?’ Yushi sighed over this stumbling block.
‘Yes, she is…’
Min finished the sentence - ‘very excited.’ Would you like an English class now?’
Yushi nodded. ‘I need more English words to tell my my girlfriend that she is good person.’
Then Min remembered that they had been on the verge of exploring the vocabulary of romantic love when Mr Telephono had interrupted them. Min asked what sorts of expressions he wanted and Yushi asked her what she would say to her lover. Min was disconcerted by his directness and said,
‘It’s not quite the same.’
‘What does your lover say to you?’
As with the dancing episode she decided to ham this up so she began to fling her arms around and utter extravagant endearments like ‘I love you more than there are stars in the sky and sand on the seashore!’
Yushi was rummaging in his satchel for his notebook and pen as she improvised wildly in her embarrassment. When he started to write things down, saying slowly ‘I - love - you - and what after that?’ Min backtracked and said she was being silly.
‘If I want to say she is beautiful, what do I say?’
‘That’s a good start. Say “You are very beautiful and I love you with all my heart”.’
Yushi wrote diligently and smiled to himself. When he had finished he asked for words for anatomy and pointed to the bits he wanted. When he pointed to his chest, Min couldn’t decide whether to say ”breast” or “bosom”. She giggled inwardly when Yushi indicated that his girlfriend was bigger in that area than Japanese women. In the end Min offered a cover-all compliment “You have a lovely body, my darling”, and told Yushi that that was enough for the moment.
He invited Min to join him and his girlfriend (Min decided she’d leave “fiancée” for a later date when it looked as if this was more than a flash in the pan), at the Tin Pot cafe for a meal. The rest of the lesson was spent practising the expressions for ordering food and booking a table. Min had decided that she would not be a killjoy and bring up the business of sentences without verbs but would make a note to pursue such humdrum necessities when the euphoria had died down.
Just as Yushi was leaving Lucky/Michael arrived. Min addressed him by his new name and Yushi had no reaction but he was grinning as he shot off on his bike and Min explained the probable reason.
‘I hear you’ve been sick.’
‘Yes - I didn’t tell Yushi. I’m much better but I was very worried in the middle of the night.’
‘Now I see you’ve got the phone on, you can always ring me - and I
mean it.’
‘Thanks doctor.’ Michael winced as if Min didn’t think he meant it. She regaled him with the whole chain of events and he said simply,
‘Cryptospiridium.’
‘Well spotted - you’ll appreciate this – every time I threw up, I kept saying the word “chrystostum” and later I was trying to remember what it meant.’ Michael laughed.
‘If my store of useless religious information serves me, that’s some saint or other - perhaps he’s the patron saint of gut ache!’
‘That would put him quite low down in the pecking order.’
‘I s’pose it’s possible to go lower - but saints are not my specialty.’
Min wanted to ask him what his specialty was but instead she offered him some coffee. He turned down the offer and stood up to go.
‘I’m glad you have recovered and I was going to suggest that we try that new coffee shop which is run by a French couple from New Caledonia. They probably import the stuff.’
Min said she was very interested in the idea and she gave Michael her phone number.
‘You know - I hate it when people tell me to take care but I think this is one of those times when the expression fits.’
‘Don’t worry - I’ve learned my lesson but I’ll remember not to advise you to be prudent. It amounts to the same thing, come to think of it.’
She sat down at her worktable as soon as Michael had gone but she stared out of the window thinking about him and her feelings towards him. She liked him a lot and they spoke the same language which was always a comfortable situation. There was however, something guarded about the man and she had a strong intuition that he was a doctor, from his reaction to her flippant remark. After a while she got up because she would not be able to concentrate fruitfully and she dialled her parents’ number.
Chapter 29
The Tin Pot café was tucked into a tiny room i
n a side street a few hundred metres from the beachfront. Tourists were hardly ever seen there and it wasn’t mentioned in the few guidebooks for the area. The Chinese family who ran it relied on the expatriates with disposable income to maintain a clientèle. They served the generic fare considered to suit the western palate along with the inevitable incidence of pineapple.
Min arrived first and sat under the ceiling fan to cool down. She was offered a glass of water but she chose 7-Up from the fridge. The motorbike announced itself and she saw Yushi and pillion rider swing around to park by the door. To Min’s surprise, Fanua was carrying a bottle of wine wrapped in newspaper which she handed to Yushi at the door. He was smiling broadly as they approached the table and Min thought as she looked at the young woman, that he had very good reason to feel pleased with himself. She was dressed in a plain navy cotton dress with a dropped waist and big pockets edged with white. Min felt dowdy in one of the few outfits which she relied on to keep her cool and she wondered where Fanua did her shopping. As he put the wine on the table Yushi said,
‘From Bond Store. Advice from boss.’
‘New Zealand chardonnay - that’s nice - thank you.’ It hadn’t occurred to Min to buy wine because she was getting used to going without it. She would offer to pay for the meal.
A young woman in thongs, glided over to their table with menus and the words “le rhythme du pays” popped into Min’s head. It seemed to describe the demeanour of the locals perfectly. She waited while they studied the dishes and Min asked if she could have her meal without pineapple as it seemed to figure so much. A jerk of the woman’s eyebrows acknowledged the request and she took a pencil from behind her ear and poised it above her pad. When they had ordered, Yushi held up the bottle and looked at Min for the formula. ‘Would you mind,’ she said, and he turned to the waitress and said,
‘Would you mind open the wine?’ He looked at Fanua who smiled sweetly and Min made a mental note.
The meal came within a few minutes and they all picked up the chopsticks instead of the available china spoons. Min always grappled with those unfamiliar tools out of a sense of ethnocentricity-avoidance but she noticed that the true believers lifted the bowl nearer its target - a habit she couldn’t quite bring herself to copy. As she was taking her first delicate mouthful she was alerted to a disturbance in the artistic display of fruit and vegetables on the floor facing her. She froze and Fanua looked around to the focal point of Min’s stare. She saw a mouse sidling around among the foliage. Min’s phobia penetrated her veneer of manners and her distressed ‘Oh no!’ made Yushi stop and look around too.
His face was twisted with concern and Min felt ashamed and gauche. Surely she could master her feelings and let a little rodent go on its way. There was clearly much of interest to detain it where it was. Fanua said,
‘Are you afraid?’
Somehow Min mastered her discomfort and took her eyes off the floor display and said,
‘I’m fine. I just got a little shock that’s all.’
They resumed eating silently but Min looked furtively from time to time at the now discredited artistry.
In what struck her as a non sequitur, Yushi observed,
‘You are lonely person,’ and waited for her response. Were “lonely” and “alone” synonymous in Japanese, and was this just a kindly reminder that she lived alone?
Fanua looked uncomfortable but Yushi pressed on.
‘You look sad sometimes I think.’ Min knew she had a habit of frowning when she was unsure but Yushi wasn’t usually around at such times. Did this have anything to do with Michael’s visit? His language did not give him much scope for nuance or tact so she took the remark as kindly meant and said jokingly,
‘It can be your job to cheer me up. And I am really happy to see you and Fanua together. Let’s drink to the future.’
She changed the subject by enquiring about Fanua’s family and heard that she boarded with her aunt who lived in town, because her village was further away. Both Min and Yushi were surprised to hear that she had five brothers and four sisters and Min decided that family introductions had been sketchy until it appeared that several siblings were in New Zealand and one was in Los Angeles. Min asked how her parents felt about her marrying someone from Japan and Fanua said that it was OK, but they hoped she would not go there to live. Yushi smiled at this and said that they too might go to New Zealand - or Los Angeles.
When they got up to leave, he offered Min a pillion ride on his bike because it was not good to walk home in the dark. Min appreciated the offer and she gave Fanua a hug when she said she would wait in the café until he came back. The swift ride home reminded Min that she had dropped off the mobility ladder and she would really like to be “motorised” again, now that she had a telephone. She had had enough of deprivation.
The night was dense with blackness beyond the headlight’s beam which picked out the occasional solitary walker, unencumbered and slow. For a moment Min felt the thrill of timelessness which was represented by the ambling walker, and she witnessed a vision of the world as it had been for centuries in this place. She felt a pang of guilt for their piercing the still silence and thus shattering the natural order of things, but at the same time she was glad not to share the moonless darkness on foot.
She thanked Yushi and shook his hand and went inside to resume her romantic musings in the silence he left behind. This place was inducing stirrings which were new to her.
Chapter 30
When she rang her parents, Min was surprised to hear her father’s voice. It was usually her mother’s prerogative to answer phone calls on the “it’ll be for you” presumption.
‘This is a surprise,’ she said. ‘How are you?’
‘Not as young as I used to be. Your mother’s out tonight at a film with old Peg. She’s been asking her for ages. She’ll be terribly sorry to have missed you - look - can you ring back a bit later? I can’t imagine those two going out on the town.’
‘I can - but right now I’m talking to you.’
Her father was not a natural on the phone. He was no chatterbox at any time but he seemed to be put off by the absence of a face. Her mother on the other hand, used the telephone like the modern equivalent of the parish pump. She could spend hours “nattering” (as her father called it) and he and Min often used to sit listening to her rejoinders trying to guess who was on the line and what they were telling her.
‘I have a phone at last, so I’ve rung to give you the number in case you need it.’ Her father said they wouldn’t wait till they needed it.
‘Anyway, how’s it going up there in the islands?’
Min was half cross and half amused by the collectivisation of the diverse and scattered countries which were mostly unknown to his compatriots, unless they had fought in the Pacific during the Second World War. Her discovery of the Pacific neighbourhood made her impatient with the ignorance which she had so recently shared.
‘I’m busy, needless to say.’
‘Met any nice people?’
‘Some.’
Her mother would not be so direct but nevertheless would want the same information which Min was always unwilling to share with her parents. She was prepared to talk about the simple facts but felt an emotional block when asked to elaborate. Her secretiveness made her feel guilty because she had not found sufficient justification for it in her own mind.
‘Will you be taking holidays at Christmas?’
‘Probably.’
‘Would you be coming this way, by any chance?’
‘No idea at this stage. Have you any plans to go away?’
‘Not as far as I know. Unless it’s in a wooden overcoat.’ The slight cackle had an embarrassed edge to it.
‘Da-a-d!’
‘Well - you know - gotta be prepared.’
If her mother had said this, it might have been emotional blackmail but her father was too guileless for that. Or was he? Min suddenly wondered if she understood her parents at all
. She was hard on her mother she knew, but it was because she went on more about religion and its straitjacket taboos. Her parents’ relationship was a mystery because they were not demonstrative and their communication was limited to exchanges about daily chores and what they would eat at the next meal. Her mother was particularly exercised by this question and although Min knew that there was a sound practical reason for this, it still annoyed her.
‘I am such a shit,’ she repeatedly told herself but with hardly any conviction. It was time for her to get to the bottom of her emotional hang-ups and perhaps to forgive herself. The events of the last few years had put that process on hold.
‘How’s the garden?’
‘A bit water-logged - it’s pretty cold and wet here. I expect it’s nice and tropical up there in those islands.’
‘It’s still the dry season - there are two basic seasons - wet and dry. I haven’t been here for the really wet yet, but I’m told it’s steamy and uncomfortable. God help me.’
‘It’s good to hear that you’re still on speaking terms with God.’ Another cackle.
‘He’s very popular in his place, you’ll be pleased to know.’
After he’d copied down the number and said they’d ring Min soon, her father hung up with his usual ‘Ta Ta.’
She forced herself to look over her course plan which was due to be handed in but her father’s voice echoed in her head. If only she could return to the comfortable pieties of her childhood when Christmas and birthdays were the highlights which lit up the landscape for weeks before and after and the stars were simply twinkling additions to the night. She had loved Jesus in all his guises - as bleeding victim, chubby infant and kind shepherd. His sufferings had been intimately connected to her childish peccadilloes but she was never able to get a final resolution of the problem. Even if she thought she had been quite good in going without things in Lent and offering up going to the dentist for the Holy Souls, she could never quite settle the account. Someone was always telling you how sinful you were. The priests and nuns seemed to have a vested interest in something called Original Sin and when Min finally gave herself absolution from this antenatal crime, she had started to have a bit of fun. Something told her she still had a long way to go.