The Plover: A Novel (29 page)

*   *   *

That guy was burned pretty much everywhere you have skin, said Piko later, except, weirdly, his feet. He was like the reverse of the minister, whose feet were burnt the worst of all his burns. Although the minister, characteristically, looked on the bright side of even
that,
saying that he was one of those lucky guys who get issued new wheels halfway through life. Very rarely does a man get a new set of personal pedestrials, he said. He was like that about everything, that guy. He never had a bad word about the guys on his island who dumped him in the ocean, never moaned about the loss of his life there. He must have had a house and a girlfriend and status and stuff there but he never spent a minute complaining about what he used to have. He was all for looking ahead, that guy. It’s not like he was one of those go go go guys you want to hit with a rock because they don’t have a reflective bone in their bodies. Guys like that are afraid of themselves so they keep running ahead, you know? They have to be busy or they are afraid the dark will eat them or something. Not the minister, though. I mean, he had a vision and everything, but it wasn’t pie in the sky for him, he really
meant
what he said and he knew how it could actually happen, against all the odds and percentages. You would listen to him and the first time he explained the Republic of Pacifica you thought, okay, this guy’s nuts, and the second time you heard him explain it you thought, okay, this guy’s totally working a con somehow, but the third time you heard it you realized that he was serious, that he wasn’t into it for power and money, he really had
thought
about all this, he really
did
see way ahead, and suddenly it didn’t seem quite so crazy. It seemed like a hell of a good idea and why don’t I help this guy? That kind of guy. He was a really remarkable guy. I hope that he and Danilo are actually making it happen. I open the newspaper every morning expecting to find a huge headline that they did it somehow, and all the heads of state are harrumphing and issuing terse statements and conducting hurried press conferences, but it’s too late, a huge new blue country was born overnight without all the pompous people noticing, and it’s too late to send in armies, and it’s not like you can beat up the ocean, anyways. A really remarkable guy. As is Danilo. That guy, for all that he was so young, he had that kind of warm electric thing that just cuts through all the walls people build up, you know? You liked him right off because you got the immediate sense he was the real deal and he was a gentle honest guy. Plus, my God, could he sing! That guy would be the most popular singer on earth if he wanted to be, I bet, but he’s another guy without a con bone. I liked that guy from the first two minutes he was on the boat. For one thing he and Pipa immediately
got
each other, which is a good sign, and for another the first thing he did on the boat was offer to help. I wish them the best. It was hard to see them go, yes. More than anyone anticipated.

*   *   *

Business meeting on the
Plover,
by command of the captain. Dusk. Pipa in her chair in the stern with the terns along the railing. Everyone else crowded around the hatch cover. Enrique in the tent. You can listen but you don’t get a vote, says Declan. I’ll go first. Decision time. We have to leave this guy in a serious hospital. There are serious hospitals about four days east, in the islands. It’s also time to haul the boat in for serious repairs and refitting. It’s also time for us to admit we actually don’t have much money. It’s also time for us to realize we are running low on food. If anyone feeds that warbler one more of the dried berries that
we
could be eating, I will throw that person overboard, even if she is bigger than me. Also there’s no more toilet paper. So. Thoughts?

Is this a vote or are you making the decision? asks Piko.

Old Ed Burke says that all government is founded on compromise and barter.

Surprise and butter? says Pipa, which gets a laugh.

Danilo and I, says the minister, have been discussing possibilities, and we have concluded that we could pool our energies to be stimulatory to our shared idea of a new and far more expansive republic on and among these waters. We conceive that we could recruit support among a fairly large population of people and so begin, so to speak, a movement.

Danilo?

If we can get enough people interested and excited about it, says Danilo, then it’s started. We are not sure about details but I think the minister is right and it’s time to start. I am very grateful for your generosity in taking me aboard.

Taromauri?

But she shook her head silently and pointed to Piko.

Doctor?

The pip and I have been talking to Taromauri, says Piko quietly, and we think maybe we three will throw in together for a while. Pipa and I would like to go back to Makana, where you picked us up, rather than the mainland, and Taromauri wants to make her way back to her island. We were thinking that we could all three throw in together for a while, get some work, and save enough money for Taromauri to go back. She wants to find her husband, and we would like to help, but we need to stash some cash.

Where would you live?

I have a good friend who lives near Makana who has a house. He’ll put us up as long as need be. He’s a good guy. Kono. He’s the guy who delivered my letter to you in his canoe.

Taromauri?

But again she shook her head and then put her huge hands over her face.

And, hey, Dec, says Piko, we thought we would take the guy with us. Take him off your hands. We can get him to the hospital and fill out forms and all. Least we can do to thank you for all this. You took us all on board and that was generous.

You sure?

Yeh.

Thanks.

We owe you.

Captain? says Pipa, and everyone smiles.

Pippish?

What will
you
do? Will you come with us?

Pause; the gull steps to the edge of the cabin roof to listen.

Well, I’ll be working the boat for a while.

Then what?

Then probably working the boat some more.

Then what?

Pause.

I don’t really know, Pip. I am not much for land lately.

Will you come with us? Please?

Ah, I don’t know, Pip.

Why?

Because I am not much for land,
Pipa,
says Declan, with just a hint of cold and formal in his voice, as if that’s the end of the discussion, and it’s just the slightest infinitesimal touch of cold and formal, but the chill of it stabs Pipa like a dart.

All right then, says Declan. Forward ho. Meeting adjourned. Dinner at eight bells. Danilo is cook and the minister is kitchen crew. Piko and Taromauri on medical watch. I am on chart duty. I suggest that the musician-at-arms coordinate an hour of music before dinner, if the musician-at-arms remembers her assignment as musician-at-arms, and hops to it.

But the musician-at-arms is huddled in her chair, her hands still, and not even Taromauri can entice her from her crumpled castle.

*   *   *

Enrique in Taromauri’s tent, the flap open and secured in such a way as to provide shade while allowing a breeze. Danilo to starboard, fishing for trevallies, keeping half an eye on Enrique. Everyone else dozing in various states of sprawl, except Declan. He is poring over his charts and weighing subtle matters like if there is what you might call an accident at sea, and there is a sole survivor of the accident, and another boat picks up the survivor, and generously transports the survivor to shore for medical attention, does this second boat, or more specifically its captain, bear a legal responsibility to report the circumstances of the accident to civil authorities? Does this captain bear any financial responsibility for medical attention provided the survivor, and what are the chances of testimony being required on the parts of the captain, some or all of his passengers, or the survivor? If one boat destroys another, no matter what the context or sensible reasons for said destruction, does the surviving boat, or more specifically the captain, bear a
moral
responsibility for the care of the survivors, if any, even if the first boat, the one that was destroyed, sought the destruction of the second boat, the one that was not destroyed, but that picked up the sole survivor, who was in fact the casus belli, the agent and cause of all the trouble in the first place? If a boat lands several passengers on an island, and the passengers have no official visa or passport or forms of identification, is the captain of the boat responsible for legal ramifications of possible customs or immigration violations, even if the captain can fairly claim that he rescued all of the passengers being landed from various forms of threat and danger, and indeed in two cases was
importuned
to do so by medical authorities on the island from which they departed? If a boat lands several passengers on an island, say under the cover of darkness, and the boat then departs, and is a number of miles away the next day, when the civil authorities become aware of the arrival of the undocumented passengers, can the civil authorities prove any link between captain and passengers, except that of unsubstantiated claims or testimony from the passengers? Can a captain who has never been a father, and has had no particular desire or interest in being a father, actually feel
paternal
toward a child, if the captain has no experience whatsoever in paternity, that he knows about? Could a man who has often and pointedly claimed independence from all constraint and relationship, and insisted with asperity on his solitude against any and all calls on his time and resources from family, friends, or civic entity, suddenly reverse course and throw in with friends as a sort of amateur and untrained uncle, without inviting loss of independence, not to mention ridicule? Can a man who has often and pointedly claimed independence from all constraint and relationship continue on such a course for his entire lifetime, whether in marine or terrestrial context, without finally arriving not at a welcome solitude but at a fearsome loneliness and desiccation of the soul? Does a man who insists on his own compass and geography and direction, without acknowledgment and correction for the courses of others, risk becoming cruel and lonely and hard as a seed that never gave itself a chance to open?

*   *   *

Taromauri gently spreads ointment on Enrique’s burns. His eyes are closed. Danilo and the minister are making flags and pennants of their own to hang in the rigging: green for Danilo, blue for the minister. Piko is gently bathing his daughter. Her eyes are closed. Declan is watching Piko and Pipa from the ladder. In
our
family, says Piko, we begin with the feet. The feet are where we touch the earth and so we start there. Begin with the foundation. Then to the legs, which are what separates us from fish and moss and lichen. Not to say that things that don’t have legs are losers but yes to say that legs are
excellent
ideas and they should be treated with respect. You should be the
best
of friends with your legs.
Your
legs have been sleeping for a long time but they might wake up. That could happen, you know. They might wake up one morning and say
where the heck have we been, we have some sprinting to do!
That could happen. That might happen. So we will keep them loose and limber, yes we will. Then the private parts, and then the seat of the soul, which has a button right
here
in case you need to open it. This is called the belly button, and I know you are ticklish, you don’t fool me with your eyes closed, my little
manuoku
. Then the arms and shoulders and chest and neck and finally we finish with the book of your soul, the space of the face, and then those epic eyes, aha! I knew you were not dozing! says Taromauri to Enrique also, at the exact same instant Piko says it to Pipa. Enrique opens his eyes but doesn’t try to speak. She works down toward his feet. You are as burned as burned can be, she says. Why did you want to live in the fire? The fire is no place to be. Whatever it was you were looking for isn’t there. It was never there. You cannot command the fire. The fire is not ours. You can visit the fire but if you try to live there, this is what happens. This is the time for you to think about the next person you want to be. You cannot stay the same person all your life. If you are still a child inside this body you need to come out now and become a man. You need to have this ointment every day now, twice a day if possible. I will put it on you for four more days but then you will have to do it yourself. You forget that I worked for you for a year and a day and I saw you with the fire. I saw how you talked to it. You didn’t think I saw but I saw. I think there is a young man inside you who should come out now. Whatever it was you used to be is burned and gone. This is a good time to think about a new skin. You still have your old feet but everything else will be new and who will live inside your new parts? That’s what you need to think about. Close your eyes now and get some sleep and I will wake you for dinner, says Piko to Pipa, at exactly the same instant as Taromauri says it to Enrique.

*   *   *

At dusk the minister called their attention to an albatross once again hanging effortlessly over the stern, and they gathered to stare at the bird’s enormous wingspan and startlingly white plumage. How that bird stays so clean in a world this dirty is a mystery to me altogether, says Declan. Then it is dinnertime. Somehow sometime over the past few days they have adopted the habit of eating in a rough circle, using the hatch cover as a table. Pipa perches in her chair, Enrique is supine in the tent, and everyone else sits around the hatch. Tonight we will be dining on, surprise! fish! says Declan. Our chef this evening is the young man to my left; a round of applause for the young man. Danilo smiles and bows his head. They eat, murmuring about this and that. Taromauri stands at one point to share a scrap with the gull, and she makes a point of also leaving a trail of berries for the warbler, which makes Declan growl, which makes Pipa laugh. The minister and Piko get into a discussion of bioluminescence, which is fascinating absolutely, says the minister, and in Pacifica we will have to find a corps of bright children who can figure out how to channel all that light for secondary use after primary use by progenitory creatures. Perhaps for example there is a way for alphabets to be written on the surface of the sea at night, so children can study at night as well as during the day. This could happen. Near the end of the meal Taromauri scrinches over to the tent and feeds scraps of fish to Enrique, and Danilo inches over to be closer just in case although as Declan has often said why in heaven’s name
we
worry about protecting
her
is a mystery to me, she could throw us all off the boat two by two without breaking a sweat, and if we really wanted to be efficient with energy we would turn the engine off and have her get in the water and push us toward the Jesus blessed islands. Danilo stares at Enrique and Enrique feels the stare and returns it. There’s no way either man will ever know that they have, had, Something Somethingivi
ć
in common. It just will not happen. Enrique never knew the name of the pilot’s brother, and Danilo never knew that his brother ended up a pilot on the
Tanets,
but still they stare at each other, each sensing some odd ripple between them. They’ll never talk about Danilo’s brother, they’ll never even suspect that the pilot who washed overboard that night was the man who sold himself to save his brother, but still they sit there in the stern, staring, as night sifts into the boat. And soon enough both of them think of Something Somethingivi
ć
, just for a moment, the thin man with a leer and a cigarette, young in Danilo’s mind and older in Enrique’s; but Enrique does not go so far as to stare at Danilo and discern the structure of the brother’s face, and it never occurs to Danilo that the burned man huddled in the tent is the last person on earth to see his brother whole and hale, before his brother stepped into the storm and never returned; and then dinner is over, and all hands turn in; the minister takes the first watch.