‘Why was Colonel Holland so determined to make a raid on the house?’ I asked.
I thought at first he hadn’t heard, or else he wasn’t going to answer. But after a while his brain seemed to catch up with the question, and he said, ‘How the hell do I know what was in his mind? From the time I joined him, he was always the same as regards Red Holland — very reticent. An Australian cousin, you see, a distant one, and that young brother of his, Carlos — the one that went down with the Holland Trader — leaving him everything. I am told the two were so alike the islanders thought it was Carlos come back from the dead, and that didn’t help either. And then, after the 1929 crash, when trade just about came to a standstill, the Old Man had to come across from PNG and bail him out. Sold practically everything he had to keep the Line going and virtually took over the running of it, living up there with Red Holland and building a small extension, just an office and a bedroom, out on the west side.’
I asked if he’d still been living there when the war started, and he said, No, the Old Man had been at Kuamegu then. It was early 1940 before he was back at Madehas, helping to organise the coast watchers in case the Japanese came into the war. ‘But if you ask me, he had another reason, too. He wanted to keep an eye on Red Holland and the schooners. Didn’t trust him. Don’t believe he ever trusted the man from the moment he first set eyes on him.’
He went rambling on about the war then, and it took me some time to get him back to the night they’d landed in the cove below the house after ambushing the guard boat. I wanted to know more about the letter that had so upset Colonel Holland, but he said the Old Man hadn’t commented on it, either then or later. No, he didn’t know who it was from, only that it was written to Red Holland and addressed to him. He had seen the envelope lying on the floor beside the books. It was addressed care of the Holland Line at a P.O. Box number in Kieta. He’d been hoping to find Japanese code books in that safe, operational plans, secret documents of some sort. He had thought that was what the raid was all about until he had seen the Colonel sitting back on his heels there with that letter in his hand. ‘All the blood seemed to have gone from his face and he was shaking like a man in a fever. Anger, hatred — I don’t know what it was …’ He hesitated, shaking his head slowly. ‘I never seen a man’s eyes like that, so horror-struck, so appalled — and tears … if he’d seen someone he loved blasted to hell by a land mine, it couldn’t have affected him more deeply.’
‘What happened to the letter?’
‘I never saw it again. Never. Only the books. He showed me those, after the war. Long after. But it was the letter,’ he muttered, shaking his head. ‘It must have been the letter.’ And he went on, ‘I tell you, man’ — his voice rambling- ‘I tell you, from that moment he became obsessed with the urge to destroy Red Holland. An’ it wasn’t because he was a collaborator. It was personal. Did I tell you we caught up with him eventually near Queen Carola?’
‘Yes.’
‘He had a house there. A native house. All wood and a palm-thatched roof. Went up like a hayrick. He was inside. The Old Man knew that. Told him so myself. There was Red Holland and one of his skippers, some women, too, but he still gave the order. Petrol-soaked arrows, that’s what we used. Fired the first one himself, and when the whole place was a roaring furnace with screaming figures running out of it and the sound of a single shot coming from inside, from the centre of the flames, he suddenly turned away, tears streaming down his cheeks.’
The memory of that night raid on the Queen Carola anchorage seemed as vivid and disturbing to Mac as the night it had happened. I couldn’t get anything more out of him, except that maybe we’d go up to the house together, later. Now, as we walked carefully up the mud-slimed, slippery track, I asked him about the books, wondering why Colonel Holland had brought them out of the house. It was a casual question, made for no particular reason except that I was puzzled by his behaviour and felt they must have some bearing on what had happened afterwards. ‘Diaries,’ Mac said. ‘That’s what I thought they’d be. Old logs, journals of voyages, something like that. They were a special sort of book, you see, with brass hinges and metal clasps. But all they contained was stamps. Nothing else — no writing, nothing. Just stamps.’
I stopped abruptly, standing there bareheaded, oblivious of the drizzling rain, staring at him. ‘Did they have green leather covers? Dark green, rather worn?’
‘Aye, green.’ He nodded, frowning.
‘And one of them with die proofs at the end — parts of the stamp printed in black?’
Again he nodded, his eyes alert now and questioning. ‘That’s what the Old Man showed me. Sent his launch over for me when I’d just got in from Choiseul and opened up the safe just to show me that. Said it could have been something to do with the Holland Line and had I ever seen a stamp like it.’
‘And had you?’
‘No, never.’ He shook his head, peering up at me under his umbrella. ‘But you have, is that it?’
‘No, only the albums.’ And I told him about the collection Perenna had asked me to sell for her.
A man appeared suddenly out of nowhere, a blanket round his shoulders and a red flower stuck in his hair. He accompanied us up to the house, a disconcerting shadow, smiling all the time, his rather protuberant eyes watchful and curious. ‘Houseboy,’ Mac said, and went on to tell me the safe was now under the stairs, the first four treads of which folded back. ‘It was the Old Man’s idea. Did you ever see one hidden like that before?’ It had been put there in 1949 after the house had been rebuilt, and he didn’t think Hans would know about it. ‘He was too young. In fact, I think there’s only two of us has any idea it’s there. And I’m the only one alive now that can open it.’
‘After Colonel Holland’s death, what happened to those stamp albums? Did they remain in the safe?’
‘Yes, I think so, along with the deeds of Madehas, ship registration papers, medals, all the things he valued.’
‘And Hans Holland didn’t know about it?’
‘No. Nor the combination. It’s a combination lock, you see.’
‘So it was you who gave Timothy Holland the albums?’
‘No, not me. He must have opened the safe himself.’
‘Who told him about it? Colonel Holland?’
He shook his head, moving on up the track. ‘Mr Tim wasn’t there when the Old Man took off. He was still at school in Australia. None of the family were there. The Old Man’s son, Captain Philip, he came across from Kuamegu, but that was after he’d gone. He must have known about the safe, or I don’t reckon he’d have been able to settle the Old Man’s affairs. Aye-’ He nodded his head under the umbrella. ‘He must have known about it, and also the combination, because the deeds of Kuamegu were in that safe, and he would have needed them when he sold up and went to England. He died there, what was it …?’ He screwed up his face in an effort to remember. ‘Almost three years ago, it must be. It was only a few months before Tim was sent here to look into the activities of the new Co-operative everybody was talking about. My guess is his father had written him about the safe before he died; he may even have told him what to look for Captain Philip thought a lot more of Tim, you see, than he did of Jonathan.’
‘And what about the letter that so upset Colonel Holland? Did Tim take that, too, or is it still there?’
‘We’ll see.’
‘Is that why you suggested we put into the cove here?’
‘There was a storm coming up.’
‘But you wanted to go up to the house and have a look at that safe again.’
He didn’t answer. We reached a little wooden summer house half hidden under a tangle of vines. Our black shadow pointed to it. ‘Mi bring Coca-Cola, coffee, tea, anything yu want?’
Mac shook his head. We were on grass now, recently mown, the house looming over us, its veranda bearing the rot scars of damp and neglect. Beside the entrance steps was a green-painted drum overflowing with blackish water scummed with drowned insects. An unswept pile of them lay under the naked light bulb by the front door. The place looked like bachelors’ quarters run by servants, and when we were inside, there was no doubt about it, everything worn, dusty and uncared for, windows open to the rain, broken panes and curtains only half pulled back. No woman had been mistress of the house for a long time. ‘Doesn’t anybody live here now?’ I asked.