The Wind and the Spray (20 page)

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

LAUREL and Nor, before that night, more or less had established between them a certain pattern for living.

It had been sometimes stormy, often blundering, frequently misunderstanding, but there had been a rhythm there, a knowledge and acceptance. Now it was gone.

It was not the difference of a house of many occupants and then a house of two, it was more the difference in character of a house. It was not children and then no children, family and then no family, it was simply something that had fled. Whatever it was that the earlier weeks had built up between them a frail, storm-tossed thing admittedly, it was not there any more.

Sometimes Laurel felt she must try to regain some of the tattered remnants; she even tried to do it with an impulsive gesture, a quick word.

It was no use, there was now a chasm of courteous politeness between them that cut them off from each other more surely than their mistakes ever had done.

In some absurd way the chasm to Laurel became the dividing hall. She hated that hall. No longer would she stand to let the wind run up it and touch her face with brine, she would hurry along it, shut the door on it, shut out the spray.

She never allowed herself to think of that night, fingers curled around the hot cup yet feeling no contact, drained of everything, it had seemed, except that new sweet certainty pulsing in her veins.

Perhaps it had happened, perhaps she had known it. Now, in the week that followed, she was not so sure.

The Fuccillis by this time were well established. Some of the other Islanders had moved into their new homes as well. Each pay-day saw the launch bringing in purchases from the coast.

“We must have a little store,” Laurel told Nor.

He shrugged disinterestedly. Apart from the actual whaling, he took no notice now of the Island activities. I was to awaken those activities, Laurel remembered, that was my special job. She wondered drearily what the awakening had achieved for Nor.

Louisa had sent for the easy chair that Laurel had recommended for the hardworking Nino.

“Soon, Laurel,” she smiled, “he will have that hair to fondle and those ears to stroke.”

Laurel laughed
...
sometimes it seemed to her that she only knew laughter these days when she was with Louisa
...
and said, “I said it the other way about, and I said it of a dog.”

“Pouf,” dismissed Louisa. “When we buy a dog it will be a cow. A milking cow.”

And a cow it was. It came all the way from the mainland on the launch, and it stood the journey well.

The Islanders gave it a rousing welcome. Laurel hoped that the cow appreciated the three hearty cheers.

“You said a dog, so we got a cow, so you name it,” beamed Louisa.

Laurel looked at the eyes like dark plums and named it Plush.

Plush became at once an Island figure. She was only plush of eye, certainly not of coat, indeed she was rather a dusty dun brown. After Nino put a new bell around her neck, however, it looked like a handsome locket, and she took on quite an air. She would crunch and sigh and sound the tuneless tonk-tonk through the long Island grass, but mostly she preferred Nor’s grass. Again and again Laurel drove her out, the jaw moving to a measure, and, even as Laurel pushed, starting on fresh blades.

There had been two more letters from David but they had been pitifully brief. But one thing, they had established the fact that Nor had been in contact.

One said a little unconvincingly,
“...
When I come out, sis.” Another promised remotely, “
...
When
w
e’re together again.”

It did not appease Laurel. Perhaps Nor had been in contact, but had any actual arrangements been made?

She glanced at Nor to question him, but was aware, more than ever, of the chasm between them. She closed her lips.

But though it was a time of doldrums for Laurel, it was never boring. Every day something seemed to happen at
Humpback. She supposed it was living so near to nature as they did.

Willie, as the children had named their beloved injured whale, had appeared again. There was great rejoicing when he blew one day in the bay.

This time, though, there was no cow and calves
...
or Mrs. Willie and twins as the Island children called them.

Luke explained, “Mrs. Willie and her youngsters haven’t any need to feel grateful like Willie, so I don’t expect we’ll see them any more. Anyway, male whales are more sentimental than females and that’s a fact, Mrs. L.”

The next day it appeared that the Island would not see Willie any more.

The whale surfaced, whether by coincidence, affection, or merely to rub against some barnacles no one would ever know, right under the
Leeward.
The
Leeward
went promptly over on its port side, and the
Clytie
had to be called back hurriedly to right her, and the
Windward
called out urgently to take the passengers aboard.

Tony Brent, a believer in real life before the printed word, had the children on the beach to watch the procedure from beginning to end.

There was a loud moan soon afterwards when with a reproachful flounce Willie dived and put out of the bay.

“Will he come back, Luke?” asked Laurel for the children.

Luke thought not. “Reckon he’s got a scare.”

“I think the people on the
Leeward
have had a scare, too,” shivered Laurel.

“It’s not a particularly uncommon thing. If the
Leeward
had been a smaller boat, it would have been tossed right up, then come down and probably not been seen any more.”

On top of the excitement came the eight-foot shark that jumped into the twelve-foot fishing boat.

“It was after a big fish catch,” Luke related ... it was always Luke doing the relating these days
...
“The porpoises have been keeping food rare for the sharks of late, and this shark must have got special hungry, I guess. The men sat
on
its head until help came.” Luke chuckled. “I asked them what they wanted done with the shark when they got the boat in and they both said shoved somewhere where they’ll never see it any more.”

Episodes like the upset
Leeward
and the time taken to right her, to tow her back, wasted valuable time in a whaling schedule.

Nor said this one evening to Laurel. He said he would be off soon after midnight on his next trip so that the whaler could be clear of the island and into action by the first rays of dawn.

“We’re behindhand,” he said.

Laurel asked him perfunctorily if there was anything she could do, pack smoko, as they called the in-between meals, fill flasks.

He shook his head.

“There’s a cook,” he reminded her.

She knew that, but all the women made it a point to send their men off with a package of sandwiches, a thermos of tea. On these expeditions the cook coped admirably, but the galley was small, the men’s capacities enormous, there was no time for an overworked cook to dole out in
-
betweens.

Mrs. Fuccilli had packed smoko for Nor when she had been here, Laurel knew that, she had seen him go off with it in a tin case. His flat refusal hurt her considerably.

“I don’t mind doing it,” she offered humbly a second time.

Nor gave her an unadorned and ungrateful, “No.”

She heard him soon after midnight. Indeed, she had not yet gone to sleep. He moved very quietly for such a large man. She wondered what he would say if suddenly she appeared and insisted upon feeding him before he set forth in the darkness. A rather wild darkness too. The wind was quite high, and there were spatterings of rain.

She got up and crossed to the window. Between the grey drops she could see the black sky streaked with cold streamers of wind-blown cloud.

She looked down on the settlement. There were fights in a dozen houses, probably in a dozen kitchens. Probably the wives were cooking something and sending their husbands out well fed.

But mine
w
ill not be well fed, she thought. She knew Nor’s ideas of looking after himself
...
but then mine is not my husband, he is simply Mr. Larsen, whaleman, as much a stranger to me as I am to him.

She looked away from the settlement up to the hills. Was Jasper still in that spot? She imagined what it would be like up there on the knoll, the endless flap and rent as the wind whipped through it, of the meagre canvas cover that she had noticed was his sole shelter, the crash and swirl of nearby branches as soaking winds thrashed at the trees.

She s
h
ivered. All at once, she resolved that, stranger or no stranger, she
would
go out and see Nor off. She pulled on her dressing gown, crossed to the door, opened it—too late.

The back door went at the same time. She heard Nor’s long steps down the path, then the click of the wicket gate. He was gone.

Oddly disconsolate, Laurel went back to bed. She lay awake for hours, but eventually she slept.

It was quite late when she wakened, and the spattering of grey rain was gone, but the wind had risen considerably. She went to the window as she had last night, and gave a cry of surprise. There was practically no visibility. It was almost as though they had been shut in a big grey room. She glanced up in the direction of the hills. Even they, too, were obliterated. She could not outline even the nearest knoll.

Luke came blindly some time afterwards.

“That you, Mrs. L.?” he called. “A fine time I’ve had even getting to the house. Never seen it like this before. The pressure or whatever it is must be driving up from the South Pole, I’d say. Mr. Brent’s closed the school. Kids would get lost getting there even though our Island’s only a six by four.”

“How long will it last?”

“You’d have to get on to Nor for that. He understands these high and low pressures and such, I don’t. Trouble is”—Luke gave Laurel a quick look—“we can
’
t ask Nor.

She understood that look at once.

“You’re not happy over the
Clytie
?”

“In a fog like this, Mrs. Larsen, I’m not happy at all. We never get it, you see, they’ll be hard put on the whaler to know how to handle it. Storms, yes, gales, they’re on
our list, but down south around here we deal in clear hazards, not those that sneak up behind you on little cat feet.”

“Is there danger?”

“Considering their duration out there in the usual terms of time, no, not yet, and there shouldn’t be either unless the
Clytie
doesn’t come home as it always does by dusk. Trouble is, Mrs. L., when
is
dusk?” Luke looked out on the obscure world.

Laurel said a little helplessly, “Did you come up to tell me this?”

“No.”

“Then what, Luke? Did you think I’d be scared?”

Luke shook his head. “No, Mrs. L., I didn’t, not when you’re Nor’s wife.”

Nor’s wife ... the two words came curiously to Laurel’s ears. She found herself exploring them
...
repeating them inwardly to herself.

She became aware that Luke was waiting for something. “What is it, Luke? What do you want?”

Luke gestured with his thumb.

“Reckon,” he said, “you should be down there.”

“Down where?”

“At the station, with the rest of the women, watching for your man to return.”

She stared at him dumbly. All at once she wanted to say, “But they have a right to watch, I haven’t. I’m not a wife and he’s not my man.”

Luke misunderstood her silence. “Oh, I know you don’t need to, Mrs. L., I know you know he’ll come through, Nor always will, but it would be a good thing to share with them, help them, give them something of what you have yourself.”

Something of what you have yourself
...
What have
I
? Laurel thought.

She hesitated.

“The radio,” she suggested weakly.

“Nothing’s getting through.”

“Then until it’s time for the
Clytie
to come back,” she murmured more weakly still.

“It’s almost time now,” he pointed out.

She looked at the clock, then remembered how she had not slept last night, how she had slept instead today.

“I’ll get my coat,” she nodded, and ran inside.

It took a long time to get to the station. The fog had worsened. They had to grope every inch of the way.

Once inside, though, all the lights blazing, all the women assembled, it was much better—but not for long. Persistently, insidiously but progressively, the fog deepened. It even trespassed into the room. The highly-powered lamps instead of illumining gave out a ghastly grey-yellow blur.

Night came.

Laurel did not mark it by the darkness, for the darkness had been there all along, she did not mark it by her watch, for she had been afraid for some hours to look at her watch, she marked it by a woman’s soft little sob.

She knew the woman. She was the wife of one of the new hands and she was very young. Laurel went and put her arms around her.

“It’s early yet,” she whispered.

The young woman said helplessly, “It’s past the time he should co
m
e.”

“Not so much past. Not time enough to worry.”

But in the hours that followed they all worried. The worry and the fear hung like the fog in the air.

At some time or other it was midnight. At some time or other it was morning again. They ate ... they drank
...
sometimes they talked, but briefly
...
now and then someone cried softly, but in the grey glow you could not see who it was.

It was Mrs. Jessopp who came and asked Laurel to do something, Luke behind her waiting to hear what she would say in response.

“But I couldn’t
... I wouldn’t know how to ... I mean how could
I
stand up and pray?”

“It would help.”

“If Padre Flett was here—”

“Padre isn’t,” Luke said, “there’s only
you
for this, Mrs. L.”

“Mrs. Jessopp is older, she could do it.”

“Mrs. Jessopp isn’t the wife of the boss, you are. They all believe in Nor, next to believing in him they believe in
you. When he’s not here, you’re their leader. They
look
to you then, don’t they, Mrs. J.?”

Mrs. Jessopp said, “Yes, dear, and I know you could do it.”

“What—what can I say?” appealed Laurel helplessly.

And then all at once she knew.

She could repeat that part of the service for the launching of ships that had stopped so indelibly with her ever since Nor had said it that day.

It was a Navy service, but she thought that the Navy wouldn’t mind; it was to send a ship out, not beckon
it
in, but that shouldn’t matter now.

She went and stood at one end of the big engine gallery. It was here she had been married to Nor Larsen, only it had all looked very different then. There had been fern and frangipani, clams crammed with Island flowers, briar streamers hung end on end.