The Takamaka Tree

Dedication

To my husband, Charles, who took me to the Seychelles.

Chapter One

Her mouth was full of sand. Her first conscious thought was the unpleasant sensation of fine grit caking her tongue and teeth.

She became aware that she was wet, and that warm water was lapping around her, washing over her legs rhythmically and gently. It was soothing and held no menace. She wished she could reach the water to rinse the sand out of her mouth, but the effort seemed too much.

The sun was rising in the sky and its warmth lulled her into sleep, an uneasy sleep in which she longed for unknown things to happen. There was a constricting band across her diaphragm which prevented movement, and each time she stirred a stabbing pain froze her into stillness.

She did not know how long she lay there, sun and sea warming and wetting her. A tiny crab scuttled away beneath her hand. A pair of sooty terns pattered curiously around her still figure, weaving a trail of arrowed footprints. Overhead the lush foliage of the leaning palms swept the sands with long green fingers. The scent of wild vanilla mingled with a confusion of oleander, hibiscus, frangipani.

Someone was turning her onto her side and she moaned because it hurt. She felt faintly annoyed, because the person ought to know that it hurt her to move. Her feeble resistance went unnoticed. She resented this interference. She only wanted to be allowed to sleep. The breeze murmuring through the leaves was her lullaby.

Her parched lips were being parted and a damp piece of fabric was probing gently, wiping out the grains of sand which clung to the inside of her mouth. She moved her tongue.

“In a minute,” said a voice, understanding. “Let’s get the sand out first, then you can have a drink.”

She trusted the voice. She lay still, letting the exploration go on, and with returning consciousness came other points of discomfort. Her eyelids and nostrils were encrusted with sand and she wanted to tell the damp fabric that it had more work to do.

She was becoming aware of an ache in her shoulders, up the back of her neck and spreading into her head. Her head felt as if it was swollen, as if the pressure would make her brain spill out of her ears.

She moaned again, wanting the promised water, but waiting with a new patience that came from the simple relief of knowing that someone was there.

Something light and damp was put over her shoulders and head, shutting off the now burning sun. A small round disc lay against her cheek. A button, she thought, with absolute clarity.

“We can’t have you getting sunstroke on top of this lot,” said the voice. “Won’t be long now, it’s nearly all gone.”

An arm was behind her head, lifting her only slightly, but the pain seared across her chest. She cried out, but at the same instant water dribbled into her mouth and she swallowed it greedily, choking on the uneven flow, the drink momentarily washing away the agony of the forward lift.

“Steady now, slowly does it.”

But she did not hear. The water dribbled down her chin and she lost consciousness again.

Much later, she emerged from the darkness and this time she opened her eyes. They opened freely, and for a while she lay staring at the patch of light from the window. It was still daylight but she had a feeling that evening was coming and the heat was sliding away.

She was lying on a narrow bed in a corner of a strange room, covered with a rough cotton sheet. The sand had gone and she was dry, but her neck was stiff and the pounding pain continued in her head.

She moved tentatively and found to her surprise that a wide bandage had been wrapped around her diaphragm and secured with two safety pins. Curiously, the support it gave was not unpleasant. Her middle area felt sore, and she automatically began to breathe with a shallow intake to ease the discomfort.

She grew more aware of the room. It was built of wood and furnished very simply with a chest of drawers, a table, some wooden chairs, a row of books on a crude shelf, and by the window someone had stuck a handful of wild flowers in a pot. A little green lizard ran across the ceiling. Where was she? Suppose she was alone? What had happened to her?

Dimly she thought she must have been in some accident, or had been ill, for she was very weak. She fought through the wool that clouded her mind, but nothing came. She could remember nothing, nothing at all. But the thought of water tormented her. Suddenly she was terribly frightened, and weak tears began to trickle down her cheeks.

Somewhere a door opened and a man came into the room. Vaguely she saw him through her mist of tears. He was a lean giant towering over the bed, dark-skinned, dark-haired, dark eyes beneath unruly brows. He dragged a chair over beside the bed and set a tin mug down on it. Gently he put an arm under her head and lifted her.

“Open your mouth,” he said with some authority. He put two pills on her tongue. “Now swallow these pills.”

She would have swallowed anything for the sake of the water. It was cool, fresh and sparkling, and she drank and drank. He let her drink it all to the last drop. She had never felt so thirsty.

“More,” she said.

“Good,” he said. “You’re English. That’s going to make life a lot easier. Still thirsty, are you? I’ll be back in a moment with something much nicer.”

English. She turned the word over in her mind. She was English. She could not quite recollect what that meant, but it was reassuring that she understood what the man said, despite his dark skin.

He returned and held the mug against her lips. The taste that filled her mouth was the pure tangy sweetness of fresh orange juice. This time she did not drink quickly but savoured the golden droplets running down her throat, one hand lightly on the man’s brown wrist in case he took it away.

“More,” she said again.

“I hope you know another word,” he said. “Conversation might become rather limited.”

He smiled and his teeth were very white against his brown skin. She could see now that he had a dark beard which almost swamped the lower half of his face.

“I thought you were a black man,” she said.

“Would it make any difference if I was?”

She tried to shake her head but the effort was too much. This could not be a hospital. It was much too primitive, and yet she had the feeling that she was being cared for in an efficient manner.

“Are you a doctor?” she asked.

“Not exactly. But I guess looking after a sick mermaid is nearly the same as looking after a sick bird.”

It was as he began to leave that she cried out, her voice full of distress.

“I don’t know who I am,” she wept.

“Do any of us?” he replied.

For several days she slept and rested, gradually gaining strength. A fat black woman came and washed her, tended to her needs most gently, all the while humming a little song under her breath. She was a big woman, with ample chins and bosom, her frizzy black hair covered in a gay handkerchief. Her dress was a faded cotton print and her calloused feet were without shoes.

“I am Bella. I take good care of you, my child.” She nodded, smiling, soaping her generously from a large hunk of crude soap. Her yellowed eyes were kind but curious.

“What has happened to me?”

Bella shrugged her shoulders. “The sea gave you back. The good Lord decided it was not your time.”

The same woman brought her food—fresh fruit, soup and, today, there was a little white fish, delicately cooked with herbs. Bella took the dishes away, glad that her patient was beginning to show some appetite.

Slowly the girl swung her legs over the side of the bed. Her head swam. She had no clothes so she dragged the sheet around her, tucking the end into the fold under her arm. She wanted to know where she was. Holding the trailing sheet, she walked to the door very stiffly, for she was still sore.

She opened it carefully, afraid of what she might see. At first she could not believe her eyes. She thought she must have died, for the view was so beautiful.

A sheet of ocean sparkled endlessly, pale green waves changing to indigo blue, diamonds riding the tips of the waves, the glorious sun catching the mirror of the water, shooting rainbow coloured rays back to the serene blue sky.

For as far as she could see, the white sand was fringed with whispering palms, flowers in profusion spilling bright petals onto the sand, the birds singing as they soared from branch to branch, their exotic wings brushing the air with flashes of colour.

She shuffled onto the wooden veranda and leaned against the timber roof support. The sun warmed her face and she closed her eyes.
This must be paradise…

“Hello, mermaid, so you’re up. Be careful, let me get you a chair.”

The dark man with a beard came up the steps onto the veranda. He was shirtless, his muscular chest as brown as his face. He was wearing ragged jeans and carrying some freshly caught fish wrapped in leaves.

“Supper,” he said. “I hope you won’t grow tired of fish. Bella can cook some very tasty Creole dishes.”

There were two wicker chairs on the veranda with faded flowered cushions. He helped her into one, making sure she was modestly covered with the draped sheet.

“I must find you some clothes,” he commented.

For a moment it was enough to sit and let the peace and quiet of the scene wash over her.

“Where am I?” she asked at last. “Can you tell me what has happened to me? I can’t remember anything.”

“I’ll tell you all that I know,” said the man, drawing up the other chair. “But it’s not much. I found you on the shore, at a place we call White Sands, washed up, half drowned, in a bad way. I brought you back to my bungalow. That was five days ago. Don’t you know who you are or where you came from?”

She trembled. “No. It’s a complete blank. And it frightens me. I try and try, but there’s nothing in my head. Just a sort of empty space.”

“Possibly you had a blow on your head, or some terrible shock. Whatever happened must have been a shock. Try and think carefully. You were in the water, swimming, floating—can you remember any of that?”

“No.”

“You obviously came from a ship because of the life jacket.”

“Life jacket?”

“You were half in a life jacket, but it hadn’t been tied on properly. It was as if someone had pushed you into it at the last moment.”

“It’s no good.”

She began to look distressed, so he changed tack. She looked anything between twenty and twenty-five, sometimes even younger when asleep. Her hands were delicate and well kept, not working hands.

“What’s your name?” he asked suddenly.

For a moment he thought that some automatic response was coming. Her mouth opened, but then she shook her head.

“Think now—Jane, Elizabeth, Mary, Frances?”

“I wouldn’t know it if you said it,” she said forlornly. “They don’t mean anything to me.”

He sighed. “Don’t worry. We’ll try again another day. I’m sure it won’t last. Your memory will return as you grow stronger. You’ve just got some kind of temporary amnesia.”

“My head does ache.”

“There’s a small bruise at the base of your neck, as if you were hit by something. Perhaps that has caused the amnesia. You’re lucky to be alive, young woman.”

“And here hurts too,” she touched her sore middle region.

“A couple of cracked ribs. But don’t worry about them. Ribs knit together without any medical help. A bandage gives enough support. They don’t put strapping on for cracked ribs these days, I believe. They’ll heal in time.”

She looked relieved. “I thought I’d done something really serious. Cracked ribs… I guess I can stand the pain if they’ll get better on their own.”

“You’re doing fine,” he said reassuringly. “In the meantime, don’t worry. We’re looking after you.”

She was very pale, her brown eyes without expression now, her hands nervously plucking at the folds of the sheet. She was dependent on this strange man for everything. And the black woman, Bella. She was too weak to do anything for herself.

His face was kind, what she could see of it, but remote. There was so much dark hair and dark beard that only patches of cheek and streaks of forehead showed as skin. His eyes were deep-set and penetrating, half closed against the sun.