Galilee. Part 61

Rachel didn't retire to bed until after one; she sat up listening to the roar of the wind-filled trees around the house, the palms bending so low that their fronds sc.r.a.ped the roof like long-nailed fingers. She had loved rainstorms as a child-they'd always seemed cleansing to her-and this storm was no exception. She liked its din, its violence, its showmans.h.i.+p. Even when the power failed, leaving her to sit by the light of a couple of candles, she was still quite happy. She had only one regret: that she didn't still have Holt's journal. What a perfect time and place this would have been to be reading the last section of the book. She would never see it again, she a.s.sumed: now it was in Mitch.e.l.l or Garrison's hands, and the chances of her reclaiming it were slim. No matter. She'd find out from Galilee what had happened to Holt. Maybe he'd turn it into a story for her; hold her in his arms and tell her how Nickelberry and the captain and himself had fared together. There wouldn't be a happy conclusion, she guessed, but right now, listening to the downpour las.h.i.+ng against the windows, she didn't much care. It wasn't a night for happy endings: it was a night for the dark to have its way. Tomorrow, when the clouds had cleared and the sun was up, she'd be pleased to hear about miraculous rescues and prayers answered. But right now, in the roaring, pelting heart of the night, she wanted Galilee there to tell her how death had come to Captain Holt, and how the ghost of his child-yes! surely the child came back-had stood at the bottom of his deathbed and called him away, just as he'd called Holt's horse. Beckoned to his father from beyond the grave and escorted him into the hereafter.

The candle flickered a little; and she shuddered. She'd actually succeeded in spooking herself.

She picked the candle up and carried it through to the kitchen, setting it down beside the stove while she refilled the kettle. There was a scuttling in the shadowy roof above her head, and she looked up to see a large gecko-the largest she'd seen either in or around the house-scuttling across the wooden slats of the ceiling. It seemed to sense her gaze, because it froze in its tracks and remained frozen until she looked away. Only then did she hear its scrabblings resume. When she looked up again it had gone.

She went back to refilling the kettle, but in the time it had taken her to look up and see the gecko her desire for tea had disappeared. She put the kettle back on the stove, unfilled, and picking up the candle, she went to bed. She started to undress, but only got as far as taking off her sandals and jeans. Then she slipped under the covers, and fell asleep to the accompaniment of the rain.

ii She was woken by an impatient rapping on the bedroom door. Then a voice, calling to her:"Rachel? Are you in there?"

She sat up, the dream she'd woken from-something about Boston, and diamonds buried in the snow on New-bury Street-lingering for a moment. "Who is it?"

"It's Niolopua. n.o.body answered the front door so I came in."

"Is there a problem?" She looked out of the window. It was day; the sky was a brilliant blue.

"You have to get up," Niolopua said, his voice urgent. "There's been a wreck. And I think maybe it's his boat."

She got up out of bed, and wandered across the room, still not fully comprehending what she was being told. There was Niolopua, spattered with red-brown mud. "The Samarkand," he said to her.

"Galilee's boat. It's been washed up on the beach." She looked back toward the window. "Not here," Niolopua went on. "Down at the other end of the island. On the Napali coast."

"Are you sure it's his?"

Niolopua nodded. "As sure as I can be," he said.

Her heart was suddenly racing.

"And him? What about him?"

"There's no sign of him," Niolopua said. "At least there wasn't an hour ago, when I was down there."

"Let me just get some clothes on," she said. "And I'll be with you."

"Have you got any boots?" he said.

"No. Why?"

"Because it's hard to get to where we're going. You have to climb."

"I'll climb," she said, "boots or no boots."

The effects of the storm were to be seen everywhere. The highway south was still awash with bright orange runoff water, the heavier streams of which carried a freight of debris: branches, boards, drowned poultry, even a few small trees. Thankfully, there were very few other vehicles on the road at this early hour-it was still only seven-and Niolopua negotiated both streams and debris with confidence.While he drove he offered Rachel a short explanation of where they were going. The Napali coast was the most dangerous and beautiful portion of the island, he explained. Here the cliffs rose out of the sea, the beaches and caves at their feet hard to reach except from the sea. Rachel was familiar with images of the coast from a brochure she'd glanced at on the short flight from Honolulu: one of the most popular tourist trips was a helicopter flight over the cliffs, and the narrow, lush valleys between the cliffs, which could only be reached by those foolhardy enough to trek down from the summits. There were rewards for those who dared such journeys-waterfalls of spectacular scale, and dense, virgin jungle-but the trip wasn't to be taken lightly. According to local legend some of the valleys were so hard to reach that until recent times small communities had existed there, completely isolated from the rest of the island.

"The beach we're going to can be reached along the foot of the cliffs," Niolopua told her. "It's maybe a mile from where the road stops."

"How did you find out about the wreck?"

"I was there during the storm. I don't know why I went. I just knew I had to be there." He glanced over at her. "I guess maybe he was calling for me."

Rachel put her hand up to her face; tears suddenly threatened. The thought of Galilee out in the dark water- "Do you still hear him?" she said softly.

Niolopua shook his head, and his own tears ran freely. "But that doesn't mean anything," he said without much real conviction. "He knows the sea. n.o.body knows it better. After all these years..."

"But if the boat sank-"

"Then we have to hope the tide brought him in."

Rachel remembered suddenly the tales of the shark lord, who sometimes guided s.h.i.+pwrecked sailors back to land, and sometimes, for his own unfathomable reasons, devoured them, and how Galilee had thrown their dinner into the water that night, as an offering, which she'd thought sweetly absurd at the time. Now she was grateful he'd done so. The world she'd been raised in had no room for shark G.o.ds, nor the efficacy of food thrown on water; but of late she'd come to understand how narrow that vision was. There were forces out there, beyond the limits of her wits or education, which could not be contained by simple commandments. Things that lived their own, wild life, unwitnessed, unbounded. Galilee knew them because he was in some measure of them.

That was both her present fear and her present hope. If he felt he belonged to that other life too much, might he not have decided to give himself over to it? To lose himself in that boundless place? If so, she would never find him again. He was gone where she could never go. If, on the other hand, his professions of love had been real-if he'd meant what he said when he talked of allthat wasted time, when he should have been looking for her-perhaps the very powers that would claim him if he chose were presently her allies, and the offering he'd made, and the shark G.o.d for whom it was intended, had been part of the story that would return him to her.

iii The signs of storm damage got worse once they were the other side of Poi'pu; the road was nearly impa.s.sable in several places, where the force of the rainwater had washed down large rocks. And once they got onto the beach road, which hugged the base of the cliffs, matters became worse still. The road was little more than a winding, rutted track, which was now largely reduced to red mud. Even driving cautiously, Niolopua several times lost momentary control of the vehicle, as its slickened wheels lost their grip.

Out to the left of the track, on the other side of a ragged band of black rocks, was the sh.o.r.e: and here, more than any other place along their route, was the most eloquent evidence of the storm's power. The sand was strewn with debris from the margin of the rocks to the water's edge, and the waves themselves dyed with the run-off mud. It was like a scene from a dream-the sky cerulean, the sea scarlet, the bright sand littered with dark, sodden timbers. In other circ.u.mstances she might have thought it beautiful. But all she saw now was debris and blood-red water: it enchanted her not at all.

"Here's where the climbing starts," Niolopua announced.

She took her eyes from the sh.o.r.e and looked ahead. The muddy track ended a few yards from them, where the cliff face jutted out into the sea; a spit of rock against which the ruddied waves rushed and broke.

"The beach we're headed for is on the other side."

"I'm ready," Rachel said, and got out of the car.

The air, for all the din and motion of the sea, was curiously still close to the cliff. Almost clammy, in fact. After just a minute or so she was sweating, and once they began to clamber over the rocks her head started to throb. Niolopua had left his sandals at the car, and was climbing barefoot, making little concession to the fact that Rachel was a neophyte at this. Only when the route became particularly dangerous did he glance back at her, and once or twice offered a hand up when the rock became steep or slick. In order to avoid having to climb over boulders that were virtually unscalable he led them out onto the spit of rock.

Once away from the cliff the air became fresher and every now and then an ambitious wave reached higher and farther than its fellows and broke close to them, throwing showers of icy water against their faces. She was soon soaked to the skin, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s so cold that her nipples hurt, her fingers numb. But they had sight of their destination now-a beach that would have looked paradisiacal if it had not been so littered: a long, wide curve of sand bounded on its landward side not by rocks but by a verdant valley scooped from the cliff. The storm had taken its toll here too: many of the trees had been practically stripped by the wind, and the fronds werecast everywhere. But the vegetation was too lush and too impenetrable for the storm to have done more than superficial damage; behind the stripped palms were banks of glistening green, speckled with bright blossom.

There was n.o.body on the beach, which stretched perhaps half a mile from the spit of rock before it was bounded by another spit, far larger than the one they'd clambered over. At this distance the second spit looked to be impa.s.sable: this beach was as far as anyone could go on foot.

Niolopua was already down on the sand, and pointing out to sea. Rachel followed his gaze. No more than a few hundred yards from the sh.o.r.e a whale was breaching, thrusting its almighty bulk skyward, then toppling like a vast black pillar, throwing fans of creamy water up around it. She watched for the creature to rise again, but it was apparently done with its game. She saw only a glistening back, a dorsal fin; then nothing. She looked back at the beach, suddenly heavy with sorrow. He wasn't here; it was obvious he wasn't here. If the wreckage Niolopua had seen was indeed that of The Samarkand then its captain was out there in the deep waters of the bay, where only the whales could find him.

She crouched down on the rock for a moment and told herself in no uncertain terms to stop feeling sorry for herself, and finish what she'd come here to do. It was no use avoiding the truth, however painful it was. If there was wreckage here she should see for herself. Then she'd know, wouldn't she? Once and for all, she'd know.

She took a deep breath, and stood up. Then she clambered down over the rocks and onto the sand.

XV.

Mitch.e.l.l knew where the Kaua'i house was; Garrison and he had talked about it many times over the years. But talking about the place and being there were two very different things. He hadn't expected to feel so much the trespa.s.ser. As soon as he got out of the taxi his heart quickened and his palms became clammy. He waited outside the gate for a few moments until he had government of his feelings, and only then did he venture to the step, slide the wooden bolt aside, and push the gate open.

There was nothing here that could do him any harm, he reminded himself. Just a woman who needed to be saved from her own stupidity.

He called her name as he walked up the path to the front door. A couple of startled doves rose from their perches on the roof, but otherwise there was no sign of life. Once he got to the door he called again, but she either hadn't heard him or she was trying to make her escape. He opened the door and stepped into the house. It smelled of old bed linen and stale food; not a bright place, as he'd expected, but murky, its colors muted, all tending toward brown. So much for the feminine touch. Several generations of Geary wives had occupied this house on and off over a period of sixty or seventy years, but the place felt grimy and charmless.

That fact didn't make his heart beat any the less violently. This was the house of women; the secret place, where he'd been told as an adolescent no Geary male ever ventured. Of course he'dasked why, and his father had told him: one of the qualities which distinguished the Gearys from other families, he'd said, was a reverence for history. The past, he'd said, was not always easy to understand; but it had to be respected. Needless to say, this answer hadn't satisfied the young Mitch.e.l.l. He hadn't wanted vague talk of reverence; he'd wanted a concrete reason for what seemed to him an absurdity. A house where only women were allowed to go? Why? Why did women deserve to have such a house (and on such an island)? They weren't the moneymakers, they weren't the power brokers. All they did, to judge by the daily rituals of his mother and her friends, was to spend what the men had earned. He simply didn't understand it.

And he still didn't. There had been times, of course, when he'd seen the strength of the Geary women at work, and it could be an impressive sight. But they were still parasites; their lush, easy lives impossible without the labors of their husbands. If he'd been hoping that entering and exploring this house would offer a clue to the mystery, he was disappointed. As he moved from room to room his anxiety diminished and finally disappeared. There were no mysteries here; nor answers to mysteries. It was just a house: a little shabby, a little stale; ripe to be gutted and refurnished; or simply demolished.

He went upstairs. The bedrooms were as unremarkable as the rooms below. Only once did he feel a return of the p.r.i.c.kling unease he'd experienced outside, and that was when he walked into the largest of the bedrooms and saw the unmade bed. This was where his wife had slept last night, no doubt; which fact would not have moved him especially, had it not been for the way the bed was fas.h.i.+oned. There was something about the crude elaboration of the carvings, and the way age had dulled the brightness of the colors, that unsettled him. It was like some bizarre funeral casket. He couldn't imagine why anybody would ever want to sleep there, especially a neurotic b.i.t.c.h like Rachel. He lingered in the room only long enough to go through the contents of her suitcase and traveling bag. He found nothing of interest. With his rifling done, he left the room, closing the door behind him, and turning the key in the lock. It was only then, when he'd put the bedroom out of sight, that he dared bring to mind its other function. It was of course the bridal suite; the place where Galilee had come to visit his women. He stood in the gloomy hallway outside the room physically sickened at that thought, but unable to keep himself from imagining the scene. A woman, a Geary woman-Rachel, Deborah, Loretta, Kitty; all of them in one congealed form- lying naked on that morbid bed, while the lover-his hands as dark as the body he was touching was pale-played and fingered what was not his to pleasure; not under any law in any land: only here, in this G.o.dless, gloomy house, where a rule of possession held sway that Mitch.e.l.l had no hope of comprehending. All that mattered to him right now was to get his wife in his hands and shake her. That's what he pictured when he saw them together again: his hands clamped around her arms; shaking her until her teeth rattled. Maybe he could still frighten some sense into her: make her ask him to forgive her, beg him to forgive her, and take her back. And maybe he would.

It wasn't out of the question, if she was sincere, and made him feel appreciated. That was the heart of the problem: she'd never been thankful enough. After all, he'd changed her life out of all recognition; s.n.a.t.c.hed her out of her trivial existence and given her a taste of the high life. She owed him everything; everything. And what had she given him in return? Ingrat.i.tude, disloyalty, infidelity.

But he knew how to be magnanimous. His father had always said that when a man was blessed by circ.u.mstance, as Mitch.e.l.l had been blessed, it was particularly inc.u.mbent upon that man to be generous in his dealings. To avoid envy and pettiness, which were the twin demons of those whohad been denied a grander perspective; to err on the side of the angels.

It wasn't easy. He fell short of those ideals every day of his life. But here was a clear circ.u.mstance in which he could apply the principles he'd been taught; in which he could resist the call of envy and vengeance and prove to be better than his baser self.

All she had to do was let him shake her and shake her, until she begged to take him back.

XVI.

This is part of the hull of The Samarkand," Niolopua said, pointing down at a length of battered timber in the sand. "There's another piece over there. And there's more in the surf."

Rachel walked down to the water's edge. There were indeed more lengths of painted wood tumbling back and forth in the waves. And further out, beyond the surf, one or two larger pieces bobbing about, including what might have been a portion of the mast.

"What makes you so sure it's The Samarkand?" she asked Niolopua, who'd come to join her at the water's edge.

He stared down at his feet, curling his toes into the stained sand. "It's just a feeling," he said. "But I trust it."

"Isn't it possible the wreckage was washed up here, and he came ash.o.r.e somewhere else?"

"Of course," Niolopua said. "He could have swum along the coast. He's certainly strong enough."

"But you don't think he did."

Niolopua shrugged. "Your instincts are as good as mine where he's concerned. Better probably.

You've been closer to him than I have."

She nodded, looking past him along the littered expanse of the sh.o.r.e. Perhaps her beloved was lying somewhere in the shallows, she thought, too exhausted to make it the last few yards without help. The thought made her stomach turn. He could be so close, so very close, and she not know it. Dying for want of a loving hand.

"I'm going to walk along the beach," she said to Niolo-pua. "See if there's any sign..."

"Would you like me to come with you?"

"No," she s.h.i.+vered. "No thanks."

Niolopua fished in the breast pocket of his s.h.i.+rt, and took out a hand-rolled cigarette and an old- fas.h.i.+oned steel lighter. "Do you want a hit of Mary Jane before you go." he said. "It's good stuff."She nodded and watched as Niolopua lit a joint up, pulled on it, then pa.s.sed it over to her. She drew a deep, fragrant lungful then pa.s.sed it back to Niolopua.

"Take your time with your walk," he told her. "I'm not going anywhere."

She slowly exhaled the smoke, already feeling a pleasant but mild light-headedness, and headed off along the beach. Just a few yards on she found more wreckage-a piece of rope with the tackle still attached; what looked to be the wheelhouse window frame; the facade of an instrument panel, its gauges still intact. She went down on her haunches to examine this last item more closely. Perhaps there was some inscription on it: some sign that would confirm Niolopua's suspicions. Or better still, prove him wrong.

She lifted up the panel; seawater ran out, and a blue-backed crab, secreted in the moist sand beneath it, scuttled away. There was nothing on either side of the panel; not even a maker's name on the face of the gauges. Frustrated, she tossed it back onto the sand, and stood up again. As she did so, the drug in her system played a strange, dislocating trick. She suddenly became acutely aware of how her ears were each receiving radically different information. On her left side, the sea: the rhythmic draw and crash of the waves. On her right, audible only when the sea was momentarily hushed, the sounds of the green. A little breeze had come up since she and Niolopua had started their climb over the rocks, and it gently shook the canopy, moving leaf against leaf, blossom against blossom.

She glanced back toward Niolopua, who was sitting in the sand staring out at the water. This time, she didn't follow his gaze. She wasn't interested in what the sea had to show her. Instead she turned her eyes up the slope of the beach. A few yards from where she stood a small stream emerged from between the trees, carving a zigzag path across the sand on its way to the sea. She started to climb the beach to the place from which it appeared, studying the wall of vegetation as she did so. Another gust of wind moved the canopy, and stirred the colored blossoms so that they seemed to nod at her as she approached.

She slipped off her sandals at the edge of the stream, and stepped into it. The water was cold; far colder than the sea had been. She bent down and let the water play against her fingers for a moment, then-making a shallow cup of her hands-scooped some of it up and splashed it against her face, running her wetted fingers back through her hair. Icy water trickled down the back of her neck, and round and down between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. She pressed her hand against her breastbone to stop the water going any further. She could feel her heart thumping under her hand. Why was it beating so fast? It wasn't just cold water and a hit of marijuana that was making her feel so strange: there was something else. She put her hand back into the stream, and this time she was certain she heard the double thump of her heart quickening. She followed the path of the water with her eyes, up into the green. Another gust of wind, and the fat wide leaves rose all at once, showing their pale undersides, and the deep shadows their brightness concealed. What was in those shadows? Something was calling to her; its message was in the water, flowing against her fingers and up through her nerves to her heart and head.

She stood up again and began to walk against the gentle flow of the stream, until she reached the edge of the vegetation. It smelled strong; the heavy fragrance of blossom mingled with thedeeper, more solid smell of all things verdant: shoot, stalk, frond, leaf. She paused to see if there was an easier way in than wading through the stream, but she could see none. The foliage was thick in every direction: the easiest option was simply to keep to the flowing path.

The choice made, she stepped out of the sunlight and into the shadows. After no more than six or seven steps she began to feel clammy-cold; a p.r.i.c.kly sweat broke out on her brow and upper lip.

Her toes were already starting to numb in the icy water.

She looked back over her shoulder. Though the ocean was only fifty yards from where she stood, if that, it might have been another world. It was so bright and blue out there; and in here, so dark, so green.

She looked away, and resumed her trek. The stream no longer ran over sand now but over stones and rotted leaves. It was a slippery path, made more treacherous still by the fact that the ground was getting steeper as she progressed. She was soon obliged to climb, doing her best to strike out into the undergrowth when the route became too steep, using saplings and vines to haul herself up," then returning to the relatively unchoked stream once she'd reached a plateau and could proceed without the need of handholds.

She could no longer see the beach, or hear the waves breaking. She was surrounded on all sides by greenery and by the inhabitants of that greenery. Birds were noisy in the trees overhead; there were lizards running everywhere. But more extraordinary than either, and more numerous, were the spiders: orange-and-black-backed creatures the span of a baby's hand, they had spun their ambitious webs everywhere, and sat at the heart of their fiefdoms awaiting their rewards. Rachel did her best to avoid touching the webs, but there were so many it was impossible. More than once she walked straight into one and had to brush its owner off her face or shoulder, or shake it out of her hair.

The climb had by now begun to take its toll on her. Her hands, weary with their exertions, were beginning to lose their grip, and her legs were shaking with fatigue. The promising curiosity she'd felt on the beach below had faded. She might go on wandering like this for hours, she realized, and never find anything. As long as she followed the stream she had no fear of getting lost, of course, but the steeper the way became the more she ran the risk of falling.

She found a flat rock, in midstream, to perch on, and from there made an a.s.sessment of her situation. She hadn't brought her watch, but she estimated that she'd been climbing for perhaps twenty-five minutes. Long enough for Niolopua to be wondering where the h.e.l.l she'd got to.

She stood up on the rock and yelled his name. It was impossible to judge how far the call went.

Not far, she suspected. She imagined it snared in the mesh of vines, in the hearts of blossoms, in spiders' webs: snared and silenced.

She regretted making the sound now. For some absurd reason she'd become anxious. She looked around. Nothing had changed; there was only green, above and below. And at her feet the burbling stream."Time to go back," she told herself quietly, and gingerly took the first step down over the weed- slickened rocks. As she did so she felt a spasm of the same force she'd experienced on the beach pa.s.sing through her from the soles of her feet.

Instinctively she looked back up along the course of the stream, studying the water as it cascaded toward her, looking for some clue. But there was nothing out of the ordinary here; at least nothing she could see. She looked again, narrowing her eyes the better to distinguish the forms before her.

So many misleading combinations of sun and leaf-shadow- Wait, now; what was that, ten or twelve yards from her, lying in the water? Something dark, sprawled in the stream.

She didn't dare hope too hard. She just started climbing again, though there were several large boulders before her, one of which had fallen like a great log, and could not be climbed around.

She was obliged to scale it like a cliff face, her fingers desperately seeking little crevices to catch hold of, while a constant cascade of water rushed down upon her. When she finally clambered to the top she was gasping with cold, but the form she'd seen was more discernible now, and at the sight of it she let out such a shout of joy that the birds in the canopy overhead rose in clamorous panic.

It was him! No doubt of it. Her prayers were answered. He was here.

She called out to him, and climbed to where he lay, tearing at the vines that blocked her way. His face was a terrible color, like wetted ash, but his eyes were open and they saw her, they knew her.

"Oh my baby," she said, falling on her knees beside him, and gathering him to her. "My sweet, beautiful man." Though she was cold, he was far, far colder; colder even than the water in which he'd lain, pa.s.sing the message of his presence down the stream.

"I knew you'd find me," he said softly, his head in her lap. "Cesaria... said you would."

"We have to get you down to the beach," she told him. He made the frailest of smiles, as though this were a sweet lunacy on her part. "Can you stand up?"

'There were dead men coming after me," he said, looking past her into the vegetation, as though some of them might still be lurking. "They followed me out of the sea. Men I'd killed-"

"You were delirious-"

"No, no," he insisted, shaking his head, "they were real. They were trying to pull me back into the sea."

"You swallowed seawater-"

"They were here!" he said."Okay," she said gently. "They were here. But they're gone now. Maybe I frightened them off."