Solomons Seal (41 page)

It was the end of any hope I might have had of taking over the running of the ship and trying to make the Holland Line profitable. And it had been profitable until Hans had started undercutting the two coasters Jona had originally operated with his more economical, more practical ramp-propelled lighters.

It was the end of the Holland Line, and for Perenna a bitter blow. She felt it much more than Jona, for whom the Line meant very little. It was only the ship that mattered to him, and even that wasn't very important since he didn't anticipate any great difficulty in getting command of a vessel belonging to one of the major shipping companies, which would have the advantage that he would no longer have to worry about the business side.

The day I left for Australia we drove down to Kieta early in the morning, just before sunrise when the
world was still fresh, and walked along the beach hand-in-hand under the palm trees. All the eastern horizon was a blaze of red, and against this flaming dawn sky the slab-sided, boxlike shape of the LCT rose black in shadow, a cut-out silhouette of a ship, the sea so still and red it might have been molten lava.

She was an ugly vessel. At least I suppose she was, being totally functional, with no concessions to anything other than the purpose for which she had been designed. But to me she had the beauty of an unattainable dream. I don't know whether it was the dream or the ship I had come down to say goodbye to, but there it all was – a ship of my own and a line to run … and I was taking the flight to Port Moresby later that day.

For Perenna it was much more than the end of a dream, and she was in tears as we stood looking at the familiar shape of the little vessel standing so clear-cut against that translucent sunrise sky. And then the red elliptical curve of the sun's rim inched up over the horizon right behind her, so that the shape of her became framed in the thrusting orb and Perenna gasped in astonishment, for it appeared as though she were being consumed in fire. I could feel her fingers digging into my hand, sensed her feelings that the ship represented something that had been a part of her all her life. That was all that remained of the trading schooners, the old post-war coasters and MFVs, the long line of vessels stretching back three-quarters of a century to the
Holland Trader
, and in a few weeks' time it would go for scrap … ‘Carlos, my grandfather,
Jona, us' – her grip on my hand had tightened, her voice more husky than usual – ‘Red Holland, too, I suppose – Carlos in a new guise – and Hans.' She paused, thinking back to her childhood. ‘Mac, all those skippers – I can't remember their names now, there must have been half a dozen of them – and the crews. So many people, all involved in keeping the islands supplied and taking their crops to market. And now it's finished – up for sale. Scrap.' There was a catch in her voice as she said that final word and she let go of my hand, turning abruptly away.

Halfway to the car, in command of herself again, she said in a small, tight voice, ‘When I came on board, that first day, in the evening, standing in the wheelhouse – I watched you at the chart table, working out our position – I thought then, knowing something of your background, conscious of the way you had dealt with those stamps and got money out to me when I needed it, I thought, This is the man to get the Holland Line on its feet again.'

‘Is that why you fell into my bunk?' I said it lightly, an attempt to lift her out of her mood, though deep down I was hurt, knowing there was a calculating streak in most women.

She stopped, turning on me quickly. ‘Don't be silly, Roy. It's just that I never thought to fall in love with a man who could match my own background – my own needs, if you like. Not physical, I don't mean that … ' Her voice trailed away. ‘I'm not putting it very well.'

‘You're putting it very clearly.' Suddenly I wanted
to hurt her, test her reaction, and I couldn't stop myself. ‘You wanted a man with certain business and technical expertise to put the Holland Line back in business. You think I'm the man, so you fall in love with me – to order.'

She looked at me, her lips trembling, the scar over her left ear white in the sun's blaze. I thought she was going to burst into tears. Instead, she suddenly gave that explosive little laugh. ‘If that's what you want to believe, maybe it's true. Maybe women do fall in love – to order, as you put it – when they meet a man they think can turn their hopes into reality.' And she added, ‘It's as good a basis for mating as any, very practical.' She turned and walked quickly back to the car.

But later, when she drove me to the airport, her mood had softened again, and it was I who was thinking about the future. All morning I hadn't been able to get the sight of those ships out of my mind, and now, standing in the shade of the airport building, waiting to board the Fokker Friendship shimmering out there in the hot sun, I told her about my arrangement with Chips Rowlinson. ‘As soon as the sale is over, I'll have some idea what my ten per cent of the increased value of the property will amount to. It won't be enough, but I should be able to borrow the rest of it on the scrap value of the ship.'

She stared at me unbelievingly. ‘Are you serious? You're ready to throw everything you hope to get … ' She was suddenly laughing, almost crying, her arms round my neck, her lips on mine. ‘Darling! You're incredible. I love you.' Everybody was staring at us,
passengers, ground crew, everybody, white teeth bright in the dark faces.

They looked as though they were about to cheer as I took hold of her arms rather self-consciously and said, ‘There are conditions.'

She leaned her head back, her hair in the sun now and shining like fire, her eyes narrowing against the glare. ‘What conditions?'

‘First, that I take over the business management of the company. And get paid for it. I'm looking for a job, remember. Second, that the company is re-organised, and only those who put new money into it hold shares. Third, you contribute anything more you get from the sale of the Carlos Holland stamp collection.' I didn't tell her about the single sheet of the Solomons Seal labels in my briefcase, and I warned her that I might make nothing out of the Munnobungle sale, and even if I did get something out of it, it might not be enough and I might not be able to raise the rest of the money. ‘So just keep your fingers crossed. Oh, and there's another condition,' I told her as the boarding announcement was made and I kissed her goodbye. ‘You and the LCT go together. Is that understood?'

‘What's that supposed to mean?' she called after me.

‘That we get married,' I said, waving to her as I joined the passengers moving out to board the aircraft. And as we turned at the runway end, I could just see the brightness of her hair moving through a crowd of islanders to the parking lot.

Next day I was in Brisbane, and Cooper was facing
me with a decision I didn't want to take. He had received two offers for Munnobungle. The first, from a neighbouring station owner on the Burdekin, had been made shortly after I had sailed for Bougainville. The second was from an agricultural company and was the result of his having advertised the sale. Both offers were close to the figure he had thought the property should fetch. The private buyer had now matched the company's offer so that I had the choice of two certain buyers at a price that would put almost $9,000 in my pocket. Just enough, I thought, to make up the difference between the amount the Holland Line owed and the loan I could expect to raise on the scrap value of the ship.

‘Two birds in the hand,' Cooper said. ‘Better than I'd have expected on the figures.' He advised acceptance. The policy of the company was to buy privately, never at auction, and with the present state of the market he thought the best we could hope for at auction would be something around the present offers, and it might well be lower.

I said I would have to cable Rowlinson, but he had already done that and handed me the reply. It was terse, and addressed to me personally:
Decide for yourself it's what you're there for
–
Rowlinson.

Auction or private treaty, it made little difference to the agents' commission, so I accepted Cooper's advice as being impartial and left for Munnobungle the next day. I felt McIver had a right to some say in the choice of purchasers, and both he and his wife seemed quite touched that I should have thought of
consulting them. I had expected them to prefer the local station owner, but as soon as they knew who it was, they opted for the company, one of whose directors had already visited Munnobungle and had indicated that if the company's offer was accepted, the McIvers could stay on.

I phoned Cooper in Brisbane, told him to close with the company, and with that settled, I was free to take a trip north to Cooktown to locate Minya Lewis. I wanted to find out what had happened to his father, if he really was the Merlyn Dai Lewis who had shipped as stoker aboard the
Holland Trader
in July 1911. Also, I had a feeling I might discover the reason Hans had been so determined to get his hands on anything connected with those Solomons Seal ship labels. It was almost as though they were some damning piece of evidence that had to be acquired at any cost.

Cooktown from the air was a straggle of neatly laid-out clapboard buildings facing on to the muddy estuary of the Endeavour River and its mangrove swamps. The memorial to Cook was clearly visible as we came in over Grassy Hill, and there were wallabies bounding through the long grass at the edge of the airfield where we landed. We were met by a minibus, and as soon as I mentioned the name Lewis the driver said, ‘You want the Old Timers' Hotel. They'll get Dog Weary Lewis for you.'

We passed the gold rush cemetery, and shortly afterwards he dropped me off at an old wooden hotel building. The big bar room that occupied most of the ground floor was almost empty, only a few old men
propping up one end of the counter and the barman talking to them. Silence fell as I dumped my things and enquired for Lewis. ‘Old bastard's usually here by now,' the barman said, coming over to me. ‘Want to buy him a beer and hear his story, do you?'

‘Something like that.'

‘Okay, mate.' He looked across at the little huddle of habitués. ‘Go fetch him, Les.' He came and joined me, leaning hairy arms on the counter, the pale dome of his head with its few hairs carefully slicked down outlined against one of the gold rush murals that decorated the walls. He had a beer with me while we waited, and when I asked him where the Dog Weary mine was, he said it was on the edge of the Simpson, way over beyond the Georgina. ‘Helluva long way from here, and what's so bloody silly, he can't get it into his thick woolly head that it was worked out years ago, before he was even born, I reck'n.'

He wouldn't tell me anything about Black Holland, only that Lewis had killed him because of an argument over the mine. ‘Ain't fair to spoil his racket for him. That's how he pays for his drinks, telling Pommies and others like you about the Dog Weary and how he killed a man over it. Except for one time when he got some sort of a legacy, or maybe he stole something. Anyways, he was flush with money for the better part of six months.' I asked how long ago that would be, and when he said about three years, I knew it must have been the cash from the sale of the Solomons Seal cover.

Frosted glass windows, and mirrors advertising
plug tobacco I had never heard of, gave the place an Edwardian appearance. ‘Custom-built for the gold miners,' the barman said over his shoulder as he dealt out beers to the old men at the far end. ‘All red plush. You wouldn't believe it, looking at the town now, but there were sixty-five saloons and a score of eating houses then, that's what they say. And the cemetery full of kids dead within months of being born. You have a gander at the gravestones. There's men there that were brought in by ship at the turn of the century dying of blackwater fever.'

We were on to our second beer when Lewis finally arrived. God knows what age he was, his hands gnarled and trembling, his shoulders stooped, the muscles of his neck standing out like cords, wiry hair turned grey. He was small and tough-looking, his face so creased and wrinkled it looked like the face of a mummy dried and preserved in the hot Queensland sun. ‘Heard you're gonna buy me a beer.' His voice was deep and husky, barely intelligible. ‘Then I tell you about Dog Weary mine.' He wore a dark serge suit that hung loosely on his thin frame, and the bulging eyes that stared at me greedily were blue like sapphires in a bloodshot yellow setting.

I bought him a beer, and straight away he began talking. It was a long, rambling tale about his father being left to die in the desert by his partner. In essence, it was what I had already read in that letter.

‘What was your father's name?' I asked.

‘Him Lewis.'

‘I want his Christian names.' The blue eyes stared
uncomprehendingly. ‘Was his name Merlyn Dai Lewis?'

He nodded, the black wizened face without expression.

‘And the partner, what was his name?'

‘Him take water, gun, everything. Come back after, dig gold.'

‘Who? Who was his partner?'

‘Holland.'

‘The man you killed?'

He looked puzzled. ‘Him Black Holland. This man his father. Red Holland.' And he went on to tell me how his father had been rescued by some aborigines on walkabout, how he had travelled with them back across all the deserts of Australia. He had married an aborigine girl and had worked in the gold fields around Kalgoorlie. ‘Me born in the desert, and sometime we live in Ora Banda.' Then they had come east, to Cooktown, where he had been brought up, and his father had gone off to find the man who had left him to die in the desert and get his share of the gold.

‘What happened then?' I asked.

‘Him never come back.' And he added, ‘Mama spik me. She very sad papa no come back, she very poor, so me go look white fellow. But white fellow him dead, too.' There was something I couldn't follow then, about being shot and put in a hospital. The name Black Holland was mentioned. And then suddenly with a sweeping gesture of his hand: ‘Sometime me hear him working Queensland, find him and he laugh at me. Him very drunk, say many things – say Dog
Weary bilong him. So me kill him, an' now Dog Weary bilong me. Savvy?'