PULAU MATI (8 page)

“You have
made me happy at times too, Anna.”  He stopped short of admitting she was doing a hell of a job making him care for her. Her face flushed and he felt like his had also.  The sound of steps on the porch broke the spell and Gray was not sure whether he was sorry or relieved.

Lex came in hollering with excitement. 
“Whoo hoo, we got the traps out!”

Gray turned and he and Lex executed a perfect chest bump.  It was a toss up as to who was the most surprised by the spontaneity
of the act.  Both of the men erupted into belly shaking laughter and the two women shook their heads but were soon caught up in the laughter.  Dayah came back with a pot of water and looked a bit puzzled by it all.

“That was cool, dude,” Lex said when he had wiped his eyes.

“But costly, dude,” Gray said, grimacing from the renewed pain the bump and the laughter had brought.  “Oh, Lex my man, look what I have found!” he said, raising a fist in triumph.  He rummaged in one of the cloth bags and brought out a big bottle of ibuprofen.

“Oh, my god!  I love you man!” Lex said, falling into one of his slacker rolls.

After Lex had taken a double dose of the pain reliever, Gray asked him how he had baited the crab traps.  Lex said he had caught a small fish on hook and line using an insect captured along the shore as bait.  He chopped up the fish for trap bait.  Gray told him he had valuable survival skills.

“
Thanks, Bro, you didn’t find any beer did you?” Lex asked.

“Now you’re really
wishing for miracles.”

Melanie had noted
Anna’s shorts and clean, wet hair.  “You didn’t happen to find any shorts that would fit me did you?”

“There
were some pants you could cut off.”  Anna pointed to a box by a cot.

Melanie
went over and gingerly hoisted a pair of small waisted but baggy legged pants from a box of soiled clothing.  “Eeeew!  I guess they can be laundered.  Did anyone find a pair of scissors?”

There were
no scissors but Gray had found a folding straight razor that easily cut the fabric. Anna asked him to cut the long sleeves from her top.  Dayah found a T-shirt and two pair of lightweight pants that fit and asked Gray to cut a pair into shorts.  When the garment modifications were complete, he pocketed the razor in lieu of a pocket knife which he would have preferred. He would have also liked some shorts for himself but he did not want to cut off his trousers if he was going to do any exploring in the jungle.  On their hike to here he had noted a number of leaves and vines with razor sharp edges and spines that would chew up bare skin.  If it appeared they were going to have to stay on the island for a long time he would go through the available clothing and find something cooler he could wear.  Lex found a pair of string tied shorts that fit and everyone but Anna went down to the pool to wash themselves and or their clothes.  Melanie brought some rags she thought could be cleaned up for bandages for Lleyton.

Melanie and Lex stripped naked
to bathe and Dayah did the same although she was only washing the clothes she had found in the hut.  Melanie was shapely and attractive but Dayah’s graceful form took Gray’s breath away.  He averted his eyes to keep from torturing himself and stripped down himself and waded in.  The water was nearly mineral free so a tiny amount of shampoo lathered up into fluffy billows.  He washed his entire body, rinsed the salt from his clothes, ducked under the water to rinse himself and then wrung out his clothing and climbed out of the pool.  Lex and Melanie had washed and then swam across the pool and were horsing around under the small waterfall.  Gray and Dayah left them at their play and carried their clothes and shoes up to the hut where they hung the clothes over a bamboo railing. Dayah went inside but Gray sat on the edge of the porch to let the sun dry his underclothes and skin.  Anna came out and sat beside him without speaking.

After a few minutes Gray said, “This would be an incredible place under different circumstances.”

Anna nodded, smiling and squinting from the sun.  “One circumstance I would choose to keep the same.”

Guessing what that circumstance would be,
Gray turned to face her.  “I think we both would like that same circumstance.”

“You think?”

Gray only nodded.

“Alyson and I talked about you.  And about you
r relationship.”

“Yeah?”

“Your head would swell if I told you the many good things she said about you.”

“She has made me feel pretty good about myself.  I could say an awful lot of good things about her.”

“You sounded too good to be true until I met you,” Anna said.

“Now you are giving me a big head.”

“She is so much in love with you, yet...”

When
Anna did not go on, Gray said, “You can finish the yet.  I think I know what it is.”

“I thought you
might.  I think I understand.”

Gray took her hand into his.
  “I am glad you do.”

“Take me for a walk,”
Anna said, sliding off the porch.

“
Alright, let’s see if we can find the crab traps they set out.”

They walked hand in hand down to the dock.   It was narrow and swayed as they walked out
single file toward the end.  Lightweight nylon ropes stretched out into the clear, rippling water to where the traps were laid.  It looked like a crab had found it’s way into the first of the traps.  The angle of the sun and the ripples made it too difficult to be sure about the other three.  A steady, strong breeze blew into their faces from the east. At the end of the dock Gray scanned the horizon.  Anna put her arms around him from behind and rested her cheek against his bare shoulder.

“You’re making me crazy,
Anna.”

“Yes?”

“Yes.”

“But we need to eat and get back across the island,” she said.

“We need to make sure we have shelter tonight, especially for Lleyton and Malik.   They may already be in shock.  If it rains it could kill them.”

The dock swayed and Gray glanced back to see Lex and Melanie coming toward them.

Lex said, “Thought we would check the traps.  Whether they have crab in them or not, Melanie thinks we should eat and get back.”

“We were thinking the same,”
Anna said.  “It’s only fair to Shinobu and Keegan… and Paolo too I guess.  We’ll take back something for them to eat.”

“Yeah, what is it with that guy?” Lex said.  “He makes me feel like I’m something
distasteful he got on his shoe.”

Gray laughed.  “Paolo?  I don’t know.  Don’t take it personally, Lex.  He seems to rub everyone the wrong way.”

When they had pulled in and emptied the four traps they had a total of six crabs with bodies the size of a man’s hand and three eight inch fish. They cleaned the fish on the counter at the foot of the dock.  There was even a bucket there for drawing water to flush the counter clean when they were finished.  The fish guts and heads went into the traps and Lex threw them out again.  Five of the crabs they threw into a pot of boiling water in the hut.  While the water came back to a boil, Grey went up the slope to a stand of bamboo he had spotted and cut down two, two inch diameter stalks.  He cut them off at ten feet and left them by the trail to take back.

Lex was sitting by the hut hacking away at a coconut with the machete.  The effort had him sweating.  When he had cleaned the majority of the fiber from the big brown seed he took a small bladed knife and tried to bore a hole in one end to get the water out.

Anna called them to lunch about the time Lex succeeded in getting a hole in the shell.  He carried the coconut in and drained it into a cup.  There was only about a third cup of milky fluid in the shell and when he sipped it he made a face.  “This is not what I pay three bucks a can for.”  He offered the cup to the others but no one wanted any.

Dayah asked, “You get coconut off ground?”

Lex shrugged and made a long, “Yeah?” like a question.

“Meat okay if… soon fall.  Coconut water you need coconut in tree.  Easy make hole then too.”

“Ahhhh, thank you, Dayah,” Lex said.

When they had eaten their lunch of
fruit, fish, crab and rice, they packed up a pan of rice and some cooked crab.  They brought along a live crab in case Shinobu liked his raw.

Gray had found a
full size shovel and a small collapsible one so along with the bags of tools, coconuts, Claymore mines, food, water, pans, and poles, everyone had their arms full.  At the saddle a strong breeze was blowing against their backs. When they turned to look back, dark and menacing storm clouds stretched across the eastern horizon.  They hurried on.

By Gray’s phone
clock it took 28 minutes from the time they left the clearing to the time they reached the hut. Shinobu was asleep when they arrived as was Lleyton, and Keegan was asleep leaning against a tree trunk.  Gray woke the old man and motioned him and Paolo to move away with them so their talking did not disturb the resting young men.

“Did I hear shots?” the old man asked
when they had sat under another tree.

“You did. 
You must have pretty good ears to hear that from a mile away,” Gray said.

The old man
smiled.  “The wind carried it,” he said.

Gray
updated Shinobu and Paolo on what they had found on the other side of the island as the two ate with relish the food they brought.   When Gray said he believed the hut was used by pirates, Melanie let out a long suffering moan.  Paolo mumbled something in German that sounded like dummes Schlampe, which Gray thought meant something like dumb trollop. Melanie may not have understood the exact meaning but she caught how it was said and scowled at Paolo.

Knowing he understood German, Anna
gave Gray a glance that asked what do we do about this guy.  Gray could only sigh, not having a suitable answer.

 
Shinobu made a great show of thanking them for bringing him the live crab.  When Paolo continued devouring the food, the old man put a hand over the pan and said, “Please, leave some for Lleyton and Keegan.”

Paolo bristled but dropped his fork into the rice and pushed the pan away.

Shinobu said Lleyton had come awake only twice while they were gone.  He had asked for water and something to eat.  Shinobu said he fed him an orange, cheese and crackers.

When Gray and Melanie checked on
Malik, he was still breathing shallowly and still unconscious.  Keegan was reluctant to eat although he did try the rice but again vomited.

Melanie pulled Gray aside and said, “
I think Keegan’s brain is swollen from the blow he took.  The ibuprofen might reduce that swelling but it also might loosen a blood clot and kill him.”

“Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.  He
’s in terrible pain and he can’t hold down food so I would advise him to take a big dose.  I’m thinking his chances are worse if he doesn’t take it.  Tell him your feelings about it and let him decide.  He seems lucid enough.”

“Thanks, Gray.  Which sack had the bottle?”

While Melanie was ministering to the young Irishman, Gray walked down to the shore.  Almost all of the floating debris that had been in close was gone.  A long trail of it stretched far out to the northwest.  Gray looked back east at the jungle and weighed whether he had the energy to tackle exploring for a cave.  He was sure they were going to need shelter.

He walked back to the group.
  “Guys, you saw the storm heading this way.  I don’t know how long it will take to get here but we probably only have three hours of daylight left so whatever we do has to be done in that time frame.  We can either haul the injured over to the hut or we build shelter.” He paused for comment.  All he got were some agreeing nods from Shinobu and the women and a groan from Lex.

“You are right to groan, Lex.  Lleyton probably weighs one eighty or better and Malik has to be about two hundred which means we’ll be carrying about one hundred pounds each up to the saddle and down.  We have plenty of blankets to make two stretchers and I saw some more bamboo on the way down.  We can either make one long trip
with two stretchers or two trips relieving each other along the way.  Either way our hands will be cramped and our knees jelly before we reach the saddle.  I guarantee it will be brutal.  And I don’t think we should count on there being a cave for shelter but I can run up there and look if you want.”

Melanie said, “
Eventually we should move over there but I don’t necessarily want to sleep in that hut without cleaning it out.  Those cots are full of bed bugs and lice.”

Anna
and Lex both nodded to that.  “Can’t we build shelter?” Lex asked.

“We are short of time to build a good one but maybe
we could build one that will suffice,” Gray said.  “We have a machete, saw, twine, rope and wire.”

Shinobu stood.  “I have had experience building shelters with the materials available here. 
If I may instruct we will complete an adequate one.  I cannot do it by myself.”