came from so far below that it gave the impression of rising mockingly from the depths like the cry of some ghostly denizen of Davey Jones’ locker – or indeed Mister Jones himself, inviting the unwary sailor to descend into his watery clutches.
“Down you come”? Easier said than done, I thought. Rope ladders had never been my stock in trade - let alone those dangling from the sides of sea vessels, lurching in sub-tropical swells, into even more wildly lurching and perilously over-laden longboats.
Nevertheless it appeared the thing would have to be done, and better sooner than later. Yes, I determined, best get it over with. Now is the moment, I thought. Yes indeed, I decided, let us without further …
“Come on now, sir! Before the next change of tide, if ye please!” Hoots of laughter from the other sailors and passengers at this.
I gritted my teeth and took firm hold of the ladder with both hands, heaved myself awkwardly over the side and, not daring a seaward glance, started to inch painstakingly downwards, scraping and bumping my already bruised knee against the side of the ship. And bruising the other one to match it, along with both elbows for good measure. In this fashion I made my way towards my destination, bobbing unsteadily such a daunting distance below.
After what seemed hours of diligent scrambling, I had very nearly attained the relative safety of the smaller vessel - when, perhaps a little over-eager to reach it and the promise of dry land beyond, I slipped from the ladder and fell with a squawk and a splash into the swirling water between ship and boat.
I rose paddling wildly to the surface, choking and spluttering, my only thought at this instant being how terribly farcical it was to have survived such a long and gruelling journey, only to drown within a few oarstrokes of the shore. In the rush of water churning around my head I could almost hear Davey’s voice, laughing in mockery: Ha ha, got another one. Down you come, doctor. All the way down.
In the next instant, however, I felt several strong hands grasping my arms and coat, and I was hauled most unceremoniously up over the gunwale and into the longboat. There I lay on my back with my legs kicking helplessly in the air like some half-drowned insect, to the unkind guffaws of sailors and passengers alike.
Slowly I heaved myself onto the end of a box and sat there exhausted and bedraggled, dripping and gasping for breath atop the luggage - as the oars were manned and we set off for the beach. Each new lurch threatened to bring up once more the now merely theoretical contents of my stomach.
2. EMPIRE BUILDERS
Along the dusty street that runs in front of Government House, a rather impressive couple come sauntering grandly, arm in arm.
These two are dressed to the nines. He in broad-brimmed black hat and tie, dark waistcoat, frock coat with silver buttons, and ruffled shirt-front. She, the taller of the two, looms above him in full-length brocaded and billowing bustled gown, buttoned high at the neck, and topped by an enormous floral hat and ornate frilled parasol. Despite the shade offered by this, both are perspiring visibly, their outfits clearly excessive in the baking South Pacific heat.
As these two very fine personages draw level with the rough stone façade of Government House, the Reverend Staines emerges from behind it. He falters in his step as he catches the gaze of the grand couple, and grins awkwardly and perhaps a trifle guiltily. They saunter to a stop in front of him.
“Good day to you, Reverend Staines” comes the cultured and just faintly European-accented voice of the lady. She is a woman of stature and some beauty, mature and somewhat hardening though it appears. A droplet of perspiration clings to the end of her aquiline nose – down which she looks imperiously at the chaplain as he performs his characteristic gesture of fiddling with his besmirched clerical collar, pulling it up nervously in a manner perhaps symbolic of his constantly faltering struggle to carry the personal burden of its moral responsibilities. He twitches slightly and lowers his head in what he fondly imagines to be a charming, chivalrous posture, but which manages only to achieve the visible status of fawning.
“Ah … good morning, Lady Anastasia … er, Colonel McMurdough”, he adds quickly, though never taking his batting eyes from the lady. “Lovely day for it.”
The lady merely inclines her head in a response of polite and dignified elegance; but the Colonel returns the greeting with haughty blankness upon his rather broad, nondescript face. “For what?”
Anastasia rolls her eyes with exasperation, hissing through clenched teeth to him: “It’s a figure of speech, Montague …”
Her husband nods ponderously in something short of full understanding, figures of speech being definitely not his forte.
The Chaplain now sees an opportunity for further oiliness and flutters his eyelashes with renewed vigour at the lady, as he oozes the double-entendred answer: “For delighting in the delicate beauties of Creation, Milady.”
She raises one eyebrow ever so slightly and smiles, lowering her eyes with an exaggerated demureness of acknowledgment. In the severely limited social environment of the colony, such flattery must be taken wherever – and, more to the point, from whomever - it may.
Colonel McMurdough meanwhile raises his own eyebrow, rather less subtly; but he’s apparently not quite sure whether to be suspicious about the turn of the conversation, or how suspicious to be – such finer judgments of human motivation also not being his forte.
“Indeed”, he finally manages to respond with what he imagines to be the subtlest hint of warning – given that he is not quite certain whether any warning, or how much warning, is warranted.
At this point the Reverend, deciding this banter has probably been pursued as far as he dares, abruptly changes his tone to one more businesslike. “Ah well,” he blurts, “must be getting on. Got a flogging to attend to.”
And rubbing his hands together with barely disguised glee at this prospect, and with no sense of irony at the rather contradictory shift from the delicate beauties of creation to the brutal realities of corporal punishment, he turns to go; but then stops short as he remembers: “Oh, by the way, the ship has come in.”
“Has it now?” responds the lady with a sharp narrowing of the eyes; and her husband reacts a good beat later, still only half way towards taking in the information, speed of comprehension being yet another item in the fairly large catalogue of intellectual skills which, we’re discovering, are not his forte:
“Ah. Indeed.”
To the McMurdoughs, word of the ship’s arrival is something of a double-edged sword. It’s partly good news, carrying the prospect of addition to their livestock, crops and other items helpful to the furtherance of their prosperity - which is, not unfair to say, the paramount consideration for both of them. And then there are those items of expensive furniture, fine clothes, spirits, gourmet delicacies and other trappings of their station. Some of these have been long awaited – Anastasia in particular feeling their absence keenly, being a woman accustomed to the very best that life has to offer.
But the ship’s arrival also carries the possibility of contact from Europe; and they both feel vaguely apprehensive – he rather more vaguely than she – of anything untoward which might have followed them here from the old life, anything they might prefer had been left well behind.
“Good day to you” lubricates the Reverend’s departing bulk, and they half-heartedly return the formality, still partly occupied in exchanging the apprehensive look about the ship’s arrival.
Staines hurries off past Government House – through the window of which, there are figures in animated conversation.
Sir Henry Blythe, second Governor of His Majesty’s Colony of Port Fortitude, sits before a large