Authors: Maya Wood
“Alexis, stay in your room. This is a very bad storm. It’s not safe now,” he commanded, his voice solid and protective.
He pushed her door open and began to usher her back. She resisted. “Inisi, can’t you bring some people down here? In my room?”
Inisi peered into the pit of her cabin. “Yes, that helps.”
“Are there more people upstairs?”
Inisi
nodded. “There are many people still in the cafeteria, but two of the windows have blown out.” Inisi called out to the passengers, beckoning the children with their faces buried into the stomachs of their mothers. They looked from Inisi to Alexis, and then back to Inisi. “Come!” Inisi yelled as the boat slammed against a wave. A line of young children filed into the black cell of her room, and thanking her quickly, Inisi shot down the hall and barreled up the stairs. She hesitated for a moment, her temples pounding furiously against her brain. And without a second thought, she found herself charging after him.
On the deck, lights buzzed and popped between shelves of waves that crashed over the surface of the boat. She saw Inisi disappear into the cafeteria, and she gripped
a metal pole to steady herself. From the corner of her eye, she glimpsed a figure flailing, and a scream drew her attention to the bow. Alexis opened her mouth to let out a shredded cry. It was a little boy clinging desperately to the wire cable. He was alone.
Alexis let go, unthinking, and bolted for the boy as a monster wave tackled
the
Allegiant
. When she recovered her senses, Alexis was flat against the deck, gagging up mouthfuls of seawater.
Oh my God. This is it
, she thought. The violence of the wave had almost knocked out her insides. Her clothing now clung limply in ribbons around her body. A shriek peeled from her throat as she snapped her head back to locate the boy. She could no longer see his little body, and she dove to the corner where the cable had come loose.
And then she saw it. The ocean’s belly contracted as though it were sucking in the soul of all life. She could perceive a horrific black mouth swelling up just beyond. Alexis scurried to the rail. A jagged rod of lightning seared the sky, and for one moment, Alexis saw everything. Just a few feet away, the boy
half-dangled from under the rail. Alexis let out a roar and plunged her body toward him as the wave gored the vessel from the opposite side. The boat pitched, and in a split second, she felt her hand lock over the arm of the boy. Their bodies swept through the cables of the rail like specks of dust on a wave.
The water was black and warm around them. She kicked her feet to find air, but the current pummeled her. She couldn’t discern which way was up or down. The ocean began to fill her lungs. The face of death fixed her with its callous gaze. She blinked it away, and crossed the ocean, picturing her father and Marion at home. Philip sitting cross-legged, smoking a cigarette. Tabitha against the rail. The men in the museum. How they could never begin to imagine her now, in the heart of the sea, sinking, breathless. Alexis pulled the boy to her, hugging him tightly under one arm.
Sorry little man,
she told him.
We die together.
Inisi heard a scream tear from his body. He was watching Alexis scramble for the bow, though he couldn’t perceive why. What he had seen was the black face of a gargantuan wave barrel toward the boat with soulless indifference. He sprinted for her. Like the shock of an exploding cannon, the vessel shook and pitched, and when he opened his eyes, he saw that Alexis was gone.
Inisi
searched frantically for the coil of rope he kept tucked at the bow’s point. He tied a knot around his waist. He looked at the choppy hell below him and dove head first. Kicking in every direction, Inisi cast out his long arms like fishing nets. When he felt a body, he prayed it was Alexis. Only there was another body. He gathered them in his arms and pulled ferociously at the rope. When they surfaced, the pair sagged like ragdolls in his grasp.
With the very last ounce of strength he possessed, he heaved them onto the deck and pulled himself above them. He had to get them below before
the boat collided with another wave. Towering above them on the deck, he saw no life in their faces. His vision flashed white under their weight as he dragged them to the stairwell. The corridor was packed, and every face turned in horror to behold the casualties.
A mother shrieked from the end of the hallway, and she scrambled to Inisi, clutching her son. She knocked at his back, begging in sobs for the water to leave his lungs. Alexis slumped in Inisi’s arms. He whipped her back with the flat of his palm as though he were exorcising an evil spirit. He felt his body tremor when she didn’t respond. “No,” he choked. He cupped her face and looked at her bloodless lips.
And then her eyes, which had closed with death, rolled in their sockets and her body jerked with violence. A stream of water shot from her mouth, and she wretched, desperate to catch the air.
The corridor let out a collective sigh of relief. The boy and the white woman were okay.
When Alexis awoke, she was lying in the flooded corridor along a chain of weary bodies. She lifted her head from the supple surface of a man’s chest, rising and dipping in slumber. It was Inisi.
I’m alive
, she thought with such surprise that she gasped. Inisi stirred, his eyes peeling open in the ship’s belly, which was gray and thick. Alexis sat up uneasily, and her body convulsed with panic.
“Sssh, sssh,” Inisi said, steadying her as he caressed her back. “Let’s get outside. You need some air.”
They moved down the corridor, clumsily maneuvering over men and women now succumbed to sleep after a terrifying night. She climbed the stairs with effort, and when she pushed through the iron door to the deck, the light sliced at her eyes. The ship’s crew scurried to sweep the deck of the lingering pools which glinted with shards of broken glass. She staggered across the deck and watched the sea churn its last response to the storm’s provocation. On the horizon, she no longer saw the seamless union of sea and sky, but a long stretch of green.
“Are you okay, Alexis?” Inisi touched her shoulder, and she saw that dark crescents underlined his eyes, now lit up gold in the sunlight.
Alexis choked. “I thought I died.” Her body heaved, and she raced to the rail, vomiting into the sea. Her eyes were bloodshot and hot with tears. “And the little boy?” she dared to ask.
“He’s fine.”
Inisi pulled her against him, his arms encircling her in a breathless embrace. “You are both fine.”
When they finally released each other, Inisi ran his palm over his scalp, staring at h
is rubber boots as though he were surprised to see them still planted on a solid surface. “There she is.” He nodded his head toward the growing ribbon of green. He turned and leaned against the rail, fishing into the pocket of his oversized pants until he retrieved a strip of wood. “We’ll be there in a couple of hours.”
A slow stream of passengers began to emerge from the lower deck, their faces puffy with weariness
and the exhaustion of prolonged terror. Inisi moved toward the travelers, ready to sort the aftermath. He looked back at Alexis and winked. “We can make a simple breakfast. You should go to the cafeteria and try to eat. If you can.”
From her room, Alexis heard the nasal belch of the ship’s horn. They must be close to docking. As much as she could, Alexis had tidied herself without the help of a functioning washroom or mirror. She clipped her damp hair back into a tight bun and pinched her cheeks for some color. Though she’d changed into new clothes, she couldn’t shake the chill, her body heavy and waterlogged. As she straightened the last of her belongings, she spotted a file titled
Dr. Henry Patterson.
She had long ago become acquainted with the man whom she was to meet on the pier, though it had been many years, and this would be their first meeting as colleagues.
A shameless smile opened on her face as she imagined the relief she would feel once she passed the baton to this man, that he would guide her now to a place with a warm shower, familiar food, and clean
dry linens. Alexis moaned aloud as she imagined closing the shutters to her room and succumbing blissfully to sleep in the womb-like dark.
On the deck, the ship’s passengers lined the railing, their faces eager and relieved to see familiar solid ground. Seagulls circled above as Alexis weaved her way through the crowd, and she moved to a clear space toward the stern. The indigo ocean had exploded into a prismatic aquamarine below in which Alexis could see shoals of silver fish zigzag around the boat. And while she hadn’t expected to see the geometric skyline of Boston or Sydney, she jerked backward in shock as she took in the humble cluster of haphazardly constructed buildings that peppered the perimeter of the pier at Port Moresby. Below them, hundreds of men and women elbowed past one another. Fishermen carried the morning’s loot to the market which she could see just to the west, the white bellies piled thickly on rickety tables beneath the canvas tarps.
She descended the gangplank with a few bags clutched in her hands, breathing the heavy island air. She could feel the fabric of her cotton dress catch against her moist body, and she watched the smooth skin of her arm glisten under a patina of perspiration. A whistle soared over the clamor, and she looked upward. Inisi was pushing his way through the restless passengers. “Alexis!” He shouted as hopped the wire cables and bounded down the ramp. “I just wanted to say goodbye. And to wish you well.” He wiped his brow with the sleeve of his shirt. “If you ever need anything, you know where to find me.”
“Inisi,” she said as they inched slowly toward the dock. “There’s no way that I can thank you for what you did. Words aren’t enough. And,” she began to fidget as he moved squarely in front of her, “I’m so glad I met you.” They smiled bashfully at each other, and she reached for his hands. “I hope to see you again, Inisi.”
He nodded. “I hope so, too.” He squeezed her palm. “Good luck, Alexis.”
“Oh, Inisi,” she cried and fell forward, her arm
s closing around him. “Please take care.”
Alexis felt his chest rumble with an affectionate laughter. He pulled back and shook his head. “I hope you find what you are looking for.” He clasped her hand between his and smiled. “Goodbye, my friend,”
he said, his voice soft and low, and turned back up the ramp.
Alexis swiveled around. This was a new chapter, and she began anxiously searching the crowd for her contact. She realized some space had opened up around her, the New Guineans eyeing this strange woman with curiosity. Beyond her wildest dreams, she’d never seen such diversity among people in one small area. Women and men, some light as milk tea, others as dark as the night sky, strolled by her. Some wore ready-made clothes most likely found in Australia. Others wore swaths of dyed cotton. Men walked shirtless, as did some women wearing sarongs or skirts of straw, and necklaces of bone and teeth. Their exposed breasts were unexceptional to everyone but Alexis, and she grew embarrassed by the ethnocentric alarms which rang loud in her head.
She must look like a stuffy nun to them, buttoned up, preserved, puritan. She bit her fingernail, attempting to distract her mind for a moment. And then, through the tangled web of bodies, she saw a figure in a white linen suit move toward her, awkwardly pausing and excusing himself as he begged passage. Below the matching white fedora cap, his pink, wet face glowed, spectacles pushed up high on his nose, the meticulously trimmed mustache hovering protectively over his rosebud lips.
Finally
, she thought,
it gets easier from here
.
Chapter
Eleven
Dr. Henry Patterson, just shy of sixty, was beginning to feel his age. In the blistering New Guinea sun which he attempted to avoid the best he could, his bony white body seemed to wilt beneath his suit. He grumbled aloud like the old men he’d observed on occasion in London’s parks. He was not, he repeated to himself almost daily, thrilled to be here.
He had begrudgingly accepted Lawrence Scott’s personal request to organize the logistics of this expedition. He’d grown tired and disillusioned. He was a family man, after all, and he belonged in the comfort of his quiet English home, taking tea with his wife and the grandchildren. Having spent many summers on the island as a young researcher, he felt he’d
paid his dues. When Lawrence had sent word about a coronary and his intention to send his daughter instead, Patterson had drawn a heavy, pensive breath. He just wasn’t cut out to lead an inexperienced woman into the heart of the Highlands.
He was nudging
his way forward through the crowd, lips still settled in a sullen arc, when he saw the comely, flaming-haired woman bobbing her head at the foot of the gangplank. Behind her,
The Allegiant
looked as weathered and tired as he. Alexis’ eyes flew open in unrestrained delight as she spotted him, and she rushed toward him, her hand outstretched as they finally united.
“Dr. Patterson!” she exclaimed breathlessly. “I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you.”
The aging man lifted his cap, revealing the few stubborn tufts of remaining hair on an otherwise bald scalp. “Alexis, you’ve grown up since I saw you last. And please,” he said stiffly in a thick English accent, “call me Henry.” He looked over her shoulder at the numerous suitcases bunched neatly together and Alexis thought she saw his mustache twitch. “I have a driver waiting. Why don’t we get you settled?”
Alexis sighed loudly with gratitude. “Oh God,” she practically whooped. “I could really use a shower and a nap.”
Henry cast a sideways glance, as though he had news he didn’t want to deliver. “I feel I should warn you, Alexis.” From his suit coat pocket, he pulled a white kerchief and wiped his neck, blooming with red irritated bumps. “I’m sure you’ve done your homework, so you ought to know there aren’t the…amenities you might be used to.”
Alexis laughed uncertainly, a flash of déjà vu sweeping her brain. “You don’t need to worry about me, Henry. I think I have an idea of what to expect.”
Henry nodded and smoothed his mustache. “Of course,” he said. “I was sorry to hear about Lawrence. He and I knew each other well many years ago. I hope when you left that he was in better health.”
Alexis was nodding soberly when a wiry young boy wearing only a pair of over-sized, dingy trousers tugged at her arm. He raised his hands, his long, knuckled fingers clutching hand-rolled cigarettes. Alexis smiled uneasily.
“They think we all smoke, so the children wait on the pier for foreigners to come, earn a few pence.” Henry moved past the child who was still watching Alexis hopefully.
“I’m sorry,” she wagged her head at the boy, and joined Henry who marched steadily ahead.
They loaded the bed of an old German pickup truck, and Alexis climbed into the cab, sitting uncomfortably close to her new mentor and colleague. It was the only automobile ripping through the muddied streets of Moresby, and people stopped and gawked as the tires spit up mud behind them. “It’s the start of the rainy season. A little early this year. It could make things difficult.”
Alexis suddenly got the feeling that this Henry Patterson wasn’t all too pleased to see her in her father’s stead. Since they’d met, almost every comment he’d uttered was laced with skepticism. She cleared her throat and kept her eyes to the path lined with thatch-roofed houses twisting deep into the town. The truck sputtered and gagged to a stop. Patterson let out a curse. “This damned contraption.”
The lines of the old driver’s mouth plunged into a disgruntled frown and he slid out of the vehicle with a groan. Patterson inched behind the wheel. “I’m afraid the mud slows us down and if the engine stalls, as it just did, we need to push it out. Well, the driver does anyhow.” Alexis craned her neck and saw the old man wiping his hand over his eyes.
“Shall I help him?” Alexis asked reluctantly.
“No, there’s no need. We’ve managed before.”
Alexis shook her head. She couldn’t bear to sit idle, like a princess on her throne, while a man sweated and bled to push this giant machine through mud. She opened the passenger door and Patterson grumbled in protest. “Stay put now,” he commanded, his voice sharp and cantankerous.
“I’m helping,” she replied simply, and slid off the seat. She sank ankle deep into the swamp of the street, and she remembered with dismay that she had put on her favorite leather pumps.
What an entrance I’ve made,
she thought crossly. The trek to the rear of the truck was arduous and long. The driver did a double take when she joined him. He had never seen such a soft but furious looking woman, not since he himself was young and acquainted with women. He eyed her with great amusement. “I don’t know much about the rainy season and this truck, but I don’t think we’re going anywhere,” she told him. He replied with an impassive stare and scratched at his graying sideburns.
Patterson flicked his hand in signal, and the pair grunted as they pushed. Alexis could feel her face swell with blood, and she strained with all her might. But the truck wheels spun and hissed over the tracks of sticks and rocks they had wedged beneath the tires. They dug around the tires, fetched more wooden branches and rocks, and shoved them far beneath the tires. But to no avail. She was absolutely despe
rate and drenched.
“Dr. Patterson,” she scratched out. “Might we leave the truck and go to the hotel?”
The old man was looking rumpled himself. “Yes, I think you’re quite right. Maybe the rain will hold and the street will dry. I can send the driver back later.”
Her back strained under the weight of her bags, and the trio labored through the brown mire for what seemed like hours. Alexis could feel the
heaviness of the driver’s gaze behind her, and he grumbled unintelligibly as he stooped over, one suitcase on his back and another sizeable piece in his hand. When Patterson let out a sigh and stopped, Alexis surveyed the nondescript buildings to either side, only one of them two stories high.
“As I was saying,” he said in his proper accent as he motioned feebly toward a semi-dilapidated structure. “Not much like the hotel you probably imagined. More along the lines of a very rustic boarding house. I’ve had to make due myself. No running water, unpredictable electricity. But,” he said, his voice
pushing out a tone of false optimism, “I’m sure you’ll manage.”
Alexis was a sight to be seen, her face pulled into a scowl, hair flying wildly from her pins, legs and arms now caked with dry mud. She entered the bathing room in which a large tin bucket full of fresh water awaited her, the ladle’s arm hanging on the rim. Her jaw dropped as she took it in. The battered bar of communal soap resting on the tile, the cement floor wet from the previous wash, the narrow canal which drained the water out onto the road. Once she’d managed to knot all of her garments onto the lone nail serving as a hook, she disrobed and took the ladle in her hand. The water was cool, and Alexis was surprised to find, unbelievably refreshing. She soaped and scrubbed, rationing out the rinses by the inches remaining in the bucket.
She returned to her room, a plain box with a small window and no curtains. She had imagined sealing out the noises of a bustling city life, but there were none to muffle save the occasional bray of a donkey, or a door slamming down the hallway. Curling into a ball on the thin mattress of her bed, Alexis was torn between the utter exhaustion of the turbulent sea voyage, and the chaos of her mind reconciling with
a reality for which she was ill-prepared. She closed her eyes, but her mind reeled with images of the day. It was when her mind turned to Philip, and she wondered whether he wondered about her, missed her, that she felt the sweet opiate of fatigue pull her deep from the light.
Alexis yawned loudly, extended her legs over the bed’s edge, and curled her toes as she stretched the sleepiness from her body. Granted she wasn’t exactly napping in the lap of luxury, but just then she couldn’t remember a more restful sleep. The light pouring through the window was turning a soft, late afternoon yellow, and she rose slowly to peer out onto the street. Henry and Alexis had agreed to meet each other for afternoon tea. He’d mentioned something of a basic veranda outside, and since the colonization of the southeastern region of the island, the hotel keepers were by now well aware of the Brits’ fondness for tea. Alexis combed her hair and dressed herself simply in a baby blue cotton summer dress. After the drama of her journey, she felt silly when she couldn’t resist spraying herself with her favorite perfume.
As she made her way through the boarding house, she nodded and smiled as she was greeted with friendly grins. From what she gathered, most of the boarders were men who’d moved to Moresby for work, sending back the pittance they made to their struggling families. In the common room, Alexis spotted a middle-aged woman humming as she wiped the dusty window sills, her hair gathered and
piled underneath a colorful turban. She saw Alexis move toward her, and she smiled toothily at her, the same strip of wood Inisi had chewed dangling from her teeth. She patted Alexis, speaking animatedly at her as she ushered her to the back of the house.
Henry sat rigid in a wicker chair, his leg crossed tightly over the other. The veranda was indeed a basic structure, with ragged slabs of wood nailed across visible beams to make a deck around the verdant hillside. Tropical plants spilled wide tongues of silky, nubile leaves onto the porch, the sunlight sifting through the fronds of arching palm trees. It was a gem among utter drabness and Alexis beamed with appreciation. She joined him, and he attempted a smile from beneath his mustache. “It might not be fit for the Queen, but it’ll have to do,” he motioned to the ceramic tea set. He poured a glass for Alexis, and she stirred a dollop of cream and cube of brownish sugar. “How do you find the living arrangements?” he asked as she sipped the steaming liquid.
Smirking, she giggled lightly. “It’s not exactly what I’d expected,” she answered truthfully and set her cup in the saucer. “But I will, as you said, manage.”
“Very good,” Henry said. His gnarled fingers traced the smooth wood of a small box from which he retrieved a pipe and tobacco. “I myself have some comforts I cannot do without. Tea and pipe smoking, for instance.” The lines in his face fell lax, and he looked at Alexis soberly. “I’m sorry to start our meeting with bad news, but I’m afraid there’s been a small hiccup in our plans.”
“Oh?”
“We were to meet with the guide I’d hired for our expedition into the Highlands this afternoon. I’d already paid him an advance to collect the materials necessary, find capable interpreters, and secure the transport, etcetera. According to our itinerary, we were to leave in just tw
o days.” Henry puffed his pipe and a red cherry burned bright in its pit. “However,” he resumed, “I received word that this fellow fled the island a week ago. He was a very clever man, to have fooled us…to have fooled
me
.”
Alexis’ mouth fell open in disbelief. “What does this mean, then? For our trip?”
Henry coughed, his kerchief knotted tightly in his fist as he covered his mouth. “Yes, well it means that we have to find someone else. It means more money. And a delay.” Henry looked past Alexis, his eyes unfocused. He shook his head. “You know, it really is the Wild West out here. There’s nothing…nothing stopping any man from doing what he will, taking what he wants. It’s hard to know whom to trust.”
Alexis’ eyes were saucers, her face stricken. Henry patted her arm, “Oh no, dear, I don’t mean to worry you. Just that we must proceed with caution. The good news is that while I was sniffing around for another guide, I came across the name McFadden. As a matter of fact, he’s infamous in these parts. A little rough around the edges from what I’ve heard, but he knows the island better than anyone.”
“Is he available?”
“I sent a message with a young chap who claims to know McFadden well. I received a reply just this morning after you retired to your room. He’s expecting us tomorrow evening on the other side of town.” A shadow crossed over Henry’s face. “I feel I should warn you…that part of town is no place for a lady.”
Alexis sniffed loudly, her chin jutting instinctively outward. She had no patience now for being told what was or wasn’t suitable for her sex. “Henry,” she said stiffly, “thank you for your concern, but I would like to remind you that I came here as my father’s equal and ask that you regard me as such.”
“As you wish, my dear.
I mean no offense. Only that this particular quarter is famous for the transients who drift in and out looking for cheap thrills and the company of paid women.” Henry straightened himself, sitting upright. “Tomorrow, then. We will meet with this McFadden. If all goes well, we can set about the process of moving out as soon as possible.”
In her room, aglow with candlelight, Alexis sat at the windowsill, the soft, hot breath of night air wafting inward. She held her watch to the light. It was impossibly late. Rubbing her eyes, she blew out the candle and tried to convince her body that it should rest now. As she lay in bed, she imagined herself curled along the length of Philip’s body. She could feel his strength vine around her, and the tumult of her thoughts began to fade into blackness, emptiness. Suddenly the door to her room thundered with the pounding of a fist, and her mind pitched from sleep into adrenaline-fueled focus. “Who’s there?” she asked, her voice as commanding as she could muster.