III

NAURATAKA

THAT HORRIBLE AFTERNOON came to an end. When she got around to organising herself, Ruth Caval was efficient, and in three hours she restored wardrobe, toiletries and footwear. Fort James could not provide Bertrand Russell – I was surprised, and rather pleased, at the amount of time she gave to hunting for him – but it did produce a copy of Alice, and also a modern reprint of Waterton’s Wanderings in South America, which, I told her, would make good bedside reading for a mathematician. (Later she asked why I thought so, and I explained that it showed a world that had nothing to do with maths.)

While she was unpacking, Edward Caval telephoned, and after speaking to her he was put through to me. I was having a bath, but with that curious blend of the modern and the medieval that is (sometimes) one of the charms of the Caribbean, there was a telephone in the bathroom. After inquiring how we were, he said that he was installed at Naurataka, and that he would like me to come back with Ruth and stay for a few days. ‘It is, I think, beyond the local earthquake belt,’ he added. I said that I should be delighted to revisit him.

*

In clean clothes, and feeling more than ready for a drink, I called on Ruth. I found her looking forlorn, and reading Alice.

‘Cheer up,’ I said, ‘most women would enjoy all those new clothes.’

‘Well, I’m not most women.’

‘I wondered if you’d let me take you out to dinner.’

‘Haven’t you had enough of me?’

I considered this. ‘What are the alternatives?’ I asked.

‘The hotel serves quite good food. And I’ve got Alice, and that other book you wished on me.’

‘And for me?’

‘A single man can always find plenty of entertainment.’

‘My dear Ruth, you are rather an ass. Do you know many people in Fort James?’

‘I don’t know anybody at all. I come from New York.’

‘I come from South Devon, which is even farther from Nueva than New York. So we’re in the same boat, more or less.’

‘All right. Where shall we go?’

‘There’s a booklet of the delights of Nueva in my room. It says there’s a beach about ten miles out of Fort James, with a waterfront restaurant and hibiscus leaning over the tables. We might find a table where the hibiscus didn’t get into the soup.’

*

Anata Beach turned out to be a charming place. The restaurant really was on the beach, in a clearing where trees came almost to the water’s edge. I can’t vouch for the hibiscus because night comes early in the tropics and it was dark when we got there, but there was a bonus that I hadn’t expected – fireflies. They weren’t round the tables, because the tables had electric light, but the place was well-planned, with low-powered lighting, and the rim of darkness round the trees sparkled with the jewel-glints of fireflies. Ruth was a bit edgy during dinner, making brittle, rather forced, conversation, but as we sat over coffee she seemed suddenly to relax. ‘I’m sorry, Peter,’ she said. ‘I’ve been horrid to you, and you have been very nice to me. Are you the sort of person I can talk to?’

‘I’m a great deal older than you are,’ I replied, a little guardedly. ‘I can’t claim any particular wisdom, but I am, or was, a soldier, and the Army tries to keep its head.’

‘Well, I don’t know what to do. You see, I’m not married to any Caval.’

‘Does Mr Caval think you are?’

‘I don’t know. I don’t see how he can – but I don’t know him at all well. No, it’s not like that. I’m quite properly Mrs Caval, at least I suppose I am if I want to be, but I don’t, much. You see, I was married to Charles Caval, but we were divorced about a year ago. Do you know anything about Caval history?’

‘I know a sort of guide-book version of it, about the quarrels between the two seventeenth-century half-brothers, and all that.’

‘It’s true enough, at least as true as family history ever is, though Charles told me so many lies when I was married to him that I don’t know what to believe about any Cavals. But that’s a bit beside the point. Charles is the son of Nicolas Caval, that’s the other branch of the Cavals, supposed to be the bitter enemies of Edward Caval’s lot. Anyway, I met him just after I’d taken my D.Phil. I’d been working very hard, and I went on vacation to Florida. Charles was on vacation, too – he’s a physicist, and a very able one, or he could be if he stuck at anything. I didn’t know anything about Nueva then. We had a hectic love affair, got married in the States, and went to live at the university where Charles had a research job. Things went wrong from the start. I was all dewy-eyed and romantic then, I suppose, and I began by respecting Charles, and I saw him as a Professor of Physics one day. We’d not been back a week when I found that he was sleeping with one of the lab. assistants, and she was only one of a string. The other campus wives tried to be very sweet and wanted to pity me – you don’t know how vile women can be when they want to pity another woman. I stood it for a bit – you see, I respected Charles as a scientist until I discovered that he was bone-idle and not above pinching the results of one of his own students’ research. The boy came to me about it, in great distress. Then I had to get out. I brushed up my D.Phil and got a job in a mid-west municipal college – there’s rather a shortage of good maths teachers, and I am good. I’ve got a better job now, but that’s by the way.

‘Charles didn’t care two cents about my leaving him. I didn’t ask for any money, and he never offered to send me anything – he never has. I had a bad time, because my parents are dead, and I’ve never had any money apart from what I’ve earned in student jobs. But I managed. Then some lawyer wrote to say that Charles wanted a divorce. That seemed to tidy up the situation, and I was really thankful to get the whole business of my marriage over and done with. I never saw Charles again after I left, and for a long time I’d quite stopped thinking of him. I was still called Caval, because that was the name I’d applied for my first job in, and it just went on. It didn’t seem to matter, anyway.

‘Then I got a letter from Edward Caval. How he got hold of my address in New York I don’t know, but he did somehow. It was rather a touching letter – kind of eighteenth-century good manners. But you’ve met Edward Caval, and you’ll know what I mean. I can’t show you the letter because it went up with the rest of my things at Chacarima, but I can remember it almost word for word. It began “My dear Ruth, (if I may call you so),” and went on, “I am an old man, and, as you may know, my branch of the Caval family will die with me. I have a great wish to meet one of your generation who bears the name Caval, and I am wondering if you would do me the honour of visiting me at Chacarima. I enclose a return air ticket from New York to Nueva. You will see that it is undated – all you have to do is to make a reservation with the airline, and let me know the date on which, as I hope, you can come. I shall then arrange for a car to meet you at Fort James airport.” He didn’t even mention Charles.

‘Well, I wasn’t all that keen on having anything to do with any more Cavals, but Edward seemed about the best of the bunch. I’d heard of him from Charles – of course, he never had a good word to say for Edward, but I’d learned to regard the reciprocal of anything Charles said as probably coming somewhere near the truth, so I was slightly disposed to think well of Edward. And I did need a vacation, and I didn’t have any money – I’d had to go quite a bit into debt in tidying up my life, and although I’ve got quite a good job now I’ve still got to pay for the furniture in my apartment, and a few other things. So I thought, why the hell not? I get a free trip to Nueva, and it’s a place people actually pay a lot of money to go to on vacation. So I wrote back and said I’d go.

‘The day before my flight the phone rang in my apartment. I answered it, and a voice said, “Mrs Caval? I hope you have a good time in Nueva, but watch out for earthquakes.” I said, “Who is it?” but he rang off without saying anything more. I think it was Charles, but I can’t be quite sure, because whoever it was either had or pretended to have a bit of a cold, and spoke in a rather nasal sort of voice.

‘I was more angry than worried – it was just the sort of vicious thing that Charles would do, to get me upset and maybe call off the trip. I’d quite got to looking forward to it by then, and all the call did was to make me more than ever determined to go. I’d almost forgotten about it until this morning.’

She stopped to drink some coffee. She wasn’t looking at me – she was gazing into the night, looking into the distance of her own life, perhaps.

‘It’s hard to see how it can be anything but an extraordinary coincidence,’ I said.

‘I suppose so.’ She seemed to speak without much conviction. ‘I’m not exactly scared, but I don’t know what to do. Edward Caval wants me to go back. I don’t think I want to go. But I’ve spent an awful lot of his money. I didn’t owe him anything before, but I feel I do, now.’

‘I should forget about the money – after all, you lost your things in his house, and naturally he’d want to replace them. And while I don’t know anything about his finances, from the look of things he must be pretty rich. How did you get on with him before?’

‘Would it sound silly if I said I don’t really know? He was wonderfully considerate – treated me like a long-lost granddaughter, who’d come home. Talked a lot about the past, about how one ancestor had done this, and another that. The nicest thing about him is that he is always so gentle. That made me feel good – after living through the past few years I sort of needed to have a gentle vacation. What I don’t know is what, if anything, he got out of me. Once or twice he seemed on the edge of saying something that might explain why he’d invited me, but he never did.’

‘Were you bored?’

‘Not a bit. I’m used to being on my own, and I’d brought some maths books that I’d wanted a chance to study. Living at Chacarima was like being a princess in a children’s story – lovely food, everything I wanted, and no one to bother me if I wanted to be alone.’

‘Why don’t you want to go back? Is your vacation nearly up?’

‘Lord, no, the university term doesn’t start for a couple of months yet. It’s just that I feel as if the whole situation had somehow turned unhealthy.’

‘I don’t see why. There’s not likely to be another earthquake, and anyway, the house he’s gone to is supposed to be away from that particular earthquake belt. Did Mr Caval say that he’d asked me to come back with you?’

‘No, he didn’t. Are you going, Peter?’

‘Would it make any difference?’

She considered this, as if confronted with a problem in maths. ‘I think perhaps it would,’ she said. ‘Unless I started getting frightened of you.’

I laughed. ‘Am I a frightening person?’

‘No, but I think maybe you could be.’

‘I’d better tell you about my own marriage.’

‘Your marriage? You said you hadn’t got a wife.’

‘I haven’t. I had once. It was a long time ago.’

The tension that I had felt between us was defused. She laughed – more like a woman who has enjoyed being taken out to dinner.

‘So I was right! She couldn’t take the sailmaker’s kit!’

‘She never even saw it. No, it wasn’t a bit like that.’ I gave her a brief account of my leaving the Army, of my years as an industrial tycoon, and of how my marriage and my job had gone together when the firm was taken over. ‘She needed someone who could afford to keep her – she married my successor in my job,’ I explained.

‘Do you miss her?’

‘Not really. I miss the things that marriage might have brought, a proper home, a family . . . but marriage with Sybil couldn’t have worked out like that. Fortunately I was able to go back to the Army.’

‘Poor Peter. It seems we’ve both been rather battered.’

*

I took Ruth back to the hotel, and we arranged to meet for the Nuevan breakfast at eleven thirty and to leave for Naurataka in the afternoon, in time to get there before dark. She said that she had still a bit of shopping to do, and wanted particularly to see if Fort James could provide her with a few more books. I felt that I ought to call on the brigadier, and, if possible, on the Prime Minister, to let them know my movements.

I found it hard to get to sleep. What an extraordinary story Ruth had told me. There were many things, I was sure, that she had not told me – but then there was really no reason why she should have told me anything at all. Could her story relate in any way to the problem that had brought me to Nueva? It didn’t seem likely. But why had Edward Caval wanted her to come from New York? She was not even a relation, merely a remote connection by a now no-longer-existing marriage. What on earth could he want to talk to her about – and if he wanted to talk to her about anything, why hadn’t he done so? And why had he never mentioned her ex-husband, who was at least a kinsman? Or was this one of the things on which Ruth had been less than wholly honest?

With these unanswered questions on my mind I could doze only fitfully, and at five thirty a.m. I was glad to get up. This was not an ungodly time for getting up in Nueva, and I reckoned that if I called on the brigadier around six there would be a good chance of finding him at home.

He was at home, drinking coffee and eating a pineapple on the verandah of his house. He invited me to share both. I began by thanking him for rallying round so promptly yesterday. ‘We are both soldiers. It was the least I could do,’ he said.

He asked what were my immediate plans. ‘I’ve a fair bit of leave due to me, and having come to Nueva it seems a pity not to take the chance of staying on,’ I said. ‘Mr Edward Caval has invited me to stay at a house he has at Naurataka – to make up, perhaps, for his house at Chacarima falling on top of me. I thought I’d accept his invitation, for a few days at any rate.’

‘Naurataka – that really is the back of beyond! It is very beautiful, though. You can get up into the mountains from there, and if you go you must take the opportunity of visiting one of the Carib settlements. But you will have to go by mule, I think.’

‘I’ve travelled by mule-back in my time. I’m ashamed of my ignorance of this part of the world. I know that there are some Carib settlements on the mainland, in the interior of Guyana and Venezuela, but I didn’t know that there were any left in the islands.’

‘There are not many. Those in Dominica are, perhaps, the best known, but there are a few still in Nueva.’ He paused. ‘The rest of us, black, white, brown and yellow are all immigrants – the Caribs are our true natives. History has not treated them kindly – or, if death be a preferable alternative to slavery, maybe they were lucky. The Caribs had – indeed, have – a culture of their own, but it could not be adapted to the coming of the Spaniards and other Europeans. They were not prepared to work as slaves on plantations. They fought where they could – bows and arrows against gunpowder, and inevitably they went down. But it was more than that – they simply could not take the life that the Europeans brought, and they just died. You are right in thinking that they almost died out in the islands. There are only a few settlements left.’

‘How do they live?’

‘They live as they have always lived, wonderfully adapted to life in the forest, understanding its resources, and living with it rather than just in it. Our Government is sympathetic to them, we have programmes for health and education in the settlements, but I am not sure that they are not happiest when they are left alone. You will meet some of them, I expect.’

‘I shall certainly try. I also came to talk to you about that lecture you asked me to give.’

‘It is good of you to remember. Of course I hope you’ll be able to give it. I didn’t want to remind you about it when you spoke of being on leave.’

‘Well, that’s just a private matter. I came here to do a job, and I’m at your disposal for anything you want me to do.’

He seemed pleased at this. ‘As far as the rifle is concerned, I don’t think there is much more to be done,’ he said. ‘It speaks – or rather shoots – for itself, particularly when handled as you handled it. I have never seen such shooting. My mind is certainly made up – I want it for our Army. I don’t think there will be any difficulty – I’m sure the Government thinks as I do. Having got you here, though, I’d like you to lecture to our Staff course. I’m in charge of Staff training, and you will understand that our resources tend to be limited.’

‘I shall be glad to do whatever I can. Give me a week, say, at Naurataka, and then if you will fix a date, I’ll keep whatever date you suggest.’

‘Splendid. Will you stay with me when you come back to Fort James?’

‘I’d be honoured.’

So that was fixed up.

*

Eight o’clock in the morning seemed an unorthodox hour for calling on Prime Ministers, but Old Government House showed signs of life, and the girl secretary whom I remembered said she thought the Prime Minister was available, and would see me.

Mr Li Cook was as affable and informal as before. ‘I am thankful that you came to no harm in that unpleasant incident,’ he said. ‘And I’m delighted to see that you are taking to our sensible Nuevan hours. The morning for work, the evening for serious conversation, the afternoon for sleep, or perhaps in the right circumstances for love-making.’ He laughed. ‘Shall we walk again under the trees?’

His caution seemed grotesque, but it was his business. When we were safely in the shade of las madres de cacao, he asked, ‘How did you get on with Mr Caval?’

‘I had scarcely time to get on with him. He gave me a drink, and we were about to have lunch – sorry, I mean breakfast – when the house fell on us. For behaviour after an earthquake I give him high marks – he was calm, cool, and astonishingly courteous throughout.’

‘He would be that. Did he strike you as at all a dangerous man?’

‘Dangerous in what context?’

‘In wishing to hurt Nueva.’

‘I shouldn’t have said so, but most of the time I spent with him we were extracting ourselves from the ruins of his house, and getting across the river to safety. However, he telephoned last night and invited me to stay with him at another house he has, at a place called Naurataka. I accepted the invitation, and I’ve arranged to go out this afternoon.’

‘Good. I can rely on your discretion, but it is most important that I should know what he sees as the future of his estates . . . Your other business seems to have turned out well.’

‘You mean the rifle?’

‘Yes. From what Brigadier Ezra tells me you are already something of a legend as a marksman, and will go down in Nuevan history.’

‘It was pure luck.’

‘Perhaps. Do you know what Napoleon used to ask his officers when he was considering them for promotion? He did not ask, “Are you a good strategist? Can you make good use of artillery?” but simply, “Are you a lucky man?”’

‘I wonder how they answered!’

‘Ah, that is another matter. Perhaps that is why he asked. But seriously, Colonel, I do not think that your performance with the Army was just luck. It was the right action at the right time – though that may be a definition of what men call luck. You did very well, and I hope you will be as successful in your other mission.’

‘I’ve told the brigadier that I’ve got some leave due to me, and that having come to Nueva I’d like to stay on for a bit, and see something of the island. That leaves me a free hand for the moment.’

‘Couldn’t be better. When we go back to the office I’ll give you my private telephone number. It is always manned, and a message there will reach me certainly and quickly.’

*

More than half of me did not much like the idea of spying on a man who had invited me to be his guest. But the remaining part of me felt that I could do no harm and might, just possibly, do some good. From the Nuevan point of view the future of the Caval lands on the Atlantic coast was clearly a fairly vital matter, and – although I had not discussed this with the Prime Minister – I was very conscious of the strategic value of the deep-water Chacarima Inlet. I was also a little concerned for Ruth. Her part in the Caval story was an enigma, but it was possible that she might need some protection. Whether or not she herself felt this I did not know, but she had seemed a bit relieved that I was going to Naurataka with her.

I got back to the hotel before Ruth, and used the time to call on the manager and arrange for a car to take us out to Mr Caval. I was having a drink on the verandah when Ruth turned up, looking, I thought, remarkably attractive in a plain white linen skirt and a sleeveless cotton blouse. She was carrying a large parcel of books.

‘Successful shopping?’ I asked.

‘Not very. There’s a new book on Descartes that I want, but the Neuvan market for Descartes appears to be limited. I could order it from New York, but I’ll probably be back before it would get here. But the bookshop is not all that bad, and I got enough to keep me going. What do you read?’

‘I travel light. I have a paperback Horace, Helen Waddell’s Medieval Latin Lyrics, and a translation of Xenophon, also in paperback. I had Latin well beaten into me at school, but I don’t know much Greek. At home I find Gibbon adequate for a lifetime’s bedside reading, but in seven volumes he’s too heavy to carry around.’

‘Didn’t you ever do any maths?’

‘I didn’t do anything very much. I’m a soldier – I went to Sandhurst at eighteen.’

‘Well, at least you seem fairly literate for a soldier.’

‘Don’t be impertinent. Sit down and have a drink, and then we’ll have lunch – I mean, breakfast. I’ve ordered a car for this afternoon.’

*

The journey to Naurataka took nearly twice as long as the trip to Chacarima. It wasn’t that the distance was all that much farther – it was only about twenty miles more – but the road was a great deal worse. We did not go via Chacarima, because once beyond the Chacarima Inlet there is no road along the coast at all. We went more or less through the middle of the island, on a road that climbed and descended in hairpin bends, and for long stretches was distinctly rough. It was breathtakingly beautiful.

Naurataka is directly on the coast. Unlike the Caval ‘Great House’ at Chacarima, which stood alone in miles of parkland, Naurataka House was quite near Naurataka village. It was a fishing village, ending in a small bay, and a breakwater enclosed one shore of the bay, making a harbour where there were several boats. Naurataka House stood on a bluff above the harbour, looking out over the Atlantic. It was quite a climb to get up to it, but once there the view was reward for anything. As we went up by car we scarcely deserved the view.

The butler, Adam, met us as if nothing had ever happened to disturb the civilised Caval life. The house was smaller than Chacarima, but still of considerable size, and the furniture was superb. After we had been shown to our rooms and had a wash, we were conducted to Mr Caval, who was sitting in the usual verandah, with the usual tray of drinks beside him.

He greeted us with all his old courtesy. ‘It is good of you to return,’ he said, ‘and while I naturally regret the unhappy incident at Chacarima I am glad that it has made us come here. In the old days this was the dower house, though my grandmother was the last Caval dowager to live here. I have always kept it up, and try to come here two or three times a year. In some ways I like it better than Chacarima, which always seemed to me a bit ostentatious. But it was convenient for the estate office, and the mill. And the Cavals have always lived at Chacarima. How tied we are to history! Now? Well, I shall certainly not rebuild a Great House at Chacarima, but it may be necessary to have a house of some sort there. For the moment, I am content to be here.’

He took his loss, I thought, extraordinarily lightly. ‘I saw Chacarima House only briefly, but it must have been a priceless possession,’ I said. ‘Any expression of sympathy seems quite inadequate. You are meeting your loss, if I may say so, with great courage.’

‘Courage? I don’t think so. There were many beautiful things at Chacarima and I am sad to see them go, but my chief feeling is of thankfulness that no lives were lost. Family documents, and the greater part of our Caval plate, were not at Chacarima. Why have so many old West Indian families slipped out of history? Because of white ants, as much as anything – the ants are relentless destroyers. We had already lost much when I succeeded to the estate, and I was determined to preserve what I could. So I deposited all papers, much plate and other heirlooms, with my old college at Oxford – there is an Oxford connection, because the first Edward Caval to come to Nueva had been an Oxfordshire squire. The college is glad to have them – they use the plate sometimes – and as I was also able to provide an endowment to go with them, everybody has benefited.’

He seemed wholly detached. It was getting on for seven o’clock, and the swift tropical nightfall that comes down like a knife was shrouding the Atlantic. The butler came with two oil lamps – there is no electricity at Naurataka – but Mr Caval waved him away. ‘A few moments yet, Adam, please,’ he said. And to us, ‘Do you mind sitting in the twilight? There will be light enough to drink by for ten minutes yet, and I have always loved this hour at Naurataka. It is not day and it is not night, but it holds something of the beauty of both, with an added peace of its own. Soon we shall need the lamps, but not quite yet.’

‘Do you regret the changes that have come to Nueva?’ I asked.

‘There has been little change at Naurataka . . . but I know what you mean. Regret, I think, is always pointless. I and my family have had much from Nueva. I like to think that we have given a little in return, but our paternal feeling for our people is out of fashion in the politics of today. I suppose many a provincial Roman felt bitterly about the collapse of the Roman Empire – and with reason, for the provinces were swept by barbarism. I cannot say that I feel any particular bitterness about the winding up of the British Empire. It had become, I suppose, an anachronism, although I am less sure that the regimes that have replaced it make for any real improvement in the human lot. But I speak from an exceptionally privileged position, and I wish independent Nueva well.’ He paused reflectively, then, in a sharper voice, he said, ‘Look out to sea!’

It was now quite dark on land, and although the sea always seems to retain some light when it is gone from the land, it was almost dark to seaward. Because we had no lights on the verandah, a speck of light some miles out to sea was clearly visible.

‘There is no lighthouse, is there?’ I asked. ‘It must be a ship.’

‘It is certainly a ship, but what is she doing?’

This seemed a fairly ridiculous question. Why shouldn’t there be a ship making her way along the Atlantic coast of Nueva? ‘Not having a chart, I can’t say what her probable passage is,’ I said. ‘But shipping must be fairly common in these coastal waters.’

‘Not nowadays. In the old days, yes, everything went by sea – the West Indian schooner was the lifeblood of the islands, and before there were roads and motor lorries most travel from place to place in Nueva was by schooner. It is still the best way of getting from Naurataka to Fort James – you will recall the road you came by today. The fishermen here take their catch to Fort James in their boats. But the Nauratakans have always been reluctant to sail at night – if they can’t get home by nightfall they put into some beach and anchor until daylight. It looks to me as if that vessel is making for the Chacarima Inlet. Why?’ He seemed strangely excited.

I didn’t know what to say. ‘Is there a port of any sort there?’ I asked.

‘No. And no fisherman would go there willingly. You have heard of the Chacarima caves – our local people firmly believe that they are haunted. Even in the old days, when we sent away our sugar by sea, we did not use the inlet, though it offers a magnificent anchorage. Because our people were reluctant to go near the caves, we had to build a jetty on a more exposed beach about five miles to the north.’

‘Couldn’t the ship be making for your jetty?’

‘No. You do not know the coast, but if she were, we couldn’t see her. Beyond the Chacarima inlet the coast trends northwards to a promontory, and our jetty is the other side of the promontory.’

‘Perhaps she is just passing the Nuevan coast, on her way to some other island.’

‘If so, we shall see the light move along the coast. It looks to me as if it is closing the shore.’

It certainly seemed so. Whoever she was, the ship was a long way off, and but for our height above sea level, we could not have seen her at all. She was far too distant to make out anything but the speck of her lights, and I thought that Caval’s eyesight was remarkably good for his age. We continued to watch the light for another ten minutes or so, and then it disappeared. It had not continued along the coast, and therefore, presumably, had put in somewhere. It didn’t seem to have anything to do with us.