The Love Beach (21 page)

'Sounds like the name of a drink,' commented Seamus over the bar.

George was huffed. 'It sounded like a piece of rudeness to me,' he said. 'West London
Crematorium
doesn't take much saying does it? And how much nicer. What a falling off of standards even in
that
trade. I walked out and went straight to put my name down to leave the country. That's how I did it. And I'm glad.'

Mr Hassey nodded agreement. He looked across and slightly up at Dahlia: 'Why did you come here, Miss?' he asked. 'If I'm not being impertinent?'

Dahlia, who had been holding Conway's thick arm and listening absently, seemed startled. 'Me? Oh, I was travelling, moving about, and the islands just happened to be on my way, that's all. I'll get them out of my way before too long. I'll go back to Wanganui.'

'New Zealand,' explained Conway.

And you?' Hassey asked Davies.

'To sell butter and fats,' shrugged Davies. 'But I didn't.'

'Ah yes, I remember. And you, Mr Conway.'

'Just studying,' said Conway cautiously. 'The natives.'

That's why I came,' said Hassey. 'Thirty‑eight years ago. Just to ascertain the fucking natives ... beg your pardon, Miss. Ah well, I've said it now. Anyway, to ascertain the natives. Been here ever since.'

'What did you do before, Mr Hassey?' asked George Turtle. Davies noticed how they always called him 'Mr Hassey', never by any familiarity. 'Go on, Mr Hassey, you've never told us.'

'Sailor, commercial traveller, general horse thief, you know,' said Mr Hassey blandly. 'Anything really. Had a little business once selling imitation jewellery in Auckland. But it was too up and down.‑Christmas time was all right, but it tailed off terrible at the other end of the year. Nothing to do at all. Could have done with another Baby Jesus about August.'

Abe came into the bar, straight from his boat, stood and bought himself a beer, rattling his loose change as he paid. 'A leak,' he said turning to the group. 'A great, wet, seeping leak. Took all day to get that plugged.' His arms flailed. about. He swam rather than talked. 'Tomorrow,' he announced, 'is the big day for moving the barges, which you know already7'

'We know already,' said Conway. 'Dawn at The Love Beach.'

'And why not?' said Abe. 'Tell me, friend, how often do you get a chance to build something sacred? I'll be there too, boy. As a matter of fact I've arranged for the heavy hauling equipment ‑ it's coming from Tahiti tonight. It'll be at the beach tomorrow, fwished tomorrow night, and back

on the freighter by the next day. It's very steep this stuff is to hire, you know. But just managed to hear this little item was on its way from Papetta to Honoraria, where they are building a bowling rink and where I have already done business concerning a harmonium.' He bowed towards Conway and then to Davies.

'Which fell to bits on St Paul's,' said Conway.

'Act of God, cargo damaged in shipment,' said Abe, opening out his hands. 'What the hell. The way those boys sang over there, can you wonder the Almighty tried to destroy the harmonium before it got to them.
He
was the one who put it together and played it.' He pointed dramatically at Davies. 'Going against the Will of God.'

'You got your money,' Davies pointed out. He was surprised now, how easily he entered into these island arguments.

'I'm glad to assist in moving the barges,' said Abe, leaning forward on the counter, looking at Seamus and at the rest of them in the mirror. 'After all it's an inter‑denominational affair ain't it. An Unknown Soldier is an Unknown Soldier, boy. Those bones you bury could be those of a Jewish lad.'

'Or an Arab,' said Conway.

'My friend,' Abe pleaded. 'Don't never mix me up with those greedy little quarrels across the world. This is the Pacific. These are the islands of the Apostles. I would be glad, proud even, to bury Arab bones.'

They made an early start at The Love Beach, the sun just brimming the sea sending an orange flood over it, making the island claim its contours once again from the dark, making the trees have shapen leaves, the mountains form, and giving the people life.

Fifty white volunteers were on the beach before breakfast and a hundred Melanesians who were to be paid, just after. They stood around looking at the invasion barges with the interest of those who have seen something for a long time but only just noticed it. They wandered about in their shirts and shorts and sandals, probing at each barge like subur‑ban men probe around an old or a new car, looking beneath and above, touching and talking. They talked about how the barges were made, how they must have come at a certain tide, how well the metal had stood the years of sea and sun and wind. and how they didn't make craft like that any longer.

The arrival of Mr English in Pollet's car stopped the activity. All the men stood about in the early sun.

English looked up at the tall prow of one of the barges. 'Gi'e a hand tae us, lads,' he said. Two men moved forward and hoisted the little leader to the metal nose. Today he was wearing a bush shirt and flappy shorts, but there was a tam o' shanter bulging on his small head and he wore his thick Highland stockings and heavy shoes. He surveyed them, black men and white, as a clan chief would have looked upon his warriors before battle.

'Taeday,' he began, wheeling a dramatic half circle so that he took them all in. 'Taeday we are goin' tae shift these wee monsters, friends. We're going to make a chapel o' them to receive the bones of the Unknown Soldier. When we find him. It's no' goin' tae be a simple matter, ye'll understan', but by nightfall we'll ha' done it, ye see.' He paused and looked around at the patches of upturned faces. He thrust his tammy back from his yellowed forehead. 'Unfortunately,' he continued, 'I ha' tae gi'e ye some puir news. The liftin' gear which our friend and colleague Abe had arranged for this day won't be here.' There was a groan from the men. Davies watched them about him in their shirts, hands on their hips, clerks and shopkeepers in the attitudes of lumberers.

'Why not?' asked Mr Kendrick, the cycle‑shop owner.

It was Abe who thickly shouted the answer. 'Let down. friends. I was let down. I arranged for the ship to call, but that captain did the dirty on me. He's sailed right past on his way to Honoraria. We watched him go.'

'Sue him, Abe,' shouted someone.

'Can't,' admitted Abe. 'It wasn't that sort of contract.' He dropped his voice and directed it at the man. 'Very difficult to prove,' he confided.

Mr English threw his arms wide. 'So we move these wee craft oursells, friends,' he announced. There was a dissenting noise from the men. 'Like the Egyptians and the pyra. mids,' said Mr English encouragingly. 'What they can do, we can do.'

'In a day?' called someone.

'Two days,' replied Mr English. 'Let's get on with it.' Davies could see that the little man had been sizing up the leap to the ground from his oratorial position on the landing barge. His eyes had measured the distance carefully during his final sentences. Now, like a theatre midget, he leapt, crashing violently into the sand, his knees reaching it fractionally before his face. Davies, Conway, and some others helped to pull him from the depression he had made. He blew sand from his mouth and dug it from the hollows of his eyes. 'Let's get on with it,' he repeated gallantly.

They needed 'to move two of the barges. The back of the chapel was already conveniently formed by one muscular landing craft which had slewed sideways as it struck the beach on that dawn in 1944 and had remained in the same place. Two other craft had to be dragged into position to flank it.

The men dug first, burrowing under the soles of the steel ships, undermining them, then laying out steel netting, and finally wooden rollers made from the fibrous trunks of the palms.

They worked heavily while the swollen sun hurried up over the island, the Mlelanesians sawing and cutting the palms needed for the rollers, the white men getting their spades beneath the barges. The task went surprisingly well and by sunset one of the barges was mounted on its rollers and ready
to
move. Everyone had a break for beer and sandwiches, brought from the British Legion Club where the wives were busy buttering and spreading. Then they fixed the ropes to the barge and were ready to pull.

Davies had gone into town with Pollet in the car to fetch additional hawsers from the jetty. They returned just as the men were beginning to heave. It was a strange scene, a sight like an ancient frieze. Davies stopped with Pollet where the trees concluded and the beach began and looked at it. He felt Pollet stop alongside him and heard him drop the first coil of hawsers to the soft ground.

The sun had just left with its usual evening flamboyance, flinging violet and red across the lower sky, making the ribbed sea like the coloured wings of a marvellous butterfly, fiery at the centre then subduing to purple and fringed with aquamarine and, in the end, a spilling of sombre grey. Against th‑is, all silhouettes, the black men and the whites pulled on the ropes that stiffened out from the prow of the landing barge. On the prow the little leader, Rob Roy English, stood, tiny legs astride, bent forward like a mighty slave driver, calling out the time of their pulling. 'One, two, three, Now! One, two, three, Now! One, two, three, Now!'

One hundred and fifty men bent against the ropes, becoming shaped like notes of music against the lines of the sea. The sight was outlined in black, against the brilliantly fading sky and the reflecting ocean.

'One, two, three, Now! One, two, three, Now!'

The gangs hung on to the ropes, tugged, relaxed, tugged again. ‑Pull, pull, pull. Miraculously the barge, with its undersized rider, began to nuzzle forward, like an old dry lizard come to life.

'It's moving,' whispered Davies to Pollet. The beauty of the beach, and the sky and the labouring men had filled his throat. 'What a strange sight.'

Pollet nodded. 'All the time, in the islands as nowhere else, you find unexpected things to cause you wonder. Sometimes they're nature gone mad, sometimes men gone mad. Often they are very, what you would call stunning, perhaps. Things are strange here, monsieur. Every day they are strange. You will learn.'

Davies felt himself involuntarily wanting to protest. 'I won't learn. I won't be here. I'm going away. Home.' But something choked the words, stopped them, and he simply gazed again out on to the beach and saw the barge moving inches only, as the men strained and the hooting high voice of Mr English encouraged them from his steel perch.

trees concluded and the beach began and looked at it. He felt Pollet stop alongside him and heard him drop the first coil of hawsers to the soft ground.

The sun had just left with its usual evening flamboyance, flinging violet and red across the lower sky, making the ribbed sea like the coloured wings of a marvellous butterfly, fiery at the centre then subduing to purple and fringed with aquamarine and, in the end, a spilling of sombre grey. Against this, all silhouettes, the black men and the whites pulled on the ropes that stiffened out from the prow of the landing barge. On the prow the little leader, Rob Roy English, stood, tiny legs astride, bent forward like a mighty slave driver, calling out the time of their pulling. 'One, two, three, Now! One, two, three, Now! One, two, three, Now!'

One hundred and fifty men bent against the ropes, becoming shaped like notes of music against the lines of the sea. The sight was outlined in black, against the brilliantly fading sky and the reflecting ocean.

'One, two, three, Now! One, two, three, Now!'

The gangs hung on to the ropes, tugged, relaxed, tugged again. ‑Pull, pull, pull. Miraculously the barge, with its undersized rider, began to nuzzle forward, like an old dry lizard come to life.

'It's moving,' whispered Davies to Pollet. The beauty of the beach, and the sky and the labouring men had filled his throat. 'What a strange sight.'

Pollet nodded. 'All the time, in the islands as nowhere else, you find unexpected things to cause you wonder. Sometimes they're nature gone mad, sometimes men gone mad. Often they are very, what you would call stunning, perhaps. Things are strange here, monsieur. Every day they are strange. You will learn.'

Davies felt himself involuntarily wanting to protest. 'I won't learn. I won't be here. I'm going away. Home.' But something choked the words, stopped them, and he simply gazed again out on to the beach and saw the barge moving inches only, as the men strained and the hooting high voice of Mr English encouraged them from his steel perch.

'It's moving,' said Davies again. 'It's definitely shifting a bit on those rollers.'

'Perhaps it would be better if we stopped admiring the artistic composition of the scene and instead pulled on one of the ropes,' suggested Pollet.

Davies moved forward. 'Yes, of course we must.'

They dropped the hawsers they had brought because they would not be needed until the next day and moved quickly across the sloping sand towards the tugging gangs. As they got nearer they could hear the grunts of the men taking the weight of each pull, their feet forced into the sand, their arms hard under the tension. Davies began to run and Pollet followed him. They reached the end men, took up a yard of rope each, and timed their pulling to the efforts of the rest; take the strain, now
PULL,
take the strain, now
PULL.

Davies was aware of the sweat immediately wriggling down his belly, soaking into his shirt, burrowing under his belt, and running to his pelvis and his legs. He blinked the salt wetness from his eyes and felt the sinew of the rope biting into his hands. Pull, pull, pull. Rest. And
pull, pull, pull.

They felt it coming. M inch at a time first, hardly perceptible. But then it began to roll towards them and they scuffed the sand and fell and got up again and fell down again, as they mastered it. Now it moved a foot, now another, now a whole yard. It was coming. It was going along with them. Six Melanesian men ran and replaced the rolled logs as they were swallowed under the barge, running and putting them under the belly of the thing as it lumbered along.