Maude stood on the beach and strained her powers of intuition. It was a hot day. The sun steamed the ocean, the reefs boiled and something in the air smelt.
Raphael had been gone six months. There had been no word or letter. No overseers could explain the circumstances. They shrugged and said maybe the ship needed new turbines, or maybe Raphael and a steady trickle of other missing Ilois were earning good money in Mauritius.
‘There’re jobs in Port Louis.’
‘What jobs?’
‘All sorts. Building jobs, dock work, factory work. He could be working in…’
‘But he’s only ever worked in plantations. That and fishing. He doesn’t do that sort of work.’
‘Then maybe he’s fishing!’
‘With his boat sitting there?’ Maude pointed to his boat. It had never been idle for so long.
‘Well maybe…’ but the man couldn’t think. He was confused, and didn’t need Maude asking questions he couldn’t answer. He was meant to be in authority.
‘Maybe what?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You should.’
The overseer sniffed.
Leonard and Odette interrupted the talk. They didn’t understand, and wanted feeding. Maude snapped, ‘Later!’ They jumped. She never snapped, raised her voice or narrowed her eyes but she began to. Raphael’s absence and the absence of his income forced her. ‘Later!’ she said again, and sat down. The overseer coughed and left.
Georges asked to sleep on her veranda; she didn’t see why not. He gave her something for the space, and she’d smack him with a pole if he bothered her. He didn’t. He said she should just think about other things. ‘Work,’ he slurred. Working would take her mind off Raphael. One day she approached a plantation manager.
‘Got a job for me?’ she said. ‘Anything?’
‘Can you use one of these?’ He showed her a knife.
‘Better than you…’ she said.
‘Good.’
‘I’ve got my own.’
‘You can use this one.’ He was a tolerant man and didn’t mind the Ilois. They were some of the friendliest people he’d ever had to order about. East Point jail was hardly ever used. Life could be hard but it had never been murder. He gave Maude a job and gloves, and she started the next day.
She split coconuts and scooped the flesh out. Chagos Agalega offered her a rent-free place too, but she preferred to stay in her own. She kept Raphael’s things – his rod, tackle, spare shirt – ready for him, and when she wasn’t working or cooking, stood on the shore and watched the waves run empty from Mauritius.
When she worked, Leonard and Odette hung about. They played with others or chased dogs and rats away from the drying trays. More like birds than children; their laughter didn’t console her. But the island didn’t ring any more. The sun seemed to shine from behind clouds when there were no clouds for miles. Even Georges couldn’t cheer her up. He told jokes, offered calou and said everything would be alright, but she didn’t laugh, didn’t drink and didn’t believe him. She neglected her vegetable garden, and didn’t care when the donkey went missing.
Since its leg had healed it had grown tame. It had lived in a paddock behind the hut. Maude knew it was planning to leave. Suddenly it was gone.
‘Where’s the donkey?’ Odette said.
Maude didn’t answer. She was too busy staring. She was tired, and hadn’t tidied her hair for days. Georges lay on the beach and smoked a cigarette.
‘Where’s the donkey?’ Odette asked him. ‘Mother won’t say. I called him.’
‘Where should he be?’
‘In the paddock.’ She pointed. ‘He comes out sometimes, but only when someone’s watching. We used to feed him but I haven’t seen him since yesterday.’
‘You want to find him?’
‘Of course,’ said Odette.
Leonard nodded. He picked his nose. ‘I’ll help,’ he said. ‘I know where he’d go.’
‘You don’t! You never helped with him anyway. You said you would, but did you?’
‘He’d go back with the wild ones.’
‘He might not. They frighten him.’
Georges led the way. The children called, ‘Donkey! Donkey!’ but nothing answered them.
They asked people they met but everyone shook their heads. They walked as far as Minni-Minni and searched around the graves, derelict buildings and jungle that surrounded the place before giving up, sitting down and watching the sun set over the lagoon.
‘He’s not here,’ said Georges.
‘No,’ said Odette.
‘He’d have heard us calling,’ said Leonard. ‘He knew his name.’
‘He never had a name! It’s stupid, calling animals names. They don’t speak to each other.’
‘He’s back with the wild ones,’ said Georges.
‘I told you.’
Not so many fishing boats bobbed in the lagoon as had once. The atmosphere of the place had shifted in a subtle and confusing way. Its waves didn’t rise and fall with the same spirit and the shore wasn’t dotted with so many lights. Some huts had been abandoned and cannibalised for other places in bigger hamlets. Georges, Leonard and Odette gave up their search.
‘We’ll go home,’ said Georges. ‘The donkey’s happier where he is, anyway. If he wants to come back he will. Come on.’ He wanted a drink.
‘That’s sad,’ said Odette.
Leonard nodded.
Maude was still sitting on the beach, twisting a knot of palm leaves with her fingers. She didn’t care where the donkey was, and didn’t answer when Georges called her name.
‘Maude!’
She cooked some food. He opened a bottle. The children sat and waited, a rooster called, a neighbour arrived to tell them to be at the manager’s house in the morning.
The manager of Chagos Agalega gave his workers the news. The British had bought the company and were closing it down. The factories would be closed soon, the plantations abandoned and all salvageable machinery shipped out. He watched faces as he explained the situation, and felt gentle puffs of tropical wind flap his trouser legs.
‘What did he say?’
‘They were orders. They’re closing.’
‘Do we keep our knives?’
‘Bloody knives,’ said Georges, and held up his thumb. He’d cut it badly. ‘It hurts.’
He’d gone to visit the nurse. She had left for Mauritius and wasn’t coming back. He went to the shop to buy a bandage. They didn’t have any and didn’t know when the next lot would come in. Supply ships had stopped sailing to the Chagos.
‘I’m bleeding!’
‘Georges! I had Marcel in yesterday. You’ve seen his leg?’
‘Yes.’
‘He needs more than a nurse. The man can’t move. Jean carried him down but I couldn’t do a thing.’
‘Then give me a bottle.’
‘Hardly any good ones left now, either. God knows.’
‘What?’
‘I don’t know…’ said the shopkeeper and went to his back room.
Georges walked to Maude’s with the bottle. The first rain in months washed the island. Big drops forcing palms droopy, filling holes in the roads and tracks. More people cleared their shelves, deserted their homes and took ships to Mauritius. The railway tracks that had served the factories rusted, old wagons lay on their sides in deserted sidings. The plantations grew wild and women wearing nothing but vests scavenged abandoned company houses.