LITMIR.BIZ

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Damn you.” Col’s anger started to get the better of him. “You can just shove off. I’ll bring her around myself tomorrow, or I’ll get someone else to. You can shove off.”

      “Okay. If that’s what you want.”

      “Hold it. What’s going on?”

      Red looked up as he was about to cast off and saw Rosie for the first time. He couldn’t make out much detail in the gloom, but at least she wasn’t wearing a dress.

      “Red, this is Rosie Trethewey.”

      Red climbed back onto the jetty. He reluctantly held out his hand. “Pleased to meet you.”

      “Like hell.” Rosie walked right past him, ignoring his offered hand. She sensed his surprise. Well, what did he expect? That she’d just roll over like one of her brothers’ silly wives? “What’s up, Col? What’s this about you taking me around tomorrow?”

      “I wouldn’t send a dog out there on a night like this.” “Out there” apparently meant open water. “I was just suggesting to Red that he’s left his run too late, and that I’d find someone to take you around to Wreck Bay tomorrow.”

      “I don’t know that we should do that, Col. Red’s taken the trouble to come and pick me up, so we should let him. As for sending a dog out there, well, if it’s good enough for Archie—I assume those eyes down there belong to Archie—then it’s okay by me.”

      “You’re out of your mind.” Jean had wandered down to put in her twopence worth.

      “Maybe. But this bloke here obviously wants to show me how hard life on the Barrier can be for a poor, defenseless woman. Let him have his moment of glory. Never know, I might surprise him.”

      She already had, but Red couldn’t let on. He and Angus had their plan, such as it was, and they were determined to stick to it. He didn’t enjoy what he was doing but accepted the necessity.

      “Jesus, Rosie, you’re as mad as he is.”

      “I heard that was the qualification for living here. C’mon, Col, pass me something.” Rosie jumped nonchalantly down into the boat. Her legs were wobbly and her hands shook. But she was determined to show Red she could be just as stubborn and unyielding as he was.

      “Leave it to Red and me. He knows where to put things to keep them dry. Relatively speaking, of course. Now, have you got any foul-weather gear?”

      Rosie shook her head.

      “Jean, you better go get your spare set. And Rosie, you better put on another sweater as well. You might feel warm in here but you won’t out there. And if you feel like throwing up at any time, just throw up in the boat or down the back of Red’s neck. Don’t lean over the side or you might get thrown out. You don’t mind if she pukes her dinner up all over your lovely white boat, do you, Red?”

      “I’ve brought a bucket.”

      “He’s brought a bucket! How bloody considerate. I told you he was a gentleman. Now Rosie, sit on the motor housing directly behind Red. The windshield will give you some protection from the spray, and you won’t get thrown about so much.”

      Rosie did as she was told. Already she was regretting her bravado. The wind was singing through the rigging of the boats on their moorings, sharp and discordant like a school orchestra tuning up. If the wind was like this in the sheltered harbor, what would it be like “out there”? A sudden shudder made her reach for the gunwale. All the talk about puking had already made her feel queasy. She remembered once helping crew a friend’s yacht from Auckland to the Bay of Islands and being violently seasick for all but the first hour of the journey. She remembered how she’d dropped to her knees and begged God to let her die. She wondered if it was too late to take Col up on his offer.

      “Here’s Jean.”

      Rosie looked up at the torch’s beam flickering down the road toward them. Oh well, she’d played her cards and couldn’t back out now. She shouldn’t have opened her big mouth, but she hated it when any man assumed weakness simply because she was a woman. She was beginning to hate this chauvinistic bastard when she remembered that hate also was something she was trying to get away from. She put on the heavy oilskin coat. It smelled of dead fish, and the sleeves were too long. She covered her head with the oilskin hat, pulling it down hard so that the wind couldn’t get beneath it, and tied the cord under her chin. Rosie was glad it was dark and nobody could see her. She thought she must look like one of the Three Stooges.

      “Good luck!”

      “Thanks.”

      Col threw the painter down to Red. “Look after her, you bastard, or you’ll have me to reckon with.”

      “See you,” said Red noncommittally and turned the bow into the channel. It might have been Rosie’s imagination, but the wind seemed to freshen immediately.

      Col hadn’t been wrong. Red groaned as Rosie reached for the bucket as soon as they cleared the lee of Selwyn Island. She needn’t have bothered. The combination of wind and tossing sea made the bucket an impossible target. He began to have second thoughts himself. He’d expected the going to be rough, but nowhere near as rough as it was. The sea would test the fillings in their teeth until they’d rounded Miners Head, and still be uncomfortable until they’d cleared Aiguilles Island. At least they weren’t in any danger. His boat was more than a match for the seas, and his Cummins diesel was boringly reliable. He thought he ought to say something to reassure his passenger, then thought better of it. That would defeat the object of the exercise. Get her sick and get her frightened. Then leave her on her own. It sounded good in theory, but putting their plan into practice was something else. What he was doing just wasn’t right. It went against everything he’d learned in Burma. It was one thing to be unhelpful, something else to be deliberately cruel. Yet what he was doing was cruel and indefensible. He heard Rosie retch violently once more and gritted his teeth. It was wrong but it was necessary. Wrong but necessary! Acknowledging the necessity didn’t make him feel any better. He sensed Archie up under the bow deck, gazing back at him reproachfully, and felt doubly guilty. Guilty and disgusted with himself. At least he should have left Archie at home.

      Once they’d rounded Aiguilles Island, Red began to feel more at ease. He stayed close in to the shore, out of the wind where the black surface of the water was barely ruffled, so that his passenger could recover. A quarter moon sat low on the horizon, touching the shore with a wan and watery light. Rosie had stopped throwing up, possibly, Red surmised, because there was nothing left to throw up. His boat was a mess, but he accepted that he only had himself to blame. He smiled grimly. That was another of Col’s predictions that had proved accurate. She’d thrown up her dinner, lunch, breakfast and the previous night’s dinner as well. But she hadn’t moaned or groaned or uttered a word of complaint. He respected her for that. He felt he should break the silence.

      “You okay?”

      “Why wouldn’t I be?”

      “We’re just coming into Wreck Bay.”

      “What? So soon?”

      Red couldn’t help himself. He smiled. In the darkness with his back to her it was okay to smile. She’d never know.

      “And wipe that smile off your face.”

      Red stiffened.

      “Don’t think you’re clever, mister. That was nothing. Until you’ve puked out on Pernod you don’t know what puking’s about.”

      Red’s face flushed with embarrassment. There was something about her that reminded him of Yvonne. His mind drifted back to the Alexandra Hospital in Singapore when the Japanese came. He recalled the nurses standing up to the Japanese soldiers, defying them by shielding their patients, and having their faces slapped for their audacity. They never voluntarily took a backward step. He could sense that Rosie was from the same mold, somebody who wouldn’t take a backward step either. It hadn’t done the nurses any good. Ultimately, it wouldn’t do her any good.

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