Wind Raker - Book IV of The Order of the Air (11 page)

“I’m entirely at your disposal,” Jerry answered, and she moved away, leaving him and Beatrice by the lanai doors. She looked at him as if he’d passed some test more significant than any in the ritual, and he knew perfectly well what it was. “I don’t disapprove,” he said. “I’ve just never met a racially mixed couple before.”

“Unsurprising, since there isn’t a state in the Union where they could marry,” Beatrice said tartly. “Fortunately, New Zealand is more — lenient.”

He suspected she had been going to say reasonable. “I’m glad for them,” he said. He was certainly aware of the dangers, couldn’t help wondering how they had managed during their year at Yale. When he had first roomed with Iskinder in his own college years, he’d observed the care with which Iskinder interacted with other students, friendly and personable and outgoing with the men, but entirely abstracted and cool to women. He’d wondered — hoped, as he got to know Iskinder better — if Iskinder simply didn’t like women much. And then he’d realized that it had nothing to do with that, but was rather that any kind of friendship with a white woman was a minefield. It could so easily become a disaster for her, the kind of thing that ruined one’s reputation and prospects for life, and for him — well, it probably wouldn’t have been lethal within the bounds of Harvard College, especially not when he was a prince of Ethiopia, but there were certainly places where so much as speaking to a white woman could only end with a death. Not all of them were hundreds of miles from Cambridge, either.

Of course going the other way was more acceptable. There were men who scouted the jazz clubs of Harlem and the South Side the way he had scouted Times Square, who took up with dancers in the jazz revues the way he might take up with a Broadway chorus boy. But it was the same thing, a peculiar vice. A kink. A dubious and dangerous taste, whether one liked Josephine Baker in high camp or golden-haired boys in drag. A white woman married to a brown-skinned man was an enormous exception in good society, and their position would never be entirely secure. He wondered how it was in Hawaii, where there were so many races mingling in such close quarters, imagined it could go either way.

Bea was still watching him, her expression intent. “I truly don’t disapprove,” Jerry said. “One of my best friends…” And then he stopped, coloring, aware of how it sounded. “My roommate all through college…” And that was no better, but Bea only smiled.

“One of my best friends, too. Peter and Margaret are dear friends. And I don’t mean to be rude. I may be just a little protective of them.”

“I understand,” Jerry said. Certainly anyone who was rude to Iskinder would never be a friend of his.

Her face relaxed a little, and she stepped out into the relative darkness of the lanai, its rafters strung with lanterns. Jerry followed, unsure what the invitation meant, but glad they were fully out of Margaret’s hearing.

“If Dr. Radke is going to be difficult, don’t invite him,” Bea said. “Margaret doesn’t need to hear anything about German racial theories.”

“Certainly not over a meal,” Jerry said. She couldn’t avoid them in academia, no one could, but one did not have to have them at the dinner table. “I don’t actually know what Radke’s politics are, but of course I won’t bring him if there’s any chance of him being unpleasant.”

“No, I know you won’t,” Bea said. She tugged a dead leaf from one of the plants along the railing. “That’s what my book is about. The one that’s out next year. It’s a love story with an interracial couple.”

“It must have been hard finding a publisher,” Jerry said. He frankly couldn’t imagine that a single New York house would touch a book like that.

“You have no idea,” Bea said. “It’s being published by a small press here in Hawaii. My first book was only published in France. I translated it myself because no American house would take it.” She took a sip of her drink, looking out into the palm fronds stirring in the night breeze. “This one is about an Englishman who is left in Hawaii in the eighteenth century and his Polynesian wife. Not that they’re ever married in the Church of England, or that she accepts his god except as one more truth among many. It’s about their twenty-five years together, and how they do and don’t reconcile their cultures.” She glanced at him sideways, a smile playing about her lips. “Most people would consider it a very immoral book.”

“I don’t think so,” Jerry said, startled into more truth than usual. “Love is always sacred. Love is love.”

She smiled at him again, the corners of his eyes crinkling, and he wondered if he’d said far too much. “Love is so big. It doesn’t belong in a little box. Any relationship between adults who consent to it is no one else’s business.”

Jerry froze for a fraction of a second, then made himself take a drink of George’s lethal cocktail. Did she know about Radke, about him? Was it his behavior, or a lucky guess? Clairvoyance? He wouldn’t put that past her. Or was it simply a Free Love platitude, and he fled like a guilty man?

“But I won’t have Dr. Radke being rude to Margaret,” she said briskly. “I just won’t stand for that.”

“No, indeed,” Jerry said, relieved to find his voice steady. “That would never do.”

Chapter Five

T
hey were disembarking at noon. Douglas rolled the new word over in his head, enjoying its syllables even though he knew it just meant “getting off the boat.” The suitcases they had had with them in the cabins were all packed again, and Mrs. Sorley said the trunks they’d watched being swung aboard the
Matsonia
in giant nets back in San Diego would be waiting for them on the dock. He had a couple of books in those trunks that he’d be glad to see again, even though he hadn’t finished the book he’d brought with him because he’d spent too much time exploring the ship.

“Douglas!” Mrs. Sorley said. “Come here, darling, let me comb your hair.”

Douglas submitted without complaint, mindful of Jimmy’s eyes on him. Jimmy had yelled at him for scaring everyone, which he hadn’t meant to do, except that he was curious about the engine room and then he’d gotten lost. But the stokers had been really nice, and they’d let him help carry the coal while the engineer told Mr. Sorley where he’d gone, and then Mr. Sorley had climbed down to collect him and apologize. He wasn’t entirely sure what Mr. Sorley was apologizing for, because he’d been really careful about not getting underfoot, and he didn’t think the stokers were mad at him. Jimmy had been mad, though, and that wasn’t fair. He wasn’t really in charge, no matter if he was eleven.

“Why do we have to get dressed up to disembark?” he asked, and Mrs. Sorley gave his chin a quick rub with her handkerchief.

“Because we’re coming to a new place, darling, and you always want to make a good impression. Jimmy, go wash your hands, please. Merilee, come here.”

Douglas parked himself on the padded bench that ran along the cabin wall, swinging his legs. He supposed that made sense. Certainly Jimmy would think so. He gave Jimmy a scowl as he came out of the little bathroom, but Jimmy ignored him. As far as Douglas could figure, Jimmy had nearly talked them out of this trip, and now that he’d been on a real ship — a freightliner, the stokers said it was called — he wouldn’t forgive Jimmy for that, not easily. He remembered Mr. Sorley sitting them down in the room that served as Gilchrist Aviation’s office, with all their licenses framed on the wall like diplomas at the doctor’s. He’d explained that the grown-ups had a job that was going to take them to Hawaii, and that he would like to bring them along.

“Why?” Jimmy asked, after a moment.

“A couple of reasons,” Mr. Sorley said. “First, if — when — your father comes back, nothing will have happened that can’t be changed. If you don’t come with us, the sheriff says we have to find someone to take care of you here, or you’ll have to go to the Children’s Home in Denver, and that might be harder to undo. Second — Mrs. Sorley and I like you, and Dora likes you. It would be nice for Dora to have some company on this trip.”

Douglas had nodded, but Jimmy frowned even more deeply. “What if our dad comes back while we’re gone? He’ll think something awful has happened.”

“If he does, he’ll go straight to the sheriff himself,” Mr. Sorley said. “And the sheriff can tell him where you are. And he can send us a telegram right away, so you’ll know what’s happened.”

“But we’ll be on the boat,” Jimmy said.

“They get telegrams on boats all the time,” Mr. Sorley answered. “I promise, he’ll be able to find you.”

They did get telegrams on the ship; Douglas had seen them delivered in the dining room, the waiters carrying the envelopes on little silver trays. They’d never gotten one, though — his father was probably still in Denver, still looking for work, or maybe he’d found a job that took him traveling, so he couldn’t write.

He didn’t like to think about that, so he turned his attention to the essay he’d been composing all the way across the Pacific. He was starting second grade next year, and the teacher was bound to ask them to write about what they’d done over the summer. He was going to have the best story in the class, hands down — the only problem was deciding what to write.

We went to Hawaii over the summer. But first we went to California and saw palm trees and Mr. Sorley learned to fly a seaplane —

He frowned.

Mr. and Mrs. Segura and Mr. Sorley learned to fly a seaplane and we visited Mr. Segura’s sisters and we saw all the baggage put in a net to go onto the ship and my little sister had to wear a leash so she wouldn’t fall overboard. And we met Miss Lee, who’s Chinese and goes to college in California and helped watch my sister and Dora —

“Douglas!” Mrs. Sorley said. “Stop wool-gathering! It’s time to go.”

“Ok.” Douglas slid off the bench and fell into line beside her. “Mrs. Sorley, why do they call it wool-gathering?”

“Because —“ Mrs. Sorley stopped. “You know, darling, I don’t know. English is a very odd language sometimes.”

“We can look it up in a dictionary,” Jimmy said. “When we get to the house.”

As if there was going to be a dictionary in Hawaii. Douglas knew better than to say that aloud, though, and didn’t pull away when Jimmy grabbed his hand. They were supposed to be staying in a house that Dr. Ballard had rented for them, and he hoped maybe it would have a thatched roof and a palm tree of its own. Dr. Ballard had a wooden leg and spoke Latin, and was hunting buried treasure, which sounded even more exciting than testing a seaplane. Maybe there would be spies, and he could get to use some of the tricks he’d learned from the Hardy Boys —

“Come on, Douglas,” Jimmy said, yanking at his hand, and Douglas let himself be dragged up the last flight of stairs to the desk.

As they came out into the sunshine, Douglas could hear music, light and sway-y, with lots of guitars and people singing in a language he didn’t recognize. Mr. Sorley was waiting for them, along with Mrs. Segura and Dora, and Douglas saw him give Mrs. Sorley an extra-wide smile. Jimmy said they liked to dance, that he’d caught them dancing once in the kitchen after everybody else was supposed to be in bed, and Douglas wondered if maybe they’d dance on the dock. Miss Lee joined the line, waving cheerfully to Mrs. Segura, and Mrs. Segura turned back to talk to her.

“— really appreciate all your help with the children —“

“I missed my own little sisters so much while I was at school,” Miss Lee answered. “It was kind of you to let me play with the girls, and with Douglas and Jimmy.”

“They’re going to hire her to take care of us over the summer,” Jimmy said, in Douglas’s ear. “Because she needs the money for college. I heard Mrs. Segura talking about it last night.”

“Well, that’s good.” Douglas liked Miss Lee: she had a sense of humor and nothing much got her bothered. She said it was because she had a brother and a whole bunch of little boy cousins, and Douglas wondered if maybe they could make friends with them. He’d like to meet more Chinese people.

Jimmy looked disapproving. “Mrs. Sorley ought to be able to take care of us. Since she brought us here.”

“I’d rather be here than in Denver,” Douglas said, and Jimmy looked for a minute as though he was going to punch him.

“We wouldn’t have gone to Denver! Somebody would have taken us in — the Thompsons, maybe.”

The Thompsons lived next door to their old house, and had four kids already. Douglas was pretty sure that if they hadn’t helped out when their father left, they weren’t going to help out now, but he didn’t want to think too hard about it. He looked over the rail instead, down onto the wharf where the band was playing. There were brown-skinned girls in grass skirts and wreaths of flowers, swaying back and forth as though their waists were hinged, and he pointed. “Look at that!”

“Don’t point, darling,” Mrs. Sorley said, shifting Merilee to her other hip, and then they were at the head of the gangway. “Be careful, now.”

Douglas wanted to run, but Jimmy gave him a look that promised retribution if he tried. He walked sedately instead, one hand on the rail, the music from the band getting louder and louder. The girls were still dancing, better than in a movie, and the sun was hot and bright and everything smelled of vanilla and things he didn’t recognize. Someday when I’m grown up, I’m going to come back here, he thought, and for an instant it seemed as though he changed, body stretching and taking on a man’s weight, and he came down a shorter ramp to embrace a Chinese woman who held him tight against the rain and wind — And then it was gone, sharper than a daydream and just as real, and he looked up to see one of the dancers holding up a necklace of purple flowers.

“Aloha, little boy,” she said. “Welcome to Hawai’i.”

“W
ell,” Alma said, surveying the neat little bungalow with its broad lanai and the sleeping porch along the side. “It’s very pretty.”

Jerry gave her a look that mingled affection and exasperation. “When Willi and I rented it, we thought it was just going to be you two and Mitch and Stasi and Dora. Not all of you plus the Patterson kids.”

Alma gave him a guilty look. “I was sure I’d written you about that.”