Easter Island (3 page)

“We are quite well,” replies Elsa.

It would certainly explain Edward’s offer. After so many years of bachelorhood, could the idea of marriage—and to Elsa, no less, who had not shown him a hint of affection in years—have been so tempting? If Father did ask, Edward would never tell. His decorum would prevent such a bald confession. But the possibility that she has been bartered discomforts her. Is this new life something laid out for her, something expected, as though her father had said,
Elsa will fetch the tea for you,
and she was now simply carrying in the steaming pot? Some thread of my own will, thinks Elsa, no matter how small, should be woven into my future. Even if I knew death was coming tomorrow, should I not be permitted to choose between poison and pistols?

She crosses the room to meet him. “Welcome home, Edward.” Resting one hand on his elbow, and straining her face upward, she kisses him on the cheek.

“Beazley!” Alice leaps up, her slender arms lassoing his neck. She pecks him with a series of kisses. “Beazley, Beazley, Beazley!”

As she squeezes him, he stands immobile as a statue, a marble saint surrendering to an odd ritual of affection.

“Allie, why don’t we let Edward sit and rest?”

He slowly extricates himself from Alice’s arms, lifts the leather satchel to his stomach, and spanks it affectionately. “There shall be no resting. Not tonight!” From the bag he produces a thick roll of papers, unfurls one, and palms it smooth on the lacquered side table. A map. Of South America. His index finger, hovering in the air, stalks the web of longitude and latitude. But as his hand descends, Alice snatches the map and drives it, with a yelp, toward the center of the carpet.

“Well!” he says. “It seems Alice likes the map!” Elsa takes the crayons from the carpet, shooting Alice a look of reprimand. Edward offers a mild but unconvincing laugh. His papers, particularly his maps, are dear to him. But scolding Alice seems, for Edward, unfeasible. Perhaps Elsa’s requests for understanding have worked.

“Well,” he pronounces, “maybe Alice would like to be our navigator.”

“Navigator?”

“An opportunity has presented itself, Elsa. An opportunity to explore another, as you said, ‘wonderful place.’ A terra incognita.”

“An expedition?”

“The Society has offered a commission.”

“Really? For us? Now?”

“There is much preparation necessary, of course. Travel arrangements, equipment. It shall be months before we can depart. But, yes, my dear. If you shall consent to it.” With a wide smile he opens his arms to her. His severity, his composure, his awkwardness, slips from him. “Consider it, if you will, my dear, a very long and adventurous honeymoon. But only, of course, if you approve.”

Elsa rushes forward, but on the periphery of his embrace she halts. “And
Alice
?”

“She would come with us. I shouldn’t have it any other way.”

A rose of excitement blooms within Elsa. A trip! She wants to ask where, but she must restrain herself—what if Alice refuses? What point is there in imagining a place she may not ever see? Go slow, she tells herself. Be moderate.

“Allie dear, how would you like . . . to go on a journey?” Alice’s eyes lift briefly from the map. Elsa turns to Edward, trying to curtail her eagerness: “I must consider this carefully. How it would be for her. If it would cause her distress. My decision depends on a great many factors.”

Edward’s hands plunge into the pockets of his coat. His head dips. “Most certainly.”

Is he disappointed at her lack of enthusiasm?

“It is her decision,” Elsa says firmly. “Or, the decision depends on her.”

But what of Elsa’s own desire? From the street below comes the jangling of carriage wheels, the sharp crack of a whip. She glances around at the towering armoire, the thick curtains, the dull and heavy gleam of this new home, this new life. The map, a yellow rectangle of possibility, seems to call to her from the dark carpet.
An expedition.

“Allie, it would be a journey filled with bird-watching.”

Alice glares at them both, eyes narrow with distrust. “What
kind
of birds?”

“Well, I’m not sure. Cape pigeons, I imagine. And petrels, and albatross.” Elsa looks toward Edward, who nods. “Oh,” adds Elsa. “And parrots.”

Alice, as though bored, twirls her braid. “Pudding is a parrot,” she says. She often speaks as though answering questions she has not been asked. “An African Gray parrot.”

“Do you think that Pudding would like to meet an Amazonian parrot?” Elsa asks.

“The Amazon is in South America. Pudding can’t fly to South America. That’s silly. There is a large ocean in between.”

“You’re quite right,” says Elsa. “That’s very silly of me. But, you know, Allie, we could
take
Pudding there.”

For a moment, Alice’s face goes limp, as though envisioning Pudding in a strange land, watching him fly from perch to perch, turning his gray face to the sun. Alice shuts her eyes, opens them again, and resumes her study of the map.

“Allie, would you show me South America?” Elsa moves toward her. “On that map.”

“Elsa, it
is
South America,” says Alice.

“Chile,” calls Edward.

“Very well. Show me Chile, Allie.”

At this, Alice brightens and vigorously flattens the map as though trying to smear the paper into the carpet. “Sit down, Elsa. You have to sit down. So you can see.”

Elsa crouches beside her.

“Ready!” announces Alice, poking at the western edge of South America. “Chil-ee. Chil-ee. Do you see? Look, Elsa.”

Huddling together, Elsa and Alice stare at the pink and orange and purple countries nestling one another, like particles clustered to a magnetic continental core.

“Alice,” Edward says from above, “move your finger a tad to the left . . .”

Alice’s small finger sets off from the coast, sailing slowly across the blue and empty Pacific.

“. . . ah, a little more now. Farther, a tad farther.”

Shadowing the Tropic of Capricorn, her finger navigates a straight course through the sea.

Finally, Edward calls through the room, “There.” The word is his arrival at this imagined destination. “There.”

Elsa squints at the speck of land and puts her arm around Alice. “That’s where we can go,” she says. “All the way there. All of us.” She can feel Alice’s breathing quicken. Alice has never traveled with Elsa; she has never left England.

“Through the
ocean
?” Alice mutters.

“Through the ocean, Allie. Just like Christopher Columbus. And Vasco da Gama.”

“Like . . . Hernando Cortez?”

“Like Hernando Cortez, Allie. And like Ferdinand . . .” Elsa lets the name hang in the air.

Alice’s eyes widen as she realizes the game. “Magellan!” she booms, her braids slapping her neck as she twists.

“And just like Captain . . .”

“Captain Cook! James Cook!” Alice’s head now rolls in delight; giggles cascade on every side. And she then recalls her favorite joke: “No, don’t cook James! Don’t cook James!” Alice leans hard into Elsa’s shoulder, nearly pushing her over. She squeals, and tickles, and sways, her exuberance scattering like raindrops. “Stop it, Elsa! You’re being silly. Elsa, you’re being silly.”

“Yes,” says Elsa, steadying herself against the force of Alice’s excitement. “I’m being very silly.”

At this, Alice giggles even more, then catches her breath. The familiar curtain falls. Rocking in silence, she scrutinizes the map, and then, with great concern, looks up. “Do they have a ladies’ room?”

Edward laughs, a genuine and hearty sound, the first that Elsa has heard from him. “I see I will have to make adjustments for the concerns of the ladies on this expedition.”

“Yes, Allie,” says Elsa. “They will have some sort of ladies’ room.”

“I’m allowed to go?”

“Absolutely.”

“Through the ocean?!”

“Yes, Allie.”

“And you are going too? You will be there?”

“Yes,” says Elsa, glancing up at Edward. “I will be there too.”

Edward nods ever so slightly and his eyes flash with pride, acknowledging receipt of her consent.

For a moment Elsa wonders if this whole scene—his question, her deliberation, Alice’s fervor, her answer—has been imagined by him beforehand, if Edward is not equally aware of her own strained pretense of freedom, and if he has not, in some way, been watching her with amusement. Could she, after all, have refused to go?

“Goodness me!” says Alice. “Goodness, goodness, goodness. I must pack my bag.”

A clap. Elsa sees that Edward’s hands have sprung together. Something like delight, or pleased confusion, sweeps his face. “Just a moment.”

From the hall comes shuffling, the sound of tugging, and soon he emerges with a large trunk in tow. Brass hinges shine against the unblemished black leather. He drags it toward the center of the carpet, then disappears into the hall and returns with another.

Alice has already pounced on the first; he sets the second beside her.

“Inside of each, ladies, you will find a vanity case, a satchel, and a journal. You should compile any further necessities onto a list and I’ll see that everything is—”

“This is mine?” Alice asks, unlatching the trunk before her.

“Yes,” says Edward.

“And that one?” Alice points to the other.

“That will be Elsa’s.”

Alice looks with dismay at the trunk before her, abandons it, and scurries toward the other. “This one is mine.”

“Alice, you can have whichever you like best,” says Elsa, rising. She feels dizzied by the haste of the decision, the map of this unknown land, and the knowledge that her life is once again about to be transformed.

“Edward, this is quite thoughtful of you. It’s a very kind gesture.”

“It is nothing. Proper luggage is a necessity. Again, any other necessities should be compiled on a list. I’ll make sure you have them, that we have everything.
In omnia paratus
.”

“Thank you, Edward.”

“No expressions of gratitude are in order. You, Miss Pendleton, are performing the great courtesy of accompanying me. I have for a long time dreamed of this trip. I am delighted you desire to go.”

It’s clear he did not for a moment doubt her consent.

“Of course,” says Elsa. “Of course I want to go. I was hoping that you would suggest something of the sort. I was, I suppose, even expecting it.”

“Ah! Yes! Really? How well, then, you feign surprise!”

She feels a blush begin, but Alice’s excitement saves her.

“Te Pito O Te Hen-oo-a?” Alice asks, her face inches from the map.

“Another language, Alice,” says Edward. “A Polynesian language. It means ‘the navel of the world.’ The English, however, call it Easter Island.”

“Is it far?”

“Oh, yes.” Edward’s voice is warm and satisfied. “It will take nearly a year to get there.”

Alice is happy. Edward is happy. So why should Elsa let Edward’s assumption bother her so? He only meant well. And she does, of course, want to go. After all, she’s had enough of gloom. This is an extraordinary opportunity.

Elsa looks down at her trunk, then looks at Edward and at Alice sitting with legs splayed around the map, and she thinks perhaps this is a moment of significance, that she will one day recall these images and the excitement she is now feeling, the sense of mystery at what lies ahead. Miles from this house, from this city, she will think back to this as a beginning—but of what? As Elsa tries to imagine the future moment from which she will look back, she feels the present moment slip from her, as though as she stands there in the drawing room she has become the memory itself: She is the recollection of herself at twenty-two, in England, in her fiancé’s house, her hands clasped, her eyes aglow, as her future self watches from a great distance.

“The mind,” says Edward, startling her from thought, “is always eager to begin scouting, is it not?”

“What? Oh, yes,” laughs Elsa, tugged back to the present. She is twenty-two again, simply crossing the room, moving toward her trunk. She throws it open like a giant book. Inside sits the vanity case, the soft leather satchel, the black and gold-leaf journal tied with a ribbon.

My imagination can do its reconnaissance, she thinks. But somebody must do the packing.

The next morning, at her dressing table, Elsa begins a postscript to her letter:

A trip I had been hoping for, well, it now seems it will happen. I shall be leaving Hertfordshire for quite some time. . . .

3

It was February 1973.

With practiced self-control, Greer Farraday closed her eyes as the small Lan Chile plane began its descent. The pilot had announced that the eastern tip of the island would soon be visible from the plane’s right side, Greer’s side, but she wanted to wait until the entire island was visible, to absorb it in one comprehensive view.

With her eyes closed, the propellers thrummed even louder in her ears. All around her,
Ooh
s! and
Magnífico
s! and
Dios mío
s! blossomed like a field of moonflowers. When finally the plane steadied and she opened her eyes, below her, like the jagged fin of a sea creature, the island rose from the water.

“
Vértigo?
” came a Spanish voice across the aisle. She turned to see the young man in the linen shirt studying her once again. His hair was dark brown, combed back, except for one thick strand that bisected his forehead. His cheekbones were high-ridged, his eyebrows two firm lines. He was handsome, and surprisingly unrumpled after the long flight. During the lunch service, when he had asked the stewardess for an extra piece of cake, Greer had offered hers: “I’m not eating it.
Lo quiere?”
He had accepted it with a smile, but his eyes betrayed surprise. She realized this was a breach of airplane etiquette—offering a portion of your meal to a stranger—and the dismayed stewardess returned moments later with a fresh piece, at which point Greer began reading her copy of Erdtman’s
Pollen Morphology and Plant Taxonomy;
this would assure them she wasn’t going to start offering around sips of her coffee.