The Takamaka Tree (6 page)

Neither of them mentioned the kiss. They did not have to. But it changed Sandy. She was more relaxed and far less on edge. It was as if she had drawn strength from their momentary closeness. It comforted her.

“Now I have five things,” she said to herself, with a little smile.

Sometimes she stared at her drawings and wondered about them. Even she, with nothing to judge them by, knew that they were good.

Bella was doing the washing in the traditional Seychellois way, standing in a pool and dipping the clothes one by one into the water. She had a smooth granite stone on which to rub them. She used a big block of locally made washing soap, but for any really dirty patches she used a handful of coconut fibres, beating out the dirt.

She was laying them out on the grass in the sun to whiten when Sandy began to sketch the fat woman. The good washerwoman sprinkled her washing with more soapy water so that they would not be left too dry.

It was a lively little sketch, Bella’s ample legs astride in the pool, her skirt hitched up, the rounded cheeks of her good-natured face glistening with sweat. And everywhere around her, on the grass, on rocks and branches, hung an assortment of garments and rags, like an old clothes shop.

Sandy’s pencil flew over the paper. Palms, coconuts, striped bamboo, the long-tongued hibiscus, a tame tern, a hood-eyed gecko sunning himself on a rock…her sketch grew into a picture teeming with detail.

She did not show the picture to Daniel but tucked it away with some other sketches and forgot all about it. Some days had passed before Daniel came across the picture quite by accident. He carried it out to the veranda where Sandy was carefully mending her bikini bra strap which had torn again. She had on his old shirt, modestly buttoned.

“This is good,” he said.

She looked up and over her shoulder. “Oh, Bella doing the washing.”

“No wonder all my clothes shrink. Bella looks as if she’s attacking everything in sight. You ought to give this to Bella. She’d be tickled pink.”

“If you think she’d like to have it.”

Daniel was about to confirm Bella’s delight in such a gift when his sharp eyes caught sight of something totally out of place in the picture. The more he looked the more he was sure that there was a face peering through the foliage of the thick, broad-leafed ferns. A man’s face, clean-shaven, young and smooth, a lick of fair hair falling over his forehead.

For a moment Daniel thought there must be some stranger on the island, although he did not see how this could be possible. He knew every inch of the island; so did Leon. And there was no landing point for a boat. He had to have come ashore in Leon’s boat, through the only gap in the reef.

Daniel narrowed his eyes. The man was not on this island. A few additional strokes of Sandy’s pencil had made him sure of that. The stranger was wearing a collar and tie; no islander could bear such civilised strangulation in this heat. No, the face came from Sandy’s past, unconsciously mirrored in her mind, even if her eyes did not see him or her memory remember him.

It was uncanny.

“On reflection, I don’t think you ought to give Bella this picture,” he said quickly. “Perhaps she wouldn’t like to be immortalised forever with her skirts up. I think she would prefer something a little more dignified.”

He slipped the drawing back into the folder. He did not want Sandy looking at it again in case she saw the face and it alarmed her. If she thought she was seeing things, it might undo all the improvement of the last few days.

“The second thing I’m going to do when we get to Mahé is to buy you a new bra,” he joked. “If they sell such things. Probably all the same size.”

“And what’s the first thing, Mr. Kane?” Sandy asked demurely.

“A can of ice cold beer,” he said, savouring the thought. “An ice cold beer at the Pirate Arms.”

Daniel could not hide their departure forever. One morning a smudge on the horizon became the red sails of a locally built schooner. It anchored outside the reef and waited for Leon to go out to it in his flat-bottomed boat.

Sandy stood stock still on the sand, her arms full of coconuts. She had been going to cook something with the moist white flesh, but now she suddenly realised that her time on La Petite was almost over. In her nervousness she dropped one of the coconuts and it fell on her toes, but she hardly noticed the pain.

She could see people moving about on the schooner and that frightened her too. She did not want to meet any people. The small world of Bella, Leon and Daniel was enough.

Daniel was shifting boxes out onto the veranda. His mouth was set into a grim line. He did not want to leave either, but at least he was realistic. Paradise could not last forever. It was time to return to civilisation, whether he liked it or not.

“I’m not coming,” said Sandy from the beach. “I want to stay here. I don’t care if I never find out who I am.”

“You can’t stay here,” said Daniel hardly looking over the rail. He dragged out a crate of books and a couple of zipped leather travel bags containing his clothes. “There’s a new observer arriving.”

“I’ll stay with Bella,” she said stubbornly.

“Bella’s going too. This is just a job for her, a chance to make some money. She’s got a family and a husband on Mahé to look after. I think her cousin and husband are going to take over. Keeping it in the family, so to speak.”

“Oh, I didn’t know.”

She looked miserably at the growing pile of luggage. Daniel ignored her. The tempo of life was changing. He had to move into second gear, and it required some effort after these months of a leisurely pace.

The island was singing to her again, but the song was low and sad. She looked out to the line of foam breaking over the reef, half expecting to see some visible sign of the music. But there was only a scavenging frigatebird with forked tail and hooked bill, its powerful wings sailing the air, skimming and dipping down to the sea, snapping up fish.

Perhaps she could build herself some sort of shelter. The huge banana leaves would make a warm roof. She could eat like the Seychellois, living off the land, learning to catch fish in the shallows like Bella.

“Don’t be stupid,” said Daniel, reading her thoughts. “You couldn’t live here by yourself. You’re not tough enough. And what would happen when your last needle broke, you ran out of paper and your bra fell to pieces? You’d be sending up smoke signals hoping for a boat to come to the rescue. Always supposing you had any matches left.”

Sandy did not answer. He did not understand. He knew who he was, where he was going, what he had to do. She was nothing, no one, with nowhere to go. It was like stepping into a void. She felt like one of those small white naked bodies, tumbling through space into some sort of hell waiting below, in the death murals of the Middle Ages. There was one painted on the wall of a small church in Surrey…

But how did she know this? Swiftly she put the thought out of her mind. She clutched the whiskery coconuts hard against her breastbone, her arms clamped around them.

“Here’s a cardboard box for your shells if you want to bring them,” said Daniel. “Though there are plenty more shells on Mahé. And so many more beaches. Don’t expect me to pay for any excess on your baggage allowance.”

“You know I haven’t any money. Why rub it in?” Sandy did not recognise the Daniel she saw now. He was different from the man who had kissed her gently and warmly. “I know I’m totally dependent on your benevolence. Don’t worry, I’m well aware of that. I’d pay you back, every penny of it, if I could!”

Daniel sat back on his heels, amazed at the outburst.

“Keep your hair on, girl. It was only a joke. Not a good one, I admit, but there’s no need for this declaration of womanly independence.”

“I don’t want to be dependent on any man,” Sandy fumed.

“Good.”

“I’ll pay you back.”

“You’ve already said that. Splendid. I’ll make out a bill. Meanwhile, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve a lot to do.”

He turned his back. Sandy swallowed hard. They had almost quarrelled. Instead of him comforting her as she had wanted, she had provoked him to angry words. Somehow it had all gone wrong.

Leon was returning from the schooner with some passengers. They sat upright in the small boat as Leon negotiated the narrow gap. Bella hurried down to the shore to greet them, her face beaming. She was only too ready to return to the shops and noisy market of Port Victoria. She was not quite so enthusiastic about returning to the bosom of her family, at present being looked after by her out-of-work husband. But she missed her friends and their daily gossip. And she had plenty to tell them about this trip and the strange girl from the sea.

She shivered as she remembered Leon telling her how Miss-Sandy had run into the sea, her arms outstretched. Bella’s superstitious beliefs easily supplied an answer.

“
Gris-gris,”
she whispered to herself. She was afraid of the spirits and believed that some kind of spell had been put on the girl. She was going straight to see the Anglican Archdeacon and the Roman Catholic Vicar-General when they reached Mahé. If she saw both worthy men, she felt she would be safe.

A European clambered out of the boat and waded ashore through the shallows. He had thin legs like a stork. His neck was slung with cameras and other equipment. Sandy hid in the shadows of the bungalow.

He did not help the Seychellois couple, but left them to struggle out as best they could. The woman’s face was dark brown and lined like old parchment, her hair tied up in a ragged handkerchief. She was not a good sailor and the sea trip had been agony. She almost fell out of the boat in her eagerness to reach solid land. Her husband had a grizzled shock of white hair and a straggly moustache.

“Hello there,” called the man, spotting Daniel on the veranda. “Anybody at home?”

Daniel straightened up and went down the steps. Sandy shrank back out of sight, but not out of hearing.

“Nice to see you,” said Daniel, holding out his hand. “I’m Daniel Kane.”

“George Webb.” He pumped Daniel’s hand vigorously. “Marvellous place. Knock out. How are the birds?”

“Flying,” said Daniel patiently.

“What a pad.” George Webb was obviously intoxicated by everything he saw. He spun around, a little off-balance, dazzled by the sunlight and the glare from the white beach.

“Perhaps you’d like to have a look at what I’ve done so far,” said Daniel. “It’s very simple to take over.”

“Done it before, old boy. No trouble. Not here, of course. Nothing like this.” He never strung more than three or four words together. He spoke like a machine-gun.

Sandy saw the two men coming towards the bungalow, and suddenly darted into the palm grove behind. But George Webb’s sharp eyes caught sight of her.

“Hello, what’s that? One of the natives? What a girl! Are they all like that? Is she—you know? Friendly?”

Sandy was wearing her sarong, casually knotted over one hip, showing a flash of long brown legs.

“I have no idea,” said Daniel dryly. “I’ll show you around the island. It won’t take long, besides Leon will need an hour or more to ferry all our luggage and equipment.”

“I’ve brought tinned stuff. Bully beef. Plenty of tinned fruit. I like to eat well. Don’t trust their cooking. Curry and things.”

“There’s plenty of fresh food and the Seychellois know how to cook. There’s nothing more delicious than fresh fish straight from the sea.”

George Webb shook his head. “Got my own stuff.”

As soon as they were out of the bungalow and heading for the southeast plateau, Sandy darted back into her room. She sat on the edge of the narrow bed, trembling despite the heat. They were awful. All three of them. She had suspected that anyone outside La Petite would be unbearable and now she knew they were. She could not stay here with them either.

She clung to the thought of Daniel, of Daniel taking care of her. Surely if she was very careful and said nothing to annoy him, he would keep her beside him. He was the only person she wanted to be with. And if that meant she had to leave La Petite and go to Mahé, then she would have to do it. Even to London. She could not let Daniel go without her.

She gathered her few belongings. She packed her shells carefully into the box, using coconut fibres to protect the special ones. Daniel had already taken her drawings. For a moment she was annoyed, then she remembered her new compliance.

She changed into a shirt and jeans, then wrapped her few possessions in the skirt. She waited on the veranda, her heart aching with the hurt of leaving the island. She looked down the beautiful wind-swept beach, knowing that she would never see it again. It would always be here though, a white, sparkling, isolated paradise, when she would be many thousands of miles away.

Daniel came back the other way, surprising her. She steeled herself to look into his eyes.

“I’m ready to leave,” she said in a low voice. “May I take these things? Are they mine to take?”

She indicated her small parcel. There was no expression in his deep eyes. She did not know whether he was still annoyed or amused.

“By jove, it’s the native girl.” George Webb quickened his pace across the sand. He was hampered by his laced walking shoes.