There came the day when we took our sea trip. I could safely leave Felicity in the care of the hotel staff, so I set off without any fears about her and greatly looked forward to what we might discover.
It was not a large boat, but there were three men to manage it. I had the map with me. We made our way through the islands and for the first time I had a better view of that one which was a little apart.
"That's Lion Island," explained Milton. "You'll see why in a moment There is a little bay and the cliff rises high above. From some way out it looks just like a reclining lion."
There is a boat there. Is that a house?"
"Yes. The island is owned by a rich mining family from Australia. A sort of holiday island. They are not there very often, I gather. They keep themselves to themselves. There! You can see the reclining lion now."
We watched the reclining lion from afar and did not go any nearer to the island.
Soon we had left the group behind us.
"You need a fairly sturdy boat to come out here," said Milton. "A squall can blow up in no time. A flimsy boat could soon be overturned. Perhaps that was what happened to your brother."
I was silent. It was difficult to believe that now. The sea was so calm; there was scarcely a movement. I saw flying fishes skim the water and then rest lightly upon it. In the distance I caught a glimpse of dolphins at play. It was a beautifully peaceful scene.
Milton was holding the map in his hand.
"Now, according to my reckoning, this is where the island should be. You can see for miles. There's no sign of any land."
"Nothing," I said. "Nothing but the deep blue sea."
"We'll tour round a little if you like ... but there is nothing... nothing at all. There has been an error somewhere."
I shook my head. "I think I shall have to come to the conclusion that there is no island. I can't understand it. That's an absolute copy of the map we found."
"I suppose your brother had the one you found?"
"Yes. He took it with him."
"Well, there it is. There is nothing here ... We'll have to give up the search, I'm afraid. So... back to Cariba."
I looked at that vast expanse of water and I thought of the young man shipwrecked, dazed, drifting on a quiet sea. How long he had drifted, he did not know. Had he become delirious? Had he dreamed of an island where everything was perfect? Perhaps he had died for a few brief moments and gone to paradise and then had come back to life to dream of an island that was lost to him.
The sea was so beautiful, so calm on this day. How different it must have been at the time of his shipwreck. The deep blue sea changed in certain places where it appeared to be lightish green. Looking back I saw patches of that colour on the surface of the water.
I was about to call Milton's attention to this when he said: k4 We were lucky the weather was so good to us. Look. You can see Lion Island in the distance."
So I looked and forgot about the colours of the sea.
I felt vaguely depressed because I had to be convinced now that there was no island. It was a dream which had been conjured up in the mind of a shipwrecked man.
The days were passing—lazy days full of bright colours and the sound of continual chatter and spurts of laughter coming from the harbour where people ran about among the bullock carts. What excuse was there to stay? I could discover nothing of any significance about Philip. It had been proved that the island did not exist—at least not where it was supposed to be according to the map.
There was Felicity, of course.
I said to myself: "We cannot leave here until she is well."
And I wanted to stay—of course, I wanted to stay. I wanted to see Milton Harrington every day. I wanted to bask in his admiration, in his passionate absorption with me. It was vanity of course, but I could not help it.
I liked to watch him from my balcony window when he came riding up to the hotel. I was proud of the respect he inspired. People stood aside for him. In this island he was all powerful—the King among them all, the man from whom their comforts flowed, for the prosperity of the island came from the plantation, and he was the plantation; he was the island.
Then he would catch sight of me on the balcony and pause and smile and I would see the glint of his blue eyes in his bronzed face. I should scarcely have been human if I had not been gratified by the attentions of such a man.
To what was it leading? I was not sure. And the very uncertainty added to the fascination. But I should have to go home. I should leave
this exotic life behind me. It would be something to remember all my life, but a life which did not include him would seem very dreary to me.
So ... I did not want to think about the future. I just wanted to revel in the present.
Felicity was a little better. On the previous day she had sat with me in the courtyard in the late afternoon when the sun had lost some of its fierceness. She shrank a little if any stranger spoke to her; but at least she had left her room for a while.
She was still getting the occasional nightmare. I slept lightly. I think I was listening for the tap on the wall even when I slept. It came now and then and I would leap out of bed and go to her. The horror in her eyes when she came out of those dreams haunted me, and I knew that it was going to take a long time for her to recover.
But it was comforting to know that she was a little better.
She would talk to the chambermaid who looked after our rooms and brought up our hot water and food for Felicity. I often had my lunch with her. She slept late in the mornings so I breakfasted downstairs and if I was going out, which I often did in the company of Milton, I would ask Maria to keep an eye on her, and if she should ask for me tell her I should not be away long.
Maria was talkative and eager to help. She was perhaps not the best of workers but she had a pleasing personality. She was young and slender with long black hair and laughing dark eyes and a light brown skin; her bead necklaces and bracelets jangled as she walked.
She would roll her eyes round as she talked and life seemed a great joke to her. Even when she was recounting some disaster she would laugh. She liked to keep us up to date with what was happening in the island. We learned that a certain Sam had hurt himself badly when he fell on the stubs of cut cane. "Cut about he was," she told us with a high-pitched giggle. "Hands and face bleeding. He'll be marked for the rest of his days." Then there was old Mrs. Joppa who was knocked down by a bullock cart which provided the same kind of mirth.
This laugh followed every item of news—joyous or tragic. I presumed it was a habit and of no significance.
Maria had a lover. One day she was going to join him in Brisbane where he was working on a property. Sabrino was going to have a property of his own one day ... just a little one for a start. Then Maria would join him. They were both saving their money to make that dream a possibility.
I listened attentively. Sabrino, it seemed, was the most handsome man in the world. He had been born in Cariba, but Cariba was no place for Sabrino; Maria lived for the day when she would join him.
The only time she was serious was when she talked of Sabrino.
She used to linger in my room. She was very interested in my clothes. Once I found her rummaging in my cupboard. I expressed surprise but could not really be angry with her, for her curiosity was so natural and she was so eager to please.
One morning I was sitting on the balcony when a very striking-looking woman came into the hotel. She was tall and her dark hair was piled high on her head; she walked with the exquisite grace such as I had noticed among the women of the island. But she was very different from the others. I felt she was of some importance and I had formed that opinion merely by seeing her walk through the crowd. She wore a white clinging gown and there was a gold chain about her neck.