East of Outback (3 page)

He wrenched himself to a sitting position. Wet sand stuck to his face, his hands, his clothes. Rain drummed all around him, quiet and steady.

Captain Foulard plopped to the sand beside him, still laughing. “Y’re a tiger, lahd. Couldn’t convince y’ to let go daht boom for nutting. Hahf ‘spect you to drahg it clear bahk to Broome.”

“Wha—What about the others? Surely we’re not the only ones. . . .” Colin couldn’t get his chest and throat to clear, and he still coughed violently.

The captain sobered. “Cahn’t say, lahd. When you feel more like it, we’ll start de long walk home. No doubt we’ll pick up a clue here and dere ’long de way.”

“I’m up to it now,” Colin lied. He managed to gain his feet on the second try. He felt a deep urge to take the boom along. “This is part of your sea anchor, isn’t it?”

“Aye, lahd. She tore loose ahnd we broached.” The captain led the way, the distant ocean on their left, the endless beach before and behind them.

A dark spot on the horizon became a beached boat as they approached.
Hardin Belle
could be distinguished on her trailboards. Colin didn’t recognize that one.

He turned to gaze out over the water, and stopped suddenly. “Captain Foulard! Look out there—on the surf.”

“Aye, lahd. Let’s take a look.”

They left the high water line and walked through spongy sand to the sloshing surf. The limp form of a man’s body washed in and out, in and out, face down. The two reverently dragged it above the high tide line and left it, neither having the strength to bury it. It was unmistakenly the body of Sake Tamemoto.

As the sun rose higher, the rain ended, and the leaden overcast began to break up. “Rest,” said the captain, and with that Colin flopped prostrate, gratefully, on the sand.

“Captain?” he mused, “Where you from?”

“Lotsa places. Born in Hawaii, raised in Tahiti.”

“Kanaka?” He was almost incredulous.

“Aye. Now, why you giggling?”

Colin watched the clearing sky overhead as it changed from gray to patchy blue. “My father and grandfather both came to a lot of grief for using Kanakas in the sugar cane fields at the beginning of the century. Labor troubles.”

“Slavers.”

“So they say, but my father wasn’t. If you met him you’d know. He’s so—so pious. Righteous. He hired many, not just Kanakas. In fact, he hired Mum out of Ireland.”

“And mahrried her. A romahntic tale.”

“Yair, guess so. Mum says ‘twas a handsome plantation. Sugarlea.”

“Ahnd daht’s why you were giggling?”

“No. Just thinking. My father had all that trouble about Kanakas, and didn’t like them a bit, and now here’s one who saved his son’s life. There’s a twist, you see?”

“You saved y’r own life, lahd. Niwer seen a mahn cling to nutting like you clung to daht boom.”

“But you attached me to it.” Colin sat up, cupping his ear. “Listen! Is that a motor car?”

“Or a truck. ‘Twill be ahead of us, coming south from Broome. Rescuers come to clean up de beach, I vow.”

“Captain? You think maybe the
Gracie
made it?”

“I know she didn’t.” Deep, deep sorrow rumbled in his muted voice. “Heard her go down in de dark, gurgling. Almost sucked us under with her as she went.”

Colin watched the cloud of sand and dirt the vehicle kicked up, and then the truck came into full view.

As the open, stake-sided truck came rumbling down the beach, a familiar voice called to them from the truck bed. Colin scrambled to his feet, and it ground to a triumphant halt beside them.

“Is you! Hey, is you!” Dizzy came leaping joyfully over the side. He hugged Colin. He shook the captain’s massive paw. He bubbled over between his Spanish and fractured English.

Colin grabbed both his arms and shook him. “Sake’s drowned. What about Ariel?”

“Sake?” Dizzy’s face melted instantly from joy to sadness. “Don’ know ‘bout Ariel. That mast, Col, it wipe me right off the boat. I thought I was gone, but that mast, Col, it saved me. I tied myself onto it and it saved me. Don’ know ’bout Ariel.” He shook his head. “Sake!”

The truck driver and his two companions were urging Colin into the back of the truck. He clambered up into the bed and leaned against the stakeside; the captain followed and sat beside him. They lurched on down the beach, as fast as could be managed on the wet sand.

“Captain Foulard,” Colin asked after he’d collected his thoughts, “what’re you going to do now?”

“Sign on with some other lugger, and start saving up.”

“You really don’t have any insurance?”

“Naw! De insurance men, dey never risk deir money on no lugger. She sail good for twenny years, den some cockeye bob come ‘long like dis one, she go down. You lose her, you lose her. Got nutting now, same ahs when I was born.”

Colin felt his breast pocket.
Could it be there yet?
Yes! It had not been lost in all that wild, terrible storm.

“That’s not exactly true, sir.” His fingers groped in the sandy, wet pocket, still sticky from the oyster flesh. He fished out the pearl and laid it in the captain’s hand, and in the same instant an immense weight lifted from his heart and soul. Who would guess a pearl could weigh so heavily? ‘This should make a down payment on a new lugger, don’t you think? It was won from that last day’s shell.”

Everyone in the back of the truck—the two strangers with shovels, the captain, and Dizzy—froze, arrested by the cleanest and loveliest of all gems. They crowded around, slamming into each other as the truck lurched forward.

The captain studied Colin with a gaze of unmistakable awe. “Y’re a dinkum lahd, a thousand times over! Ahbso-bloody-lutely!” He turned it around and around in the palm of his hand. “Looka daht! Best pearl come outta Broome in years. Seventy, seventy-five grains, aht least.”

The sun emerged full strength and set the pearl to glowing.

“Down payment? The whole lugger, lahd, and den some. But money be de least of it. Ah, lahd, think of the price paid for dis pearl. Think of de price.”

C
HAPTER
T
HREE

M
ADMAN’S
T
RACK

Amid salmon-pink sand dunes and endless flats, just north of the dense, green mangrove thickets of Dampier Creek, Broome marched to her own secret drummer. Mostly her ear bent to the endless tides, quite deep on this northwestern Australian coast. At high tide large ships tied up at the long white jetty. Come low tide, they lay atilt like stranded whales, a quarter of a mile from water.

She listened, too, to the seasons of storms; the gentle sun of winter and the raging destruction of the occasional willy-willy come down off the Timor Sea. Sydney throbbed to its own bustling beat; Broome adopted the gentle pulse of the world God made.

Colin Sloan stood at the crest of a pink dune on Broome’s foreshore, contemplating lines. The ragged green line to the south marked the mangroves of Dampier Creek. The fluffy green line behind him marked the trees shading Broome’s streets and bungalows. The hazy ruler-level line before him divided emerald sea from azure sky.

Quiet sea. Serene sea. Cloudless blue heavens. Why could Colin not feel any of this peace?

He turned, in no particular hurry, and skidded down the dune. Near the tin sorting shed where the street ended above the sloping beach, he sat down to empty the sand from his shoes. From within the shed came the gentle clack of shell on shell. Colin wandered over and looked inside.

In the gloom lay mounds of shell, mountains of shell. So this was where all the three-hundred-pound sacks of the stuff ended up. In the midst of the mountains came that clacking. Colin waited until his eyes adjusted, then went exploring.

An Aboriginal half-caste sat on a stool tossing shell. Nearly as broad as he was tall, he filled the little stool and then some. He glanced at Colin and grinned, his huge teeth as bright as any pearl.

He flicked two small, thin shells into a bin reserved for the smaller variety. “I know him. Him be Sloan feller survive
Gracie
.”

Colin felt his cheeks warming. “I’m that famous?”

“Pearl you save, famous. Gus feller, already get bid—new boat.”

“That was just this morning. You must hear all the news. Do you know if they found the Koepanger yet? The one called Ariel?”

“Him bad gone, no find. Shark maybe.”

What price, pearls
. Colin thought, but he didn’t speak it out.

A small brown shadow, a merest motion, caught the corner of Colin’s eye. “You have rats in here. I just saw one.”

“Too right. Rat heaven; him lotsa place hide, lotsa dry bits oyster him eat.”

Clyde Armbruster used to tell Colin that if you see a rat out in broad daylight, you can count on a hundred lurking undetected. In fact, just after the great war Clyde bought two big tomcats for the stables, simply because he saw one rat at noon. Were there hundreds right here in the shed? Colin shuddered at the thought.

“I never knew what happened to the shell after you unload it at the jetty. You sort it out by size?”

“Too right. Here. Him grade Extra Heavy, see?” The man held up a thick shell, seven inches across at least. He threw it over into a bin of similarly sized shells. “Big shell, little shell, no worries. Easy sort. Middle shell—no big, no small—him make puzzle; need good eye.”

Colin spent another twenty minutes with the lively man, trying to tune his ear to this Aboriginal brand of semi-English, talking about shells, and learning more than he really wanted to know about boats lost in past storms. Finally, he took an opportunity to leave, and walked out into the dusty street.

Not much sign of the killer willy-willy remained here in town.
I wonder what it looks like down in Port Hedland?
News reports claimed a killer storm a month ago had wrecked that port. No serious wreckage marred the tranquility here on the rim of nowhere. The solid wooden storm shutters on the white bungalows, lowered during high wind to protect windows, were all raised again. A few trees were down, a lot of branches and fronds, a couple of fences. That was all. Colin had noticed earlier that some buildings were literally tied to the ground with cables and guy lines. Now he understood why.

Captain Auguste Foulard stood under a tree near Sheba Lane, in a cluster of half a dozen men. Out of sheer curiosity, Colin crossed the wide street and joined them.

They were gathered around a rickety little table under a poinciana tree, and at the table sat a wizened fellow of undecipherable ancestry, probably Malay or similar descent. He had planted both elbows on the table, and with a three-corner needle file he was working away at a pearl, inches from his face.

A powerful hand slapped Colin’s back. “Here’s de lahd!”

Colin smiled and caught his breath. Quickly regaining his composure, he asked, “Is this your pearl he’s working on, sir?”

“Aye, lahd.”

“Thought you were going to sell it.”

“Feel risky today.” The captain smiled. “You see, lahd, a pearl must be cleaned, like dis mahn is doing. Remove one skin or more until all de blemishes be taken away. Wit every skin, another grain is gone. De pearl trader, he pay me good money for de pearl, den he take a risk, see how small de pearl become. But mebbe I cahn get better money—if I clean it first ahnd it stays big, I win. If it grows small, I lose.”

“I see. And you think it’s worth the risk.”

“Too much hahppen to daht pearl, lahd. Charmed, daht pearl. I’ll win.”

Colin dropped to a squat, bringing his eyes closer to the level of the pearl. Rapt, he watched the skill and precision of this nameless pearl cleaner. For a long time the fellow worked, and no one moved. There was nothing hurried about the beat of Broome’s drummer. The man dipped the pearl in a little dish of powder, rubbed it, swished it in a cup of scummy water, then laid the pearl on the pan of a tiny scale.

The onlookers craned their necks to get a reading. Those who could see nodded knowingly and smiled.

The captain beamed. “Knew I’d win! Less’n three grains lost in the cleaning! And is perfect!” His voice dropped. “Perfect.”

For the first time the pearl cleaner raised his head. His eyes glowed with pride and triumph. He dropped the pearl into Auguste Foulard’s waiting palm. The captain held it out on display.

Colin caught his breath. A murmur of approval and awe rose from the onlookers. Even before cleaning, this pearl delighted the eye. Now, with its soft rose glow, it absolutely dazzled the mind and heart.
Like a virtuous woman
.

Colin could not refrain from asking the question everyone else either knew already or wanted to ask: “What is it worth. Captain? Do you know?”

“My new lugger ahnd den some, lahd. Ahnd den some! Now I go to de buyer. Dis is so perfect, it likely bring seven thousand aht least.”

The show over, most of the group dispersed. Colin followed Captain Foulard out into the street.

The captain was nodding, with a spring to his step Colin had not noticed before. “Five hundred pounds to Sake’s widow and his kids. Commission to Ben dere, de cleaner. Couple hunnert pounds to you, lahd, for saving it, and I still got my next lugger!”

A couple hundred pounds!
That was certainly more than Colin had expected to have in his pocket. When your boat goes down you use up all your luck surviving. There’s nothing left, including your job. All the luggers out working were fully manned, and there was scant employment ashore here until next lay-up.

Colin saw a familiar face across the street. “Excuse me, please, sir. G’day.”

“G’day, lahd!” The captain whanged him another clap on the back. Captain Foulard went his way toward the pearl buyers, and Colin crossed the street to Dizzy.

The little man sat dejected on the bench in front of the post office, staring at the pink dust.

Colin flopped down beside him. “G’day, mate.”

“
Buenos días
.” No smile. Not an acknowledging nod. Abject gloom.

“Let me guess. You didn’t get that job you wanted out at the livery stable.”

“Good bet. You win.” Dizzy lurched suddenly, rearranging his wiry body. “He said he don’ need more ringers, he need less horses. Ain’ nobody use horses no more; he got too many, no work. Gonna slaughter a couple if he don’ sell ’em.”